ODYSSEY TO ELSINORE

Excerpt from ODYSSEY TO ELSINORE Chapter 5 - Listen to Your Inner Voice “A quarter of the persons travelling through the Sahara Desert lose their life. The route from Djanet to Ghat is notorious for taking human lives. The atmosphere alone causes severe dehydration. I saw human skeletons littering the shifting sands. This is an environment where road signs do not matter. The unpredictable nature of the weather renders any landmark set up by humans obsolete. One needs a compass. The only consolation seemed to be the aesthetic beauty and clarity of the skies lit up by stars at night. There has been grave instability in Mali in recent years following the war in Libya that ousted the leader Muammer Gaddafi. Hostage-taking in Amenas, south-eastern Algeria, has caught the attention of the world’s media. I am compelled to reflect on my personal experience of those relatively unknown and intriguing parts of the world. Northern Mali alone is larger than the whole of Spain and France combined. We joined a multinational African group heading towards Libya at Djanet after several days of traveling from Tamanrasset. A diminutive and fierce looking Tuareg guide with a dagger strapped to his left upper arm and concealed under his indigo-dyed cotton robes was paid to take us from Djanet to Ghat. He did not carry a compass. He wore a cheich, and I could see only his eyes throughout the trek. We arrived in Djanet sitting in the passenger seat of a Toyota Land Cruiser driven by a friendly French-speaking Berber man. The trip took a couple of days by road from Tamanrasset. Now we were about to begin a trek on foot across mountainous and desolate terrain where it was impossible for vehicles to venture. We met the Tuareg guide who was to lead us. Our lives were in his hands now. He asked us to ditch all heavy baggage except for water bottles. My feet suffered from blisters after weeks of traveling in footwear that could no longer cope. I had to walk barefoot at times. The weather was extremely hot during the day and often dipped below zero at night. My feet felt numb from the cold. One must adapt to survive in this environment. Caravans of enslaved Africans had endured this tortuous terrain for centuries. The group led by our guide walked for several days. I saw many burial mounds of fallen heroes on the route. There were also skeletons, torn garments, and many shoe parts littering the path. Drinking water was a scarce resource. I wondered whether we were going to make it to our destination. We rested at night and walked in the daytime. One afternoon, a Ghanaian member of our group from Kumasi collapsed. This person was much older than we were but well built. This environment was a leveller. Luckily, for this man, a member of the group from Niger had some traditional medicine. He made some minute lacerations to the back of the neck of the ailing Ghanaian and administered some potion. He then did what appeared to be sucking from a cow horn placed on the cuts. The man recovered. We all rested for the night and continued the next morning. Kofi’s ailment continued to bother him. His walking was severely impaired. There was no chance of the merciless guide waiting for anyone on this life-threatening trek. The earlier he got us to our destination, the better for the survival of the whole group in the deadly environment. It was about survival of the fittest. My mate continued to lag behind. Two older people also could not keep up due to severe dehydration and exhaustion. I felt it was my responsibility to stay by Kofi, despite the fact that he had been blaming me for allowing him to come on the trip. This area was mountainous, so there were huge boulders all over the place. We lagged behind in an area that was full of burial mounds and skeletons of the fallen. Fear gripped us. We thought this was going to be the end of our lives. I urged the others to keep calm. I recited the passage of Psalms 23 from my small pocket Bible. Verse 4 mirrored the moment: ‘Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.’ I felt energised and urged them to keep up. I overcame fear. I knew that all would be well. In those parts, one was encouraged to keep moving until it was time to rest for the day; once you stop, it becomes difficult to continue without an extended period of rest like sleep. We kept going slowly and hopefully. I suggested to the group to turn by a massive boulder. To our surprise and elation, we came to an open space where we found a group of Western people with geophysical survey instruments and a couple of tents. This was an area where there were 6,000-year-old petroglyphs – ancient rock art in the world’s largest open-air museum. I approached a man to ask for directions. He spoke English. His name was Norbert, and he was from Kempten in Bavaria, Germany. He was very friendly. He even took a photo with us. It was interesting that during my first trip fifteen months earlier, I had met Uli the German tourist at Koupela, in the northern part of Togo. He had travelled by road from Europe via Algeria and Niger, and along the way, he was robbed of his possessions. He had warned Tom and me of the dangers ahead. He was also from Kempten. What a coincidence! I began to believe in synchronicity after this death-defying experience deep in the Sahara Desert. Carl Gustav Jung defined synchronicity as ‘an acausal connecting principle’. I also felt that my inner compass led me. Norbert pointed us in the direction where we eventually caught up with the rest of the group. One more dangerous episode on that leg of the journey came at the end.”