I was inspired to work on this write-up after a very kind someone asked me several times to go by car and have beverages at a cafe in town, as ‘I needed a change of environment’. Soon after a second happening surprised me: the dependency of another very kind person’s expectations way beyond what has become my natural way of living.
It is not about a journey but the effects of a journey.
Food. One can not do otherwise than loving Indian street food, in particular the dishes available at truck dhaba’s. The inventiveness of African mom’s is not to dismiss either. They cook up delicious meals with leavy vegetables and home-made palm oil. A delight for a cyclist on sandy roads through the few patches of virgin forest. I vividly remember my breakfast at restaurants lining the streets in Sana’a, though busy with clientele I would eat in quietness. Fresh fish perfectly fried, while goat heads would simmer next to where I sat. In the far away past I would wander the streets of Bangladesh and Pakistan in search of a restaurant mentioned in the Lonely Planet, sometimes it took me hours to find such place, not seldom wandering off forgetting to eat. Though my own prepared sugary tomato paste pasta in the desert was tasty and bread fried in olive oil whether at a soppy wet Patagonian patch, the hostile windy pampa or a sweltering Argentinian yerba mate grove was always good enough. Food mixed up with sand in Mauritania, quick decaying beef in warm sunny Bolivia and constipation enhancing dishes in Paraguay, it all had its charm.
A very short update about the Iveco truck which Geo and I fetched from Spain. In times like these, we´d waited for long to get this done. Mobile diary notes with Instagram snapshots on my creative weblog. 5 days of driving an overloaded truck through 5 countries, how´s that on the pshyche of one who passionately dislikes cars?
Is South America on your wish-list of countries to travel through, perhaps by bicycle, then I hope I can inspire you. When you like to see pretty, soothing or curious photo’s, here they are.
A bit of a boast…
My sister was a model for some time, on a pearl white beach where the palm trees were outfitted with electricity outlets. She modelled in the sultry Caribbean, she withstood the wind and she splashed into the lazuli colored water as if she were a pro. She never was one, but more than I ever could be.
Cycling Cindy