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Welcome to Djibouti

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Welcome to Djibouti

Arrive, Survive, and Thrive in the Hottest Country on Earth

Rachel Pieh Jones

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for the expatriates who have called Djibouti home and for the Djiboutians who warmly welcome us

By Rachel Pieh Jones

www.djiboutijones.com

Copyright 2020

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Table of Contents

Introduction

All Will Be Well in Djibouti

Level 1 Arrive

Chapter 1: Hotels and Homes

Essay: But What’s Different about an Expat Family?

Chapter 2: Restaurants, Cafes, Bars, and Grocery Stores

Essay: Bread Baked in the Heat of Hell

Level 2 Survive

Chapter 3: Get Online, Find a Doctor, Dentist, Pharmacy, or Vet

Essay: Land of the Red River Hogs

Chapter 4: Care for the Body and Mind: salons, schools, sports

Essay: Death by Heartbreak

Level 3 Thrive

Chapter 5: Worship, Rest, and Play

Essay: A Mosque, a Books, and a Banister

Chapter 6: Touring and Exploring

Essay: White Gold

Level 4 More Tips

Transportation

The Bawadi Mall

Etiquette and Health

Essay: To Kiss or Not to Kiss

Money and Djibouti Resources and Miscellaneous

Running, Biking, Sports

Essay: Samia, Somalia, and Running for Last Place

Suggested Tourist Itineraries

Essay: Letter from Bankoulé

Final Suggestions

Maps

Bonus Content (2020): What to wear, what to read, and more

FAQ

Suggested Packing List for moving to Djibouti and for visiting

More essays and articles about Djibouti

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Welcome to Djibouti

Arrive, Survive, and Thrive in the Hottest Country on Earth

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Introduction

Welcome to Djibouti.

First thing to do: join the Expats of Djibouti Facebook group. You can ask all the questions I fail to answer here and connect with people. https://www.facebook.com/groups/362100957281135/?multi_permalinks=138857029796 7524%2C1388220934669127%2C1388107278013826%2C1387896901368197%2C1387 136261444261¬if_id=1568093197915413¬if_t=group_activity&ref=notif

Did you ever feel so hot and sweaty in your life?

If you haven’t come up with your own yet, here are two useful nicknames for Djibouti:

The Hellhole of Creation The Devil’s Lair

But don’t let the heat be the only thing you notice about Djibouti. This is a nation of stark beauty, underwater brilliance, and welcoming people.

I am not Djiboutian. I just live here. I’ve lived here since 2004. I have not explored every nook and cranny, but I’ve found places I love and appreciate. I can’t guarantee that locations will remain open – my favorite café only lasted a year. I’m not promising perfection in services or experiences, I’m simply sharing from what my family has discovered.

Everything in here must be taken with a grain of salt. This is based on my personal experiences and my concerted effort to see the best in what is, to me as a foreigner, a challenging place to live. And, one of the best decisions I ever made about living in Djibouti, one that most definitely taints the lenses through which I see this nation, was making the choice to not complain.

It’s hot. It can be smelly. Customer service isn’t really a ‘thing.’ I’m lonely. I want to eat peanut butter by the spoonful and can’t always find it in stores. Yada-yada-yada. Stop complaining. Because you know what? You can find peanut butter in stores. It just might not be your favorite brand. But you know what else? I’ve come to prefer the brands I find here. Go figure. Adapt. Don’t try to recreate the country or culture you left. Buy local. You’ll be just fine.

Sure, there is a garbage dump taller than your house. Look at that, and you’ll get discouraged. But look beyond it, at the mountains and the wide expanse of desert and you’ll find beauty, adventure, and hopefully even community.

In this book I address the questions I most commonly receive via email from tourists or from people moving to Djibouti. They’ve found my blog, they struggle to find other useful sources of information, and they contact me. This means most of the places I mention, and the perspective I offer, are geared toward expatriates and foreigners.

Examples of emails I get: I just moved here, and googled “Djibouti” and your blog came up, along with little else. Where can I get a good cup of coffee?

I will be moving to Djibouti in a month, with a five-year old who only speaks English. What are my education options?

Help! I’m about to board a plane back to Canada with three little kids and I can’t get internet in my hotel room. Before we leave Djibouti, where I can I go to download books and games for them?

I’m coming for a week and can’t afford the Kempinski Hotel. Are there any other hotels? How can I get in touch?

I hope that this book helps, and I hope you enjoy reading it. But even more, I hope your visit or stay in Djibouti is deeply satisfying and that as you are challenged by what you see and experience, you will leave (or stay) as a better, more open, more creative, and stronger person. I think that is what is happening to me and for that, I will be forever grateful.

All Will Be Well in Djibouti (originally published in Outpost, cover story)

I perch on the ledge of a Djiboutian fisherman’s boat. An orange life preserver provides a little padding, but my back still aches from the jarring ride. That morning, I ran twenty- nine kilometers along the beach and into the desert, training for a marathon across the border, in Somaliland. I had finished with barely enough time to jump into the boat before it launched from shore and my muscles are tight and cramping. I didn’t have time to stretch or grab anything to eat. But I do not want to miss this.

Seawater swirls around my feet and I wrap a towel over my camera to protect it from waves and mist. My husband sits across from me and our youngest daughter, 12-year old Lucy, stretches out on the floor of the simple wooden boat, right where she dropped after we hauled in her over the side. Exhausted. Exhilarated. Her snorkel mask and flippers lay beside her, her hair is a tangled brown mass on top of her head and dangling down like seaweed over her face. She spent the last hour swimming with whale sharks, our yearly Christmas tradition in Djibouti.

Her older brother and sister are still in the water. 17-year old twins, and seniors in high school. This is their last guaranteed Christmas vacation in Djibouti, their last chance to swim with these sharks while they can still call Djibouti ‘home.’ I don’t want to think about that, not here on the boat. I’ve thought enough about it already, cried enough about it already. Tears here will just look like ocean water on my cheeks but crying in the middle of the Gulf of Tadjourah, in front of fishermen wearing only damp, white boxer shorts, feels undignified and melodramatic.

Henry and Maggie don’t want to get out of the water. Next Christmas, who knows where they will be? Whale sharks will migrate through Djibouti’s waters in this season but the twins might be shoveling snow in Minnesota, their birthplace but a state in which they have only spent three of their seventeen years. Maybe they will be hanging out on a college campus. Navigating through a North American Christmas season of consumerism and culture shock, far removed from their Christmases spent in a Muslim, desert, African nation. The only certainty is that they won’t be snorkeling with the largest shark in the ocean.

*

We moved to Djibouti by accident in 2004, but stayed on purpose. My family’s life in the Horn of Africa began next door, in Somaliland, in 2003. Somaliland is the northwestern part of Somalia and declared independence in 1991. While the south descended into ongoing conflict and anarchy, the north built a government, economy, and healthcare and educational sectors. The region seemed peaceful enough to bring our family there and we were warmly welcomed.

Until we weren’t. Unanticipated violence targeting Westerners forced an emergency evacuation and we fled, with a backpack and a suitcase. Most of our clothing, toys, kitchen supplies, and all our furniture remained in Somaliland, including bananas on the counter, clothes on the line, and rusting cookie sheets in the sink.

There was a harried rush to the airport, a flight to Nairobi, Kenya, and a discussion with our boss and a Somali coworker. My husband had been a professor at Amoud University, the only functioning university in all of Somalia at the time. Now, we had three options: stay in Kenya, return to Minnesota, or move to Djibouti and continue working as a professor, again of English and again in the only university in the country. Kenya had no clear job for us, Minnesota after less than a year abroad felt like quitting. Djibouti bordered Somaliland, had a work option, and our Somali friends urged us to stay in Africa. We chose Djibouti.

Djibouti hasn’t historically been held in high regard by visitors.

“A sewer and a garbage dump made a baby in hell,” an expatriate who lived in Djibouti said. “They named it Djibouti.”

In the 1930s, Evelyn Waugh said Djibouti was intolerably desolate, a “country of dust and boulders, utterly devoid of any sign of life.”

As long ago as 1331, Ibn Battuta wrote that Djibouti “is a large city with a great bazaar, but it is the dirtiest, most disagreeable and most stinking town in the world.”

I rejected these pronouncements. Not only judgmental, they demanded that comfort, beauty, even life itself, look a certain way.

Djibouti was once French Somaliland, a French colony, and gained independence in 1977. The capital city, Djibouti, Djibouti tops lists of the world’s funniest place names: Pis Pis River, Nicaragua. Butztown, Pennsylvania. Titless, Switerzerland. Assloss, Scotland. Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateapokaiwhenuakitanatahu, New Zealand.

No one knows what the word Djibouti means or where it comes from. Afars claim it has to do with rocks, the Afar language, and maybe the Afar word for cooking pot. Somalis claim it is from the folk tale of the Buty, or the cannibal woman with one over-sized ear and a taste for children, Dheg Dheer. Fewer than one million people call Djibouti home. For better or worse, by accident and providence, my family and I became some of those people.

*

Rue de Nelson Mandela, the road our house sat on in the Ambouli neighborhood, was a primary thoroughfare and it was dirt. Internet was dial-up. The largest grocery store was the size of an American truck stop gas station and never sold mozzarella or cheddar cheese, no chicken, no fresh green vegetables. The city had one movie theater, the

Odéon. Our temporary, first apartment, had backed up against the open-air theater and we fell asleep to the sounds of classic French films floating into our bedroom. The Odéon shut down a few years later.

A train rumbled several times a week to and from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Djibouti is a desert and imports nearly all its fruits and vegetables from Ethiopia. Ethiopia is landlocked and imports almost everything except its fruits and vegetables, through the port of Djibouti. The two countries share a symbiotic relationship that isn’t always cordial. The train was a lifeline. Then it, too, shut down.

My husband worked long hours at the university, leaving me home alone with the twins and my Somali language textbooks. Fun City, a playground half a kilometer from our house became my salvation. The teeter-totters had jagged metal edges, the merry-go- round screeched and never rotated fast enough to produce the desired dizzying effect. The slides were sticky with humidity and not cemented in, so they wobbled under the weight of my kids. Broken glass, at least one medical syringe, thorns, and rusty nails littered the dirt. We adored Fun City and were often the only patrons. The kids ran in the vast open space and I read a book, my sweaty fingers leaving damp prints on the pages, until the makhriib call to prayer sent us home for dinner of baguettes and peanut butter. Eventually, Fun City shut down.

Electricity, too, frequently shut down. We didn’t have a generator. I tripped over Legos in the dark or bathed the kids by candlelight while they screamed, terrified of the dark and terrified the candles would light our house on fire. In the hot season during hours-long power outages, if Tom was at work, I would sit on the steps outside and text him repeatedly.

“The power is out.”

“We are so hot.”

“Kids are screaming.”

“Power’s out.”

I knew he couldn’t respond but would finish class and find fifteen or twenty messages from a desperate, furious, and sweat-drenched wife. It was my way of telling him I was miserable. This, the heat and challenge of finding decent food, the loneliness and isolation, was harder than I had anticipated. Maybe it was too hard. Maybe thriving in Djibouti was our chimera.

Later, when the kids were in French school and forced to do homework by flashlight, their arms and chins dripping sweat onto the paper so the ink bled, I snapped photos and sent them to Tom.

It was my way of asking, “What the hell are we doing here?”

*

Oh, I knew what we were doing in Djibouti. We made a commitment to invest in education in places that asked for our help. We believed long-term investment, with local partnership, was necessary for effective development. Too much aid in Africa consists of foreigners swooping in for a food drop-off, an orphanage visit, and a photo op. Too little thought is given to how that food affects the local agricultural economy, how those visits deepen attachment disorders, how those photo ops present a white savior and a powerless African.

Our goal was to put ourselves under local leadership, to seek understanding of the local worldview and value system and within those, to provide quality education. Tom taught at the university. I taught English classes at a local women’s organization that campaigned against Female Genital Mutilation, provided food and medicine for HIV patients, and managed microfinance loans to women in poverty. We started small business and hired Djiboutians to run them, launched the region’s only all-girls running team Girls Run 2, initiated kids’ soccer clubs, donated time, supplies, and teachers to refugee camps.

Mostly, though, what we were doing in Djibouti was building a life: fulfilling work, meaningful relationships, a healthy family. I don’t know that we intended to stay so long. I don’t think we intended to leave any sooner. Annie Dillard wrote, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. What we do with this hour, and that one, is what we are doing…There is no shortage of good days. It is good lives that are hard to come by.”

Waugh and Battutu would not call a day spent in Djibouti a good day. Would I call a life spent in Djibouti, a good life?

*

I wrote about life and giving birth to my youngest in Djibouti for the New York Times and one woman commented that it was, “Irresponsible for women to give birth in Africa.” Awo was one of these fellow irresponsible women and she taught me a Somali saying, “Qabrigayga afka ayaa furan yahay.” The mouth of my grave is open.

Women said this during pregnancy and the forty days following childbirth They meant they could die, or the baby could die, at any time, and they’re right. The infant and maternal mortality rates in Djibouti are among the highest in the world. Awo explained the phrase was a request for prayers for protection and health.

Djiboutians had other ways of procuring protection during these vulnerable days. Some mothers painted thick black unibrows on their infants with charcoal, to make the baby unappealing to malevolent spirits. Others tucked putrid herbs into black mesh bracelets and tied them around their baby’s wrists and ankles, again to deter evil spirits. My favorite, and a custom I followed, was a mandatory rest period of forty days following childbirth, during which mother and infant remained indoors. This sounded like heaven. Forty days to rest, bond, and recover.

“If we need to go outside before the forty days are over,” Awo said, “we put a nail behind our ear. Or a knife. That way we can fight off the jinn who might attack.” Jinn are mischievous devils, or genies.

After the forty days, the new mother’s friends and family throw an afartanbax. They survived and can now move about outside the refugee of home. The word literally translates ‘forty go out’ and is comparable to a Western baby shower. Guests bring gifts, eat samboosas and cake, and dance.

Awo gave birth to a boy and named him God. Pronounced like “goad,” the name meant poisonous snake. Forty days later, she invited Henry, Maggie, and I to her afartanbax.

Halfway through the party, Awo picked up God and approached seven-year old Henry. He stared up at her, confused and scared at the prospect of holding a fragile newborn.

“Take the baby,” Awo said. “Its time for the parade.”

“You’re choosing Henry?” I asked. Awo nodded.

The highlight of an afartanbax is when the mother selects a child of the same gender as her baby from among the guests. The child must be someone she loves and respects, and in handing her baby to this child, the mother is saying, “I admire your character and hope my baby emulates you as he grows.”

Awo nodded again and I encouraged Henry to take God and hold him close to his chest.

“The guests are going to make a line behind you,” I told him. “Awo and the other moms will sing and clap and we’ll walk through the neighborhood.” I didn’t add, ‘don’t drop the baby.’

We meandered over stones and crooked cement steps, past goats and plastic bags snagged in thorn bushes. Henry carried God in and out of homes, his face a mix of trepidation and pride. The air smelled like jasmine and frankincense. Sweat gathered on my forehead and my tongue burned from overly sweetened tea. Awo held my hand.

*

Afar lore in Djibouti tells of a massive sea creature in the Gulf of Tadjourah. Jacques Cousteau visited in the 1980s, to see what he could uncover. Some say he saw gigantic manta rays. Some say he lowered a shark cage with a camel into the sea and when he pulled it up, the cage was crushed, the camel devoured. Supposedly Cousteau took a video of the underwater beast, but it was both too fuzzy and too frightening to share publicly. He didn’t think the world was ready to face what he found. Others say he encountered lumbering, gentle giants. Whale sharks.

The westernmost part of Gulf of Tadjourah is the Ghoubet al-Kharab, or the pit of demons. Less than a hundred meters offshore in the Ghoubet is Devil’s Island, a black mound of volcanic rock and home to the king of the jinn and his minions.

When I invite Djiboutian friends to the beach, they tell me they can’t swim, they are too frightened of what might be in the water, and they make me swear to remove all my jewelry.

“The jinn will drown you,” one friend said, “just to steal your earrings. No one comes out of the ocean still wearing all their jewelry.”

I don’t tell them that while swimming off the coast of Somaliland, years earlier and a few hundred kilometers down the same coast, Tom lost his wedding band.

What lurks beneath the waters of Djibouti? Mysterious, violent creatures? A kind of African Loch Ness monster? Demons, weighed down by jewelry?

Every year between late November and early February, the easy answer to that question is: whale sharks. Massive plankton blooms draw whale sharks into the gulf. They swim back and forth, their mouths open to filter the water. If the plankton are particularly concentrated, the whale sharks will stop and turn their bodies vertical, sucking down as much as they can. This is known as ram-feeding and finding a whale shark in the middle of this feast is breathtaking. They barely move and divers can simply float and stare.

Whale sharks in Djibouti are mostly adolescent males, scientists aren’t sure exactly why, and several of the sharks we’ve sees have been tagged for research. Though young, they still dwarf swimmers, between five and seven meters long. Full grown whale sharks can reach up to twelve meters. Toothless and serene, the most dangerous thing about them is their tail, which could overturn a boat or break a swimmer’s leg with a minor flick.

“Wasn’t Nebi Yunus, the prophet Jonah, swallowed by a whale shark?” Awo asks when I tell her what we do every Christmas.

Maybe.

* Djibouti is a small but powerful country. Due to its stability compared to Somalia, Yemen, and Eritrea, the country has flourished economically. Djibouti hosts military bases from France, the United States, Germany, Italy, Japan, and China, and has one of Africa’s busiest container ports, strategically located at the crux of critical shipping lanes. But at the same time, Djibouti is a regional misfit, a French-speaking island in a sea of English-speaking nations. This makes it difficult for Djiboutians to find much-needed employment as the country grows, and the unemployment rate hovers stubbornly near 60%.

Tom taught for nearly a decade at the university. He also earned his PhD in Education Development, from the University of Minnesota. He and Djiboutian education professionals began discussions to open an American, English-based, K-12 school. By 2014, the university English department no longer needed input from outside, and the country recognized the need for English language instruction to begin at younger ages.

In September, 2016, the doors of the International School of Djibouti opened. A dream. A start-up. A delight. A brick tied around our ankles?

Evelyn Waugh said, “No one voluntarily stays long in Djibouti."

Fifteen years and we are still here, voluntarily. Now that we run a growing PreK-12th grade school, I can’t foresee leaving. I sound vain, claiming indispensability. Waugh would assume we stay under compulsion. Compelled by what? Moving back to the United States has become our next impossible. Someday, we will tackle that obstacle, I imagine, perhaps pulled by the centripetal force of our children at university there. But for now, what I mean is, we are home.

*

This year on whale-sharking day, because of my long morning run and an arm injury, I’m not swimming but I rode along in the boat to watch. I’m glad I did. Djibouti’s whale sharking season has become more well-known and the water floods with swimmers and boats. There is no official regulation and today is the busiest time on the water I’ve ever seen.

Almost a dozen boats form a circle around several sharks and eight to ten swimmers jump from each boat. This means way too many people in the water at the same time. Few of the boat drivers shut off their motors and while the swimmers follow the sharks, they aren’t able to also look out for whipping propellers. The air is thick with the smell of gasoline. People shout at each other in French, English, Somali, Arabic, Dutch, German, looking for members of their own party, looking for fins peeking between the waves. I shout at our boat captain to turn off the motor and he does, sometimes. But the other boats are still out there, dangerously close to the people, to my people, who are swept up in the awe of the underwater experience and swept away from their groups by the waves and currents.

I barely register the whale sharks while scanning the water Tom, our three kids, and two of their friends. I want them to stay together and to stay away from the motors, but as they tire, they return to the boat to climb in and catch their breath before diving again. I keep directing our captain toward the group and shout again to turn off the motor.

Later that afternoon, a young French boy will get his arm caught in a propeller. When I hear the news, after my own kids are showered and watching a movie at home, I cry. The boy survived and didn’t lose his arm, but I can’t shake the trauma his mother must have felt at the sight of her child and his blood seeping into the ocean.

Eventually, the whale sharks dive deep, out of sight for snorkelers, and our group heads back to shore, to Arta Plage, where we have lunch waiting.

Halfway back to the beach, we spot a single, massive whale shark. The twins want one more dive. The captain cuts the motor and the two are into the water. The only sound here is the wind and the waves slapping against our boat.

Maggie swims alongside the whale shark. He moves slowly and she has no trouble keeping up. Her brother lags behind a bit so for maybe three minutes and maybe an eternity, Maggie has the fish to herself. She barely moves her arms and paddles with her flippers. They float, parallel to one another, in a large circle. She is a mermaid, she is in paradise. Here is a swimmer not in the water for the rush of adrenaline and not in the water for bragging rights on social media. This is a swimmer with a long, hard-earned love affair with the sea, a swimmer on her last dive. It seems the whale shark recognizes this about Maggie.

Is that possible?

* Have I given the impression that I dislike Djibouti? It is never easy to live as a foreigner, on the fringe, always slightly confused. In Paris to the Moon, Adam Gopnik writes,

“There is also the odd knowledge, at once comforting and scary, that whatever is going on outside, you are without a predisposed opinion on it, that you have had a kind of operation, removing your instant reflexive sides-taking instinct…And the slightly amused, removed feeling always breaks down as you realize that you really don’t want to be so lofty and Olympian — or rather, that being lofty and Olympian carries within it, by tradition and precedent, the habit of wishing you could be down there in the plain, taking sides. Even the gods, actually looking down from Olympus in amusement, kept hurtling down to get laid or slug somebody.”

I’m simply saying there is loss in choosing a life abroad. There is gain, of course, but the loss is more interesting. The gains are experienced in living, in the particularities of friends, work, celebrations, and daily habits. We don’t often pause living to examine or appreciate it. The moments of loss pique and we take note.

Fifteen years means this life in Djibouti has become my life; my past, my present, and, presumably, my future. This is where my youngest daughter was born on 9/11, though not that 9/11, where my son struggled to breathe and was revived by a snake-collecting French doctor, where my oldest daughter played street soccer, the only foreigner to join a national women’s athletic team. The call to prayer structures my day, my stomach growls when the bread man honks his bicycle horn to announce the daily delivery of fresh baguettes. Wild parakeets land in my neem trees and I love that a long conversation is expected at the grocery store register, that the man selling spinach on the street corner knows I will buy it every time I drive by.

My years of raising a family are irrevocably Djibouti-stained and for that, there is only grateful affection.

*

Do I contradict myself?

Very well, I contradict myself.

(I am large. I contain multitudes.)

Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass

*

Djibouti has a new movie theater, or at least, the promise of one. In December 2017, the Bawadi Mall opened, one year behind schedule. Only a few stores opened at first, but one by one, more are being added and there are billboards promising a movie theater.

Maybe before my twins graduate, they will be able to again watch a movie in Djibouti, like when they were toddlers and we lived next to the Odéon.

Djibouti has a new train running to Addis Ababa, which also opened a year behind schedule and with a partial opening. Cargo trains run on a regular basis. The few times the passenger train ran, it produced varied results. One passenger reported an uneventful trip of twelve hours from Addis Ababa to Djibouti, roughly on schedule. Another passenger reported a trip of nearly twenty-four hours that included striking several goats on the tracks, and negotiating the price for those animals with the shepherds.

Maybe before my twins graduate, they will be able to take a train ride to Ethiopia.

Fun City has not reopened. It is now a graveyard for dozens of construction trucks. I don’t think the twins would want to play there anymore, anyway.

What looked like downward mobility for Djibouti – the loss of the movie theater, train, Fun City – was actually pruning, preparation for something new and better. My twins moved from diapers to driver’s licenses while Djibouti shifted beneath our feet. What looks like loss for my family, like downward mobility as two of us return to the United States, is paralleling our host nation.

*

The whale shark is a sun-speckled shadow. Maggie stretches out on her side, flicking water into the air with her blue flippers. Henry glides through the sea to catch up, his strokes confident and smooth.

Julian Of Norwich said, “All will be well and all will be well, and every kind of thing shall be well.” Until now, I didn’t understand what she meant or why she repeated herself.

I suppose all parents feel awe when they contemplate their children, fresh astonishment at each developmental stage. I birthed American children and then I molded Djiboutian children and I can’t entirely grasp the implications of this. A long time ago, I made a choice to live in Africa. That choice will reverberate down generations in ways I didn’t anticipate and can’t predict. Would I go back and change it, if I could? On which moment does everything hang and what might pulling that thread precipitate? There is no way to

know and that is what makes up a life. One choice, upon the next, and the next. We are left to watch in awe and to wonder how it will all turn out.

Behind me, across the water, is Tadjourah city and Sable Blanc, the white sand beach where we first saw a blue-spotted octopus and gigantic clams. Mountains rise above Tadjourah and are only visible from this far away on clear days. Up in those mountains are a pair of shoes Henry forgot once while camping, and a set of little green army men. Further along the coast is Obock and Djibouti’s oldest lighthouse, where we celebrated my 39th birthday with plastic-wrapped processed cakes and Yemeni moukhbasa fish. In front of me is Arta Plage, where Lucy earned the bubbled worm-like scar on the back of her thigh, where Maggie caught starfish, and where Henry collected discarded bullet casings.

Right next to our boat, the whale shark turns to the left and is now alongside Henry. All is well. Maggie splashes water up into my face with her flippers. All will be well. The twins surface and on their faces is all the joy finite humans can plumb from the universe. All manner of things will be well.

Chapter 1: Hotels and Homes

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Hotels

Adjust your expectations. Customer service isn’t really a ‘thing’ yet. Rats are common. Cleanliness is relative. The price you are charged might imply luxury but actually purchases you air conditioning and a shower of non-temperature controlled, but pressurized (hopefully), water.

Here are some of your options:

The Kempinski (http://www.kempinski.com/en/djibouti/djibouti-palace/welcome/) Ilot Du Heron Phone: +253 21 325555, [email protected]

This is the Cadillac of Hotels in Djibouti and their prices reflect this. The hotel is beautiful. The first time my children saw it, they literally stopped in their tracks, their jaws dropped open, and they gasped. There is a fountain surrounded by green grass in front of the hotel and yes, my children have made grass angels there and yes, they have splashed in the fountain. They are easily impressed. Staff speak French, Somali, English, and probably more. There is a well-equipped gym and two pools, one with an in-pool bar and both set at the edge of the ocean with a stunning view of the ports and ships at sea.

For the tourist with money, this is the simplest location as the hotel can also book tours to beaches, whale sharking, and other adventures. The buffet breakfast is decent though over-priced, which is just something people must get used to in Djibouti.

You will also have to get used to seeing Americans here as many of the contractors hired by Camp Lemonier, the American military base, live in apartments at the Kempinski.

The Sheraton Plateau de Serpent Phone: +253 21 328000, [email protected]

The Sheraton is the second-tier hotel and, like the Kempinski buffet, decent but over- priced. The rooms are small, and smoking is still acceptable (same at the Kempinski). There is a nice swimming pool (where someone, I’m not saying who, lost her top a few years ago), also right on the ocean, and a trampoline for kids (unless the heat and sun has burned it out).

The Sheraton has a popular Friday lunch buffet, which I love for the delicious chocolate mousse and fresh fruit, it can be purchased along with a day pass to the pool. Day passes are available every day of the week and there are also monthly memberships. Though the Sheraton is rundown in many respects and rated the worst Sheraton Hotel in their entire worldwide line, the hotel is as clean and efficient as anything else in Djibouti and this local context must be kept in mind.

Les Acacias Also in Heron, just a few blocks from the Kempinski, Les Acacias has a seaside pool and comfortable rooms. The hotel looks lovely but there is, as per usual, some false advertising. The website states as one of its leisure options: “Jogging: Enthusiasts can explore downtown Djibouti on the many tracks and paths.” There are no tracks or paths and certainly not in downtown Djibouti.

Website: http://www.acaciashoteldjibouti.com/ Address: Lotissement Heron BP 4111 Djibouti Phone: +253 21 327878

Looking for some cheaper options?

Menelik Hotel located in downtown Djibouti, on Place 27 Juin. Air conditioned, WiFi, centrally located, and serving breakfast, this is a good mid-range option.

Phone: +253 21 351177

Atlantic Hotel Downtown Djibouti, next to the Star Café. Clean rooms, air conditioning and WiFi. The website doesn’t seem to work, so either search for the Atlantic on Facebook or through the Lonely Planet link below, or call.

Phone: +253 21 331100 https://www.lonelyplanet.com/djibouti/djibouti-city/hotels/atlantic-hotel/a/lod/c022367b- e5b1-4694-be96-5b420fd88fea/355221

Hotel de l’Europe. Basic, no elevator so prepare to haul your bags upstairs. Clean and air-conditioned. Great location on Place Menelik, right downtown near the tourist market and several restaurants. Especially important – l’Europe is only a few blocks from the best gelato in the Horn of Africa. No pool here. http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g293787-d3509961-Reviews- Hotel_Residence_de_l_Europe-Djibouti.html

Auberge le Heron http://aubergeleheron.net/ Slightly cheaper, a single room can be found for around $75. Further from downtown but close to the ocean. Walking distance to restaurants, taxis, and an excellent grocery store.

Looking for even cheaper?

African Village Hotel [email protected] +253 21 340102 As close to the airport as you can get without still being in the airport.

Sharaf Hotel +253 21 344341 This hotel is just over a mile from the airport. It has a teensy pool and restaurant. It is near a shop that sells handicrafts from Madagascar and a popular café but is not within walking distance to other touristy interests or downtown, though taxis are plentiful and inexpensive. Rooms are small but clean.

Assamo Hotel +253 21 352575 Assamo Hotel is located at the end of Avenue 13, which leads straight downtown. The area is lively and rich with Djiboutian city culture – donkey carts and buses and kids playing jump rope and the Islamic call to prayer. The rooms are air conditioned and simple.

Hotel Horseed Google it. Check out the reviews and then make your decision. Don’t blame me. http://www.tripadvisor.co.za/ShowUserReviews-g293787-d2422467-r170916054- Hotel_Horseed-Djibouti.html

Hotels Outside Djibouti City

Sunny Hill Center in Arta Town No website, but the Facebook link works. The photo image is slightly deceptive. Sunny Hill is nowhere near the sea. You can view the sea, but reaching it would require a 3-hour hike. Sunny Hill does have simple, clean rooms, including larger bungalows for families, a pool, a restaurant, workout facility, library and game rooms, and a playground. Since it is up in the hills, it is slightly cooler here than in Djibouti City and Sunny Hill is a great place to go for the day on weekends.

Phone: +253 27 422258 https://www.facebook.com/pages/category/Hotel-Resort/Sunny-Hill-Center- 160505767984650/

Le Golfe, in Tadjourah Right on the sea, even if you don’t plan to spend the night, it is a good stop for dinner.

Phone: +253 77 073377 http://hotel-restaurant-le-golfe-djibouti-tadjourah.e-monsite.com/pages/l-hotel.html

Le Corto Maltese, in Tadjourah http://www.region-tadjourah.dj/potentialite/hotellerie

Houses

You’re moving to Djibouti and need to find your own housing? Well…

Some, like US embassy officials, are provided housing. Others are also provided it by their companies. Not everyone has such luxuries or services.

How exactly does one go house hunting in Djibouti when Zillow is not a thing here? Not only is Zillow not a thing, but addresses are not a thing, nor are real estate agents, nor are for rent signs – though occasionally you’ll spot one taped onto a gate in more expatriate occupied neighborhoods.

There is a real estate agency downtown, in the same building as the Beverly Café. Sometimes there are people inside and they usually know about apartments or houses for rent.

I still haven’t answered the question of how to find housing. The answer is: people. You have to talk to people.

You are probably thinking, “But I don’t know any people yet!” That is why I am the one who often gets these emails.

If you are already in Djibouti, staying perhaps at the Horseed Hotel and dying, literally, to get into your own place, you do know people. You know taxi drivers and restaurant waiters and hotel staff, and they know people, lots of people. Start asking questions.

Figure out which neighborhood you are interested in, how much rent you can afford, what kind of place you want – house, villa, apartment, how many rooms, etc. And then talk to people.

Also, start walking.

Go to the neighborhood that catches your eye. There are security guards at almost every gate and these guys know what’s up in their areas. Ask them. Tell them what you want.

Sometimes it is especially helpful to hire someone to do the legwork for you. Negotiate with someone who will look for you. He should come back to you in a few days with a list of places that fit your needs. Go see them together. If you like one, he can help negotiate with the landlord. If not, send him out for another round. People typically pay 1-2,000 franc per day of visiting together for this work and then a negotiated percentage of the month’s rent of whatever house they sign on.

Some suggestions:

For proximity to night life and urban Djiboutian culture, look for apartments downtown, on Avenue 13, or in the Gachamaley area.

For proximity to the airport, the French junior and senior high school Kessel, the US embassy and base, French military bases, and Casino grocery store, look in Gabode (1-5), airport, and Haramous. Haramous also has the largest, newest housing developments.

For proximity to the ocean, the French elementary school Dolto, the Heron French military base, and the Kempinski, look in the Heron neighborhood.

For proximity to the market, look in Ambouli, Cité Progrés, and Riyaad.

For proximity to local culture, cheaper housing, and to stick out but be welcomed in as a foreigner, look in the Balbala neighborhood.

Real Estate Agencies

If you don’t want to do the walk and talk thing, there are a few new real estate agencies around. I won’t vouch for them, but will tell you about them.

Dahaboo https://www.dahaboo.com

This is actually a great site for all kinds of selling and buying. And there is a housing section.

City Life Agency https://www.citylife-agency.com/djibouti-immobilier/

But What’s So Different about Being an Expat Family, Anyway? (originally published in Brain Child)

My twins are seniors and our conversations have naturally turned toward university choices. For my family, of course, that includes conversations about America and culture, home and upbringing. We moved to Somalia when the twins were two and we’ve lived in the Horn of Africa ever since.

One evening, my daughter asked, “But what’s really so different about growing up here? How does my experience compare with that of a high school girl in Minnesota?”

How can I even begin to answer?

I read about parents horrified at the thought of sending a 12-year old down the block alone. I sent my 12-year olds to Kenya alone. I’ve read about families bemoaning the fact their children don’t have their own bathrooms, or extolling the incredible and surprising virtues of siblings being forced to share a sink. My children share a bathroom and the girls share a bedroom.

And so, when they say it is hard for them to understand what might be different about their life compared to an American teenager and I think about the so-called suffering of sharing a bathroom sink or the fear of sending a child to the corner alone, the answer is so big, so deep, I don’t know what to say.

On a practical level, I can describe the choices we’ve made that highlight our values – living within our means financially, indoor space that promotes family intimacy and shared experiences, an imperfect house with an incredible backyard perfect for a family more interested in being active than aesthetics, living in community.

But on a deeper level, how do I begin to talk about courage or risk or the power of that community? How do I address the ways living abroad impacts my kids’ experience of race (isn’t every president black? Every president they have lived under has been) or religion (aren’t all Muslims doctors, teachers, artists, shopkeepers, friends? Not terrorists) or wealth (does all that stuff make people content? Some of their friends are content in aluminum shacks)?

I can’t explain to my twins how their childhood has affected them. They’ll need to discover the answer to that question on their own. I couldn’t begin to articulate one. I have ideas, but sometimes the only way to answer our deep questions is to experience a

contrast, to set our question and our experience against something new, opposing, different. Italo Calvino wrote, “Each city receives its form from the desert it opposes.”

This scares me. I want to have an answer for them the way I had an answer for diaper rash, the way M and M’s were the answer on long-haul flights, the way my kisses were the answer for scraped knees. Those answers provided, healed, protected. That’s what I want to give them now – protection, healing, and provision.

But I can’t any longer. They will move on from high school and I can’t go to that next place with them. I can watch and talk and process and pray and be their safe space as they wrestle with who they are, where they come from, and who they want to become. But I can’t answer the question of identity, which is really the core of what my daughter meant when she asked how her life experiences have been different.

I can only hope that as our family has chosen to do, my kids have learned to shift their attention, to be wise and thoughtful and to make good choices. Develop uplifting community, be curious and brave. Focus on gratitude, choose delight with intention and integrity. Live there, where you are, in all the richness and challenges of it.

Chapter 2: Restaurants, Cafes, Bars, and Grocery Stores

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Restaurants (see Bawadi Mall for options available there)

The Kempinski Hotel has several eating options and for an evening of air conditioning and good food, they are worth the prices. A juice bar, buffet, and a sit-down restaurant are all options. Service and quality can be a bit inconsistent – one night we were served a bread basket, two nights later, no bread basket. But the atmosphere is calm and relaxing.

The Kempinski also hosts evening specials, depending on the day of the week, like Tapas on Tuesdays with unlimited sangria. Check the website or their Facebook page for updates. Reservations required.

Melting Pot is owned by Greek friends of my husband’s and this is our restaurant of choice for date nights. Inside is a Japanese restaurant and outside is a restaurant with a mixture of French, Mediterranean, and local cuisine. The atmosphere is beautiful, with flowering plants and strings of lights, and the service is excellent. http://www.meltingpotdj.com/

Beach House is right on the ocean and is a popular meeting place for expatriates and Djiboutians. https://www.facebook.com/duche.Admin/

Janeteyn is the cleanest, more upscale mukbasa restaurant in town. For a more ‘authentic’ experience, I recommend the mukbasa restaurants downtown or on Avenue 13, but for a cool room, comfortable seating, and clean area, this is where to go to get delicious Yemeni fish. Be sure to ask the waiters if you can go in the back with them to pick out your own fish.

Kurry is located near the US embassy in Haramous. The food here is excellent. This restaurant is in a small, remodeled house. The chef and waiters are quite talkative and always happy to have guests. Our only complaint is that they are sometimes too talkative. If we want to spend time together as a couple or a family, we don’t usually want to be joined by our chef. But, the food is great. http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g293787-d2419127-Reviews- Kurry_Flavour_of_India-Djibouti.html

Pizzaiolo is a regular, every Friday night, for my family. My husband calls, they know his number, and a pizza is delivered with thirty minutes. Sometimes he is rebuked for not coming in to visit the cooks and staff and so once in a while he will pick it up rather than ordering delivery.

Haramous Pizzaiolo is essentially the same as Pizzaiolo above (the one near Cinquieme grocery store) but has a pool and serves more than pizza. Hamburgers, fish, salad, and more.

Café de la Gare since before Independence, this restaurant has been known for excellent cuisine. This is an upscale French restaurant. Rumors have said that reservations are required but if you go early in the evening (before 8) and not on a weekend, you will most likely find a table. http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g293787- d3833351-Reviews-Cafe_de_la_Gare-Djibouti.html

Singh’s Indian food, on Plateau du Serpent. Sit-in or carry-out, but beware that carry-out orders can take a really long time, so order in advance.

La Pergola good menu selection from burgers to paninis to pastas to salads and more. Nice atmosphere and the wait staff is always friendly.

QG upstairs from the Pergola, a bar and restaurant combo with a pool table, indoor/outdoor seating, and a small menu mostly pizzas and burgers. Nice place to hang out in a group or family, kid-friendly.

Moonlight on the corniche, the rooftop is a great place in the evening hours, they have a large menu including hookah and drinks.

Kirifu also on the corniche, has cute little cabanas for individual and romantic seating, great for Ethiopian food and more.

The Sheraton Buffet hotel feeling, but an impressive buffet

Kempinski brunch pricey but worth the splurge at least once in a while

Tentazioni Italian restaurant at the Kempinski sometimes the food here is good, sometimes it isn’t. Sometimes a meal comes with bread sticks, sometimes it doesn’t.

Bankoulé at the Kempinski Sometimes good, sometimes not good. Always overpriced but a nice atmosphere.

Bafena serves great Ethiopian food. Good, over-priced, but you are also paying for the atmosphere. You could get the same food on the street for much cheaper but won’t have anyone pouring your coffee from four feet above the coffee cup in a long, steady stream.

Chez Mahad serves fresh squeezed fruit juices, sometimes with strawberry and vanilla swirl soft serve ice cream mixed in. Chez Mahad is located right across from the “blue door” or tourist section of the market and provides an excellent vantage point from which to observe and experience Djiboutian city life.

Point Burger serves fast food that isn’t so fast or so good. If you like your burgers served on dry, crusty buns, with cabbage and mayo, here’s your stop. The French fries are excellent, except when they aren’t. My kids still like Point Burger, but they also like McDonalds, so I’m not sure that counts as much.

Restaurant Abyssinia https://www.facebook.com/Abyssinia253/ High votes on the food, decor, and customer service. The chef-owner is a young man who learned how to cook from his mother. Located just 1-2 blocks from Cash Center, around the corner from The Spot's Heron location.

HanCakes https://www.facebook.com/pages/category/Cafeteria/HanCakes- 1563654363964047/ Hilarious décor, I’ve heard it compared to a café-bakery version of Victoria’s Secret! But the coffee and tea are wonderful, and everything in the bakery case looks really good. Across the street from Star Coffee.

Street food. There are all kinds of foods available on the streets and I have no problem eating from these vendors. You can buy beans and baguettes, shawarmas, fadira (fried bread chopped into pieces and served with scrambled eggs, ground beef, onions, ketchup, and mayo), Ethiopian, tea, juice, spaghetti in a plastic bag, fried chicken and French fries…

Candy store! Between Al-Gamil and Casino, this is a fun new (2019) store with a cotton candy machine, scoop-able candy, ice cream, and slushies.

Safari Food Delivery https://www.safarifooddelivery.com/restaurants/lists

I have not yet used this service, but you can order from several local restaurants and have food delivered to your house. Try it and let me know!

Cafes

Casino Quite possibly the worst coffee I have ever had is the coffee at the Casino café. It is a great place to sit and chat, but a terrible place to drink coffee. The coffee comes in miniature Dixie-cup sized glasses half-filled (or are they half emptied?) and is horribly bitter. Order orange juice instead, and a croissant.

Buna House Downtown under the green Starbucks inspired logo (or should we say plagiarized?), Buna House serves a decent cup of coffee and the Burundian barrister will even swirl cream into shapes – leaves or flowers or pretty designs. Buna House is almost always crammed full with men but women are welcome to come in. I once interviewed Ayanleh Souleiman, world renowned Djiboutian runner, in Buna House. Big mistake – it was a great interview but incredibly hard to hear because of the vibrancy of the conversations and life going on around us.

Le Moulin In Gabode, this is a popular café among foreigners and Djiboutians alike. Lots of French women drop their kids off at school and then gather here for coffee, croissants, and conversation. The coffee isn’t great and comes again in miniature portions, but the tea is excellent and the staff friendly. Moulin also has a branch in Heron.

The Spot Near Cinquieme grocery store. This is popular and family-friendly and serves everything from fresh-squeezed lime mint juice to waffles to kebabs. Because there is no WiFi here (as of this writing), I like to come here to work on writing projects and sip mint lime juice.

Star Coffee Downtown near Place Menelik. Cute, modern style. Good coffee, decent desserts, and child booster seating. Also has Wifi!

Pause Café At the Moulk Center in Gabode near Kessel high school. A great stop for internet, coffee, and Moroccan tajine.

Healthyish in Haramus, has a pool and a walking track

Villa Camille new (2019), this is the most beautiful, relaxing, creative space in Djibouti (in my opinion). There is a café, a yoga studio, an art studio highlighting local work, a handicrafts store, massage parlor, all the good and lovely things. In Heron, near Peltier Hospital. https://www.facebook.com/villacamilledjibouti/

And of course you can always get coffee or other drinks at the Kempinski or Sheraton Hotels. Obscenely overpriced. For example, a bottle of water at the stores on the street will cost 120 franc for a liter. The Kempinski will charge you 1200.

Bars

You can buy alcoholic drinks at Casino, Cash Center, Bambis grocery store, Fratacci, and a few other liquor stores. You can also purchase beer, wine, or other drinks at most of the upscale restaurants and pizza joints.

I can’t tell you anything about bars, I don’t go to them. One guest wandered into what he thought was a bar and found himself in a brothel. ‘Nuf said.

Grocery Stores

Casino Well-stocked most of the time (if you consider one side of one quarter of a short aisle which is the entire cereal aisle being full of generic Corn Flakes well stocked, which I do), sells pork and alcohol, which some other stores don’t. Has tampons, cheddar cheese (sometimes), and produce. $8 for a wilting head of lettuce? What other choice do I have. The cashiers are friendly and listen when we put in requests. They accept credit cards (most of the time) and have good security guards and a parking lot, which means you don’t get bothered. Some people avoid Casino because they feel the prices are too high but other than on a few items (like eggs, which are way cheaper at Cinquieme, al-Gamil, or Bambis) Casino is decently priced.

Geant Casino Basically the same as Casino, but bigger, shall we say “geant?” This one is located inside the Bawadi Mall and is halaal. So you won’t find pork or alcohol products here.

Al-Gamil A few years ago this store burned to the ground. Now, it is up and running again and has quickly become my go-to store. The aisles are wide and clean, the staff friendly and this is where I can find my ground beef holiday creations in the meat section. I mean that literally, every Christmas the butcher forms snowmen, Santas, and Happy New Year signs with ground beef and vegetables. This makes me so happy. Al-Gamil has good prices and a wide variety of both groceries and household supplies. Upstairs they have furniture and exercise equipment. Located on Airport Road, near Gabode.

Cinquieme My second favorite store, though they also burned down a few years ago and are still working to resurrect. This is where I go for ground beef, eggs, paper products, and household cleaners. Also, they have the best rotisserie chicken in town and the guys sitting outside with coolers are always selling freshly caught shrimp, crab, and other fish.

Nougaprix is the most centrally located grocery store and they typically sell good produce at decent prices. They are also my go-to store for yeast and Mentos, when the craving hits. Nougaprix and Al-Gamil are owned by the same company and sell essentially the same products.

Cash Center This is the store for the Heron neighborhood end of town. It is also the best place for household products, kitchen supplies, toys, and birthday gifts. I don’t get there often as it feels so far away, a full ten to twelve-minute drive, but when I can’t find flour or jam or pens that work at other stores, I’ll go there.

Napolean’s Personally, I don’t like shopping at Napoleans and only do when I need an obscure school supply item. Parking is horrible and staff at Napolean’s are aggressive and I find driving there and pulling out of there incredibly stressful. The staff are often unfriendly and unhelpful, and I usually feel unwelcome. Sorry Napolean’s, hard to recommend you.

Market and street vendors Riyaad Market, off Rue d’Arta and near UNFD and Dar al Hanaan maternity hospital is a great place to buy things at slightly reduced prices. I don’t go there weekly because I can get the same prices from the fruit and vegetable stands close to my house. But I do go there when I want grains or spices. I pick out wheat, flax, sorghum, barley, and others and then hire a local woman to grind it. Street vendors are the best place to get bananas, watermelon, cucumbers, tomatoes, etc. They will often have things not in the grocery stores. And no way am I paying Casino’s prices for bananas! The ones hanging from ropes at the outside vendors are just as sweet.

Dukaans Dukaans are the little shops that are on almost every street and they are fantastic for things like pasta, popcorn, Coke, tomato paste, phone cards, bottled water…and so much more. Wander to the one nearest you and scan the shelves. I love being able to just run across the street for a few things.

The bread guy Don’t neglect your neighborhood bread guy. He pushes a wooden cart through the streets several times a day, honking a bicycle horn and selling fresh baguettes. When we first moved to Djibouti, I thought the noise was a strange bird. But no, it was fresh baguettes delivered to my doorstep. Delicious.

Other shopping? Like for running shoes and bras and swimsuits? Bring it from somewhere else. Running shoes? Crap. Bras? For sale in the market, hanging from wooden beams, sold by men who will hold the bras up to their own chests and remark on how good you would look in it. Swimsuits? Unless you like speedos and string bikinis that won’t last long…bring them.

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Bread Baked in the Heat of Hell (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

The March afternoon in Djibouti is still relatively cool, 90 degrees but Fathia is drenched in sweat. She stands over an open wood-burning stove made from clay and has a towel wrapped her arm. Sweat drips down the backs of my legs and down my stomach and all I do is stand next to the stove and watch. She never stops moving, an aerobic effort of bending, standing, rolling dough, tossing bread into a bucket. She never misses the target, never drops a piece. She smiles, laughs, and is able to carry on a conversation without slowing.

Fathia is a baker of muufo, pronounced like mofo, bread and I drove all over Djibouti Town to find her beehive-shaped oven. She works on Avenue Vingt-Six, Twenty-Sixth Street, across from the ‘big mosque’ and at the crux where the road curves slightly toward the stoplights. I should have known I would find muufo there. Avenue Vingt-Six is a vibrant four blocks of Djiboutian culture unlike any other street in town.

On one corner pillows are stacked ten and twelve high, balanced on top of hand-carved bed frames, the opposite corner has stacks of car tires, equally precariously balanced. In narrow alleyways women labor with tib iyo mooye, mortars and pestles, the mortars as tall as a small child, the pestles like thick oars. They are pounding grain and two women work a single mortar, alternating with a steady rhythm and a deep echoing thud. Other women sit on the cement steps of hardware stores or food stalls and weave dried grasses into short-handled brooms, mafiiq.

Men walk behind donkeys which have two yellow water barrels strapped onto their backs. Others ride in wagons pulled by donkeys, the wagons filled with burlap sacks of long grasses or open-mouthed bags of charcoal. They pass women who saunter with sacks of grass or charcoal balanced on their heads or women who bend nearly in half at the waist and carry on their backs up to twenty empty oil jugs or empty cardboard boxes, all tied together with strips of cloth. Khat stands, wooden green stalls where young women sell the leafy drug, are every few meters, many of them shaded by fading blue and red umbrellas.

Crows flock to this street to peck at the discarded grains, the splotches of spilled tomato sauce, the road kill. They perch on electricity wires and swoop across the street, adding their grating caws to the bustling sounds of daily work. The mosque on the corner adds the essential backdrop to the street, sometimes by nature of the five-times-daily call to prayer or the Friday sermons, but always by nature of its tall white minaret.

Once on this street, I find the muufo oven, known as a tinaar or tandoor oven in Somali, easily. It is smaller than I anticipated, knee-high and bumpy, rough-hewn, with the

opening on top. Fathia says a man built it for her using clay from Yemen but she maintains it herself by patching cracks that appear on the outside and along the bottom. Inside, charcoal burns down to white ash and the sides and top of the oven are blackened. Fathia shoves the charcoal into the oven through an opening at the base and then seals it to keep the heat inside.

A neighbor boy about ten years old works with Fathia and her mother. His job is to remove and replace the metal cover. The handle is broken off and a wire, it looks like it came from a hanger, has been fitted into the holes. This is what he grabs to pick up the cover with his bare hand and says it isn’t hot at all. When he gets distracted by customers or passing kids or a nearby soccer ball, Fathia calls him back to his work and they both laugh.

Fathia’s mother sits on a black bench removed from the backseat of a van. The lining is torn and foam stuffing oozes out but the bench still looks comfortable. Her job is to manage the sales and money, though math eludes her and she has to ask Fathia how much change to give customers. A tarp hangs behind Fathia and offers shade from Djibouti’s relentless sun. They work in the yard of her house, painted a pepto bismal pink, and the yard is littered with broken television sets, scraps of cardboard, planks of wood, and plastic buckets.

Fathia uses three buckets. A white one filled with the dough she mixed this morning, a yellow one with water, and another white one into which she tosses the finished bread. She scoops up a handful of dough, pats it into a flattened circle with her palms, bends over the yellow bucket to splash water on both sides of the bread and then reaches deep inside the oven to slap it against the walls. The water makes it stick. It doesn’t take long to cook and in less than a minute the bread falls off the wall. Fathia covers her hand with a purple towel and reaches in to pick up the muufo. It looks like brown pita bread. She tosses it like a Frisbee into her mother’s bucket and almost immediately someone buys it.

In some parts of Somalia muufo is made from a base of cornmeal but Fathia uses ground wheat and sorghum. She blends hot red peppers, coriander seeds, garlic, onions, chili powder, and cilantro and mixes it all with water to form the hearty dough. People eat it plain or with shaah – tea with sweetened condensed milk, or with sour yogurt.

There aren’t many muufo ovens in Djibouti, there may only be Fathia’s, she isn’t sure. Later I find out there are more in the Balbala slum area but they are only operational in the mornings. I also saw a small, single-family sized one in the small village of Randa in the northern mountains, which meant there are far more than Fathia thought. But she isn’t worried about competition. Her bread is cheap and fresh and there is a steady stream of customers. Her mother wraps the warm bread in newspaper or plastic bags and hands it to little boys and grown men who carry it back to their homes, passing it between their hands to keep the heat seeping through the paper from burning their fingers.

To keep her own arms from burning, a blue towel is wrapped around Fathia’s arm from her wrist to the middle of her upper arm, like a cast. A single strip of a medical bandage winds around the towel and is knotted at the top to keep the towel in place.

Inside, the oven is blisteringly hot. Hot as hell, Fathia’s mother tells me and then she asks if I want to go there, to hell.

“No,” I say.

“Do you pray the salat?” she asks, referring to the Islamic ritual prayer.

“I don’t,” I say.

“Do you have any religion?” She sounds worried.

“I follow the religion of Jesus.”

“Well then you are going to hell,” she says. “It will be hotter than the muufo oven. I don’t think you can handle that.”

“I’m sure I can’t handle it,” I say.

Fathia laughs at our conversation and instructs her mother on how much change to give me for the muufo I bought. Her sister joins the discussion and asks for my phone number when I turn to leave.

On the drive back to my house I nibble on the warm muufo. The next day Fathia’s sister calls just to say hello. I don’t tell her that I didn’t like the muufo, it tasted strange, like spaghetti-flavored bread. It doesn’t matter, to me anyway, whether or not I like the bread. I did like watching Fathia work with an easy expertise, and the warmth of how her family and neighbors welcomed me, the curious outsider. This is what customer service looks like in Djibouti. It involves sharing phone numbers, threats of hell, and laughter. Even if there is another muufo baker in Djibouti and even though I don’t like the flavor, Fathia won me over as a client and I’ll be back for more. Maybe eventually I will even learn to enjoy the surprising combination of garlic, onions, cilantro, and chili pepper in my bread. At the very least, every time I see it or smell it, I will be reminded of the heat of hell and maybe I’ll be reminded to pray.

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Chapter 3: Get Online, Find a Doctor, Dentist, Pharmacy, and Vet

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Online

Telephone poles in Djibouti tend to look like poorly constructed birds’ nests, wires going every direction, loops, knots, tangled masses of stripped wires, some dangling down low ready to zap an unsuspecting pedestrian.

Djibouti Telecom doesn’t like to install new internet lines for homes on poles that are already overtapped. Sometimes they simply refuse. At our last house, we scored one of the final available connections. When we moved out, the neighbor quickly switched the connection to his house before new tenants could move in.

This leaves some people sans internet in their homes. Others are visitors, others want to access Facebook, email, Google maps (though I can’t imagine why, there are few street names and no house numbers. Just turn left at the third goat past the khat stand) while cruising around town or while grabbing a cup of (terrible) coffee at Casino.

Alas! Internet has become a basic human right, hasn’t it? How will we survive without instant, high-speed connections at every minute of our days? What if people can’t get in touch with us in this exact moment? What if I can’t respond to a Tweet for several hours? Life could end.

So, the search for an internet connection is on. Where, oh where, in Djibouti, can one find internet that you don’t have to pay insane prices for? If it comes to your home, you’ll be paying insane prices but at least it will be available. Except for when it isn’t.

You could go to the Kempinski and buy a million-dollar bottle of water and get an hour of free internet.

Better yet, go to the Sheraton. Sit in the lounge, order fresh-squeezed orange juice or a Coke, and ask for the internet password. Though it always reeks of smoke, the connection is good, the view of the ocean gorgeous, and the juice delicious.

Or, go to Clubhouse Pizzaiolo in Haramous. It looks more and more rundown, but the pizza is still good, the pool still refreshing, and the internet still free.

And now, go to Le Moulin Café in Gabode 5. Good tea, excellent croissants, fantabulous baguettes, tajine, air conditioning, and Wi-Fi.

Also, Pause Café, at the Moulk Center, and Star Coffee downtown

It is possible to get Wi-Fi on smart phones, sometimes the connections will be weak but if you have a phone card and a SIM card, go for it.

One more tip: some sites are blocked in Djibouti. Clicking on them will only bring you to FIFA’s home page. And while my husband often goes to the FIFA home page, others might not want to. Get a VPN.

Doctors

Based on thorough research provided by a group of visiting medical professionals, getting medical care in Djibouti is not recommended.

It’s a bummer that sometimes medical care simply cannot be avoided.

You might slice the tip of your finger off with the tomato paste can top. You might fall through thin earth and sink knee dip into boiling mud. Your son might wake up in the middle of the night and not be able to breathe. You might be in a car accident. You might be pregnant. You might break a bone. You might have cancer (I do).

All of these things have happened to us or people we know well.

In such cases, get medical care. Or at least get the bone set and then go to Dubai or Nairobi or London to make sure it was set correctly.

Things like elective surgery? Best done somewhere else. Seriously. And from what we can tell, the medical situation is not improving any time soon.

If you have chronic medical conditions that require medication, either bring your supply with, ensure you have a way to receive medication in the mail, or figure out the French equivalent and find out if local pharmacies stock it and keep it in stock.

Regarding malaria – yes, there are occasional cases of malaria. Some organizations (the US embassy, for example) require their staff to take prophylaxis. Other people do it optionally. My family relies on mosquito spray, sometimes bed nets (but usually not), and blood testing when we have fevers. It is up to you.

There is also dengue fever here so avoiding mosquitoes is a good idea. Plus, they are just plain annoying.

So, back to medical care. Where do you go if you are pregnant, in a car accident, slice off your finger, or can’t breathe?

The first place to go in a serious emergency is the French military hospital. This is difficult to access if you are not French military, but if you have a foreign passport and cash, or if you have a French military friend who can accompany you, and if you have a legitimate emergency, you will (most likely) be welcome.

This hospital is inside the Cinq military base. You must park outside and walk in, stop at the badging office and call the number posted on the wall. Explain your emergency and someone will come to pick you up in an escorted van. Get treated inside, pay inside, and then the van will drive you back to the entrance gate. +253 21 345180

SDMS Clinic This is a decent clinic for blood tests, dentists, and general check-ups, though results have been varied as to the actual quality of care. Staff speak English and most major international insurances are accepted here, the only place where this is possible. +253 21 352585 [email protected]

Peltier Hospital, the government hospital, located in Heron near the Ethiopian Embassy Avenue Marechal +253 21 352710

Al-Rahma Hospital in Balbala +253 21 364113

The Sudanese Hospital on Rue d’Arta

Dr. Bruno Dell’Aquila, at the Moulk Center. Specializes in Ophthalmology but also does general care (253) 21.35.27.24

Clinic Affi also does good after-hours urgent care (and non-after hours as well). This is where people have gone for stitches and also for prenatal care. Some docs speak English, all speak French. It is clean, accessible, and good quality. Located on the edge of Cité Saudi. Clinic Affi also has other services like dermatology. Check their website or call to find out when the specialist will be in. For example, in dermatology, the doc only comes one afternoon per week and no appointment is necessary. Just show up and get in line.

Route Salines Ouest, Across from French Cultural Center

+253 21 357474 http://clinique-affi.com/ips/

Pole Medical has a great pediatrician. This is where my youngest got all her early childhood care, including vaccinations. I learned that you have to go to the pharmacy first, buy the vaccine, then bring it with you to the appointment at the clinic. They are located downtown on the corner of the street with the gelato place. So get your shots, then soothe the tears with the best ice cream in the country.

Pole Medical Center: Dr. Bruno Dell’Aquila and Dr. Guillard

Pole Medical Clinic (also known as “La Bouche” by locals) Rue Pierre Pascal, in Menelik Square

+253 21 352724 Personal Contact: Dr. Bruno, [email protected]

Dr. Acina: Pole Medical Clinic, +253 21 357575 Dr. Acina also works in a pediatric clinic behind Cinquieme grocery store. She has been my go-to doctor for my own children for years.

Lab Abdan is where you’ll get blood work done and tested. They used to be located downtown on the third floor. When my husband had dengue fever I had to practically carry him up the narrow staircase, back down, and then back again to get results. I thought he was going to pass out and tumble down the steps. Thankfully, they have moved to Cité Saudi, near Clinic Affi. They are prompt and reliable.

+253 21 350360

Peltier is Djibouti’s national hospital. You can get X-rays here, though you might not be able to find someone who can read them. You can get an eye exam here though the exam entails reading letters as big as a cereal box so pretty much anyone can pass. You can get acupuncture here. Sometimes. There is also a dentist. They pull teeth with no warning. You can give birth here, just like the cats in the hallway that walk around with placentas still attached.

Dar al-Hanan is the maternity hospital. I once visited a friend and killed twelve cockroaches crawling on her bed in the first ten minutes.

Kinesiology Clinique Affi (253) 21.34.44.97

Autism Association www.autisme-djibouti.org fb.me/vaincre.autisme.djibouti +253 77820021

Psychologist Ms. Pelzer 77157208

Reflexology Ms. Severine Painblanc 77157575

Orthophoniste (language therapist) Ms. Vauterin 253 77176076 or [email protected]

Pharmacies

Grande Pharmacie: De la Corne D’Afrique, Rue de Marseille Telephone: +253 21 353444 or +253 21 342615

Pharmacie Independence: Rue d’Ethiopie Telephone: +253 21 352630

Pharmacie Nouvelle: Place Harbi Telephone: +253 21 351894 or +253 21 353871

Pharmacie Al Razi: Avenue Cheik Houmed Telephone: +253 21 354681

Pharmacie Moulk Center: +253 21 34 57 59

Dentists

My family has not done much dental care in Djibouti, but it is good to know there are reliable dentists in the country. Just in case.

Maison Medicale has a dentist. Clean, not too expensive, takes some forms of insurance.

+253 21 350038

There is a dentist and orthodontist in the same compound as Dr. Acina’s office behind the Cinquieme grocery store.

77176076 [email protected]

SDMS Clinic This is a decent clinic for blood tests, dentists, and general check-ups, though results have been varied as to the actual quality of care. Staff speak English and most major international insurances are accepted here, the only place where this is possible.

+253 21 352585 [email protected]

Veterinarians

I really don’t want to get into our family history with animals. It isn’t pretty. It involves flying cats, escaped and returned and re-escaped and never returned bunnies, extreme heat, runaway cats, cat drop-offs, car tires, mysterious dogs, crabs, and even a few chickens and a baby deer. But I don’t want to scare you off or think I’m entirely heartless or cruel. So I’m not going there.

Instead, I will tell you that there is one excellent veterinarian in Djibouti. There are several people who care for flocks in the bush by giving vaccinations but there is only one vet who will neuter your dog or vaccinate the wild cat you picked up from the side of the road. He also used to care for cheetahs and started one of the best places in Djibouti – The DECAN cheetah refugee (see The Red River Hog story below).

The office is about four doors down from Djibouti’s International Airport. Stop by, give him a call, make an appointment. Get your pets cared for.

I don’t know anything about getting animals in or out of the country on airplanes. Ask your airline.

Decan: http://decandjibouti.org/ Docteur Bertrand LAFRANCE

Route de l'Aéroport

Phone +253 77 609746 email : [email protected]

Land of the Red River Hogs (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

My favorite lines about wildlife in Djibouti are: “Red River Hog is one of the animals found in Djibouti. It mainly lives in the rain forests. The fur of the animal is usually reddish in color and its mode of nutrition is omnivorous.” (Quote from Mapsoftheworld.com) Red river hogs are as numerous in Djibouti as are rain forests, which is to say, there aren’t any. Or at least, I’ve never seen or heard of either.

There are plenty of other indigenous species with various modes of nutrition. Baboons are a common sight on Route 1, the two-lane highway that connects Djibouti City to Ethiopia. Ostriches can also be seen from this road, a few kilometers before passing the Grand Bara desert. I have only seen them in pairs, a brown female blending in with the dusty backdrop and a male with tar-black feathers and a pink neck. Further north, Forêt de Day is one of the only places left on earth to see the elusive bird immortalized on the Djiboutian 250 franc coin, the francolin. Djibouti is not home to large land animals like in Kenya or Tanzania but wildlife does abound. Chameleons, sand snakes, wild parrots, flamingos, bee eaters, hyraxes, hyenas.

Some can be seen in the capital city, but most are easier to spot away from the crush of people and noise and exhaust. Unless you believe the superstition that some humans can turn into hyenas during the full moon. These human-hyena hybrids are rumored to devour neighbors and revert to their human forms by morning. If this is true, who knows how many hyenas a person might see while strolling through the market or riding the bus, crammed between a goat and a college student.

This is not to say that there are no animals in the city. Packs of wild dogs, feral cats, and crows are the most obnoxious when alive and the most putrid when turned to road kill. Donkeys pull wagons delivering water, charcoal, and dry grasses. Camels, in town with their nomadic owners, saunter past the gleaming US embassy or munch on plastic bags on the corner of my street, sometimes camels block my running path and I have to dodge their plodding hooves and vicious teeth. There are herds of goat and black-headed, fatty- butt sheep. Sometimes I am late to meetings because herds of long horned cattle are being driven up Rue de Venice toward the port where they will be shipped to the Middle East and slaughtered.

It is fairly easy to encounter wildlife in Djibouti but the best place to physically engage with it, besides underwater where you can swim with whale sharks and eels and sting rays with a circumference broader than a human’s arm span, is at the DECAN wildlife refuge.

The refuge is not a zoo but there are animals in cages. Neither is it a safari trip, though there are lions and zebras and savannah-like grasses. DECAN stands for Decouvrir et Aider la Nature, Discover and Help Nature, and it is designed for education, conservation, and the rescue of abused or trafficked animals.

Dr. Bertrand LaFrance served with the French military in Djibouti, returned to France where he studied to be come a veterinarian and then in 1995, moved back to Djibouti with his wife. He opened a veterinary clinic and gave safety trainings to the military regarding venomous animals; scorpions, spiders, and snakes. He also developed an interest in the protection of local flora and fauna. He was especially interested in the protection of at-risk species, like sea turtles and the centuries-old acacia trees, threatened due to the overgrazing of domesticated herd animals and the introduction of the invasive and prolific honey mesquite species. Then, in 2001 La France learned of a cheetah being held in a local restaurant.

The cheetah population has been in steady decline partly due to the fragility of the species in dealing with disease and the degradation of its habitat but also due to human activity – namely the high value placed on cheetah pelts. Starting in 1999, Djiboutian police increased their anti-trafficking actions and in two years seized at least eleven baby cheetahs, some already dead and some who had endured abuse. Presumably, their destination was Dubai where their fur would be sold at exorbitant prices. For a small country with a tiny, but vital to the worldwide survival, population of cheetahs, this was an environmental disaster.

LaFrance rescued the cheetah that had been chained in the restaurant and kept it in his yard. Soon he had five, then six cheetahs, an untenable situation for life in the city. LaFrance asked the Djiboutian government for a 39 hectares space where he could relocate the cheetahs and launch a program for studying the genetics and reproduction of the species. He called it DECAN. The government agreed (today the space has expanded to 200 acres) and LaFrance developed far grander plans than merely cheetah preservation. DECAN soon also focused on the protection of plants and other animals and what began as a cheetah refuge became a project with the goal of reintroducing animals formerly found in the region and of educating people on conservation and nature.

DECAN is located just a fifteen minute drive from Djibouti City. Follow the now-defunct railroad track, pass the Japanese military camp, the American military base Camp Lemonier, and the Turkish military camp. Pass the golf course where caddies carry patches of green turf to lay over the dirt for golfers. Pass huts and flocks of goats and dust-covered hills and women hanging hand-scrubbed laundry out to dry. DECAN is on the left, less than nine kilometers from Loyada, the border with Somaliland.

Construction began on the refuge in 2002 and it was opened to the public in 2003. Colloquially known as the Cheetah Refuge, DECAN is home to ostriches, gazelles, tortoises, caracals, porcupines, hyenas and more. In 2010 the president of Somaliland donated two lions, a 5-year old male and a 2-year old female. In 2012 the lioness gave birth to two boys and in 2014, to two more babies, though one died from complications at

birth. As recently as January 2015, through a cooperation with the Beauval Zoo in France, DECAN obtained zebras and oryx.

Dirt paths cut through the thorny mesquite bushes and lead visitors past the caracal, or lynx, past the baboons. The baboons act friendly and will grasp a finger or two but will also suddenly flash scary sharp teeth or a bright red bottom. The ostriches seem equally aggressive and when the lions pounce on the calf fetuses DECAN obtains from the market butchers, I’m thankful for the fence, newly electrified.

There is no fence, however, between visitors and the zebras and oryx. A Djiboutian guard with a long, narrow stick, opens a gate and we walk over a wooden bridge and then there, right in front of us like horses in Halloween costumes, are zebras. Oryx with fierce- looking horns, calmly chewing grass. I could almost touch them.

DECAN is a popular school field trip option. US and French soldiers posted in peaceful Djibouti volunteer at the refuge, families tour and picnic, and the Djiboutian government gives regular and generous support to the work of DECAN and Dr. LaFrance. But the message of caring for the land and its creatures hasn’t caught on yet in Djibouti on a massive scale.

In the past six months garbage trucks have started making regular rounds of the city to pick up trash. The truck sings out an ice-cream truck jingle that all Djibouti Town residents can now hum in our sleep. A few years ago a new career option became available to women, street sweepers. They wear matching peach ankle-length jackets that look like lab coats with reflective lights on them. Under the watch of a male supervisor and most often working after dark, the women labor in groups of five or six, moving from street to street and sweeping up the garbage that gathers along sidewalks and snags beneath thorn bushes. So efforts to clean up the city are increasing. But a handful of trucks or a few groups of street sweepers are not enough for a city of 600,00. Sometimes when I drive behind open-air dump trucks I can count the bags and cardboard packaging boxes that fly out the back end. In town despite the efforts of the new garbage trucks, piles of trash accumulate on street corners. These are left behind for goats and birds to munch down.

Trash heaps also line the road to the DECAN refuge. Rusted out cars, broken toilets, tires and tires and tires, diapers. Sometimes black, acrid smoke curls up from the mountainous piles as someone lights a fire in an attempt to burn down the garbage. Goats eat plastic bags. Truck drivers toss food cartons out of windows. Children open candies and let the wrappers float to the ground.

Oppressive, sometimes 120-degree heat, and scant natural water sources make animal survival in Djibouti a challenge. Drought leaves animal skeletons alongside the highway. LaFrance is fighting an uphill battle of animal and environmental protection and conservation in Djibouti.

There may very well be red river hogs in Djibouti, there may even be rain forests. I hope there are, along with the Nile Crocodile which also supposedly lives in Djibouti but of which there is not a single photo. Neither have I heard a single credible story of a sighting. Perhaps these creatures and forests are tucked away in the north past Lac Abbé or hidden in unreachable hills and valleys near Mount Mousa Ali, Djibouti’s tallest peak. Perhaps they are only seen by the same humans who turn into hyenas during the full moon. Maybe I’ll even see them one day but in the meantime, I’m happy to let a baboon hold my finger at DECAN, to back away from the ostrich, and to support the conservation work of Dr. Bertrand LaFrance and his team.

Chapter 4: Care for the Body and Mind: salons, schools, and sports

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Hair and Nails

I know my hairdresser pretty well. She has been doing my hair now for almost ten years and our daughters have been friends off and on.

I tried to go local with my haircuts. My husband does, and he gets a back massage, a facial, and sometimes a lollipop for less than $6.00. So I tried a couple of local places. Each one was a unique disaster. They just don’t have experience cutting blond curly hair. Eventually I quit trying and settled on Chez Muriel, or when Muriel broke her leg and was gone for a few months, Concept Beauté. Both do excellent work and it feels like a day retreat to spend hours in the cool, crisp air inside their salons. Sipping tea, trying to eavesdrop on French conversations, or trying to read my Kindle.

Chez Murielle/Espace Coiffure is located in Haramous. She has pedicures, manicures, facials, massages, coloring, cuts, waxing…And she does a good job. +253 21 342510

Concept Beauté is located in Heron. She also has several similar accouterments to what Muriel offers. And she also does a good job. +253 21 340109

I happen to live on the side of town closer to Muriel’s, so I go there. I’d recommend both.

Amazones Chez Massage, nails, waxing, hairdressing, and more Place Menelik [email protected] 21 350829

Exercise

(see Running, Biking, and Sports for more info and see Maps for suggested routes)

You want a gym or a class or a running path? No matter what, be prepared to sweat.

Queens Spa located on the Corniche, for women. The exercise equipment is new and though limited in terms of weight-lifting options, there are treadmills and ellipticals. The air conditioning is never on and must be turned on when you arrive. There is cold drinking water available.

Telephone: +253 21 346999

Again, there does not appear to be a website but rather a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/category/Beauty-Salon/Queens-SpaWellness- 2053935634894815/

Workout Facility at the Moulk Center http://www.apparthotelmoulkcenter.com

There is a pool and a gym, air conditioning, and the best prices I’ve found yet. They also offer loads of classes.

Per month to use the gym and the pool: 35,000 djf Per month for just the gym: 20,000 Per month for just the pool: 15,000

The only other gym that can really be compared to a western-style and quality gym is the K Wellness Center at the Kempinski Hotel. But for prices as high as $300-500/month(!!!) For a single membership, not exactly affordable. And be careful on the treadmill for the occasional power outages. Not cool.

There is a gym in Gabode 5, Body Forme. It costs 10,000 franc/month and the hours are always changing. Originally it was open 24-hours a day, by members’ thumbprints. Then only morning and late afternoon. I was able to negotiate during Ramadan for my own preferred hours. The air conditioning is rarely on. I just found the remotes and turned them on myself. There is some kind of idea that if the air is less than 110 degrees and thick with sweaty humidity, you might get sick. I don’t care. I turned on the a/c. I also drag machines so that they are directly beneath the ceiling fans.

Even so, even so, when I stand up from the bike or the elliptical, there is literally a lake of sweat running from my machine all the way to the back wall. It is nasty. But if you want to lose a little water weight, go for it.

I tend to only use the gyms during the summer or if I have a running injury and need to bike for a while. Biking on Djibouti’s streets terrifies me. People do it and outside the city, it must be stunning and rugged for bikers. But in the city – massive trucks and drivers high on khat don’t give me much confidence for embarking on long rides.

There is also a women’s gym and a men’s gym on the top of the Al-Galux downtown, across from the Nougaprix grocery store. These are opened by thumbprint and have lockers and bathrooms, though rarely any running water. They also don’t use the a/c and have only a few broken ceiling fans. I find it much more comfortable to simply work out outside.

Which brings me to running trails. Yes, it is safe to run in Djibouti. And I pity the American military personnel who are relegated to running endless loops inside their electrified fences while I am, alone, out in the desert with flamingos and weaver birds and herons and the occasional camel or herd of goats.

There can be a bit of pushback from teenage Djiboutians and I try to avoid running at the times when school is getting out. They like to shout things like, “Sex! Sex! Sex!” and “Whore!” Ignore them. Most other people are encouraging. They shout, “Bon courage!” and give thumbs-up and clap and say that sport is a good thing. Listen to these people.

Heron is great for running, there are small trails that lead along the ocean. La Siesta road is also good for running but best in the mornings, before the beach fills up.

Gabode is great, many French military people run here, sometimes in massive groups. Sometimes during their races they have water stops and always offer me a bottle.

Haramous is also great for running, wide streets that are quiet from cars and traffic. Not every street is well lit though, so be careful after dark.

And at the edge of Haramous is a trail that leads out into the desert. This is a great place to run. Dirt roads, ocean views, sometimes kite surfers or sky divers to watch. The trail does loop all the way around the airport, a French military base, and comes out at the entrance to the US military base. I like to use this for my long runs on the weekends. Or for an off-road bike ride.

Schools

Schools are primarily in French, though recent years have seen three major English language PreK+ schools open.

The International School of Djibouti (www.internationalschoolofdjibouti.org) This school was started by my husband and I and launched with our 15 years of experience in education in the Horn of Africa and a PhD in Education Development. The school features an American curriculum, native English speakers, a strong family community, and affordable prices.

Quality Schools International (www.qsi.org) This school was launched in conjunction with the US embassy and primarily serves the foreign diplomat population. It offers quality education at an extremely high price.

International School of Africa (www.isa-dj.com) This school has a lovely facility and English language curriculum, affordable prices.

While there are now English options, French remains the dominant language for education.

Dolto is the elementary school.

Kessel is the high school.

This is the website for both schools: http://webetab.ac-bordeaux.fr/lycee-francais- djibouti/

Other solid options are Nativité (http://www.aefe.fr/reseau-scolaire-mondial/rechercher- un-etablissement/djibouti-djibouti-ecole-de-la-nativite) and Guelleh Batal. Smaller, less expensive, larger class sizes, fewer foreigners, slightly lower caliber of teaching.

Language Schools

While here you could study French, Afar, Arabic, or Somali. The Alliance Francais offers courses in all of these languages, depending on the demand. French always has a few levels on offer, the others require you to check in. http://www.afdjibouti.org/

Oxford English. Before going here, read this online review and then decide for yourself. http://forums.eslcafe.com/teacher/viewtopic.php?p=46161

Hire a friend. I have learned the most language simply by hiring a local to help me a few hours a day or a few hours a week. This also builds relationships and provides for fairly in-depth cultural learning.

ISD (the International School of Djibouti) offers classes to adults if there is enough demand, we specialize in groups. We also have afternoon intensive English programs for children which include academics as well as sports, art, and more to help kids learn.

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Death By Heartbreak: the truth and mythology of a Somali poet, lover, and hero (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

Elmi Boderi died of a broken heart. To Djiboutian women he is a hero of the most romantic kind who ruined their chance of ever finding such true love. To Djiboutian men he was a fool who ruined their chance of ever finding true love.

“Who can love like that?” Goudal, a teacher, said. “To see a beautiful woman in the street and never speak to her and then die?” He shook his head. “How is a man supposed to love like that? He was crazy.”

“No man in Djibouti can love a woman like that,” Sagal, a cleaning woman, said. “They are too full of chewing khat and too interested in flirting with more than one girl.” (Khat is a popular leafy amphetamine chewed primarily by men in the late afternoons.)

“I don’t even think it is a true story,” Goudal said.

“Absolutely it is a true story,” another cleaning woman said. “I’ve seen Elmi’s grave in Somaliland.”

No matter what people personally believed about the veracity of Elmi and Hodan’s story, simply mentioning their names stirred up impassioned conversation. At an English class, one student leaned in and propped up on his elbows, his eyes light and his voice vibrant. “You know, we Somalis are a people who get easily excited. It is because of the hot temperature, we can’t control our emotions. This is why Elmi died.”

The details regarding their love story vary wildly but Elmi Boderi was a real man. Born Elmi Ismail Liban in 1908 on the Ethiopian-Somali border in a region under British colonial rule, he earned his nickname “Boderi” from the mispronounced English word “border.” Around 1931 Elmi moved to Berbera, which was then the seat of the British administration.

Hodan Abdi, the object of Elmi’s love, was born in Berbera, a blisteringly hot coastal town in northern Somalia.

Elmi worked in a bakery and one day Hodan walked in to buy bread. With one glance at the young woman, Elmi fell hopelessly in love. He kept his love a secret until he could bear concealing it no longer and revealed his affection to his closest friends Musa Farah and Tabase. Eventually word spread throughout the village but Hodan never returned Elmi’s love. He began composing poetry about Hodan and this unrequited love.

She is altogether fair: Her fine-shaped bones begin her excellence; Magnificent of bearing, tall is she; A proud grace is her body’s greatest splendor; Yet she is gentle, womanly, soft of skin. Her gums’ dark gloss is like unto blackest ink; And a careless flickering of her slanted eyes Begets a light clear as the white spring moon. My heart leaps when I see her walking by, Infinite suppleness in her body’s sway. I often fear that some malicious djinn May envy her beauty, and wish to do her harm.

From Qaraami (Passion) as presented by Margaret Laurence in A Tree for Poverty.

Elmi couldn’t bring himself to directly approach Hodan. He heard she washed clothes near a well with other women from Berbera once a week and went to the spot in the hope of meeting her. She didn’t come. He went to her aunt’s house with Musa Farah and tried to draw her out to talk, she refused. Elmi couldn’t sleep, he was so filled with love. One day Hodan, having heard rumors of his affection and unable to resist any longer, came to the home he shared with Musa. Elmi, exhausted, had finally fallen asleep. Hodan waited and waited but he didn’t wake up and Musa never woke him. Eventually, she left and when Elmi woke he composed a poem that said his greatest friend had caused the greatest deception.

Hodan’s father worked as an interpreter for British colonial employees and his salary placed the family solidly in the middle class, well above an itinerant baker from an obscure rural village hundreds of miles away. Hodan’s family knew of Elmi’s love and refused the match. Possibly because of economic disparity, possibly because of clan complications, possibly because of the erotic poetry he wrote of her. One poem spoke of once seeing Hodan’s naked body, a serious offense in this devoutly Muslim society.

Elmi became so distraught, barely able to eat or work and Hodan’s family was so upset about his poems that they threatened to kill him. To protect him from himself and from Hodan’s relatives, Elmi’s friends exiled him to the village of Zeila. But Zeila was not far enough away and news reached Elmi that Hodan was engaged to another, Mohamed Shabeele. He fell into a dangerous fever and delirium. In a desperate attempt to save his life his friends brought him other young, beautiful women who, as expressed in a later poem, exposed their breasts, hoping to lure him away from Hodan.

These women failed to tempt Elmi and he grew weaker and weaker, his body ravaged by both love and love denied. He hovered between life and death and after months, perhaps years, of suffering, he gave up the fight and died.

*****

The Somali language was only written down in 1977 and Somali history and culture has been primarily transferred through the millennia orally. Though blog posts and essays abound both in print and online about Elmi and Hodan, and every Djiboutian Somali I spoke with about their story had their own version, it is difficult to find a conclusive history. It is difficult, even, to find an agreed-upon spelling of Elmi’s last name. Booderi. Boderi. Bonderi. Bondhari. Boodhari.

The story as I’ve recounted it is based on articles, books, and interviews with Somalis and is filled with tangled information, half-truths, misunderstandings, and wild guesses. Some people claim Elmi is not the author of the poem Qaraami. Some say Hodan was eight years old, other that she was fifteen. Some say Hodan rushed to Elmi’s deathbed and wept tears of grief. Remorse? Love? Relief? Others say she most certainly did not come to his deathbed. One young woman, who confessed she had only heard the story, never studied it, thought Hodan died when she heard Elmi died. But Hodan actually remained happily married to Mohamed Shabeele, bore children, and allowed one of her sons, Rashiid Shabeele, to interview her about Elmi, though these interviews didn’t take place until nearly fifty years later and her son tiptoed around some of the more erotic and potentially embarrassing or dishonoring aspects of the story.

The women who bore their breasts to tempt Elmi? Probably a mistranslation and could refer to women in relatively low-cut dresses. The woman who saw Elmi’s grave in Somaliland? It is likely she saw the grave of an Indian man. Elmi’s sister Halimo Ismail Liban says Elmi asked his friends to hide his grave, adding a level of mysticism and mystery to his life and death.

The basic facts are these: A man named Elmi fell in love with a young woman named Hodan. Elmi worked at a bakery in Berbera and composed poems inspired by his love for her. He failed to win her love in return and they never married. Instead, Hodan married Mohamed Shabeele and Elmi married a woman named Faqira who later divorced him. Elmi died.

Here, the speculation comes in. What did Elmi die of? A broken heart? Every Somali I spoke to firmly believes this. Can one die of a broken heart? Why not? You stop working, stop caring for your hygiene, stop sleeping, stop eating. You wander the streets in a love- induced fog and eventually, you die. This is completely plausible in the passionate Somali worldview.

This view is vividly depicted through poetry and Somalis are famous for their poetic oral tradition but until Elmi, most poetry was used to describe war, camels and livestock, the traditions of nomadic life, and work like the poems women chanted while constructing aqals, their nomadic homes. After Elmi died, a wave of new poetry swept through Somali culture, composed and recited by young men and filled with rich, romantic vocabulary. This poetry is known as belwo and is sung as opposed to the chanted and more strictly rule-governed gabay.

Jamal Abdi Gaboobe in his doctoral thesis suggests that though few facts about Elmi’s life can be verified with absolute certainty, Elmi’s influence on Somali ideas about romance and on the evolution of Somali poetry is unparalleled, likely because of the intensity of his broken hearted suffering.

“Speaking about French culture, André Marlaux was reported to have said, “we are profiting from the suffering of Baudelaire.” The same could be said of Bodari with regard to Somali culture. Bodari’s suffering has enriched Somali culture. His poetry rescued Somali poetry and culture from the danger of irrelevance to modern life. It strengthened it, made it more capable of handling issues and concepts that until then it could not handle in an effective manner.”

Westerners, like me, who ask whether or not Elmi actually died of a broken heart or who demand facts that can be verified beyond the shadow of a doubt, are fixated on the wrong details. This causes us to overlook at least one of the broader points of the story of Elmi and Hodan, there are many, as Gaboobe writes in his thesis, which also looks at the Islamic Sufi influence on Elmi and Somali poetry. The primary issue that arose in my conversations with Djiboutian Somalis is that Elmi impacted two fundamental aspects of Somali life, among both past and modern generations.

Elmi brought poetry into the realm of the deeply personal. By the outpouring of other Somali poets following his death, it seems his courage in exposing his desire allowed others to embrace the idea of openly addressing their intimate lives and relationships through poem and song. And, Elmi’s passion revealed a gentle, affectionate side of Somali masculinity that up until his era, had remained mostly obscured behind the fierce, warrior persona.

Some say Elmi was crazy, an idiot, weak. He deserved this suffering that led to enriching Somali culture. Some say he was a hero, a creative genius, the ideal lover. To me, it doesn’t seem to matter which he was. What does matter, what seems pertinent to modern- day Somalis who are filled with passion and heat from the climate they live in, like the English student expressed, is: who would give up their life for the sake of love? This is the question young people ask as they consider romantic relationships and future marriage. Is it possible or wise to love with such abandon that one would even be willing to die?

Like Goudal said, “Who can love like that?”

Chapter 5: Worship, Rest, and Play

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Worship

There is freedom of religion in Djibouti and this is perhaps most visibly evident from one spot on the cornice. You can stand and look across the water and see a minaret, the cross atop the cathedral, and the dome of the Ethiopian orthodox church almost in a line.

My family attends the Église Protestante de Djibouti. Services are on Sunday evenings, 7:00-8:30. They are mostly conducted in French but portions of it are in English. They have a children’s program and a super-fantastic choir.

The Catholic Cathedral is just down the street from the protestant church and has a lovely building. Services are also on Sunday evenings and there is a Saturday morning women’s prayer group.

And now I confess my ignorance. I know nothing about the Ethiopian Orthodox church or the many mosques in town. I also heard a rumor that there is a synagogue but have not managed to find it.

Hang Out

Now that you’ve been in Djibouti for a while you may have made some friends. Or, you might want to make some friends. Where can you go to hang out as a family or with people? Where can you go to sit and drink juice and watch the world go by? Where can you go to see a concert or a movie (since there is no official movie theater in the country)?

The Arthur Rimbaud Cultural Center is near downtown, after Clinique Affi and before the Nougaprix, a round blue and white building inside a fence. Here you’ll find a library, including a children’s area, and an auditorium where there are often movies, concerts, school events, and cultural performances. Their website keeps a schedule posted: http://www.ambafrance-dj.org/-Institut-Francais-de-Djibouti-

Le Moulin Café, Spot Café, Pause Café, these are all in Gabode.

Casino also has a bakery and seating area. On Fridays, after prayers, this is packed full of men drinking coffee and discussing news, culture, and religion. The coffee is terrible. Probably the worst coffee I’ve ever had, and it comes in these petite cups, Dixie Cup size, but that’s about all I can handle anyway. Get something else and enjoy the cool air conditioning and company. http://www.coubeche.com/en/casino-haramous/

Buna House is downtown and here you’ll find a decent cup of coffee, but you might not find a place to sit. It is almost always crammed full and the noise is incredible – of the coffee machines and the people shouting to be heard. Also, it is mostly men. The few times I’ve gone, I’ve been the only woman other than the waitress. But I haven’t felt uncomfortable and it is a good, central and well-known location to meet someone. https://www.facebook.com/bunnahouse

Chez Mahad is a popular juice bar near the tourist section of the market, the ‘blue doors.’ Fresh squeezed orange juice, chilled watermelon juice, mango juice with a dollop of soft-serve strawberry ice cream… http://www.lonelyplanet.com/djibouti/djibouti- city/entertainment-nightlife/other/chez-mahad

Da Fortuna Gelato Italiano There is no placard outside, just a gigantic ice cream cone stuck to the side of the building. It is small, with only a few chairs and tables, but you can almost always find a seat. The gelato is incredible and not crazy expensive, this is one of my children’s favorite places to go. http://www.oshopages.com/da-fortuna-gelato- italiano-in-djibouti--253-21-35-72-02-640201.html

The Corniche families often go here in the evenings to stroll along the waterfront

Bawadi Mall is also a nice location for walking and people-watching

Play

Ah, the search for the decent playground…let the search continue. We used to love going to a place called Fun City. It was close to our house and located on a gigantic piece of property that had trees, flower bushes, and lots of open space for the kids to run. There was a sickly-looking horse they could ride, an airplane ride that went up and down and slowly spun in a circle, and all the kinds of playground equipment that don’t exist anymore in the US because of safety regulations. Teeter-totters, warped merry-go-rounds, sharp-edged slides made so hot by the sun that they burned the backs of the thighs, rickety swings. Climbing gyms that were wobbling and rusty and hard to grip with sweaty palms. We loved Fun City. But it closed down.

So now where can you go?

The International School of Djibouti in Gabode. Check the website (www.internationalschoolofdjibouti.com) to confirm details, but generally the school playground is open to all children two afternoons per week.

Nougaprix has a playground, now it is two stories. This makes me nervous because you can feel the ground shake when you are on the upper floor. They used to have a ball pit, but I didn’t let my kids go in it. Kids barfed in there. Peed in there. Did who knows what in there. This place is crazy-full on weekends and can be a fun, if slightly nerve-wracking spot to meet another family with kids.

Al-Galux is only open on weekend evenings, which makes it hard for us to get there as we are often at the beach or doing something else. But they have decent equipment that is safe and in good condition. We enjoy hosting birthday parties here.

Turtle Island is out past the US embassy, past the French military bases, and across from the end of the airport runway. It is a patch of desert where kids can play soccer, fly kites, roam around. During low tide, you can walk across the beach to an island and there are often loads of turtles in the waters around it.

Hara Mus has a new (2019) sports and playground area. You can rent the space for football games or just come for the play area.

In Gabode 4 there is a tennis court and kids can join the tennis club and play three days, or more, per week.

An arcade opened at the Bawadi Mall (see the Mall section for details)

And a movie theater, also at the mall! It is extremely difficult to find out accurate show times, because there is no website and they rely on the mall’s Facebook page, but maybe this will be updated soon. See Bawadi Mall for more info.

Swim

There are several pools in Djibouti: at the Kempinski, La Siesta, and Sheraton Hotels, and at the Haramous Pizzaiolo compound and at La Pergola. Haramous has a kiddie pool, as does the Kempinski. We don’t enjoy swimming at the Kempinski because the deep end is right in the middle of the pool and with little children, it was challenging to keep an eye on them. Also, I have been approached too many times there by drunk people enjoying the in-pool bar. We love swimming at the Sheraton because the pool is right on the ocean so there is a nice breeze and beautiful view. The other pools are also all decent in quality and the water is always warm.

Kempinski has a kiddie pool and a swim up bar, oceanside view, towels provided. This is the most expensive.

Sheraton more affordable (2,500 for the day) towels provided, oceanside view, restaurant service poolside

La Pergola sometimes the pool has a sunshade pulled over the tops, can feel private except on Fridays and holidays when more families come. Can get full service from the bar/restaurant while swimming. 2,000 for the day

Pizzaolo not often crowded, sometimes dirty. Restaurant service available, has a kiddie pool.

Healthyish small size, newest pool

Moulk Center best price, good for lap swimming. 1500 for the day

A Mosque, a Book, and a Banister (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

The Hamoudi Mosque in downtown Djibouti is considered one of the city’s most iconic structures. One gushing sightseer compared the mosque to the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. This is quite a stretch. The same sightseer encouraged visitors to arrive ‘on time,’ though he did not specify what time that should be. Presumably, he meant the Islamic prayer time but his reasoning is questionable. He claims that the mosque is inside a restricted area and several security checks must be passed through. This is also quite a stretch. The Hamoudi Mosque is in the busiest section of the city, right at the heart of the market and central bus station, and there are no security checks surrounding it and no guards posted at the entrances. Maybe once inside there are security checks but as a non- Muslim female foreigner, I have never been inside.

The mosque is located in Place Mahmoud Harbi, the official name of the bus station and this section of market and city, but almost no Djiboutians say ‘Place Mahmoud Harbi.’ Djibouti won independence from France in 1977 and until then, the area had been called Place Rimbaud. Arthur Rimbaud was a French poet who passed through Djibouti in the 1880s. Mahmoud Harbi was a Djiboutian and pan-Somalist. He labored for years, ultimately in vain, to join Djibouti to Somalia and was killed in a mysterious plane crash nearly two decades before independence. Sometime after independence the area was renamed in honor of the Djiboutian politician, though staff at the Djibouti Tourism Office weren’t sure of the exact year of the change and still today, Place Rimbaud is the moniker that lingers.

The Hamoudi Mosque stands on a triangular corner island, which gives the building a unique shape, perhaps the inspiration for the Dome of the Rock comparison. Wikipedia says the Hamoudi Mosque was built in 1906. Staff in the Djibouti Tourism Office say it was built between 1913 and 1920, by an Arab businessman named Hadji Hamoudi. People I spoke with on the streets didn’t have any idea what year it was built.

Directly in front of the mosque, across Rue de l’Ethiopie, is a food market. It used to be the fish market and reeked of slowly warming fresh fish and rotten guts. Cats prowled between tables and screeched as they fought over bones and flesh. The wall outside the fish market still has a sign painted on it, “Cleanliness is close to godliness.” Now the fish market is about two kilometers down Rue d’Arta and the milder smells associated with tomatoes, potatoes, bananas, and watermelon fill the air.

Donkey carts, buses, taxis, shoppers, and vendors cram the dusty streets, narrowed by aluminum stall overhangs and umbrellas. Some vendors sell their wares from wheelbarrows that they squeeze down walkways or park in front of open shops. Some use overturned, defunct air conditioner units as shelves or stools and hawk plastic flip flops,

barrettes, and tools carefully displayed on tarps spread over the dirt. Girls stroll with circular metal trays loaded with individual sachets of red hot sauce and fried dough balls balanced on their heads. Men hold stalks of khat and slowly chew on the leaves.

Beggars, women weaving grass baskets, and people selling fresh squeezed orange juice line the curb along all three sides of the Hamoudi Mosque. Up the slight hill the mosque sits on are the ‘blue doors.’ These are the tourist market stalls and though few of the doors are painted blue anymore, like Place Rimbaud, the name lingers.

Stalls closest to the mosque sell religious paraphernalia: tusbahs, or prayer beads, white robes for men, skull caps, walking canes, Quran stands, prayer rugs, and cassette tapes or DVDs loaded with sermons. Behind glass cases there are a few Qurans wrapped in cloth. These aren’t for sale, not to me and not to anyone. Talk of selling the Islamic holy book is highly offensive to my Djiboutian friends. Allah’s message revealed to the prophet Mohammed is too precious for money. To give the Quran a monetary value would make it too human, too fallible, stripped of all its inherent holiness.

But, vendors must earn a living and can’t pass out Qurans for free. So, how exactly does a person procure a Quran? The stall owner and the person looking for the Quran give each other gifts. The shopper could say something like, “I’m interested in having a new Quran.” The stall owner will hand him a Quran and the shopper will lay a handful of bills and coins on the countertop. They both make a fair estimate as to the matching value of the gifts, there is no haggling, and the interaction ends.

I learned this when I was looking for a French translation of the Quran and mistakenly inquired after the availability and price of one. I was told that there were no French translations available, that I should never ask the price of one, and that even if the stall had a French translation, I would not be allowed to hold it.

A few weeks later my husband visited a Djiboutian doctor and saw a French/Arabic translation on the doctor’s desk.

“My wife has been looking for a French Quran,” my husband said, and asked where I could find a copy.

“She must have mine,” the doctor said. He wrapped it in a cloth and gave it to my husband without hesitating.

Along with being an iconic building, the Hamoudi Mosque is considered one of Djibouti City’s top tourist sites. My suspicion is that this is because there aren’t many tourist sites, at least not in the city. Tourists mainly come to Djibouti for the snorkeling, scuba diving, adventure hiking, and rustic experiences available far from the city center. The mosque is as closed to me as a tourist as is buying a Quran and to get a feel for the building and the affection people feel toward it, I circle the mosque several times, looking, wondering, curious about what goes on inside.

A group of teenage boys pours out of the door after the evening prayer time. They slip into their black faux leather sandals and scurry down the steps. One of them balances on the green banister and slides down, launching himself into the cacophonous street below.

As I watch the boys who had been praying until they disappear in the crowd, I remember the long-ago feel of cold metal, the crunch of snow, the glow of a dim streetlight against ice patches on the sidewalk. I remember the onionskin pages of my Bible between my fingers and the warmth that spread to my toes when we prayed inside the building. I remember sliding down the black banister outside my church on wintery Minnesota nights.

The structure of religion and religious buildings and holy books within Islam is different than it is within the religion I grew up with and hold dear. But there are similarities and one the most fundamental similarities is that they are religions followed by people. People who don’t know the exact dates of historical events and who gift their precious books to near-strangers. People who slide down banisters after prayer.

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Chapter 6: Touring and Exploring

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Get Away

You’ve had enough of the city life and want to get away. Great. Getting out of Djibouti will introduce you to incredible, rugged beauty. Just be careful on the narrow road filled with truckers going to and from Ethiopia. Hundreds every day travel this road and the sides of the road are littered with skeletal remains of deadly accidents.

Decan is not that far out of the city, less than fifteen kilometers, out past the US military base Camp Lemonier. Decan started as a cheetah refuge and has expanded into a zoo with lions, monkeys, oryx, zebras, caracals, tortoises, porcupines, camels, ostriches, and more.

The best beaches, and most accessible ones, are Khor Ambado and Arta Plage. Khor Ambado is only a 20-30-minute drive from the city, over a super-bumpy road, but well worth the effort. You rent a shade and order lunch or bring your own food and shade. You can swim out to an abandoned ship and snorkel around or jump off the rocks at high tide into the water. Arta Plage is where you’ll find excellent snorkeling. This is a popular camping spot for families, just maybe don’t set up inside the cement structures. Those are also used as toilets.

Randa is a small village in the mountainous north of the country. Here, you can spend a night or two at an encampment where you’ll sleep in local-style huts, eat delicious meals prepared by the cooks, and be taken on a walking tour of the hills and the village, including seeing the water source, the gardens, and some of the biggest trees in the country.

Djalello is another encampment, this one operated by Decan. It is a protected refuge area and very well maintained. Spotless, decorated in a tasteful Djiboutian style, with clearly marked hiking trails and decent bathrooms and showers. For Djalello, you must get a key ahead of time by going to ATTA Travel in downtown Djibouti and booking your stay. You also must bring your own food, but utensils and cooking supplies are available at the campsite for your use.

Tadjourah is a town on the other side of the Gulf of Tadjourah and can be reached by car or by ferry. You could stay in the Gulf Hotel or right on the beach at one of several encampments. The most beautiful snorkeling is at Sable Blanc, or white sands beach.

Foret du Day is further up in the mountains than Randa and is quite cool, at least compared to the city. Here you can also stay in huts and go on hikes, this time through a slowly dying forest where you might spot the endangered Francolin bird.

Ardoukoba Volcano is an active volcano located in the middle of a vast lava field on the way to Tadjourah, just past Lac Assal. You have to drive off the road, through the lava, past the ‘great rift’ and then hike a short bit. This is where the winds in Djibouti are so strong that you might not even be able to climb up the mountain, depending on the day. But if you do, you can walk around the rim and climb down inside as well. Or explore around the lava tunnels.

Lac Assal is the lowest point in Africa and is a stunning place of brilliant white salt surrounded by black volcanic rock. You can float in here as easily as in the Dead Sea. Just don’t get any water in your eyes. There are also hot springs here, fresh water, just on the other side of the road. Bring fresh water so you can rinse off after swimming.

Isle Mucha or Musha Island is well worth a trip. Take a boat and either stay overnight on the side with air-conditioned huts and food provided or spend the day on the other side of the island, on your own. On this side you can follow a river that snakes through the roots and cool shade of the mangrove forest. Or from both sides, you can either snorkel near shore or take a boat further out and see massive eels, rays, sharks, and so much more.

Douda Golf Course Technically still in town, the 18-hole golf course is uniquely Djiboutian. It is all dirt and you bring your own small patch of green turf. You will likely need to dodge flocks of goats or camel trains.

Douda Beach Near the golf course, but on the ocean side of the road to Somaliland, is Douda Beach. 500 franc/person for entry and there are umbrellas and chairs set up on the beach for use. There is a small, run down playground and outhouse-style toilets. There are also bungalows on stilts that people can rent for an afternoon or evening. This is mostly shallow but at high tide, is a great kayaking location, through the mangrove rivers. Often you can see flocks of flamingos here.

The Grand Bara Desert is worth stopping in as you drive past it to Ali Sabieh. This is one of the longest stretches of flat, uninterrupted earth on the planet. Sometimes massive dust storms pick up over the desert and once in a while you can spot ostrich. Every December, the French military hosts a 15k run, the Grand Bara 15k. You can register for this by contacting the French military base in November.

Kite Surfing You can do this in the Grand Bara. Be sure to arrange with a reputable tour guide, like Rushing Waters, to make sure the staff are on site when you arrive.

Hike from Arta Town to Arta Plage You can do this on your own, have someone drop you off in Arta Town and follow a very rough and unmarked path downward toward the beach. I recommend having an experienced hiker with you, simply so you don’t get lost. It takes between 2-3 hours. Make sure you arrange for someone to pick you up at the beach, or you’ll be hiking back up the mountain! Also, in November every year there is a Peace Walk 15k that starts in Arta Town.

Volunteer If you would like to use some of your time in Djibouti to do service projects, consider volunteering at Caritas in downtown Djibouti. They work with homeless youth. There is also a bead and bread project, run by local women. For information on this, contact Rachel Jones (www.djiboutijones.com)

Who Do I Call?

Rushing Water Adventures, ranked #1 on Trip Advisor for all tours and adventures in Djibouti: http://www.kayakdjibouti.com/ or call +253 77 794958 or email: [email protected]

Mohamad Atbara, also known as Petit Mohamed +253 77692728

Dolphin Excursions http://dolphin-excursions.com/ Or call +253 21 347807

Atta Travel https://atta-dj.com/en/home/ or call +253 21 354848

Agence de Tourism www.leslacs.dj Les Lacs +253 77822291

Agence Safar [email protected] +253 77814115

Le Goubet [email protected] +253 21354520

Guide Houmed Loita +253 77822291

Siyyan Travel [email protected] +253 77103674

Abdullah 77810822 – for a boat to the islands

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White Gold (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

For centuries, salt caravans have crossed the Danakil Depression between Djibouti and Ethiopia. Camels, led by Afar men and laden with salt bricks and crystals and smaller granules to trade, plod across this brutal portion of the Great Rift Valley, the 6,000 kilometers-long trench stretching from northern Syria to Mozambique.

The salt comes from Lac Assal (Salt Lake), the lowest point in Africa and, at 155 meters below sea level, the third lowest depression on earth. It is the second most salinated lake in the world, after Don Juan Pond in Antarctica. Volcanoes surround the lake like sentries, ancient and immovable pillars. One of them, Ardoukoba Volcano, erupted in 1978 and left a swath of lava tunnels and desiccated earth between the lake and the Gulf of Tadjourah. The dry winds and relentless sun that scorch the land and sap the air of moisture have earned this region the nickname Hell.

In 1937 Edgar Aubert de la Rüe and his wife began the arduous task of mapping Djibouti, or what was then known as French Somaliland. In the region of the Ghoubbet el-Kharab they descended into Lac Assal, into hell. Under the full moon, so as to avoid the blistering sun, they hiked down a corridor carved into the basalt, passing the graves of people who had apparently died of thirst.

They climbed over cliffs and by the time they reached the lake, beads of sweat had formed on their brows, as though they were in a steam bath though the day had not yet fully begun. “We felt we were literally suffocating,” Edgar wrote about the hike, “and there was a violent, brusque wind.”

French explorers Joseph Kessel and Henri Monfried had stumbled across Lac Assal seven years earlier, in 1930, while following an ancient slave trading path from Ethiopia to the Red Sea. They referred to the “death waters of Lac Assal” and described the gorge as having been sculpted by demons in the pit of hell. Monfried wrote that the lake had three circles, the heat and the imagery not unlike Dante’s Inferno. “One of black lava, one of shining silver, and one of intense blue.”

More recently, to encourage tourism, the hellish and demonic descriptions of Lac Assal have been replaced by poetic, less apocalyptic, language. “A lake like mint,” one tour book writes, “fringed with vapor, encrusted with salt cubes, like milky oil in a bowl of ink.”

In 1986 a French magazine recommended that tourists leave Djibouti Town by 5 a.m. in order to reach the lake by 9 a.m. and avoid the 50 degrees Celsius springtime

temperatures. The same magazine offered two pieces of advice: 1) not to drive on the salt crust and 2) to avoid swimming because there is no water to rinse off the salt afterwards.

When my family visits the lake, which on newer roads now takes less than two hours to reach, we drive on the salt crust (and give the Jeep a thorough washing upon returning home), swim in the lake (it is almost impossible to stand, the salt makes the body so buoyant) and bring our own jugs of water for washing.

Expatriate life in Djibouti is filled with hills and valleys, Ardoukoba volcano peaks and Danakil depressions. Some days, Lac Assal looks like the minty, vapor-fringed bowl of ink described in the newer tour guides. Other days, when I want to cry from homesickness, the lake looms like a graveyard of salt-encrusted cattle ribs and bird carcasses.

We first visited Lac Assal the day after Christmas in 2004, two years after we had left Minnesota. Two years since we had seen snow or felt cold. My husband turned the air conditioner in the car on high, said, “Pretend its snow,” and spun circles on the salt crust while our three-year old twins squealed from the back seat. But when we climbed out of the car, heat blasted away all memories of a snowy Minnesota holiday. The kids cried after they dipped their fingers in the lake and then touched their eyes.

While tourists swim and snap photos around the lake, the Afar camel herders begin their trek to Ethiopia. “Faite pisser vos chameux,” they shout, the traditional call to start the day, Make your camels piss! Bricks are the simplest form in which to extract and transport the salt, but Lac Assal is also known for its rare salt balls, or Afar Salt Pearls. Salt bricks are carved from the crusty shore. Salt balls are found beneath the honey-thick water of the lake.

Ever since the French established a presence in Djibouti in March of 1862, there has been interest in developing the production and exportation of salt bricks and slabs from Lac Assal, the world’s largest salt reserve. French explorers hoped to become rich. French diplomats hoped to gain power. France hoped to win out over Britain and Italy in colonial advancement in the Horn of Africa. The only natural resource was salt, white gold.

In 1887 a concession signed between local sultans and two French men, Leon Chefneux and Robert Bonnet, gave the foreigners the right to trade salt from the lake for the next fifty years. The exception was that the Afar traders maintained control over the salt trade with Ethiopia. After interpersonal disagreements, the arrangement ended. Five years later the project was relaunched but this time the sultans refused to hand the lake over to the French.

More than a hundred years after the failed negotiations, salt projects continue to come and go at Lac Assal. Currently a new port at Ghoubbet, with the aim of exporting salt, is under stop-and-go construction. Various international agencies and sovereign governments have participated in talks and development planning for Lac Assal.

While governments plan and companies create business arrangements for high tech extraction and export, Afar salters break the lake’s crinkling surface by striking it with sticks. They gather bricks of salt, crystallized by the rapid evaporation in the dry, fire- wind atmosphere of the lake. Cylindrical coffers carry 3-12 kilograms of salt, 120-150 kilograms per camel.

The five-week journey takes the Afars through Hamad Ela village, where a salt tax is levied on each camel, to the Afar Ethiopian town of Berahile, where the salt is unloaded and moved by truck to Mekele. From Mekele, the salt is distributed throughout the country. It is used as table salt or added to animal feed. In the past, the salt bricks themselves were used as currency. Now the salt fetches approximately $9 per camel load.

In the past the men slung their arms over Kalashnikovs or AK-47s balanced across their shoulders. Since independence from France in 1977, since the ending of Djibouti’s civil war and final peace talks in 2001, since the passage of laws that forbid personal ownership of guns, walking sticks have replaced firearms. They carry no meat. They drink water or sometimes camel milk. They revel in the freedom and beauty of this desolate land.

Let the developers debate funding and ownership and the future, let my family continue to bring tourists to the lake. The salt caravans press on, steady and oblivious to international borders and foreign transplants, heading to Ethiopia to trade the white gold from hell.

Quotes and dates and some descriptions taken from L’Or Blanc de Djibouti, translated into English by Rachel Pieh Jones.

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Transportation

Taxis are green and white. None of them have meters, some have seatbelts, most have windshields. A taxi will take you anywhere but be sure to negotiate the price before getting in. Close rides are 500 franc. To get across town, like from the airport to the Kempinski, or places in Balbala, be prepared to pay 2-3,000. They are generally safe, though women should take caution if they are riding alone late at night, especially if leaving from one of the bars or clubs. The driving may not be what a Western visitor is accustomed to, but accidents are rare inside the city limits of Djibouti. Street addresses are not common so if you are not going to a well-known location, you might need to direct your driver.

Buses come in two sizes: short and long. Short buses are 40 franc/ride and long buses are 50 franc. They take certain routes and the man hanging out the door and jangling coins in his hand will shout out the line. There are no designated stops other than downtown. Just get off wherever and whenever you like. You can pound on the roof, shout, “Wope, wope,” or “joog,” say, “arrete ici,” or simply say “stop.” Be prepared to squish and feel free to bring anything onboard, many children, many bags, goats or sheep, anything goes if you can fit it (mostly) inside.

To flag down a taxi or a bus, put out one hand, palm down and wave your fingers toward the ground. Or, catch the driver’s eye through the window and raise your chin in his direction.

If you look foreign and lost, don’t be surprised if someone pulls up next to you and asks if you are lost or if you would like a ride, taxi driver or not. It is totally up to you whether you decide to accept or not. I have accepted rides from strangers and at other times, I’ve thanked them and declined.

Rent a car Renting a car is possible, though not exactly easy.

Marill works in conjunction with Europcar http://www.groupe-marill.com/en/activite/djibouti-0 +253 21 329425

Europcar has an office at the airport and in town. https://www.europcar.com/location/djibouti/djibouti +253 21 329425

Hertz As of 2018, Hertz has many signs around town and an office at the airport. However the website doesn’t allow the option of renting a car in Djibouti. You will need to arrange the car in person upon arrival or based on when you would like to use it. https://djibouti.rentalcars24h.fr/djibouti-international-airport/hertz

Pyramid This is where we get our car serviced. They also do rentals. Located in Route Boulaos-zone Industrielle +253 21 358203

Some companies will only rent a car for seven-days at a time. Some companies will require you to hire a driver. It can be more financially prudent to simply rely on taxis in the city or to hire a tour guide to take you outside the city.

The Djibouti-Ethiopia Train

The train opened for passengers in January, 2018 (despite news reports that it opened in 2016). The project was built by China between 2011 and 2016, funded on the Ethiopian side by the Ethiopian government and China Exim Bank. Chinese companies will manage the running of the trains until 2023. It is 759 kilometers between Addis Ababa and Djibouti Town and the train can reach speeds of 120 km/hour but rarely does and the trip takes about 13 hours total, including a brief stop in Dire Dawa, Ethiopia. One downside to the train is that both stations are located far from the city centers, so plan to pay for a taxi anywhere you need to go, the fare from Nagad Station to downtown in Djibouti will run about 2,000 franc or more.

It runs several days a week, except when it doesn’t, ticket prices depend on your seating choice. Below, you’ll find a link to the most recent (as of the publishing date of this book) prices and schedules. Be sure to confirm on your own just in case there have been changes. At this point, the only way to purchase a ticket in Djibouti is to go to the station directly. Make sure you have a valid visa for Ethiopia.

Nagad Station is easily reached by taking the road that passes by the Japanese and US military camps. You’ll reach a T, to the left will be a check point and eventually, the border with Somaliland. To the right, about 1 kilometer down, is the beautiful, new station.

Rumors are that occasionally the train needs to stop for animals on the track or even after hitting animals on the track. Or, there could be delays because of electrical outages, so arrival times are slightly flexible. The train does have air conditioning and the seating arrangement appears to be flexible, i.e., sit where you want, not necessarily in the number marked on your ticket. Bring food and water.

More info here: https://www.seat61.com/Ethiopia.htm

Flying into Djibouti is fairly straightforward.

Visas are available at the airport and now online https://www.evisa.gouv.dj. The airport is small but small does not mean efficient. You won’t be rushed through the immigration line, but you will get through. Your bags may or may not be searched, depending on whether or not the x-ray machine is working. You will need to present all your ticket stubs, for every flight you took before reaching Djibouti, so don’t throw them away.

Options for flights include:

Kenya Airways. KQ flies every other day to Nairobi. Sometimes there is a touch down in Addis Ababa, but Kenya-bound passengers don’t get off. From Nairobi, passengers can fly all over the world.

Ethiopian Airlines. Flies to Dire Dawa, Ethiopia, and to Addis Ababa. From Addis Ababa, passengers can fly all over the world.

Qatar Airways. Flies to Qatar two days a week.

Air France. Flies to Paris one day a week and is by far the most expensive option.

Daallo. Flies to Hargeisa, Somaliland and to Dire Dawa, Ethiopia, and Mogadishu, Somalia

Air Djibouti. Flies to Hargeisa, Somaliland.

Turkish Airlines. Flies to Istanbul two days a week.

Fly Dubai. Flies to Dubai two days a week.

Each airline has offices in downtown Djibouti. Some have online purchase options.

Biking is a quick way to get around certain sections of town but be extremely careful when biking, drivers are not looking out for you and they are not looking out for lanes or donkey carts or massive trucks or cars going the wrong direction. Also, not all roads are paved and even those that are can be quite bumpy, so be prepared to be jostled. That said, many people do bike. Lock it up when you stop. For where to ride for longer rides and exercise, see Running section

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The Bawadi Mall

https://www.facebook.com/djiboutibawadimall/

If you try to google the Bawadi Mall, you’ll find one, but this is not Djibouti’s Bawadi Mall. Use the Facebook link or look up Bawadi Mall on Facebook, just be sure to clarify the Djibouti Mall, not the one in Al Ain, UAE.

The mall opened with a partial opening in December 2017. Over the next year, more and more stores were added. There are still rumors and signs of a movie theater, the only one in Djibouti open to the public, but there is no actual theater yet.

The mall is secure, clean, air conditioned, and fairly small, but it is a mall and that is no small thing in Djibouti.

On holidays and other special occasions, the mall often hosts family-friendly events like bands or tumbling acts.

Location The mall is on Rue de Venice, near the roundabout with the blue dolphins

Hours 9:00 a.m.-10:00 p.m. 7-days/week

Stores Geant Casino grocery store, household, like an American Target Marso African style clothing DjibCloud technology Shoe Express La Grand Recre toys Kayan Tobacco Beauty Success makeup and perfume CAC International Bank Eye and Watch Le Sporting

Honey Store Max Fashion clothing Kashkha clothing SVAMC clothing, shoes, accessories Bank of Africa L’Elixir perfume and makeup Le Bonheur men’s clothing LG appliances Shakir Furniture household Discorama kiosque

Restaurants Chicking Ethiopian Coffee Café Gourmand Bombay Grill Kat Kout’s (Djiboutian food) Bharat Mahal Point Burger

Children’s Arcade Fun Time

Movie Theater Star Cinemas Djibouti, call or check their Facebook page for showtimes. https://www.facebook.com/StarCinemasDjibouti/

+253 21357807 +253 21252121

Money

Exchange Rate

1.00 USD 177 DJF 1.00 Euro 206 DJF 1.00 Pound 234 DJF 1.00 Yuan 26 DJF 1.00 Kenyan Shilling 1.77 DJF 1.00 Ethiopian Birr 6.35 DJF

Djibouti is expensive. This surprises many people and the actual expensivity of the expensiveness surprises them even more. Yes, I made that word up. Its fine, it’s true. You can get by sort of cheaply: buses, street food, cheap hotels or couch surfing, but if you want to enjoy a sit-down meal without wild cats at your feet or if you want to stay in a hotel with a pool or even just a hotel that isn’t a dive or if you want to leave the city on a tour, show me the money. Or rather, show Djibouti the money, though if you’d like to leave me a tip for all this awesome advice, I’m not adverse to that.

You cannot use travelers checks in Djibouti and there are only a few grocery stores that accept credit cards. Once in a while, the credit card system is down. You will need cash. I repeat, you will need cash. No matter how many times I say this to newcomers, there are a few who don’t believe me. Bring cash.

There are ATMs but once in a while they are empty. Bring cash.

That said, you can withdraw money from ATMs, which are located in the major grocery stores: Casino and al-Gamil. There are also ATMs near banks, outside the airport, and downtown.

At Casino, you can pay in dollars, Euros, or Yuan, but you will not get a good exchange rate.

So, with the cash that you brought (because you brought some, right?), if you don’t withdraw franc from an ATM, you’ll need to turn your money into Djiboutian money. You can do this at a bank or with the money ladies.

That’s not their official title, but they are ladies and they exchange money.

Go downtown and on every corner around the Hammoudi Mosque and bus station area, you will see women sitting with large cloth bags in their laps. These are the money ladies. They have heaps of cash, in several currencies, and will exchange whatever they can. Yuan to Euro, birr to dollars, Somaliland shillings to Kenyan shillings, dollars to franc. I have never run into a problem with theft or deceit in the exchange rate. Simply drive up, roll your window down, and explain what you need. I generally do this for up to $500 to DJF.

To tip or not to tip? Tipping has not been common in Djibouti until recently and it is still optional. That said, more and more Djiboutians do leave tips at cafes or restaurants. Generosity is never looked down upon. A few hundred franc is a good starting point, depending on the size of the meal or the party.

Beggars, to give or not to give? This is totally up to you. Again, generosity is never looked down upon. Some people carry bags of dates in their cars and pass them out to children on street corners. Others simply give a few coins. Others say no. Others say they give to the local mosque or church or aid project instead of to individuals. You don’t have to give, but do consider the humanity of the person asking and offer them dignity by not being rude or aggressive.

Etiquette

Top touring tips 1. Be respectful 2. Be curious 3. Be kind 4. Be generous 5. Be humble 6. Don’t litter 7. Ask before taking photos 8. Don’t photograph police or government officials or sites 9. Bargain 10. Respect Islam 11. Learn some history before you go 12. Laugh at yourself 13. Enjoy differences, don’t judge them 14. Try it, taste it, explore it

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To Kiss Or Not to Kiss (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

I'm at a dinner party. A person approaches, their face bright with a wide smile. Cheeks shimmer with a thin sheen of ever-present Djibouti sweat. The face gets closer, closer, closer. It is almost touching mine now, looming, damp, expectant. I have less than two seconds to process several things: gender, nationality, age, religion, and urban vs. rural. I have to process these things in order to respond appropriately and to prepare for potential outcomes.

Djibouti is a complicated mixture of Somali, Afar, Yemeni, French, Ethiopian, and 'other' cultures. This means there is a complicated mixture of possible appropriate greetings. Two cheek kisses for French men or women, also children. Unless I inadvertently put out an "I'm a cold American" vibe, in which case just as I am about to pucker up and lean in, they thrust out their hand for a handshake which, as the other person isn't used to it, may be surprisingly vigorous or uncomfortably limp.

Three cheek kisses for Ethiopian women. A nod of the head toward Brits and a wave and smile for the Americans, of either gender, usually accompanied by “Hey.” For Djiboutian women, grab their hand and kiss the back of it, then they will pull it toward themselves to kiss the back, a third kiss seems optional. This should be firm and confident, not weak or flimsy. Also, cheek kisses are acceptable. The trouble comes in when I go for the hand and they go for the cheek. This can quickly be turned into a handholding and kissing greeting.

If I make a mistake and go the wrong direction, I will end up kissing my friend on the lips. Or I will end the number of kisses too early and offend my friend. Or I will end the kissing early, realize it when the other person is left hanging mid-cheek-kiss, and I will try to make up for it by coming back in to fulfill the count obligation but the other person has already pulled back and now I'm hanging mid-cheek-kiss, and we both laugh awkwardly. Or I will shake the hand when I should have kissed the cheek, I will kiss the cheek when I should have kissed the hand, I will kiss a man of a nationality I should not be kissing, or I will kiss people in the wrong order according to age. I may also end up with my face squeezed between the warm, damp palms of an elderly rural woman and she will pinch me and pull my face close for a loud, juicy, full-on lip kiss. And then another and another, each one wetter and louder than the last, and some things you just need to be prepared for. I speak from experience.

Even though I've lived in a kissing culture for over sixteen years, kissing sometimes still feels weird. There are still so many questions, even when I know whom to kiss and how many times, and on which body part. How much actual contact between lips and cheek

(elderly rural woman aside)? None. Simply brushing cheeks is fine. Think about it – people would have to contort their lips around to the side if both greeters’ lips were supposed to actually touch skin. Should there be an accompanying noise? Sure, within reason. But not the fakey ‘mwah, mwah.’ More of a quick smack or pop. Unless I am kissing friends from Madagascar, they seem to prefer silence. What if the noise comes out anyway, loud or juicy? Oops. Ignore it, maybe no one else noticed.

The more I consider it, however, it isn't actually the kissing or cheek-brushing that feels strange, I prefer that now to the full body hug that people who barely know each other in the United States might give. When hugging a taller man, where do you put your hands? Do you reach up for the neck or go low around his waist? Where do you put your head? Lean into his chest with your cheek? Smash your face right into his body? Do the side- hug thing? How close do you hug? How long do you hug? Do you tap-tap-tap with your hands on his back? Do you add an extra little squeeze? What about a shorter man? I don't really want his face pressed into my chest, so...awkward side hug it is. We should have just kissed cheeks.

What feels strange about the kiss is my accompanying uncertainty as to when it is to be employed. Do I kiss everyone I see, even if I'm in a rush? But right there lies an important issue - the American get-the-work-done versus the local value-the-relationship conflict. Since I am not in America, I better get kissing. But do I kiss people I'm just meeting for the first time? What about the guy I recognize but we've never really talked and now we find each other in the grocery check-out line together? Probably not. But if someone else introduces us, then yes, kiss. Right? Maybe not. In a group do I kiss in a certain order? Do I interrupt a conversation between two people simply so I can kiss one of them, the one I know? And then should I kiss both of them just because, well, we love kissing? Do I kiss upon arrival and departure? If I’m sitting when the person leans in, do I stand? Should I have stood up earlier? How long afterwards, while they make the smooching rounds in a group, do I remain standing?

I've asked friends and feel reasonably confident that I can greet a local woman appropriately, that I can attend a local wedding or a funeral and not be an embarrassment to the host or an unconsciously rude guest. My trouble comes when I take into account that there are more than Djiboutian people in my life. There are Yemenis, Kenyans, Ethiopians, French, Germans, Brits, Italians, Americans, Nigerians, Congolese…

I feel most comfortable greeting Djiboutian friends, Somali and Afar, and I feel least comfortable when greeting French friends. I suspect this is because I have spent more time in Somalia and Djibouti than in France and have invested more energy learning the local culture than I have invested in learning the ways of the large expatriate French community.

People often recommend that when you are in doubt about kissing, don’t. I disagree. At least in this particular part of the world and when you are a foreigner, better to be overly warm and friendly. I’m already foreign, I already stick out, and people already tease me

about my strange mannerisms. I may as well give them one more thing to laugh at and talk about behind my (warm and friendly) back.*

I think my best solution regarding the conundrum of greeting people is to simply act like the old bush women. I should walk up to friends and strangers alike, grab their faces, and plant a fat, juicy smacker-oo on their lips. People will think I'm bizarre, not entirely sane. But I'm an American who has lived in the Horn of Africa for over sixteen years, fifteen of those years in the brain-numbing heat of Djibouti. It is highly possible that they're right.

Here I come, pucker up.

*I mean this woman to woman or man to man. I don’t recommend going around a Muslim country and kissing people of the opposite gender. If a person of the opposite gender initiates (kiss, handshake, stare, or eyes to the ground), reciprocate in kind.

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Health, Safety, Danger, Annoyances

There are a few specific health risks in Djibouti. This is not medical advice. I am not a doctor.

Heat stroke, heat exhaustion, sunburn. Djibouti is hot. It is really, really hot. All year round, even through the night. Also, Djibouti is close to the equator. You will get sunburned. Slather it on, slather it on the kids, do it again because you’ll sweat it off. Then do it again. Drink water. Drink more water. Keep drinking water. Watch out for signs of overheating, especially in children. You might need to move slowly or take more rests if you’re hiking. No problem.

Dengue Fever. There is dengue fever in Djibouti, my daughter has had it twice and my husband once. There’s nothing to take to prevent it and nothing to take to cure it, but it is painful and can lead to serious health risks which require hospitalization. So: use mosquito nets or bug spray.

Malaria. Malaria is rare in Djibouti, but it does occur. If you are touring for a short time, it is recommended to take prophylaxis. Also, many people living long term in Djibouti do take prophylaxis. If you can’t or don’t want to be on medication, use mosquito nets and bug spray and be sure to get any strange fever tested immediately. The best place to do this is Lab Abdan, near the French Cultural Center downtown.

Wild dogs. There are packs of wild dogs and they can be nasty. Most of the time, they are harmless. But once in a while, they have been known to chase someone. I have actually been bitten, once, while on a run. There’s no need for a rabies vaccination, but do be wary of the dogs. If you are chased, it is totally appropriate to pick up a rock and feign throwing it at the dog. This is usually sufficient to thwart them.

Cholera, Typhoid, Tuberculosis, HIV. These disease do exist in Djibouti. Wash your hands, wash your fruits and vegetables, drink filtered or bottled water. Don’t sleep around. Make sure that if you need medical care, it is at a reputable clinic or hospital so that equipment is clean.

Worms. For anyone living in Djibouti long term, especially if you have pets or children, it is highly recommended that you deworm on a bi-annual schedule. This is very easy to do. Go to a pharmacy, tell them you need Vermox and for what age of person. Do the

whole family at the same time. Its gross but necessary and really no big deal. If you experience severe diarrhea or stomach or intestinal pain, see a doctor for a more serious deworming medication or a possible test for something more serious.

Giardia. I have known many people who contracted giardia. This can be dealt with with Cipro or other medications. If you are sick with vomiting and/or diarrhea, be very careful to stay hydrated.

Pickpockets, theft, crime

Pickpocketing is about the worst crime that happens to tourists. In crowded areas, keep an eye on your wallet or purse. There are occasional home break-ins, but these are very rare and rarely violent. Violent crime is almost unheard of. Djibouti is quite safe. Make wise choices and use discretion.

Being overcharged or ‘ripped off’ is not a crime. You are a foreigner or a tourist, you probably have a lot more money or assets than the person you are bargaining with. They are not being deceptive, they are being smart.

Harassment

This is something I have experienced a lot of. Women, in particular, and white foreigners, may be harassed. One of the reasons I have experienced it is because I understand the local languages. If you don’t understand, don’t worry! If you ever feel unsafe, the best advice I have is to tell someone. Anyone. Once, I was being harassed while on a run. I passed a homeless man, stopped, and started talking to him as though I knew him. He was shocked, but the man harassing me turned around and walked away. Other times, I have asked policemen to step in and help me. Djiboutians generally take hospitality seriously and if you ask for help, they will respond and defend you.

What to do if you get seriously ill or have a serious accident? Healthcare is not awesome in Djibouti, I’m sorry to say.

It is not recommended that you have surgery or undergo a major medical procedure in Djibouti. For things like broken bones, get them set, and then go somewhere else. Kenya, the UAE, France, the US…

If you have an emergency, the best hospital is now located inside the French military base. This makes it very difficult for outsiders to get medical care.

It is still the first place I go in an emergency. If you are American, also contact the US embassy for assistance.

In the front office, there is a phone hanging on the wall. Use that to call the hospital. An escort will come get you. The only people permitted inside are those with passports.

No matter where you go, bring a passport and bring cash.

Your other options are (see hospitals and clinics for more information on these): Peltier Hospital Al Rahma Hospital The Sudanese Hospital SDMS clinic

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Resources

Djibouti Jones www.djiboutijones.com (mine, I’m biased). This site is about life at the crossroads of faith and culture and it chronicles my family’s life and experiences in the Horn of Africa.

Expats of Djibouti Facebook Group https://www.facebook.com/groups/362100957281135/

Djibouti on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/unicef_djibouti/ https://www.instagram.com/djibeautifull/ https://www.instagram.com/aboutdjibouti/

French embassy and info in French

US embassy in Djibouti

French Facebook group Bon plans et entraide a Djibouti – this is a great place to find items for sale and social events. You have to ask to join the group.

Books and Movies

Any book by Abdourahman Waberi, especially Passage of Tears.

Djibouti, by Elmore Leonard. This book uses the name Djibouti, but it doesn’t represent Djibouti very accurately. In fact, Leonard said he never visited but liked the sound of the name.

Red, in this movie, Djibouti makes a minor appearance when Morgan Freeman shows up as a fake general from Djibouti. The flag waves for a few seconds, on the front of his diplomatic vehicle.

The Train to Djibouti, by Lara Kassa

The Monk of Mokha, by Dave Eggers, briefly mentions Djibouti

Books about the Horn of Africa (not necessarily Djibouti) http://www.djiboutijones.com/2013/12/10-books-about-the-horn-of-africa-published-in- 2013/

Itineraries

When to visit The best time to visit Djibouti is in the winter. November-March is ideal, both for weather and for whale sharking, a must-do.

If you just can’t get to Djibouti in the winter, and even if you do, plan for heat and sun. Bring a hat, sunblock, light-weight quick-dry clothing, and plenty to drink. If you will be hiking or camping, also consider bringing electrolyte tablets like Nuun, or Gatorade.

Itinerary Suggestions

Two Days

Taking a layover or a long weekend? How can you pack those most into a two-day visit?

Warning: almost everything outside the city will require a four-wheel drive vehicle (see car rentals). In the city and to other major towns, you can rely on taxis and buses.

Beach Bum Two Days

If you want to relax and swim but don’t want to go for long drives.

Day One: check into your hotel and catch a ride (either with your host or rent a car) to Khor Ambado beach. This is about 25-minutes outside Djibouti City and has one brief, incredibly rocky section. The beach is beautiful. Sandy, surrounded by rocky hills, clear water. At high tide, walk down the beach and there are two rocky outcroppings from which you can jump. One lower and one higher. The rocks and are sharp for climbing up and there can be the occasional sting ray below, so it is recommended to wear sandals. Also, make sure the tide is high enough!

The reef is fairly far from shore here, but people do still snorkel and there is a shipwreck, visible from shore and not too far away for strong swimmers or kayakers, great for snorkeling around.

There are a few beach restaurants and you can rent a shade with tables and chairs for 500- 1,000 franc/person, plus the cost of the food you order. Or, you can drive a bit further down the beach and set up on your own for free.

Stay until sunset and watch the crabs come out in droves. The sound of their clacking fills the air as they fight over holes.

Enjoy a dinner of mukbasa back in town, at a Yemeni fish joint on Avenue 13, for the best local fare served quick and hot. There isn’t a sign for the restaurant, just ask a passerby for mukbasa.

Day Two: Enjoy a breakfast of croissants and coffee, or fried liver and bread if you prefer, and head out in the morning to Arta Plage.

This is about an hour and forty-five-minute drive from town. Turn off Route 1 after Oueh Village, near the Djiboutian military camp. Now you’ll be off road for about 15 kilometers, just follow the road as it heads toward the sea. When you see the French military base, right at the edge of the ocean, turn in. Yes, turn in, they won’t stop you. Keep driving and over a small hill, you’ll see the end of the road. There are a few squat, dilapidated buildings, and a large hill. That’s where you’re going.

The buildings are the leftovers of a once-dreamed-of resort. Now, they are changing rooms and toilets.

Here, you’re on your own for food and water and shelter. Bring it all. Great beach day food includes simply grabbing a rotisserie chicken before you leave the city, and a few baguettes.

This is a rocky beach, so keep your sandals on unless you are snorkeling or diving and have flippers. The coral is really sharp, my entire family has scars on our legs. We spend a lot of time here.

For people who don’t want to swim, you can climb over the hill (ignore the “Danger of Death” sign, seriously, just ignore it). Up on top of the hill there is a memorial to soldiers killed in a training accident (it was years ago, really, you’re safe). Kids enjoy digging around for spent bullet cartridges up here. Keep going and follow the trail down the other side where you’ll find a shallow and sandy, more secluded beach.

For those who want to snorkel, jump in. This is the best thing about Arta Plage. The reef is mere meters from shore and the fish come right up to shore. This means even toddlers can slap on a pair of goggles and see the incredible sea life, or people who can’t swim can use a flotation device and pop their head under water without fear. Starfish, octopi, and more swim just off shore and can be easily spotted by the astute observer.

Follow the reef along the hillside and you can go for hours, just make sure to take a buddy.

You’ll find eels, turtles, dolphins, Nemo and Dori, mackerel, lion fish, black tip reef sharks, an absolutely incredible array of creatures, the colors are astounding, and the area is compact, so much in such a small area.

If you are here during whale-sharking season, which typically runs December through mid-February, though they have been spotted outside this time period as well, you can easily rent a boat at Arta Plage. Especially on weekends, but also during the week, local fishermen turn their boats into tour boats.

Haggle for a good price (generally 2-4,000/person) and hop in. Know, though, that you will need to be careful of things like the ship’s motor and the lack of flotation devices. If you need them, bring your own life jackets. And, tell, absolutely tell, the boat captain to TURN OFF the motor when people are jumping in and out of the boat or swimming nearby. This is essential.

Also, these are living creatures. Be respectful. Don’t touch or harass them.

This is the wild sea, so there are dangers. Be careful of the razor-sharp coral. There are also stonefish here, jellyfish sometimes, and other stingy and bitey creatures. Be wary of picking up shells as well.

Be respectful. Arta Plage is rapidly turning into a garbage strewn dump. If you bring something with you, take it out with you. Don’t leave behind your trash.

At the end of a long relaxing and exhilarating day, head back to town and crash, or rush to the airport.

City Tour Two Days

Don’t want to leave the city, or can’t?

There are no museums or true theaters in Djibouti. So, what can you do in town?

Day One: Check out Riyaad Market for food and local clothing and trinkets. This is down Rue d’Arta from downtown. The market that is in central downtown where you can find touristy items is locally known as “The Blue Doors.” After perusing this section, cross the street and enjoy fresh squeezed juices, with or without ice cream.

Then, walk over to Avenue 13, through the lower market, and find mukbasa for a delicious lunch of Yemeni fish and sides.

Take it easy in the afternoon or enjoy people-watching at La Siesta beach or at Kempinski beach, on the opposite side of the peninsula and next to the Kempinski Hotel. You can maybe even join in a game of pick-up soccer or volleyball.

In the evening, head to the Corniche for a stroll along the water and the port, if you’re lucky, you’ll be able to watch some container ships load and unload. Enjoy a seaside dinner at the Moonlight Café or l’Amite. In the middle of the Corniche there is also a quick ice cream stop.

Day Two: There are several options to enjoy, accessible via taxi.

Golf at the Douda golf club, one of the world’s only all-sand golf course. You can hire a caddy who will carry a piece of green for you. Do this in the early morning, before the sun gets too hot.

In the afternoon, explore the DECAN animal refuge, open only in the afternoon. Zebra, monkeys, cheetahs, lions, and more, can be seen here.

Or, head to Turtle Island, this is a beach area close to the US embassy and the Gabode neighborhoods. It’s a great area for playing soccer, flying kites, or simply enjoying the sound of the sea. Our favorite thing to do here is to rent kayaks or stand up paddle boards from Rushing Waters and paddle around the island. It is almost a guarantee that you will see stingrays and massive sea turtles out here.

Enjoy a relaxing French dinner at Djibouti’s oldest restaurant, La Gare.

Get Outta Town Two Days

Want to try and see it all? You can’t. But, here are some highlights.

Day One: Get on the road early. Drive to Lac Assal, the salt lake. Along the way, stop at Djibouti’s Grand Canyon and hike around the rocks, check out the souvenirs. Swim in the lake (be sure to bring fresh water for rinsing) and then explore the hot springs (they really are hot, several people have been burned because they didn’t believe me).

By now, it is probably lunch time already, or later. Eat a picnic lunch at the hot springs. Again, for tourists without their own kitchen, rotisserie chickens and baguettes are great travel foods. Get them before you leave town!

Keep driving on Route 1 and you’ll pass the Ghoubet and then you’ll come up on the volcanos and lava field. Turn off the main road, drive past the seismic testing sites. Pick a volcano and hike it. Or, follow the tracks in the dirt and turn off to your right. You’ll see the salt lake behind a series of black volcanos. This is the most popular one to climb, up and down in.

On your way out of this area, stop at the lava tunnels, see if you can find the longest ones and crawl through them. Check out “The Crack” and see if you can push it a little further apart.

Hop back in the car and keep driving north. You’ll most likely want to stop in Tadjourah for the night, it isn’t recommended to keep driving north in the dark. See Tadjourah for hotel options.

In the morning, either catch a quick swim at Sable Blanc, the white sands beach, or keep driving north to Obock. In Obock, the best thing to do is to see the lighthouse. You’ll need a local guide, this can be any young man willing to drive with you for 3-5,000 franc past the guard and out to the site. There isn’t really a road, just head toward the lighthouse. You can climb up inside and explore it.

Before leaving Obock, stop at mukbasa for more Yemeni fish, flatbread, and fresh minty lime juice.

On your way back to Djibouti, if you still have energy, turn off the road and head out to Arta Plage, for a quick ocean dip.

Four Days

For a four-day trip, I recommend combining the City Tour and the Get Outta Town tour. If you don’t want to spend two full days in town, skip Turtle Island and linger longer in Tadjourah or at Arta Plage.

Or, skip Obock and drive to either Randa or Foret du Day. These are encampments in the north (turn off before you get to Tadjourah) where you can rent local-style huts. Sleep here, eat here (they will provide all your meals as well as tea and desserts), and hike in the cooler mountains. The camp will provide you with a hiking guide as well. And, if you’d like, they will hire dancers to perform Afar-style songs for you in the evenings. Foret du Day is a bit of a longer drive, but the juniper forest and the canyon are rare sites to behold.

Another option to add on a four-day trip is Musha Island. You can either do a day trip or spend the night. On one side of the island, there are huts and a restaurant, all-inclusive. The other side has a mangrove forest and a white sandy beach. You can either bring your lunch or hire a local fisherman to catch crabs or fish for you. He will cook it up right on the beach.

Seven Days

Now, you can almost do it all! Not really, but almost. No, not at all.

Day One: explore the city, check out the 2-day city tour itinerary.

Day Two: Go whale sharking at Arta Plage. If it isn’t whale shark season, still go there and snorkel or dive.

Day Three: Do a day trip to Musha Island or get on a diving boat. You can either snorkel off the boat or do a dive, with Dolphin Excursions. On the boat, a feast of a lunch will be provided.

Day Four and Five: On these days, hit up Lac Assal, the volcanos, Tadjourah, and Sable Blanc.

Day Six: Drive to the Grand Bara desert. Explore the open desert or arrange (ahead of time) to go kite surfing out here.

Day Seven: Explore more in the city, shop for souvenirs, drink fresh squeezed juice at Chez Mahad, relax at one of the hotel pools (even if you aren’t a hotel guest, you can purchase a day pass to the pool), or the pool at the Haramous Pizzaiolo compound.

For more touring options, see Chapter 6: Touring and Exploring

For how to arrange these trips, see Who Do I Call

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Letter from Bankoulé (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

I heard a rumor that there was a waterfall in Bankoulé village. Djibouti averages 6.5 inches of rain annually so the image of so much water than it poured over rocks and fell down with enough volume and force to create a waterfall compelled me to visit with my family.

Bankoulé is 45 kilometers from the coastal city Tadjourah, the largest city in northern Djibouti and requires a rugged 4X4 to reach it. A single sign pointed in the direction of the village, or used to, before the paint faded and before the sign tipped over. But since, at the place where the sign fell, there was a fork in the road and only two options, I took the path that veered away from a village called Randa and hoped it was the right guess.

We inched around boulders and over tree roots and kept repeating out loud that this had to be a road, there was no other road and we knew Bankoulé wasn’t an imaginary place. At one point the path went over such a steep hill with such an abrupt drop off that I couldn’t see the road below and had to trust that rocks or dirt or something would catch the vehicle as it crested the hill.

After ninety migraine-inducing minutes, we reached the tourist encampment, about a kilometer after the actual village, and stumbled out of the car, our legs wobbly as they tested out the firm, smooth ground after the intense bouncing and vibrating of the trek to get here.

Rusted-out pickup trucks, heaps of trash, and empty gas cans tipped on their sides littered the parking lot. A narrow walkway led from the parking lot to an outdoor, roofed eating area, and a dozen huts, each equipped with beds, lanterns, and mosquito nets. A few bangles of silver tinsel were tacked to the walls of the eating area for decoration and seemed incongruous dangling next to a tusbah, a string of Islamic prayer beads.

After dumping our belongings in the huts and drinking steaming tea, we prepared to hike to the waterfall. I wasn’t sure what we would find and tried to keep my expectations low. I’ve been to Niagara Falls, I’ve canoed on the Mississippi, I come from Minnesota, Land of 10,000 Lakes, I grew up with a river in my backyard. I love running water. And I have lived in Djibouti for twelve years, I know how little water there is in the desert, how unlikely it is to fall in substantial cascades.

A Djiboutian pointed us further up into the hills, it would be impossible to get lost, he said. There is no other place to go. He was right, we walked through a valley and as long as we kept following the natural curves of the hills, we couldn’t wander off.

Bankoualé Palm trees, Livistona carinensis, towered over us like gangly truffula trees from Dr. Seuss’s The Lorax. The palm is an endangered species and grows only in small areas of Djibouti, Somalia, and Yemen. In Djibouti there are fewer than 400 trees. Over- grazing causes most of the seeds and seedlings to be eaten and the only areas were young Livistona carinensis thrive are in gardens where they are protected from grazing and winter flooding.

The tree trunks are skinny, I can easily wrap my arms around them but the trees are over 40 meters tall, topped with small bursts of fanlike palm leaves. Hawks perched on top of several trees and occasionally swooped down over the valley in pursuit of mice or lizards.

A man leading a camel passed us. He had come from up the valley, his camel carried a mat and sticks designed to hold cargo. He would return later that night or the next day with jugs filled with water and with piles of sticks or boxes of food staples, medicine, or schoolbooks strapped to the camel. Vehicles couldn’t pass this way and remote villages relied on camels and donkeys for supplies.

Bright clothing spread over the gray rocks were the first sign that we were nearing the waterfall. Women hand washed dresses and scarves in the tiny streams that trickled through rocks and draped their clothing like red and orange flowers over bushes and stones to dry. I thought maybe we would hear the waterfall before we saw it, the pounding rush might drown out the sounds of the wooden, clacking camel bell or the sounds of my youngest daughter endlessly singing the same song.

But there was no pounding crashing water. The drying clothes remained the only clue that water was nearby until we stood directly beneath the waterfall.

“Is this it?” my son asked.

“I guess so,” I said.

A pipe with the circumference of a garden hose poked out from a rock in the side of the hill. A small but steady trickle of water flowed from the pipe and dribbled down the rocks to the valley where stones divided it into even smaller rivulets that ran for a few meters, the widest about a foot across, and then dried up. The force of the flow approximated what I would use to wet my toothbrush.

We each dipped our hands into the water and flicked droplets into each other’s faces. It was cold and clean, not salty like piped water in the city.

We didn’t stay long at the waterfall, there wasn’t much to do. We walked back down the valley and into Ardo Village. We arrived during the afternoon resting time and the only sounds came from a home under construction. Men squat on the roof of a domed, circular house, finishing the stick and grass roof for a newly married couple. Children ran up to us and grabbed my kids’ hands and pulled them toward the only public building in the

village, a blue and white school. One of the rooms was entirely devoted to baskets and handicrafts for sale to tourists. Unfortunately there aren’t many who venture this far inland and thick layers of dust covered the crafts, which were stacked in precariously balanced pyramids to make room for everything. My kids each picked out a few items: baskets, coin purses, and small knives with leather sheaths.

The next morning I woke early and watched yellow-billed hornbills flit amongst the powdery acacia trees at the camp. I hadn’t really expected to see a waterfall so it was hard to call what I felt ‘dissatisfaction’ but at the same time, I felt vaguely despondent.

In the movie, The Princess Bride, Inigo Montoya says to the man in black, “Who are you?”

“No one of consequence,” the man in black says.

“I must know.”

“Get used to disappointment.”

Living abroad is not all adventure or Eiffel Towers or decadent meals or exotic beaches. It is often an experience to which the only response is, “get used to disappointment.” Meaning, it is often mundane, trips to the grocery store, school lessons, business meetings, day-to-day, unexciting trickles of water out of rocks.

As I sat on a rock and sipped bitter Nescafe and reflected on the various metaphors I could pull from this hunt for an illusive waterfall, the last person I expected to see was Jesus.

A man with long brown hair and a full beard walked past me. He was barefoot and wore strange clothes, a tunic-like shirt, tattered shorts. He skin was brown and leathery from the sun and his fingers and toes were covered in dirt as though he had come from a hard day of farm work.

One of the camp employees saw me watching the man.

“That’s Jesus,” he said.

I laughed. “Jesus?” He used the Anglophone word, not a French Jésus, not Arabic Ciise. Not Afar or Somali.

He shrugged. “That’s what we call him. He kind of looks like Jesus, doesn’t he?”

“How did Jesus get to Bankoualé?” I asked.

“From France, years ago. He has a garden and lives nearby,” the man said. “Sometimes he comes here for food or coffee.”

I laughed again. Waterfalls that were really water piped down a mountain. Jesus strolling through my camp at breakfast. The despondency lifted. So much for expectations.

Running (and biking)

Running is generally safe (be careful of the heat, though) but you must be careful of where you run and what you wear. Both men and women should keep in mind this is a modest culture, bare chests for men or only sports bras for women would not be a good idea. Some women do run in shorts or tank tops, I tend to wear knee-length capris and a t- shirt. After dark, it is not recommended that you go on the more isolated routes.

The best neighborhoods are running are Heron, Haramous, Gabode, and the major roads around the city. If you want to run outside the city, Arta Town is a wonderful, hilly, and slightly cooler place where running is also acceptable.

I recommend bringing water or sports drink if you plan to run longer than 45 minutes, or carry a few coins and stop at any dukaan for a bottle of water.

A few challenges, other than the heat, are toilets and wild dogs. For toilets, I don’t know what to tell you except that in a pinch you could take advantage of hotels or cafes, I have been known to plan long runs along routes that pass by the Sheraton or the Kempinski.

For dogs, they can be scary and mean. More often than not, they will only bark, but once in a while, they might chase or even bite. I’m sorry to say it, but I recommend that if you see a pack of dogs up ahead or are feeling threatened, you should bend down and grab a handful of the plentiful rocks. Just that movement will usually scare them off. If not, you’ll have to actually throw the rocks. Like I said, I’m sorry to say it, but it’s necessary for your own safety. I have been bitten by a wild dog and that is not okay.

If you want to run hills, they are hard to find in town. Either head to Arta Town, or run what I’ve marked on the map as The Hill. It is far less common for people to run here, so especially for women, I recommend running in pairs, and everyone should be careful of the heavy truck traffic, but it is a big hill. I don’t recommend running the hill nearer town, Rue d’Arta, as it cuts through Balbala. Runners, especially women, are not welcome here. I’ve been stoned and severely harassed on this road the few times I tried, even early, early in the morning.

On the running maps, I’ve only marked a few specific routes, but if you stay on the main road around town or inside the neighborhoods I mentioned above, you’ll be fine.

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Samia, Somalia, and Running for Last Place (originally published in Running Times)

Samia Yusuf Omar’s running career opened with last place in the 100 meters at the African Championships in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 2008. It ended sometime in April 2012 in the waters between Libya and Italy.

I first met Samia in Ethiopia in 2008. I was with the Djiboutian athletic team and the three female sprinters from Somalia, with no other women in their contingent, joined us in the stands.

When she raced, Samia traded the traditional large, bright Somali headscarf for a black, brown, and white striped stocking cap or a blue bandana with the five-pointed white Somali star. She finished last in her first round heat, against west African women with muscular thighs thicker than Samia’s waist.

“I don’t mind coming in last,” she said later, over pizza and bottles of orange Fanta. “I’ve never left Somalia before, I’m just happy to be here.”

A month later, I interviewed Samia for a Running Times article when she came to a regional competition in Djibouti. She talked about training at the bullet-ridden stadium in Mogadishu, about running through roadblocks and ducking into doorways to avoid being seen by al-Shabaab militants on the way to a scheduled workout, about not going to school. There wasn’t one, there weren’t jobs. So, she ran, content to compete even for last place.

Samia ran for Somalia in the Beijing Olympics. She dropped the stocking cap and donned a white Nike sweatband and again came in last, but with a personal best in the 200 meters; 32:16.

Every time I saw Samia, her face was serious, her eyes heavy and dark, and she rarely smiled. She channeled the adrenaline and intensity of life in Mogadishu into her running. Now that she had seen Ethiopia, Djibouti, even China, Samia dreamed of more. A coach, quality shoes, a running community. No stones thrown at her back. No death threats from those who believed women shouldn’t run.

Samia’s hopes of a better life took her out of Somalia to Ethiopia. From there, she trekked across Sudan and into Libya and eventually boarded a boat sailing for Europe.

I have lived in Somalia and Djibouti since 2003 and regularly read articles about refugees fleeing the Horn of Africa in boats, trying to get to Yemen or Italy, anywhere but here.

The passengers don’t always arrive. Samia didn’t.

It isn’t exactly clear what happened. Some reports say the boat simply sank. Others say the Italian police stopped the boat to help it refuel, asked the travelers to swim to their police boat, and some drowned in the process, including Samia. No matter the details, the end result was the same. Samia drowned.

Somali athletes face extreme challenges. The head of the Somali Olympic committee, Aden Yabarow Wiish, was killed when a suicide bomber blew herself up on April 4, 2012 at Mogadishu’s national theater. Samsam Mohamed Farah, who competed in the 400 meters for Somalia in the London Olympics, faces death threats in the country she ran to honor.

Female runners are an anomaly in Somalia and Djibouti, and I am proud to be one of them. I’ve worn the modest, baggy, loose clothing. I’ve felt the stones on my back and against my calves. I’ve heard the insults and seen the lewd gestures. But I love running and I don’t have to face death threats or bullets or sinking ships.

Samia loved running. She hoped it could bring her a better life and so she ran from what she knew. From danger and hopelessness. From her homeland and a family of five siblings, with her mother’s reluctant blessing. She marathon-ed across a continent, across the Mediterranean Sea, and yet again, she came in last place. This time with no one cheering her on.

Her fellow Somali athlete, Mogadishu-born British champion Mo Farah will inspire a generation of athletes. Samia’s life and death are a mere flickering blip in the sports world.

But to me, Samia is an inspiration.

I admire her because she ran with courage, she pursued greatness with intensity. She is an inspiration to cheer for last place and to finish, unafraid, in last place.

Samia is an inspiration to live and give and work and hope for a world in which never again will a Somali athlete have to die to run.

Some Final Tips

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How to Stay Cool in Djibouti

It isn’t possible to stay cool in Djibouti. You could leave, but then you aren’t in Djibouti. Summer temperatures reach as high as 120 with heat indexes over 150 degrees Fahrenheit. And it doesn’t really cool off much after sunset. So it is just plain, freaking hot. So hot my kids ask for sweaters when the winter temps drop to the mid 80’s. So hot candles melt without being lit and lollipops melt and car tires explode.

So the question is not: how does one stay cool in Djibouti? The question is: how does one stay sane while sweating in Djibouti?

Don’t talk about it. Just don’t. No complaining, no whining, no discussion. It is hot and everyone knows it and everyone feels it. Talking about it won’t help.

Don’t get angry. Getting angry makes you hotter, makes you sweaty, makes you less patient with everything else. So try to control your temper.

Drink water, lots and lots of water with ice, if possible. Or chew on ice. Or put ice down your shirt. Just don’t get angry if someone else puts ice down your shirt because, see the second suggestion.

Avoid going outside during peak sun hours. Try to get all your work, play, exercise, and visiting done either before 6:00 a.m. or after 6:00 p.m. Yeah. Good luck with that.

Go grocery shopping at Casino, the large, new air-conditioned store. Shop slowly. Meander. Browse. Roam. Chat with friends in the pasta aisle. Pretend like you forgot something and go back in after you’ve paid and left.

Hit the beach. It is a bit of a drive but do it. The water will feel like a soothing bath. Stay until sunset and if the wind picks up and you are soaking wet, you just might feel a shiver or two. Don’t worry, you won’t get sick from the cold, it is still 105.

10 Tips for Hot Running

Hot yoga, also called Bikram yoga, is trendy and last week everyone in Minnesota did ‘hot living’ while temperatures passed 100 for nearly a week. I like to refer to running in Djibouti as ‘hot running.’

In hot yoga, the temperature of the room is kept at 105 degrees F (40.6 C) with a humidity of 40%. This is hot. This is also Djibouti, a lot more of the year than I would like. People say, “Oh, you can run in this Minnesota heat, you’re used to it.” My response, “After 100 degrees, no one gets used to it.”

Typically the first week of extreme heat and/or humidity brings on diarrhea post-run, my first clue the seasons are changing. After that, my body does adjust to some extent and I’m able to run on. But I can’t run foolishly, running in such high temperatures requires advance preparation. Failing to plan for the heat has worse consequences than a 100-yard dash to the nearest toilet/desert bush/hotel restroom.

So how does one run in the heat? Here are my 10 non-scientific tips:

Expect to run slower. Expect it to feel harder. I still wear my Timex Ironman but mostly out of curiosity. There will be no PR’s in the summer.

Take walk breaks and feel no shame. I do workouts that include walk breaks, like short sprints. I walk when I feel like walking.

Know your body and listen to it. Sometimes I stay home and do P90X or INSANITY or Pilates. Sometimes I cut a run short. Sometimes it takes my body an extra day or two to feel recovered. That’s fine.

Run in the morning or the evening. I never run, even in the ‘cool’ season after 7:00 a.m. The sun rises in Djibouti by 6 every morning so often I am out the door by 5:30 a.m.

Hydrate. This means before you run, while you run, and after you run. I don’t have the option of drinking fountains so I either carry everything or bring coins to buy water bottles. I usually freeze my Camelbak or plastic water bottle the night before and by the time I’m a mile in, there’s enough water to drink.

Wear light clothing. I can’t wear shorts or tank tops, but if you can, wear less. And make sure it is moisture wicking. Although in Djibouti, this doesn’t mean much because by mile 2-3, my clothes are 100% soaked and slap against my skin and spray droplets of water to the ground in steady streams, no exaggeration. Which leads to number 7…

Wear tight clothing. I do wear slightly fitted clothes, though not spandex leggings unless my shirt is long enough to cover my butt. But loose clothes, when they get this soaked, tend to cause rashes and annoying slurping sounds.

Know how much you sweat. And plan accordingly. Weigh yourself naked before you run and again after you run. Figure in how much you drank and figure out how much you sweat. Losing more than 3 percent of your weight seriously affects performance. For me, this means after I lose 3.75 pounds or so, I’m going to suffer. I easily lose that much on a Djibouti run. So I know my pace and legs will suffer and I know I need to get a lot of liquid.

Get enough sodium. I love popcorn and pretzels so that’s an easy one for me. My feet cramp on long, sweaty runs because I am a wild sweater and a salty sweater, I can see salt lines on my face and clothes before some of my running partners even soak through. Gatorade gives me worse runs than the temperature so I get sodium elsewhere. It is important to keep your body in balance.

Love it. You’re crazy. You’re beet red and slimy and dust has turned into salted mud on your face (think of it as a free spa day). Your clothes could be wrung out. But you are strong, you’re extreme, you’re prepared, you love running. originally published on Djibouti Jones http://www.djiboutijones.com/2012/07/10-tips-for- hot-running/

Maps

Load the map on your phone or computer and you will find the key designating each location and for more information about the suggested running routes. But in general, here is the color guide:

Red: Schools, fitness centers, community gathering locations

Green: Produce stands

Blue: food – grocery stores, restaurants, cafes

Yellow: services – tailors, doctors, pharmacies, banks, etc.

Purple: shopping and souvenirs

Heron Neighborhood, Riyaad Market, and Hassan Gouleed Stadium https://drive.google.com/open?id=1pfYl6et- gbig_kOWM2ndV7OoowO6MIFA&usp=sharing

Running Routes https://drive.google.com/open?id=1omO6NdzgkqNbh8g6aqa6yeqhYyMtyGas&usp=shar ing

Tourist Sites and Camps https://drive.google.com/open?id=1IJomnqGhCHBA3kBEKllCJOeuMjtszdZf&usp=shari ng

Gabode and Haramous https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Cr3pKKulP7AAqxDWN- RuLSO9zakYq2Ah&usp=sharing

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2020 Bonus: What to pack, wear, speak? Djibouti and Somaliland

This is a pamphlet I put together for staff and friends coming to Djibouti. It is short and highly practical. Slightly redundant with what is already in this book, but here you go.

What to pack? How to study language? What to wear?

Included is information based on what people ask me about most often. I hope you find it helpful. It might spark more questions. Feel free to contact me with those, if you’d like. I know it can feel daunting to move to this part of the world and that it is hard to find resources in English.

Healthcare Language Learning Resource List Food What to Pack Safety Education What to Wear Religion Adjustments for Somaliland Shameless Self Promotion

Healthcare

*This is not medical advice. I am not a doctor.*

Malaria There is some malaria in Djibouti, but it is fairly rare. We do not take any prophylaxis and never have. Some people choose to, that is a personal decision or can be based on requirements of your embassy or employer.

Dengue Fever Dengue is much more common than malaria and is increasingly common. There are no medications to prevent dengue. It can be intense and serious and sends people to the hospital every year.

For both dengue and malaria, there is a reliable lab called Lab Abdan, this has been the most trustworthy blood testing location in our experience. Some prefer SDMS Clinic. However, if the case is quite serious, it is recommended that people attempt to be seen at the French Military Hospital.

To prevent mosquito-borne illnesses make sure your house is screened. Use mosquito nets. Use bug spray. Spray down rooms with something like Doom. Prevention is key.

There are gynecologists in Djibouti, currently the most recommended ones are at Clinic Affi. The care is not high quality but for standard pregnancies, is sufficient. However, most foreign employees tell their staff to leave to give birth elsewhere. There is extremely limited neonatal care or pregnancy intervention should something go wrong. Regarding any surgical procedure, the current recommendation is to leave the country if possible.

For emergency procedures, if at all possible, go to the French Military Hospital. There are dozens of well-stocked pharmacies in Djibouti and most medications are available. They might be a European brand, which could impact the composition of the meds, so if you have a highly sensitive situation, be sure to check that. If you require something specific and need to know before arriving if it is stocked, ask your employer or a friend to check that out for you.

There are several dentists, of varying quality. It is inexpensive and fairly easy to get a decent cleaning and also many children do orthodontic work here. If you require something more invasive, like root canal, you might want to consider going elsewhere. But for cavities and basics, you can find dentists.

Language Learning

If you plan to study French

There are classes at the Alliance Francaise and you can even take tests to earn certificates recognized in Europe for language competency.

You can also utilize any of the suggestions below. I’ve done them all, and then some.

If you plan to study Somali, Afar, or Arabic

Sometimes there are classes available at the Alliance, but not always and the level can be widely variant.

I have not studied Afar or Arabic so can’t provide examples of materials for those languages.

For Somali, here are the best books I’ve found so far:

Colloquial Somali by Martin Orwin Somali Grammar Textbook Somali Dictionary

There are other materials available, mostly self-produced and they are useful to a point. However, a great way to learn any language is to hire a tutor. Find someone patient and start working through words. Some methods for doing this are LAMP: Language Acquisition Made Practical and GPA: Growing Participator Approach, both have information available online. I’ve used both and trained people to use both. I’ve also simply carried around a small notebook, pointed and grunted, and made notes.

Learning any language requires time, patience, diligence, relationships, and a willingness to look and sound like a fool for a long time. I’m still learning.

Language learning will not get you all the way into any culture though. You also need cultural learning – learn the stories, history, poetry, myths and legends of the place you live. Who are Dheg Dheer, Elmi Bondhari, Cigal Shidaad? What happened to the Mad Mullah? Who built the wells around Wajir? What did Hawa Jibril do during the fight for independence? Be endlessly curious. That’s my best tip for successfully living abroad. Or at least, a good tip.

Resources (google these names, you’ll find so much information online, these are some of the best)

Sam of Somalia on YouTube Books by Nuruddin Farah, here’s one link but there are many more Articles in Quartz by Abdi Latif Dahir Call Me American (one of my recent faves) by Abdi Iftin Noor Books by I.M. Lewis like Saints and Somalis or A Modern History of the Somali, and many more Pirates of Somalia, the movie and the book, by Jay Bahadur Desert Flower by Waris Dirie and the sequel, Desert Dawn The Last Camel Warriors by Gerald Hanley Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi No God but God, by Reza Aslan Getting Somalia Wrong, by Mary Harper Somali Sideways, by Mohamed Mahmud The Deep Cultural Experience by Joseph Shaules When Helping Hurts The Intercultural Mind

Food

In Djibouti, you can get pretty much anything you want. It might not be cheap and it might not be consistently stocked, but most things are here, even brown sugar these days, and peanut butter and cheddar cheese. I’ve even seen Reeses Pieces now and then. Interestingly, milk is hard to find. There used to be long-life UHT milk but that has been replaced by a locally produced product which I refuse to drink and I don’t serve my family. Fresh milk is ridiculously expensive. We don’t drink a lot of milk anyway, but when we do, I use powdered milk.

Chocolate chips or other flavored chips are also hard to impossible to find and if you do find them, they are likely all melted together. Forget it. Just buy bars of milk, dark, or white chocolate and chop them up.

I also always bring black beans. Once in a while I find them, like once every four years or so. Also I bring holiday specific items like canned pumpkin.

There are pork products and liquor stores.

I do recommend that you adapt to local food as much as possible, it is both easier and more natural and connects to the place. That said, bring some favorites if you want, at least to enjoy for a while.

In Somalia, the situation is much different. There is no pork or alcohol and stores are pretty limited. Of course you can get food, you won’t starve, but it won’t be what you love or are used to, most likely. Bring spices (until you figure out is locally available), peanut butter, molasses (for making brown sugar, it will go further than bringing the sugar straight up), cheese (freeze it in big solid chunks and make sure you have a fridge when you arrive), mapeline (for making syrup), black beans…the rest would be based on what you love to make.

You can get to Djibouti from Somaliland easily, so could stock up and return.

Suggested Packing List for Moving to Djibouti

This is hard to say because it depends on your interests and your family situation. I’ll tell you what I bring and that could spark ideas. I am pretty lowkey and try to go local when possible.

I also am not one who needs a lot for my kids, for example we never used a changing table but just changed diapers on the floor. I am a minimalist about most things (other than books and sports equipment), just so you know as you read this.

You might want a lot more and that’s fine, figure out a way to pack and store it!

• Books. Lots of books, even with Kindles, I still bring books. Especially with little kids. • Library card. If you are American, your USA county library likely has an online e-book loaning service. I use my USA county library every single month to download books. Sign up for a card before you come. • English books are hard to find. I also bring stacks of magazines. • Scotch tape. It is, plain and simple, the best. It sticks things together and they stay stuck. You can sometimes find it here, but not always and it costs more. • Floss. Same issue as with Scotch tape. If available at all, its expensive. • Craft supplies. • Liquid glue. This is for people with kids who might want to make crafts. • Makeup and specific hair products. Deodorant, perfume, lotion. The makeup will melt off your face but it still feels nice to put on sometimes. • Socks, underwear, bras, including sports bras. • Swim suits, rash guards, beach sandals that will stay on in water. Snorkeling equipment, or you can buy some here. • Sunblock, bug spray. Both are much cheaper in the US (if you’re coming from there) • All running gear: shoes, water backpack, Gu or gels, arm band for phone, etc. Same for other sports, especially the shoes and sports bras. • Coffee equipment, if you’re a coffee nerd. You can get great beans and grounds here, but bring your tools. • I bring specific kitchen utensils I love, like my apple slicer and a good pair of knives. If you have something you really like, just bring it. For larger items, my bread machine and crock pot are indispensable. You might always want a high quality blender, waffle maker, and a mixer. • Electronic equipment. • Clothes. Of course you can buy clothes here, people aren’t naked. But bring things you like. I have all kinds: shorts and tank tops for in the house or for when

traveling, cold weather clothes for traveling and camping, modest clothes for going to certain sections of town and by that I mean long skirts and long sleeve, loose tops, blue jeans…a little bit of everything is useful. For kids, too, as they are growing so quickly, it can be nice to have at least a few things to grow into while you figure out what is locally available. • If you have babies, an off-road stroller or bike trailer can be useful. • Car seats for babies and booster seats for toddlers. • Holiday decorations. I keep ours to just one bucket per holiday, or less, which means we use only our favorites. Some are portable, we can bring them with if we move around over a holiday. Easter baskets, Christmas ornaments, a Thanksgiving tablecloth…

Suggested Packing List for Visiting Djibouti

• Bug spray • Sunblock • Power converters (220 volt is used in Djibouti) • Travel outlet adapter (Djibouti plugs are two-pronged circular outlets known as Type E and also Type F) • Journal for all your notes on travel • Unlocked phone if you want to use a SIM card • Cash (remember from the money section?) • Slip on sandals. People take their shoes off in homes and so if you do any visiting, it is on and off and on and off with the shoes. Sandals make this much easier. • Hiking shoes or sport shoes • Beach shoes that will stay on in the water • Snorkel gear unless you plan to rent some • Water bottle • Beach reads • Color fish guide to the Red Sea • Antibacterial handwash • Toilet paper or a package of Kleenex • Medications • At least one more modest outfit • Hat and sunglasses

Safety

Djibouti is pretty safe. I go running alone, even after dark if I stick to certain neighborhoods and streets. That said, while violent crime is rare, theft and harassment are fairly common. Use common sense like avoiding certain sections of town alone or after dark, keep doors locked, keep an eye on your purse. In your home it can be a good idea to have a lock box for cash or important documents.

In public places, if you feel harassed or unsafe, it is absolutely appropriate to seek the help of people nearby or to respond with a strong, negative reaction. This will draw attention and discourage the person harassing you. And, in general, Djiboutians are quick to protect or to stand up for others, so feel free to seek help.

Dogs can be unsafe, so be wary of large wandering packs of dogs. If you bend down and act like you are picking up a stone to throw, most of the time, that action alone will be sufficient for scaring them off. But they do sometimes chase, follow, or try to bite, so be careful.

I do experience a lot of sexual harassment, which I write about extensively on my website and in my newsletter. If you want to talk about this, drop me an email.

Education

The majority of foreign children attend French schools. There are also a few English schools now. I am 100% partial to the International School of Djibouti because it is the school my husband and I started. ISD offers afternoon English intensive programs as well as extra curricular activities for kids who are interested in either learning English but are not able to do so as their full school day focus, and for kids who want to meet and hang out with other English speakers. They also have classes for grades PreK-12th grade. Our goal is to build a strong community around the school so that while children receive a top quality education, their whole families will be integrated into life, work, and social networks.

What to wear

For men, clothing is fairly simple. Other than avoiding shorts and tanktops when conducting work business, dress is casual and Western. Trousers, short-sleeve collared or button-down shirts, even t-shirts, are appropriate attire. Very few men wear suitcoats or ties.

For women, clothing can be more complicated, depending on your work environment, personal conviction, and style. There is a wide variety, from women who cover entirely, including their faces, hands, and feet, to women who wear shorts and tank tops.

Personally, I feel most comfortable in the middle. That most often means covering my legs past my knees and covering my shoulders, nothing too form-fitting or low-cut.

Though not required, I find this modesty to be respectful and allows me to feel comfortable. Some women wear only long skirts, I tend to wear trousers, linen pants, or leggings. If I do wear a tank top, I will often through a scarf or sweater over the top. It is valuable to have a variety of clothing.

For example when I go to a local wedding, I wear bright, flowing, sparkley clothes and when I go to a funeral, I cover my head and wear something very modest and loose. I wear shorts in the house and really love to wear the local housedress inside. You can find material in the market and have one sewn for less than $4.00 total.

For everyone, it is a good idea to also bring clothing for traveling to colder locations – blue jeans and at least one warm jacket or sweatshirt.

Religion

When it comes to religion, Djibouti is majority Muslim. There are mosques in every neighborhood and schools and workplaces follow the Islamic holidays (as well as French and Djiboutian holidays).

However, people are comfortable with those of other religious faiths and there is no obligation to follow Islam. Evangelism and aggressive conversion tactics are discouraged, however. People are, for the most part, content to follow their own beliefs and content to allow others to follow their own.

There are two primary churches, both French: Protestant and Catholic. Both are downtown, almost right across the street from each other. There is an Ethiopian Orthodox community. There are small groups that meet together on their own, of various faiths.

Adjustments for those moving to Somaliland instead of Djibouti

You will have far less freedom of movement. People do not run in the streets, for example, for exercise. There is one workout facility for women downtown and a basketball club and a soccer team, but you’ll have to find locals to introduce you to these groups.

You should dress much more modestly. Women only wear skirts or dresses, or trousers with long, long shirts. Even foreign women cover their hair when out and about. Men and women don’t physically interact in public.

Do not bring pork or alcohol products into the country. Do bring other food items, you’ll find much less available in stores.

Expect to be more isolated, at least for a while, as people are often initially suspicious of outsiders and earning trust can be a slow process. Be patient.

I can’t speak much to the health care situation in Somaliland. There are several Western- trained doctors but I don’t know their specialties, the availability of equipment or medicines, or when they are in the country. Make sure to check with your employer with questions.

Education for children is homeschool. If you choose to send your kids to a local school, don’t have high expectations as to quality and plan to aggressively supplement at home. Some families choose boarding school for older children.

Shameless Self Promotion

Finding Home: Third Culture Kids in the World

Djiboutilicious, cooking in a country as hot as your oven

Welcome to Djibouti, 2019 edition: arrive, survive, and thrive in the hottest country on earth

Stronger than Death: How Annalena Tonelli Defied Terror and Tuberculosis in the Horn of Africa

You can also find a ton more information and stories at my website: www.djiboutijones.com

At the website, you will find a signup form for my newsletter, Stories from the Horn. It comes out twice a month and is full of links to news and human interest stories, book recommendations and Kindle deals, a personal essay about life in the Horn of Africa, and much more.

If you find this pamphlet at all useful or encouraging, would you please consider purchasing one (or more!) of my books and also share what you loved with someone else who might benefit as well.

FAQ

Official name: The Republic of Djibouti Capital city: Djibouti Size: 23,000 square kilometers ( Official languages: French and Arabic Other language spoken: Somali, Afar, English, Amharic President: Ismael Omar Guelleh Religion: Islam Population: 1 million (2019) Demographics: 60% Somali, 35% Afar, 5% other (Yemeni, Ethiopian, French, etc) Life expectancy: 53 years Unemployment: 39.4% Telephone code: +253 Time zone: GMT + 3 (no daylight savings changes) Climate: October to April is semi-cool, May-June is hot and humid, July-August is hot and dry, September is hot and humid

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Essays and Stories

(a random selection of essays about life in Djibouti. I have published so, so many articles and if you enjoy these, google some of my other work)

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Five Things Cigaal Shidaad Taught a Foreigner (originally published in the Sahan Journal)

Once upon a time there was a man called Cigaal Shiidaad. It was night and Cigaal Shiidaad was traveling in the countryside. He saw what looked like a lion sitting in the middle of the path. He was a coward. He thought, "Oh, this is a lion." Cigaal Shiidaad stood where he was. He took his shield and spear, and got ready to fight the lion. He yelled loudly, trying to scare the lion away. But he was not able to scare it away. It just stood there. Cigaal Shiidaad was too scared to pass.

In the morning he saw the tree stump. He went closer to the stump, and he said, "Stump, you are one thing, and what I saw was something very different. What will I do? I thought you were a lion about to attack me, but you are only a stump. I will never travel at night again." (http://lyndale.mpls.k12.mn.us/uploads/07.pdf)

This is the first folktale I learned about Cigaal Shidaad, the Somali coward. I read it while living in Minneapolis, home to thousands of Somalis, many of them my neighbors at the time, in Cedar Riverside Plaza.

In 2003 my husband, two-year old twins, and I moved to Borama, Somaliland. He taught at Amoud University and I focused on managing these toddler twins and life in a strange, new world. One of my favorite things about living in Somaliland was the discovery of local folktales and folk heroes. I begged neighbors to tell me stories and they talked about Dheg Dheer, Araweillo, the Diin iyo Dacwo (Turtle and the Fox) and, of course, Cigaal Shidaad.

I couldn’t relate with the cannibal woman or the queen who castrated all the men but I could relate with a coward. I understood his perspective, the fear that paralyzed him in the middle of the road in front of a tree stump/lion. But while I empathized with Cigaal Shidaad, I didn’t want to be like him. So I had to learn from him. What could Cigaal Shidaad teach this foreign woman about how to live and thrive in the Horn of Africa?

Don’t rely on first impressions Cigaal Shidaad walked in physical darkness, at night, and he failed to see beyond his initial idea about what he thought the tree stump was. Despite the fact that the lion- shaped form never growled and never moved all night long, he couldn’t imagine it as anything else.

I walked in cultural darkness. I still remember one of my first walks to the village market. Small stones struck the backs of my legs as I tripped over rocks and cacti, following a woman hired to help me. The stones were thrown by young children who stood in the doorway of their home. My first reaction was that they were being cruel, that the stones were intended to insult or injure me. But when I looked up at the children’s faces, I saw

wide smiles, bright eyes, and hands eagerly waving. They had simply wanted my attention, to greet me.

When surrounded by a foreign language and by a culture we don’t understand, the human tendency is to feel defensive, to assume people are against us. This reaction is related to fear and insecurity, to feeling vulnerable as an outsider. In reality the lions, those people we fear or the stones we assume are an insult? They are harmless tree stumps, they are welcoming gestures. I now know I can’t trust my first impressions.

Naming things accurately matters In order to name things accurately, we have to discover what they truly are. This requires investigation, curiosity, an open mind, and a willingness to adjust assumptions. It took Cigaal Shidaad all night to finally see the stump for what it was. Some versions of the story have him traveling to find lost camels. He wasted all these hours and the camels wandered even further away, because of his fear.

News reports stir up fear and Islamophobia by perpetuating the lie that Muslim=terrorist. Or Somali=al-Shabaab. When I told people we were moving to Somaliland, some asked about this. What about all those scary people and all that violence?

What I discovered in Somaliland was that yes, there were some scary people and there was some violence. But that was the miniscule minority. There were also mothers. Students. Teachers. Neighbors. Doctors. Musicians. Shepherds. I’m not going to be like Cigaal Shidaad. I’m not going to waste time being afraid because of a failure to accurately name the people I encounter.

Being brave means engaging with what I am afraid of In order to discover what things truly are, in order to accurately name them, I have to engage with them. If Cigaal Shidaad had approached the stump, he would have quickly discovered his error and moved on. Armed with a spear and shield, he did try to frighten the ‘lion’ away by shouting but he didn’t try to fight it. Had he launched his spear and started a fight, he would have discovered his mistake and continued along his way.

It is scary to be the outsider. Sometimes it is uncomfortable to be the American, the white skin, the non-Muslim. I stick out, the only goat in a camel herd. But if I stand outside and only ever look in at my host culture from a distance, I won’t be able to see it for what it is – a world rich with relationships and tradition and a world view that provides a sharpening challenge against my own. And so I engage, ask questions, learn.

Be prepared for the unexpected Cigaal Shidaad didn’t expect a tree stump to be in the middle of his path. He expected danger, a lion. So that was what he was prepared for. And that’s what he found, or thought he found.

Especially when living in a foreign country, we have to be ready to see and experience things that we don’t expect. When asking for directions a man climbs into the car. Instead

of explaining the way, he prefers to show the way. He isn’t a thief, he is trying to help. When buying halwo candy in the market and the vendor loads a baggie with far more than I asked for, he isn’t trying to wrangle the foreigner out of more money, he is communicating pride in his handiwork and wants me to enjoy it, it is a gift.

Once a coward, always a coward Even though in the morning Cigaal Shidaad discovered his error, he still swore he would never again travel at night.

I think that by following the first four ideas, Cigaal Shidaad could overcome his cowardice, but he seemed to sink deeper into it and continued to do cowardly things, like trying to hide inside a rolled up rug and pretending he was dead to hide from soldiers. It is as though by acting like a coward, he became a coward and couldn’t shake the reputation.

I have done cowardly things, like making wrong assumptions and judging situations inaccurately. Sometimes I feel like a coward, afraid of silly or not-so-silly things, but I haven’t yet entirely embraced the term coward as my identity. *****

“You are one thing and what I saw was very different. What will I do?” Cigaal Shidaad said and then decided he would never travel at night again.

Me, an alien in a foreign land, what will I do?

I will question my first impressions, name things accurately, engage with what I fear, try to be prepared for the unexpected, and, for as long as possible, fight to not label myself a coward.

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Highlighting the Power of Small Things (originally published in Ethical Storytelling)

Today we talk about power in terms strength, leadership, control, the person at the microphone, on the screen, the ones making policies. Everyone deserves equal access to that power no matter their gender, color, orientation, religion, or ability.

Every voice needs to be represented in conversations and decision-making. We need diversity in positions of power representative of the diversity on the ground. There is absolutely a place and a time to challenge, convict, and force change of the inappropriate, staid, and oppressive power dynamics that have been in place for far too long.

But. In the shouting and the tweeting and the outrage, in the grasping for obvious power that has too long been limited to too few, we can’t forget the power of the small, quiet, unknown, and steady.

Kali Mohamed, headmistress at the only school for the deaf among Somali children in northern Kenya is powerful. Koos, a nurse at a tuberculosis clinic in Somaliland who continued working even after her boss was shot in the head inside the clinic, is powerful. Saada who abandoned a career in Canada to start a school for street kids in Djibouti is powerful. Nasra, a girls running coach in Djibouti, who strives to keep girls in school, is powerful.

These women do not look powerful, they aren’t in the news and aren’t influencers on social media. They aren’t the ones setting government policy. But they are the ones changing the world. They are changing the everyday lives of average people through courageous acts of consistent service.

When we think about telling stories, it is vital to look beyond the obvious players and the loudest voices and to explore who is working quietly, even subversively.

How do we highlight those stories, when the powerful ones so easily dominate? And how do we tell them without compromising the power dynamic the story-teller often inherently brings?

Look behind the leader

If possible, don’t only speak with the official spokesperson, donors, or leader for a project or story. Talk to the housekeepers, the drivers, the secretaries, the beneficiaries. A doctor might have one perspective on a health service initiative, a patient might have a very different story, and the hospital guard a third perspective. I spoke once with the head of the local sports federation and he told me one version of female participation in sports.

When I talked with a girls’ handball coach, and then the girls on the team, I heard a different story, a much more nuanced and complicated one.

Use their own words

After obtaining permission, make sure to use the words of the people doing the small things. influenced heavily by their attitudes, not only specific words. For example, where I live in Djibouti, certain sections of town are often referred to as slums by developmental organizations. But when I talk to the people who live in those areas, they are proud of their development and their work, and never consider their neighborhood a slum, but a home and a vibrant community.

Think collaboration

Don’t think of a story as your or their story only, but as a group project. Your presence will influence the story, whether you want it to or not. Be aware of that dynamic instead of pretending it doesn’t exist.

Pay attention to the details emphasized

Are you describing the trash in someone’s yard or the hospitable way they wiped off a cushion for you to sit on? Do you stress that young girls wear headscarves or that young girls are playing soccer and going to school? All of these things could be true, but be mindful of how the story is crafted and of which telling will offer dignity to the subjects.

Consider how those reading the story will hear it

For example, an American audience might make assumptions about girls and headscarves that aren’t accurate, depending on what you emphasize, and how you do it.

** Power matters and the voices at the top, influencing and leading, need to be diverse. But power also resides in hidden places and there is power in telling those stories ethically. In highlighting acts of radical self-sacrifice and love. The kind of power lived in the small might not draw international attention, fame, or glory. But it is power that changes lives. It is upside down, hard work, and requires courageous humility.

We cannot talk about the dynamics of power without at least acknowledging that often power lies not in the voice of the loudest or the hands the richest, but in the love of the humblest. And we must be intentional to amplify the hidden work of small things.

The Hard Work of Unemployment (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

The CIA World Factbook quotes, as of February 21, 2013, a 59% urban unemployment rate for Djibouti and an 83% rural unemployment rate.

This number on a piece of paper or a website declares that restaurateur Amina, her shalmad shellacked to her back with sweat and her feet calloused, elephantine, is unemployed, that she does not work as she alternately stirs a pot of beans, a pot of pasta, a pot of tea, and chops eight kilos of onions before eight a.m.

Amina sits in the sliver of shade cast by her wooden restaurant. Her feet touch at the heels and wrap around an aluminum pot of onions. One hand cups the purple bulbs and the other slices a knife through white flesh in quick, steady strokes. One slip and her thumb would land in the pot but Amina has sliced onions like this for decades. Sometimes she wraps a yellow plastic bag around her thumb to protect from blisters but she never slips. She never cries either. Eight kilos of onions, every morning, and not a tear dampens her cheeks.

Amina’s coworker arrives while she is stirring hot peppers into mashed orange lentils. Deeqa lugs sacks of non-perishable food for the day and plops them in front of the restaurant. Amina lifts her chin in acknowledgement and greeting. Spaghetti noodles, a 10-liter yellow jug of oil, blackened charcoal pellets, potatoes. Deeqa tosses her red shalmad over a wooden pole that juts, totem-like, out of the ground at a slight angle. Amina wears her scarf tight and the rare times that she stands, she holds the extra material of her dress in a pinch between her armpit and her side. Deeqa tucks her extra dress material under the elastic band of her polyester slip at her bellybutton. The bulge gives her the droopy appearance of a woman five-months pregnant.

A man with his arms hooked over a walking stick lodged across his shoulders approaches and demands tea. He wears a green UMP shirt, the President’s political party, and a macwiis, a wrap-around sarong, which he has rolled up and folded over until his knees are exposed.

“You never pay,” Amina says and turns away.

“I am the chief of this neighborhood,” the man says and stands in the smoke curling from beneath her pot of simmering beans. “Give me tea.”

“No.” Amina rips open eight bags of spaghetti with her teeth and dumps the noodles into boiling water along with a handful of course salt. The man watches, spits over his shoulder, nudges a sack of bread with his sandaled foot.

“Give me tea.” He raises his voice this time and waves a hand over his head.

“You never pay,” Amina shouts back. “You don’t wear underwear.”

Deeqa laughs, a scratchy, cavernous laugh and repeats the insult, adding “waryaa,” hey man. She promises to serve him tea when he pays them for his other breakfasts and lunches and cups of tea. He watches a moment, then wanders to another makeshift restaurant on the next corner. Amina can hear his shouts but the distance blurs the words.

“I owe 80,000 franc to the shopkeeper who sold me these supplies,” Amina says, “and the men think they can come eat for free.” She has already peeled all the potatoes Deeqa brought and now, without a word, a man wearing a Muslim prayer cap stoops to gather the peelings into a plastic bag for his goats.

By the time breakfast; beans and baguettes and tea, and lunch; spaghetti with a potato- filled white sauce, has been served, little actual money ever changes hands.

The bread man delivered baguettes in the morning, an elderly woman brought whole pepper and coriander seeds and poured them from a cut-off clear plastic water bottle into a scrap of magazine paper Amina cupped in her palm. Amina filled yellow jugs with water from a nearby home, construction crews drank and ordered and shoveled in as much food as they could during their fifteen-minute meal breaks. And no money appeared.

The only coins came from a group of street-cleaning women. They wore matching faded peach cloaks and wound scarves over their faces, some with sunglasses perched in the narrow slit left open for their eyes. Black gloves and thick socks protected them from the garbage they picked up and stuffed into heavy-duty plastic bags.

“The President will pray at the mosque at the end of this street today,” one of the women explained to Amina when she bought, and paid for, a glass of chilled red Vimto-flavored water.

Later, Deeqa would sweep all the non-edible scraps into a pile with a stick broom and burn it to discourage swarms of crows and flies and out of respect for the women who cleaned the road for the President. Amina would bring ground sorghum flour to the house that supplied her water. Tomorrow, the spice woman would receive a free lunch. Next week Amina would pay the bread man for the entire month’s orders of baguettes. At the end of the month, she would cajole the construction crews and plead with Allah and hope the men paid off their debts so she could pay down her own.

In Djibouti, unemployment can look like a variety of things including a dauntingly large number on a list of a statistics. In Amina’s case, unemployment looks like entrepreneurship and relationships, community and networking and, quite simply, like hard work.

Light Upon Light, a Djiboutian Lighthouse (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

1894 was a big year for Djibouti, or Jibuti, or French Somaliland. In 1894 French colonial governor, Léonce Lagarde established a permanent French administration in Djibouti and gave the region the title Côte Française des Somalis, or French Somaliland. In 1894 Armand Savouré’s Franco-African Company planned to land ox carts in Djibouti for the launch of a wheeling transport service to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. But the road between Ethiopia and Djibouti was rocky and brutally hot with few watering holes and the journey could take more than a month. The port in Zeila, Somaliland was closer and the British pressured Menelik of Ethiopia to use their facilities instead. The division and then a conflict with Afar and Somali clans in Djibouti brought the plan came to an abrupt halt. In 1894 the company that would eventually build the Ethiopia-Djibouti railroad was founded, the Imperial Railway Company of Ethiopia. Construction didn’t begin until 1897 and by 1906, the work stopped due to political disagreements. The end point eventually began the Ethiopian city of Dire Dawa. And, according to the London Gazette of August 21, 1894, in 1894 the French government gave notice (on June 6) of a new lighthouse constructed in Djibouti, at Fort Ayabley. The lighthouse was “exactly on the line joining Direction Hill and Pyramid, and with Ambuli House bearing E by N. ¾ N.” Or, the lighthouse might have been built in 1912. My tour guide, Sayid Ali, scribbled facts about the lighthouse on a blue post-it note and passed it to me over the gear shift in his truck. Built in 1912, in line with the Obock lighthouse which was built in 1820 or 1830 or some year in between, details weren’t Sayid’s forté, and in line with a third lighthouse on Maskali Island in the Gulf of Tadjourah. Sayid didn’t know the distance between the lighthouse and the sea or whether or not it still functioned. He didn’t know about the fort that surrounded the lighthouse or how far the beam spread or the rate at which the light blinked. He did know that there had never been a ship run aground in Djibouti and he was willing to drive me to see it, willing to ask if we could go inside even though no foreigners I spoke with and no locals I asked knew anyone who had ever been inside. Somali doesn’t have a traditional word for lighthouse. Djiboutians who speak French use ‘phare.’ Otherwise, Djibouti’s lighthouses are known as ‘biliqbiliqta.’ The word comes from how the light appears to sound, should it make sound, when it is turned on and blinking at regular intervals. When I moved to Djibouti I first thought the square three-story building was a strange mosque. White-washed walls, an orange stripe down the center of the northern side, and a green dome on top that I couldn’t quite make out. Maybe it was a mosque

with a fat, low minaret. But there was no visible door and the windows on the upper levels were high and narrow, like slits. Windows on the first floor were boarded up and painted over. Mosques in Djibouti are more inviting, with flung-open doors and windows without glass or screens. Mosques fill with men kneeling or sitting or chatting, flip-flops and black faux leather sandals lined up on the front steps. Here, there were no shoes and the only men visible sat on wobbling green khat stands and chewed massive wads of the leafy amphetamine. If it wasn’t a mosque, I figured the building was a shrine. In Djibouti when a sheikh dies, his followers place green or red flags at the burial site. People visit the shrine to pray and seek blessing and sometimes there are small white structures near the shrines. Maybe I simply couldn’t see the flags from the road. But this is no fat-minareted mosque and it isn’t a shrine. This is, as I learned from Sayiid Ali, Djibouti’s third lighthouse and an historic fort, dating from the time of French colonialism. Maybe 1912, maybe 1894. Ayablay Lighthouse, or Fort Ayablay, stands at the peak of the highest hill in Balbala, seven kilometers south southwest of the harbor. The dusty white color and non- intimidating structure blend the building into the rest of Balbala, Djibouti’s ever- expanding slum suburb. Graffiti on the lighthouse and surrounding wall declares vive IOG, or long live Ismail Omar Guelleh Djibouti’s President. The swooping scribbles camouflage the lighthouse as any other average wall, invisible in the scrum of wooden houses and aluminum roofs and more graffiti. Sayiid pulled up to the lighthouse and eight men watched me climb out of his silver Toyota pick-up truck. He had his doubts about whether or not we would be allowed inside but was as curious as I was. He introduced me and explained that we wanted to visit the lighthouse. “Is this possible?” he asked. “Go in, go in,” one of the men said. His cheek bulged with khat and I understood the welcoming wave better than the green spittle-thickened words. I followed Sayiid up two stone steps, worn and crumbling, and through an unassuming green metal gate, the same utilitarian style as my own front gate in Ambouli neighborhood on the other side of the wadi. Mud or ash or smoke stains, I didn’t linger long enough to discern which, streaked the wall and the blackened stone gave the fort the feeling of having survived a recent battle, of wounded endurance. A woman squat in front of a wooden shack inside the compound and rhythmically beat laxoox batter for tomorrow’s breakfast of spongy sorghum flatbread. A young boy sat in the shade of a plastic bag-strewn thorn tree. The woman nodded, expressionless, when Sayiid asked if we could see the lighthouse. She hollered for a man named Mohammed, and the boy pounded on the wooden door at the base of the building. Mohammed answered with a command to come in. He lay on a thin mattress in a room lit by the sunlight sneaking through widely-spaced planks of a makeshift door, prison bar-shaped beams of light scattered across the cement floor. A macwiis, a men’s sarong the color of eggplant covered him like a blanket from his armpits to his knees. He rolled over and called, without rising, for another man named Mohammed. Mohammed number two bounded down a set of narrow metal stairs, pulling up, zipping, and belting his baggy blue jeans on the way. While the Mohammeds discussed our visit, my eyes accustomed to the shadowy interior. The lighthouse walls were made

of thick stone and shelves had been notched out at random intervals. Clothes and books and cooking utensils piled on the dugout spaces. Wooden slats covered arched windows, locked tight against the dust and heat of Djibouti’s blistering summer. An unused freezer blocked part of the entryway and I leaned against the door, the metal cooling my skin through my shirt, sweater, and scarf, to let the younger Mohammed squeeze back up the steps. Mohammed peered over his shoulder and motioned for us to follow. Sayiid glanced at me and grinned. “They are welcoming us to go all the way to the top,” he said. “I’ve never been to the top. I was born in Quartier 4 and I don’t know anyone who has ever been inside, or to the top. This is very kind of them.” It was, indeed, kind of them. The lighthouse still functioned, under the operating auspices of the Port of Djibouti and the coastguard. This Afar family of Mohammeds, and others, maintained the lighthouse and lived in the keeper’s quarters. We were asking to see the lighthouse, and by necessity, to traipse through their home. I inched sideways up the steep staircase behind the men. Mohammed stopped on the second floor and told us to go ahead. He stayed with another young man on a bench: a radio, a pile of khat, and two Coke bottles between them. Sayiid and I continued on our own. The third floor windows sagged open and the only objects here were batteries, charging for the dark night ahead. One more staircase, steeper and narrower than the last, a green wooden door designed for people of hobbit height, and we reentered the blazing sunlight, on top of Djibouti Town. “Wow,” Sayiid said. I echoed him and then we both fell silent. From Turtle Island, where the United States military is expanding to the sea, to Djibouti’s shipping port, over all of Balbala, and the desert disappearing into Ethiopia beyond the horizon, all the city lay stretched out below us. White minarets of actual mosques and fluttering green flags of actual shrines pierced the view. Tadjourah’s mountain ranges on the opposite side of the gulf formed a low, dark divider between sky and ocean. Sayiid later said he remembers when there was nothing in Balbala but this lighthouse. No shantytowns, no night schools, no women selling fresh-squeezed mango juice, no fields of children playing football, no Italian Hospital. The French established a barricade at the edge of Djibouti Town and checked the permission papers of everyone passing in or out. This kept Djiboutians nearly locked into their coastal constraints until independence in 1977 when Sayiid was eleven years old. Now the once-barren land rings with the call to prayer from dozens of mosques and the clatter of stores, wedding music, bicycle horns of men selling baguettes, children, cooking, donkey carts, and buses. But still, the lighthouse rises above it all. The Quran says, in Surah 24:35 that Allah guides those he wills to his light. He is “light upon light.” The Ayabley lighthouse once provided light in a dark crook of the world. The lighthouse used to beam strong and clear across the hills and the salt flats and the harbor but now that Djibouti has regular, reliable electricity, the lighthouse is harder to pinpoint. It is now as symbolic and historical, in a sense as spiritual, as it is practical. Two bulbs, the size of dinner plates, were encased in a glass lantern and covered with a green roof, facing north northwest. From six o’clock until dawn the lights blink, biliqbiliq.

Sayiid and I admired the view and the lights and the blue mosquito net draped in the corner where someone could man the lighthouse, sleep, stay malaria-free, and enjoy the steady breeze all night long. “1912,” Sayiid repeated. 1894 or 1912, either way, I respected Sayiid’s confidence in his date. Few other Djiboutians even dared to venture a guess when I asked. Sayiid went to the effort to find a date and to write it down and he spoke it with pride. On our slow descent down the ladder-like stairs, we stopped to thank the two Mohammeds. I spoke Somali for the first time of the afternoon. “I’ve lived here for ten years,” I said, “and have never seen so much of Djibouti at one time.” “That’s impossible,” the younger Mohammed said, referring to my Somali, not the view. “What are you?” “I’m American,” I said, “and it is possible. Though quite difficult.” He laughed, shook my hand, and returned to his radio and khat. Outside, in the courtyard, I looked at the wall with the narrow windows. Just the right height and width for a weapon to aim and shoot through. The lighthouse and fort is a reminder of war, a testimony to freedom, and a safety beacon. At the strategic point where the Red Sea turns into the Gulf of Aden, Djibouti’s primary economic driver is her port and this lighthouse has been steering ships in and out for one hundred and nineteen years. Or one hundred and one years. I gave the woman who had let us in, and her son, a pack of gum. I thought about Sayiid, forty-two years old and proud of his nation’s history. Of this little boy, living in the center of history and the present. His mother, making a home of a wooden shack between ancient windows for the weapons used to contain her people. And of the Mohammeds inside, guiding ships past Obock, past the Maskali Islands, safely into the port, around the Horn of Africa, night after night. Sayiid drove me home and we argued about whether there had been four floors or three floors. We laughed at how barely five minutes after leaving such a unique and historical landmark, we had already forgotten something as fundamental as how tall it was. We rehashed our climb and I concluded that there were four staircases. Sayid concluded there were three. Details aren’t his forté.

Motherhood in an Age of Terrorism (originally published in Brain Child)

Three days after terrorists killed seventeen people in Paris my daughter said at lunch, “Muslims can kill anyone they want, right?”

Terrorism and religious extremism is not hypothetical for my family. A week after suicide bombers blew up a restaurant in Djibouti my daughter asked how we could be sure the Somalia-based terror group al-Shabaab wouldn’t blow up our airplane. My kids go to school behind barbed wire, the walls guarded by armed soldiers and policemen. Sometimes a tank shows up to guard the entrance. We’ve received death threats and people have made throat-cutting motions at us. A man on a bus once shouted that I would be the first person he would kill.

This child asking about al-Shabaab and Muslims killing people? She was born on September 11. Not the September 11. Four years later but we will never be able to mention her birthday without thinking of 2001. She was born in a Muslim country and a Somali midwife delivered her. She is our light on a dark day.

“Can your teacher kill you?” I said to my daughter in response. Her teacher is a Djiboutian Muslim. “Can Safa?” Her friend. “Can Sagal?” My friend.

“No way,” she said. Those were people, friends, coworkers. They played marbles together and came to birthday parties, gave spelling exams.

I don’t know where she picked up the idea that Muslims can kill anyone they want and she didn’t know where she had heard it either. But at nine years old she was already absorbing the climate of hate and fear that permeates our world. It was my job as a mom to counter that, to provide a new climate.

I thought I had been doing exactly that. We are immersed in Islam, surrounded by Muslims. The call to prayer governs our working and sleeping hours. Our weekend is Thursday and Friday because Friday is the Islamic holy day. We have a Quran nestled onto a wooden cradle at the highest point of our living room, next to the Bible. Our coworkers and fellow students and running partners are Muslim. Shopkeepers, taxi drivers, airline employees, teachers, policemen and women, politicians. We celebrate weddings with Muslims and grieve at funerals with Muslims, we pray with Muslims and fast with them and spin dizzy on the merry-go-round with them.

I assumed that this lifestyle was enough. If I showed empathy for Muslims and developed authentic relationships with them, I thought that would communicate a certain worldview to my children. A worldview that said Muslims are not ‘others,’ they are not people to be

afraid of or judgmental toward, they are not different from us. We have different faith convictions but we have a shared humanity.

But my daughter didn’t draw a connecting line between Safa and al-Qaeda or between her teacher and al-Shabaab so when she said Muslims could kill anyone they wanted, she didn’t realize her words lumped them into the same category. That wasn’t her intention and I realized she needed more than an example lived out in front of her. She needed me to talk about the relationship between Islam and our faith, Christianity, about the call to prayer and our protestant church service. She needed to hear from me about terror attacks and how to respond to them. She needed me to give her words and language that could specifically counteract the words she heard from the broader culture.

An article in Newsweek, Even Babies Discriminate (focused on race) debunks the idea that raising kids in a diverse environment naturally helps them embrace diversity. I expected the ‘environment to become the message.’ It didn’t. I needed to address the religious, ethnic, and economic diversity around us directly, openly, and verbally.

So what do I communicate with her and my older kids when violence strikes close to home? When terrorists, claiming to be Muslims, attack in France (where we attended language school) and slaughter seventeen people? Or when the Somali terror group al- Shabaab, claiming to be Muslims, attacks a shopping mall in Kenya (where we used to live) and kills almost seventy people? Or when this same terror group detonates a bomb in a restaurant down the block from our favorite ice cream place?

First, I tell them what happened, they are old enough to know. I use the real names of the real terror groups involved. They are going to hear about it at school anyway, I want first dibs on how things are presented.

In the telling, I emphasize certain things. A Somali Muslim man rescued dozens of people from the mall in Kenya, he went back and back and back, risking his own life to get others out. Djiboutian taxi drivers, also Muslims, were the first responders at the site of the suicide bomb, they rushed the injured to hospitals. The rector of the Great Mosque of Paris denounced the attack in France, a Muslim policeman was killed trying to protect people.

I don’t promise these things will never happen here and I don’t promise I will keep them safe. I do promise that we will remember those who are grieving, we will not be swayed in our conviction that ‘muslim’ and ‘terrorist’ are not synonymous, we will pray for peace and pursue peace.

What does that mean practically for parents: pursue peace? It starts with these kinds of conversations with our kids but it can’t end there. I don’t know what it will take for the violence to end but as I think about my own need to improve my mothering in this area, four action points come to mind.

Uprooting the Darkness

The Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda is an extremist militant Christian group, they belong on the same religious spectrum as me. They rape, maim, kidnap, use child soldiers, and destroy villages in the name of establishing a Uganda based on the rule of the Ten Commandments in the Old Testament.

I would like to put as much distance between myself and the LRA as the east is from the west. The moment I recognize this darkness in my religious system it becomes easier to recognize that the majority of Muslims would like that same amount of distance between themselves and ISIS or al-Qaeda. Yes, there is a violent strain of Islam. And yes, there is a violent strain of Christianity. It isn’t helpful to say, “they aren’t real Christians” or “they aren’t real Muslims.” This excuses us from wrestling with this violence in our religious systems and from dealing with our own darkness. But it is in us, too. At least in me.

Some Djiboutians have treated me poorly. Stoned me, spit on me, insulted me, robbed me. In my angry humiliation I respond poorly. I take that anger and direct it, indiscriminately, at everyone. I start to see everyone in the light of the one who wronged me, like personal religious and racial profiling. I need to uproot this. Occasionally I see it rise up in my children and I need to address it in them, too.

Refusing Ignorance Ignorance leads to fear. What we don’t know and don’t understand, we fear. Fear drives us toward isolation. But the time for living like an ostrich with our head buried in the sand while all the world crumbles around us is long past. It is too late to run for a cabin in the woods.

“Are you afraid?” is one of the most common questions people ask about my family living in Djibouti. They look different, dress different, eat different, talk different, worship different. They live over there. We should be afraid.

But we aren’t because they don’t live over there, they live right here and we have spent more than a decade learning about Islam and local culture and figuring out how to teach our kids about the faith of their peers. To my kids Muslims aren’t anonymous people in turbans and face veils waving machine guns. They are Safa and fourth grade teachers and we aren’t afraid of them. We stand next to them at interfaith prayer gatherings where priests and pastors and imams plead with God for peace. We hold their hands. They hold ours.

There is no excuse for ignorance, for not knowing the ‘other,’ the Muslim or the Christian. Most people today live, work, shop, or travel within meters of this other person. As parents we can slip our family out of the world, become isolated, disappear into homogenous enclaves of people who live, look, and believe like us. We can believe the lie that this will keep our children safe. Or, we can engage. We can insert ourselves into situations that require courage, humility, and intention.

Messy Relationships

Peace rallies and solidarity marches and protest tweets are good. I’ve been to them. I’ve tweeted #bringbackourgirls and #jesuischarlie. But they aren’t enough. Not even with forty world leaders linking arms. During the rally people feel less alone, less afraid, united across divisions. Afterward they go home. And then what?

Then we need to get into relationships. Messy, disagreeing, mutually-improving relationships. I rarely see eye to eye on religious matters with my Muslim friends. That’s okay, this isn’t about agreeing or forcing someone over to our side of a debate. It is about developing empathy and compassion. Brené Brown says, “Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.”

As parents forge compassionate relationships across religious and other boundaries, our kids will follow in our footsteps. They’ll have play dates with Muslims or Christians, Americans or Djiboutians or French. They won’t know the ‘other,’ they will know their friends and will call them by name.

Casting a Vision We are raising a fresh generation and this is what gives me great hope. Motherhood in an age of terrorism is an incredible opportunity to cast a vision for our kids of another way to live. Differences in religion and politics and race and gender and economics all have the potential to explode into unending violence. Are we going to raise our kids with fear, cowardice, and isolationism? Or are we going to grab hold of this broken world with one hand and our children with the other and commit to being part of healing it?

What I Learned When I Failed to Learn Somali (originally published in The Smart Set)

There are sixteen ways to form a sentence using the same six words in Somali. The man cuts his beard with a razor. His beard with a razor the man cuts. With a razor the man his beard cuts. With a razor cuts the man his beard. And on and on. It doesn’t work in English. Somali uses small changes, a ‘u’ at the end of a word instead of an ‘i.’ Waa, or waxaa instead of baa which affects the placement and stress and subject and object of words in the sentence but which means nothing by itself. This makes Somali a challenging language to learn for non-native speakers. Somali also has words specific to the life of camel-herding nomads, words with no direct translation into English. Words for the Ethiopian women who carry bundles of sticks on their hunched-over backs. Different words for different genders of camels, different ages, whether or not a camel has given birth. This makes Somali a challenging language to learn for non-native, non-nomadic, non-camel-herding speakers. I moved to Somalia started studying language in 2003 and used a Somali-English dictionary with a Southern dialect, a book called Colloquial Somali with a northern dialect and written by Martin Orwin, and a black notebook and pen which I slipped into the makeshift pocket-pouch formed by tucking my cotton Somali housedress into my underwear. The pouch brought the added benefit of giving me wider hips and neighbors stopped worrying about the skinny, sickly American. The dictionary was helpful only as far as the words I searched for could be found in it, were spelled correctly, and were used in the northern village of Boroma where I lived. I conquered Colloquial Somali but remained confused about some of Orwin’s grammar explanations. I emailed to thank him for producing the only reasonably logical Somali language grammar and told him that though I was edging on conversational, I was far from fluent. He responded with a generous, apologetic email. He said he was sorry for all the mistakes in the book. The black notebook and pen proved my most useful, reliable language learning tools. I made vocabulary lists and wrote and memorized complete sentences word for word. I once sat with a language tutor and worked out every combination of word order using the same six words. We came up with sixteen sentences. I earned a degree in Linguistics. I tape-recorded conversations and listened to them again and again until I could understand every word. I practiced guttural q’s and x’s and kh’s until my vocal chords were raw and aching. I memorized proverbs, folk tales, songs, poetry. I read children’s books and did elementary school homework with our neighborhood children. For ten years.

In Djibouti, 2012, the Somali language celebrated forty years of existence as a written language with a conference at the University of Djibouti. In October 1972

Somali’s president Mohamed Siad Barre introduced written Somali using the Latin alphabet, which replaced the Arabic script previously used. Somali linguist Shire Jama Ahmed played a key role in this transformation. As a language learner from an English background, I am indebted to Barre and Ahmed. Somali is hard enough to learn without needing to learn the Arabic script as well. Though it never reaches the upper echelons of challenging languages to learn, listed by the Foreign Service Institute, practitioners disagree. According to one essay, Somali has all the hard sounds of Arabic, some of the tones of Mandarin, irregular plurals like in German or Arabic, and uses cases like Greek or German. Somali prepositions are perhaps the most complicated, and complained about, aspect to learn. Though there are only four prepositions, they include two deictic particles which indicate location relative to the speaker and may be combined with the prepositions or verbs to form entirely new words. The lack of resource material adds to the difficulty of learning Somali. When I studied French I could watch television and read Harry Potter novels in French. Somali has not yet achieved this level of proliferation and hasn’t even decided on a consistent spelling system. I attended the celebratory conference in Djibouti and sat near the front, next to a Somali-American friend. I barely understood a word. Were they using the words about camel trains? Camels urinating on certain sides of holes dug into the desert earth? Or camels in a long line, tied together with ropes made from shredded blue and red cloth, braided together? Were they using southern words like the one that meant lay with your wife in the south and meant fuck in the north and I only knew the northern meaning? Were they talking too fast, too technically? Had I really learned so little? I don’t know. Like I said, I didn’t understand much, I had failed to learn Somali. Actually, I did understand. I caught almost all the words buzzing around. What I didn’t catch were the subtleties, the nuances, the way they all worked together in a sentence. I heard phrases and knew they couldn’t mean what I thought they meant. ‘They both got sneezed out of the same place’ could not possibly mean what I heard. Later, I learned that ‘they both got sneezed out of the same place’ meant the two people referred to looked identical. Somalis loved with their livers, not with their hearts. ‘The woman came to the doctor with a hyena bite and he gave her a rabies vaccine.’ This made sense to me and wasn’t funny but the crowd exploded into raucous laughter that didn’t die down for minutes. Later, I learned ‘hyena bite’ is a euphemism for sexually transmitted disease and the doctor himself wasn’t aware of this. He treated for rabies when he should have treated for syphilis. And right there, sitting in the University of Djibouti lecture hall, surrounded by Somali scholars and government officials and friends, with a massive Radio and Television of Djibouti video camera in my foreign face, I knew that I had not failed to learn Somali, thought my ability was more inchoate than I like to imagine. I learned the vocabulary and the verb conjugations. I learned color words and the punch lines in stories about Igal Shidaad, the clever coward. I had, sort of, learned Somali. But, I sat there not understanding the difference between a hyena and syphilis, not knowing about sneezes and twins, not knowing that when my leg fell asleep I should

shout, “quick someone who is blacker than me come and pinch my leg!” And I knew that at the same time, I would never learn Somali, not fully. This is the fascinating aspect of language learning, it ushers the student into an entirely new world. Memorizing and using new vocabulary words is a way of stripping off and stepping away from self. It violently imposes a new way of seeing the world. I had to shake off the exaggerated confidence, relinquish the pride I’d gained with each new level of proficiency. Because, ultimately, what I learned while striving to learn Somali is that language is more than definitions and grammatically arranged sentences. Language is how a person, how a culture, experiences the world. Now, my words are a combination of English and Somali. I don’t expect to fully learn Somali because, palimpsest-like, I can’t entirely shed my English-speaking self, though little by little it diminishes. Native levels of fluency elude me. I am left with the collision, the welding and widening of worlds, and now I love with both my liver and my heart.

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The View from the Port of Djibouti (originally published in EthnoTraveler)

The waves of the Gulf of Tadjourah don’t crash, white-capped, against the gray stones lining the Corniche. They roll and heave and slap, lackadaisically, on the shore, almost as if they are weary from heat exhaustion. It makes sense; everyone in Djibouti is tired from the sweltering days in the hottest country on earth. Despite the listlessness of the waves, the winds off the ocean where the Red Sea bleeds into the Gulf of Aden provide a soothing breeze and I stroll along Rue de Venice, sweat streaming between my shoulder blades, in search of relief. My pathway lies between the fishing docks and the shipping port. In the latter, blue gantry cranes tower over a container ship. Djibouti’s location makes up for her small size, comparable to Massachusetts, and enables the country to influence vital shipping lanes connecting Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. Stevedores in faded orange bodysuits load and unload in the shadows of these massive cranes, which bear protesting camels toward a ship headed for Dubai. Cloth wraps around the camels like diapers. Knobby-kneed legs dangle and the terrified camels bellow and flail as they soar across the water. This transfer of livestock and goods keeps the port in constant motion and provides a significant portion of the job opportunities for Djibouti’s 800,000 citizens. Inland, dust coats Djibouti with a brown haze but at the seaside is the beauty of a colorful, developing nation in the slow, laboring, throes of progress. A myriad of green, blue, red, and white containers are stacked like building blocks in the port storage area. A narrow minaret, decorated in yellow and green patchwork paint, peeks over the stacks. Crackling static fills the air, then the nasalized Arabic words of the muezzin, “Allahu Abkar! God is great!” rise and swell. At this call to prayer, all work halts so the men can eat a quick lunch and pray. Women emerge from slivers of shade cast by the billboard of Djibouti’s president and set up shop; orange jugs of tea sweetened with condensed milk, aluminum platters of hardboiled eggs and crispy baguettes. The men cross the roundabout and squat on the curb, perched like crows, with turbans shading their heads and their hands cupped around plastic glasses of steaming shaah. They face the water to catch the same wafts of thick, salty air that barely sways my peasant skirt. Between the container/camel ship and the fishing docks bobs a Somali dhow. The boat, like Djibouti, is in progress. Portions of the thirty-foot dhow are painted green, blue, red, and white like the containers, the same colors as the Djiboutian flag, which flaps against a crooked wooden pole in the center of the boat. But most of the vessel’s curved planks are bare. A man clings to a ladder hanging over the edge, pounding nails. Now that the camels have quieted, the sound of his hammer echoes, hollow, across the water. The dhow is a perfect image of a Somali pirate mother ship, but these men aren’t pirates, they are fishermen. They stretch out on tarps and smoke cigarettes, sip Cokes, and chew khat, a leafy mild narcotic. They wave at those of us on shore. Wide wooden fishing docks jut out parallel to, but dwarfed by, the shipping

port. The boats here are smaller than the container ships, their cargo destined for Djibouti Town rather than Dubai. Tuna, red snapper, barracuda, black tip reef shark. Nets and strings are filled with fish caught during a long night at sea, the prospect of a solid meal swinging from hooks. Either the fishermen will sell their catch in the market or to expatriates like me, or they will take it home for dinner. Pale pink flamingos balance on scrawny legs in the shallows at the far side of the docks. Some bend, their beaks immersed in the water, and others stand straight. They look like unorganized letters of the alphabet. A low row of mangroves creates a border between land and sea. The trees hold back the desert from encroaching on the flamingos and the port. Or maybe the mangroves hold back the ocean from encroaching upon the desert, that soft, dry wadi where athletes run and nomads herd camel trains, where refugees set up temporary housing, and students take a shortcut from Balbala shanty town to the junior high school. To the south, where the road to Ethiopia meets the sea, and barely visible over the flatness of the moonscape-like wadi, are the tops of the gantry cranes of Djibouti’s new shipping port, the Port of Doraleh. Here, there are more ships, new jobs for stevedores, larger huddles of women selling tea. Their bright scarves and new port uniforms are brilliant, are signs of hope-filled development against the backdrop of the dusty desert. I feel comfortably hedged in by these borders of water and sand, flamingoes and fishermen. I wipe sweat from my eyes, wave back at the men on the dhow, and ask the young boys waggling fish at me how much they want for the basket of fresh shrimp at their feet.

Happy touring and happy living, welcome to Djibouti. Look me up or drop me a note and let me know how you are enjoying your time here!

www.djiboutijones.com

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Notes