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November 25, 2005
Losing Myself & My Guidebook in Kairouan
After a quick breakfast at the Diplomat, I hailed a taxi and went straight to the southern bus station. It was 8:40am, and I was hoping to get the 9am bus to Kairouan, assuming that's when the next bus left the station. Fortunately, I arrived with just enough time to buy my ticket for nine dinars and get on the bus, which left three minutes later. There were less than 10 of us on the bus, so we had plenty of room to spread out. Interestingly, the bus was one of the WSIS delegate buses - it still had the WSIS hotel route sign on it. The driver went around the bus and asked everyone's destination. No one said they were going to Nabeul, usually the first stop on the bus, so we made a direct line to Kairouan, arriving in just over two hours rather than the usual three.
The Kairouan bus station was a swirl of dust, with nary a taxi in sight. I grabbed my bags and hiked a few meters outside of the station, hoping to hail a passing taxi. It didn't take too long; within five minutes I had a ride to my hotel. Soon we pulled up to what appeared to be a medieval sandstone fortress; indeed, it was the Hotel La Kasbah, my home for the next night. The Kasbah was the medina's former military stronghold, but it had been converted beautifully into Kairouan's classiest hotel. Normally a room during the high season could easily fetch well over $100 a night, but I managed to get a room for closer to $50.
After tossing my belongings into my room, I grabbed my daypack, camera and Lonely Planet guidebook so I could explore the city. I'd been waiting for years to do this, ever since becoming interested in genealogy. You see my name, Carvin, was originally spelled Karawan, a name associated with a family of Tunisian rabbis who lived in medieval Kairouan. Even though there are few, if any, Jews left in Kairouan today, it was once an intellectual powerhouse for Talmudic studies, rivaling the colleges of Babylon back in the 10th and 11th centuries. According to legend, a group of four rabbis left Babylon on a mission to the Mediterranean; at some point in their voyage, their ship was attacked by pirates, and the four rabbis were initially taken as hostages, sent to four different cities, including Kairouan. Eventually, they were allowed to settle in those cities, becoming the basis for what would be a thriving Jewish community. Who knows if there's any truth to the story, let alone my actual genealogical connection to Kairouan. Either way, it's still a possibility, so my visit here would give me a chance to reconnect with my supposed heritage.
Leaving the hotel, I walked across the road to the local market. It was jammed with vendors and shoppers haggling mostly over produce, particularly peppers, oranges and pomegranates. Other vendors sold dates, fennel, chickpeas, dried fruits and nuts. The vendors would call out their produce and the price associated with it, hoping to attract new customers, so the market had the sound of an agricultural stock exchange.
No one seemed to mind I was there; as far as I could tell I was the only non-Tunisian in the market. People occasionally said bonjour or marhaba to me, but otherwise they went around their business, as did I, taking photos along the way. I asked several people if they minded having their pictures taken, and fortunately no one objected. Further along the market towards the southwest gate of the medina, I passed along a series of vendors selling shoes and clothing. This area was particularly crowded, with women in hejabs and jeans alike looking for bargains.
Beyond the market, I reached the old stone gate to the medina. Numerous vendors had set up shop for tourists, selling souvenirs and postcards, while others sold mobile phone accessories and music CDs. I walked along Avenue 7th de November, the main road through this part of the medina. You could tell that this was a major destination for tourists given the number of carpet shops along the strip; Kairouan is famous throughout Tunisia for its carpets. I wasn't in the market for a rug, though, so I declined the numerous requests to come inside and have a look. I'd read that carpet vendors were extremely persistent here, but generally I didn't find that to be the case. Frankly, the souvenir vendors in the Tunis medina made a harder sell than the carpet guys along the street here. The medina had an odd familiarity to it; I'd been told that some of the scenes from Raiders of the Lost Ark had been filmed here, so I'd have to take some pics and compare them with the movie when I got home. Most of the buildings were whitewashed with light blue accents; once you headed north away from the main drag, you could really appreciate the brightness of the place.
I wandered upward through the medina, in the general direction of the Great Mosque, the holiest Islamic site in North Africa. There wasn't a direct route to the mosque, per se; instead, you had to weave through the alleyways, using your inner compass and your map as a guide. The neighborhoods were residential, with people coming and going from place to place on bicycles and motor scooters, boys kicking soccer balls against the walls. Still no signs of other tourists, amazingly; it was as if I had the entire medina to myself. Soon I reached the southern wall of the mosque. I followed it west another block or two, reaching a dense spot of souvenir vendors; this must be the main entrance. Walking through a large wooden door, I paid the 5.2 dinar entrance fee, including a camera fee. Inside, I found a group of two dozen Spanish tourists and their guide, standing in the enormous courtyard. Far to my left, the mosque's ancient minaret soared upward, while to the right, the domed prayer hall. The mosque was first constructed in the late 7th century, though most of what's scene today dates from a couple hundred years later; either way, it's one of the oldest mosques in the world and an important pilgrimage site.
I strolled along the courtyard as the sun bore down on me. It was only in the low 70s, but the light colors of the stonework made the light reflect from the ground. Even with sun glasses on I had to squint much of the time. The perimeter of the courtyard was lined with hundreds of columns, all much older than the mosque itself. They were taken from Roman and Punic sites across north Tunisia, including Carthage. Because of this, no two columns were alike.
I walked over to the prayer hall, waiting a little while for the Spanish tourists to get out of the way so I could have a look for myself. Non-Muslims aren't allowed inside, but you could stand at the doorway and appreciate the view. The interior was decorated by elaborate chandeliers and columns, the floor covered in carpets from wall to wall. A small number of men prayed inside, but otherwise the prayer hall was almost empty. From there, I crossed the full length of the courtyard, which sloped gradually to a central point, allowing rainwater to drain into a cistern.
I stood below the massive sandstone minaret, peering upward. The lowest levels of the minaret date from some of the earliest constructions of the mosque; in fact, several of the stones used in the construction featured Latin script from the Roman era. The people who built it probably must not have spoken Latin; one block had the words appearing upside down. I sat along the edge of the courtyard, basking in the sun and reading my guidebook. I shot some video as well, hoping to make a brief video blog about my visit to the mosque. After a while it got too hot sitting there, so I departed the mosque and started to retrace my path through the medina, intent on having a late lunch somewhere near Ave de 7th Novembre. Along the way I stopped at a snack shop to grab a bottle of water - man was I parched - and continued through the covered souk, where I was invited to climb to the terrace of a carpet shop to enjoy their view of the medina. From the roof, I could see minarets in every direction, the blue sky and puffy white clouds perfectly complimenting the blue and white colors of the medina.
Leaving the shop, I continued through the souk, where I was briefly stopped by a man who spoke in French for a couple of minutes about the beauty of Islam. I couldn't understand most of what he said, so I smiled a lot and nodded my head politely.
A few minutes later, I was back along the main avenue. I knew my Lonely Planet guide had several local restaurant suggestions, so I pulled out my daypack to take a look. The outer pocket was open; the book was missing. I paused for a moment , somewhat confused; I rummaged through the other pockets but couldn't find it. Had I been pickpocketed, perhaps while being lectured by the man in the souk? That didn't seem likely, because nothing else was missing.
Retracing my steps northward through the souk, I stopped at both the carpet shop and the snack shop; no sign of the book. I continued all the way to the mosque, which was closing its doors to tourists for the rest of the day. I went inside and met an old man who said the mosque was closed, so I struggled to explain in French that my book was missing. The fact that I was flummoxed by my book disappearing made it harder to get my words right.
"J'etait ici a une heure," I struggled. "Avec une libre touriste Tunisienne. Mais maintenant Je ne trouver pas cette livre. Peutetre j'oublie ici?"
The man replied to me slowly, but I couldn't make out much of what he was saying. It sounded like he was telling me to go to the tourism office to buy a book.
"Non, non, monsieur," I replied. "Je ne besoin pas couper un livre."
He continued to explain to me what he was trying to say, leading me out of the mosque while walking my bike. I started to get the sense that he had actually found my book and sent it to the tourism office. He told me the office closed at 3pm, and gave me directions to walk there. I just hoped I understood what the hell he was saying.
I walked for about 30 minutes towards the office; why I didn't hail a taxi is beyond me. I then reached a large building that appeared to be the right place; inside I found two women who spoke a little English.
"Is this the tourism office?"
"No, this is a ticket office," one of them replied. "The tourism office is closed today."
"Closed?" I said. "That doesn't make sense."
"Why not?"
"I lost my guide book today when I was at the mosque. A man at the mosque said he had found my book and brought it to the tourism office, and gave me directions that led me here."
"This is not the tourism office, but it is close by," she continued. "But still, the office is locked today, so it is not possible he could have brought your book."
It seemed quite clear that my Lonely Planet guide had become a casualty of my trip to Tunisia, at the worst possible time since I hadn't really gone anywhere yet. There wasn't much I could really do except give the women my contact information in case the book turned up; they wrote down my hotel and room number but the look on their face said quite clearly they thought the whole exercise was pointless.
So here I was on the first day of a week-long excursion in Tunisia, without a guide book. Needing some time to think, I went to the city's one Internet café, a Publinet centre at a local hotel. A young teenage girl set me up on a PC, charging me about a dollar for an hour of Internet access. They had DSL, so the connection wasn't too bad. I also checked to see if my WSISBlogs.org website was blocked, as had been rumored at WSIS; it wasn't. I also updated my blog with some journals I'd written on my laptop as saved on my USB key; this was a lot easier than struggling to type on an Arabic keyboard, with multiple keys in all the wrong places (wrong to me, at least).
I stopped at the hotel and asked if there was a bookstore in town; the receptionist told me that I could find a couple of books near the far end of Avenue 7th de Novembre. By now, it was late in the afternoon, the sun getting low in the sky. I strolled the shops, looking to see if I could find a bookstore; eventually I reached the eastern gate of the medina, not having passed a single one. I then tried to find one in the newer part of the city, outside the medina walls. I had no problem finding an ATM and a dozen places to buy shoes, but still no bookstore.
It was just after 6pm; the sun had set and several planets flickered in the sky. Feeling somewhat dejected because of my failed book hunt, I decided to find a place to get some dinner. A few doors down passed the gate, though, I suddenly noticed a row of shops with hundreds of books in the window. They must have just opened for the evening. I went in one shop and asked about tour books; they had a couple English-language books about Tunisian history, but no English guides. However, I managed to find a French guidebook; skimming through it, I figured I could work out the details since my reading ability was a hell of a lot better than my speaking ability.
With my new book in hand, I stopped at the Restaurant de la jeunesse for dinner, where I had a fixed-price meal for eight dinars. The first course, a Tunisian tuna salad, was delicious, but the second course, a Tunisian tagine, was a bit much for me. I'd forgotten that tagines here were different than the stew-like tagines of Morocco, so I ended up with a fried square of quiche. I ate a few bites of it but otherwise filled up on bread and olives. They then brought over a small place of the local delicacy, honey-soaked pastries filled with minced dates. They looked almost exactly like Fig Newtons but were 10 times sweeter, so there was no way I could finish the five pieces on my plate.
Back at the hotel, I wrapped up my evening sitting in their café, an extraordinary place in a dark, vaulted part of the kasbah. I smoked a shisha and drank some mint tea while writing my blog; the evening call to prayer rang out in the distance as the Chemical Brothers' "Galvanize" played on the stereo system. Yet another instance of the old colliding with the new here in Tunisia.
Posted by acarvin at November 25, 2005 5:32 PM
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