Entering Djibouti

It is hot here, but cool for Djibouti. How hot? Hotter than the outside of Uranus, but in the winter, about the same as the inside of your anus (thx Scottie).

We went for a walk to check out the local scenery. Walked along the beach, the local people sleep there in the summer because their homes are too hot to sleep in, I'm told. Quickly veered away from the beach because it smelled like human turds and we have yet to repeat that particular walk. Here is some local scenery:




We arrived about midnight on september 20 something, and had a little trouble getting a visa. Just another lesson in not believing that getting a visa before arriving isn't worth the effort, despite what anyone tells you. Although it wasn't bad, and it is funny that the officials that questioned us looked so grim and dire before they let us in, and so jolly once we convinced them. People don't always look the way they feel, but they often look the way you think they feel. Or the way you feel. Didn't get close enough to them to figure out if they felt the way they looked.

And then some 90 year old Djiboutian grabbed our 30kg luggage despite our protests (because we had $20 US money for the cab ride, zero Djibouti francs and only some kenyan shilling amounting to about $5) and dragged it to a cab. The cab driver dutifully told us the ride was $20 (3600 Djibouti Francs) and since our luggage didn't fit in the cab, the trunk was open and I kept an eye on it. The toothless valet was befuddled at our Kenyan Shilling tip, but we left him in a cloud of fine Djibouti sand as he uttered his righteous curses.

Arriving at the Alia Hotel, our reservation was lost, although Ann managed to pull it up and show it to the concierge on her laptop, and we slept in a single that night. Everyone including Ann speaks french here, except me. Later that day we got moved to a double room, here is the view from that window:

So it was hot this first week, and we finally got into a permanent place, out of the hotel room. Me and Ann went on a couple of walks trying to find the charming shoreline we envisioned. It smelled at the waters edge. Even at the hotel Sheraton and places cordoned off. In fact, it seemed that there was a whole road made of human turds blackened and hardened by the sun on the northernmost edge of this place. We called it the rue de poo. There were herons there.