rites of passage

We had spent nearly three months lost in the Sahara. Our initial plan had been to

cross from East to West, using Sorenʼs house in Tenerife as our launch pad. We

flew from there to Marrakech. Things started to go wrong almost immediately. We

travelled to Erg Chebbi on the edge of the Sahara, the gateway to the real desert,

where we were due to meet up with Rashid, our guide. He never showed up. The

local guides made their living from helping tourists disembark from their four by

fours and transfer to a camel train which took them half an hour into the desert,

where groups of Canadians, Australians and North Americans would sing songs

round an open fire and eat couscous and satisfy their lust for adventure. None of

these guides were interested in a group of five crazies who actually planned to

enter their desert. The expedition was only rescued from disaster when a Berber

who was heading towards the Algerian border to hook up with his tribe agreed to

let us tag along.

The succession of wrong turns, near-death experiences and mirages (both

physical and psychological) that occurred over the course of the following ten

weeks have been detailed in my travelogue, Lost in a Sea of Sand, which you

may well have read. This isnʼt the place to repeat any of that. Suffice it to say that

when we finally escaped from the desert and arrived at Timbuktu, it seemed like  

a dream. Each one of us had forgotten what a world containing buildings looked

like, had forgotten that a world where man could exercise some kind of

ascendancy over nature (and sand) existed.

Timbuktu is an ancient city, with an extensive and highly developed cultural

heritage. None of us had the slightest interest in this. All we cared about was

having a proper shower, not having to sleep in a tent, and being able to get out of

the sun. These are the things that matter after youʼve spent the best part of three

months trying to stay alive in the Sahara. When Pav came back after going out to

have a look around and told us sheʼd found a Welshman in the library, no-one

was impressed. It was only when she added that he was a Welshman with a

generator, a fridge and a seemingly limitless supply of cold beer, that our

curiosity was aroused. 

His name was Liam and he told us heʼd lived there for almost ten years. He had

originally come as part of a project which intended to catalogue the library of

Abdarahman Sidi Idie, initiated by an organisation heʼd worked for which he

grandly claimed was a depositary for all the stories in the world. The job had

taken longer than anticipated. After a couple of years the funds had run out, and

his colleagues had returned to Europe, but Liam had fallen in love with the city,

its libraries, and their stories, and had chosen to stay.

    

I asked where the beers came from. He told me they were made from barley

stewed in fermented camel milk. Back home Iʼd have probably spat out the sip Iʼd

just taken, but under the circumstances even camel-piss fermented beer would

have tasted just fine.

It turned into a crazy night. The alcohol went to everyoneʼs heads. The energy

weʼd been using just to survive was no longer needed for that purpose. We

suddenly had a surplus. It affected us all in different ways. Pav and Soren finally

had sex, after weeks of pretending they werenʼt really interested. Those seven

days in Timbuktu, drinking Liamʼs beer, waking up hungover then drinking some

more, was one of the best weeks of our lives. None of this is in the book,

because itʼs personal, and even though the publishers begged me to make the

book a bit juicier, I didnʼt think it was appropriate. Thereʼs a big difference

between your public life and your private life, and you have to respect that.

It was also under the influence of Liamʼs beer that I found myself walking into a

mosque for the first time in my life. Of course, Iʼd visited mosques before, as a

tourist, but this time it wasnʼt like that. I guess that whilst the others used up all

that surplus energy being physical, I used that surplus energy and applied it to

the spiritual side of things. It was the first time I realised what it meant to be in a

holy place. As I sat on the floor, watching people chat or pray, with no one

seeming to bat an eyelash at this westerner sharing their sacred space, I

experienced what I can only call, no matter how corny it sounds, a sense of

transcendental relief. There and then, God came to find me. I knew straightaway

the part he had played in our salvation, as well as realising that it would always

be, from now on, so much better now that I was aware of his presence, by my

side, to guide me through all the journeys I had yet to make.

Of course, none of this is in the book either. My publishers like to play me up as

some kind of macho figurehead, always going on crazy adventures, challenging

the boundaries, as it says on the back of all my books. I canʼt complain. My

image is my fortune, and without it, I wouldnʼt be able to do the things I feel I

have to do in this world, no matter how self-serving and absurd they sometimes

seem. My public doesnʼt need to know the truth about my relationship with God.

Not yet. One day soon, I shall tell them. Or God will reveal it. But for now, they

wouldnʼt be ready for it, and I have to assume that heʼs OK with that, otherwise

heʼd do something about it.

2010

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