The Coptic procession carrying the Arc of the Covenant finished its circuit through the unpaved streets of the overgrown village of Axum, and re-entered the dark cloisters of the ancient brooding church. It was still early morning, and, already lugging my pack, I headed to the dusty square which served Axum as a transport hub.
In Addis Ababa I had been told that all travel north of Axum into the rebelling province of Eritrea was impossible due to rebel military activity which had closed the main highway. Once in Axum, I discovered that the Ethiopian army had reopened the road, and busses occasionally scooted through the war zone to the provincial capital of Asmara. My plan then changed to jumping one of those busses and subsequently finding transport from the Eritrean port of Massawa up the Red Sea to Aquaba in Jordan.
A deal had been brewing between one of the antiquities shopkeepers and yours truly to trade my pewter belt buckle, a heavy Ethiopian silver chain, and some cash for two more Axumite coins. I went to the shop to close the deal, but found it still closed, and the only bus headed to Asmara was about to leave. At the last possible moment when I already had one foot on the bus steps, the shopkeeper appeared, all out of breath, with the coins wrapped up in a cloth. I took a glance at them, made a rude comment in English, turned, and boarded. The clever shyster had been watching me from hiding until he knew there was no time to check carefully, made his last-second cameo, and had tried to substitute two inferior coins for the ones we had been bargaining over. No trade.
I rode the bus all day, stopping many times at army checkpoints where everyone had to get down and be searched while the soldiers searched the bus and luggage. In the south of Ethiopia the soldiers had been uniformly armed with old British Enfield bolt-action rifles. As I traveled north I had noted that those weapons were progressively replaced by semi-automatic M1 Garands of U.S. manufacture. There in the north of the country where the real fighting was going on, the standard weapon of the Ethiopian army was the big, heavy, almost-modern M14 rifle.
I did see two bridges which had been dynamited by the rebels. Bulldozers had cut temporary paths around the bridges, which were being repaired. I took a good photo of a blown bridge from the bus window as we drove away.
In the villages where the bus stopped I got plenty of attention from the locals. Just standing beside a tea shop, or sitting by the road on a bench I attracted crowds of dozens of people, not all begging, but standing around staring at me and speaking to one another in low voices. This was something new for me in Ethiopia. I figured it was a cultural thing, because I had encountered plenty of that behavior in Egypt, but hadn’t noted it since I had reached the Sudan. Here in Eritrea perhaps the culture was more similar to Egypt. Or perhaps in that area they just hadn’t ever seen many Farangi.
That morning in Axum, and while traveling to Asmara, I saw lots of children enthusiastically cracking big whips! I saw others pounding big fleshy succulent-plant leaves between rocks to get at the strong internal fibers which they braided to make their bullwhips. Whips were in some curious way related to that particular Coptic Holy Day, and cracking the whips was a traditional way to celebrate or worship. Strange customs in Ethiopia.
At one of those untrammeled village stops I found a street vendor sitting beside the road on a blanket upon which he had spread his wares. He had nothing but used junk, but the stuff included two little amulets for sale. Almost every Ethiopian wore a little flat, square leather pouch on a thong around his neck. I had heard that there were protective magical charms inside each one, and I was interested to learn more about them. I decided to buy one to disassemble, and another one to keep intact. So I began to bargain for his two little protective amulets, which had obviously spent many years at someone’s throat. This attracted a pretty good crowd of interested spectators. We finally reached agreement, I paid the man, and he handed over the charms. I immediately pulled out my pocketknife and slit open the side of one amulet.
Instant PANDEMONIUM! The vendor LEAPED to his feet and backed away fast, screaming something! Everyone else hollered and squawked and moved smartly away from me! Just from the tone and facial expressions I know that the message pounding me from all sides was
"WHY the HELL did you do THAT!?!?!?!"
In a heartbeat I went from the middle of a claustrophobic crowd of passive onlookers to a lone figure in the center of a ring of shouting, gesticulating, startled people with nobody closer than 40 feet! I slowly closed the knife and put it and both amulets into my pocket. This response calmed the scene down considerably.
I still don’t know exactly what felony I had committed by cutting open the charm packet, but I have a theory. Perhaps the little charms absorb the bad things from which they protect the wearers, and perhaps I had released all of that evil. I usually am not that stupid and culturally unaware. That evening, in the privacy of my cathouse room, I checked out my acquisition. Inside the little flat leather envelope was a very thin sheet of oiled, scraped animal skin, all slick and greasy. This sheet had been carefully inscribed with lots of Ethiopian writings, various mystical signs, and lots of magic number squares using Arabic, roman, and unknown numerals. The sheet was about 8" square, and had been elaborately folded in a strange helical/accordion pattern to fit into the 1" square amulet package. What a treasure!
That experience triggered in me an interest in magic number squares which lasted until I found myself laid up for a week in a Bosnian hospital with time on my hands (but that is another story). There I worked out for myself a system to create magic number squares of almost any dimension, and summing to any desired number, at which point their cachet of mystery evaporated.
We arrived in Asmara the following morning. Though well inland, that city had a much more Mediterranean feel to it, with western alphabet signs, the occasional Italian restaurant, and even a gelati shop. I did see other white folks, mostly Italian looking young gents with natty clothes and slick hairstyles. Everywhere I went in Asmara, the kids immediately shouted "Americani!" I know that I am indistinguishable from a German or a Dutchman to the eye, so it was something of a mystery how they always had me correctly pegged as American.
Walking down a street with my pack on, searching for cheap lodging, I heard a sudden commotion behind me, and spun around, ready for anything! Two small Eritrean men had BURST out of their office just after I passed! They were grinning widely, speaking English to me, and excitedly almost picked me up to carry me back into their little travel agency! The travel agents served me good sweet hot tea, and explained that they were so happy to see me because I was the first overland tourist they had seen in about eight months, and their business had really been hurting! I figured this was a substantial exaggeration, just setting me up so I would buy an air ticket from them. I told them my plans to travel north on the Red Sea, and they told me about a wonderful airfare they could offer me to Athens, via Addis Ababa, Khartoum, and Cairo.
With the help of the travel agents I located a nearby house of prostitution, signed in, and took a room. I had the usual hassle with the pretty professional girls, two of whom knocked at my door, invited themselves in to visit, wore out their few words of English, and then sat in my room forever, intently watching everything I did. I finally couldn’t stand the sexual tension and scrutiny anymore, and gently ejected them. I guess I’m just not a very good host.
Asmara at the time was a very tense place. Police and soldiers were everywhere. There was a 10 PM to 5AM curfew, and the story was that the army really did shoot you without warning if you were out and about. The streets were patrolled even in daytime by big open military trucks full of soldiers with machine guns mounted on the tops of the cabs. The soldiers looked scared and jumpy, which is a really bad sign. I heard automatic weapons fire in the streets every night. I never did find any empty AK-47 cartridges on the streets in the daytime, though I looked for them.
I ate some Gelati, but it just didn’t quite hit the spot. It had been more than six months since I’d had any American ice cream. My travel agent buddies had told me about an American Navy communications base on the outskirts of Asmara called Kagnew Station. I took a horse cab out to the American base and spent half an hour trying to talk my way past the Eritrean-manned guard post at the gate of the huge, fenced compound. The guards weren’t buying any of my fast talk, and were ignoring my American passport. Then a big, flashy Chrysler pulled up to the gate behind me, driven by a white guy sporting granny glasses with red lenses, a bright colored paisley shirt, and a huge blond afro hairdo.
"What’s goin’ on here, Herbert?" He asked.
The ranking guard reported deferentially, and handed the freak behind the wheel my passport. He looked it over, glanced at me, and said, "S’ ok, let him in" , then drove onto the base. When asked, Herbert informed me that the flaky-looking guy was John Morris, the civillian head of Kagnew Station security!
I found my way to the PX and cafeteria, empty at that time of day. The subsidized prices were so low as to be negligible, and the Eritrean staff fixed me up two chili dogs, fried onion rings, and a big bowl of vanilla ice cream, which I really enjoyed.
While I was eating, the security head and another freaky-looking white guy came into the cafeteria with two of the most beautiful women I have ever seen in my life. All four of them sat at another table. Those Eritrean ladies were really stunning, high cheekbones, almond eyes, young, slender, perfectly coifed and made up, wearing long, slinky, expensively designed and custom-tailored low-cut gowns. They were speaking lovely, American-accented english, and speaking it well. I hadn’t seen anything like them for quite a long time. And it was still the morning!
When my repast was finished, I wandered over to their table to thank Morris for allowing me to visit the PX. We did mutual introductions, and they asked where I had flown in from, and why. When I admitted that I had been in Axum the day before, four jaws went slack with surprise. "There haven’t been any Farangi up that road for over six months!" exclaimed John. "How did you avoid the army checkpoints?" When I allowed that I had been passed through by at least six checkpoints, their amazement increased. "Every foreigner that tried that route lately was stopped at the first checkpoint and received a military escort clean back to Addis, five days hard travel!"
The only explanation that makes any sense to me is that, since I came through the war zone on one of the big Coptic religious holidays, the "big fish" soldiers must have all taken the day off, and the "little fish" that were left wouldn’t take responsibility to seize me and send me back, so I slipped through. Just chalk it up to strong vagabond’s luck.