Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Au Coin du Monde

I guess that I expected something that felt more like Morocco than Paris, which just goes to show my latent (latent?) Orientalism: all these crazy Arab towns will look the same! Another thing that shows how Eurocentric (or Mediterocentric) my tendencies has to do with when I think of Algerian geography: to go to the Sahara in my mind means going North, Algiers is on the southern coast, I look south across the great sea, etc…



What Algiers resembles most to my mind, since I can’t see something without comparing it to other things, is Marseille without all those blasted French. Well, that isn’t quite right either, but keep in mind I’ve only been there for about two hours total. I guess the lesson is that Braudel was on to something. I guess I should read those Mediterranean books again, as it might mean a bit more now that I’ve been to a few more places bordering this sea. Although I also have to keep in mind what Charles Wheeler once said to me about the notion of seas/oceans/river/water in general as bringing people and cultures together (which seems to be an analytic trend, especially about the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean): “sure, but have you ever been on a long boat ride? Can you imagine that 500 years ago? The ocean sucks, man. If you fall off your boat you will die; if you fall off your wagon on land you might get a bruise. You get blown off course, there’s no landmarks, no way to find longitude, no way to get fresh water, it’s harder than you think to catch fish, long enough out there and you’ll get scurvy, even if you have both fresh water and fish. No, I think water probably keeps more people apart than it brings together.” Which I think is probably true.



From the Glycines I get a pretty good view of some of the town below and the port, pictures to come. The whole town is built on a fairly steep incline coming off the sea, and none of the streets just go straight through. They are not exactly switchbacks, but something pretty close. Nearer the water the town levels off.



When I came into town from the airport at 12:30am on the highway (newly paved and smooth, I must say) the other night there was a huge traffic jam going the other way: cars standing still for probably two miles (at 12:30am, take that L.A.). The driver said, “oh, there’s always construction,” which didn’t really explain much to me. Then when I walked into town along a main road yesterday there was a traffic jam the entire way on one side of the road. Coming back up the hill the traffic was jammed going the other way. I think that Algiers has only a few roads that they are magically moving around: if the road is in use on the other side of town people just have to sit patiently. I assume that angry gesticulating and laying on the horn for minutes at a time are both signs of patient waiting here. But, it is Ramadan after all, and people are bound to get angry by the end of the day.

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