Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
of that journey was my chance meeting with Mazar Mahir, a tour guide of Ancient Nubian
descent whose family business controlled the tourist trade in Wadi Halfa, the town on the
Nile that marks the border between Sudan and Egypt. Mazar was known throughout the
world as the go-to man for Sudan, and over the past years, we'd stayed in intermittent con-
tact. At first, I'd hoped Mazar himself would accompany me for the Sudanese leg of this
expedition, but - perhaps wisely - he had declared himself too busy. I didn't blame him -
his life was consumed with hosting tourists and helping them get out of trouble with the
Egyptian authorities. But it is not for nothing that the Sudanese are hailed, the world over,
as the most hospitable of hosts. 'I have a suggestion,' Mazar had said to me, 'and his name
is Moez. He is my little brother. He'll meet you at the airport. See if you like him, Lev. He
says he can walk.'
And that was all I knew about the man waiting for me in the airport: not that he was a
good guy, nor that he was very experienced, only that he could walk.
It was, I decided as he silently led me to his car, an inauspicious start.
After a night at the Acropole Hotel, I wended my way to meet Moez at his office in down-
town Khartoum. Less than a week had passed since that fateful night in Bor, but already it
felt like a lifetime ago.
With the morning light filtering through the shutters of his tiny first-floor room, nestled
between a spluttering air-conditioning unit and a lethal-looking fuse box, I was able to
consider Moez more thoughtfully.
'
Salaam Alaikum
,' he said, respectfully.
'
Inta Kwies? Tamam?
' I smiled back. 'Sorry,' I added. 'I've forgotten most of my Ar-
abic.'
'
Mafi Mushkila
. No problem. I will teach you.
Tamam?
'
'Tamam
,' I said.
'
Chai?
'
Well, that one was easy. I gratefully accepted his offer of tea and followed him to the
corner of his claustrophobic little office. Here, the walls were covered in photographs of
Moez with tourists, scientists and archaeologists. In between hung traditional paintings:
African masks, posters of the famous Pyramids of Meroe, shelves of Bedouin knives,
fossils, pieces of broken pottery and even some bones. 'It's all original,' Moez said with a
smile. 'Sudan is full of these things. I like rocks, particularly: granite, quartz, gold. Any-
where you go, you can just pick it up.'
'Gold?'
'Oh, it's everywhere. It's where the word
Nubia
comes from.'
'What is?'
