Saturday, July 14, 2012


The journey from Dakhla to Nouadhibou took around 8 hours even though those cities are not very far. My Mauritanian trip didn't start in the best way because I didn't have time to eat and drink all day and I was overheated in the car. By the time we arrived in Nouadhibou I was sick, but I managed to control myself and didn't throw up. My host was a French guy working there. He took me to a restaurant in the evening and we ordered a lot of seafood which was tasty although I couldn't eat much. On Tuesday and Wednesday my host took me to the sea at Cap Blanc and I had a big beach just for myself because the local people don't usually  swim there. I saw many shipwrecks there and also the train which was allegedly the longest one in the world. It was around 30°C in Nouadhibou during these days. We used to go to the restaurant every day for the lunch and dinner and we always ordered fish, shrimps, octopus and calmars. 
On Thursday morning I took a bus to Nouakchott where we arrived in the afternoon. It was 35°C there and I had to take a taxi to my host's house. He lived with his family and many friends used to visit him often. There was a restaurant in his house. The first 2 days I felt sick and I spent most of the time lying on the mattress in the living room but on Sunday I went to the embassy of Senegal and asked for the visa there. They refused to give me it at first, telling me they used to give it only to residents of Nouakchott. I finally had to bribe someone at the police station to give me the residence visa for 6 months in Nouakchott to be able to get visa to Senegal.
I stayed 8 days with my host and I spent a good time there although I didn't like this city at all. It was very hot at first and the sky was white due to the dust. The city was dirty and nothing to visit there. I went to the museum but it was small and not very interesting. The only good place in Nouakchott was a beach. 
The weather got colder after some days and it was only 25°C there and windy. The sky finally became blue. I couldn't stay with my host longer and I moved to Maison des artistes where I slept 6 days in an atelier. My companions were two guys, one of them was Ridiaw from Nouakchott and another one was Papis from Senegal. We used to go to the beach together and to a restaurant for a dinner. There were many mosquitoes in Nouakchott and I was bitten many times during the night, but there wasn't risk of malaria in Mauritania in contrary to Senegal. I studied French 5 years but I never spoke this language, only in Nouakchott I didn't have a choice because most people didn't know English.
I had to wait in Mauritania 2 weeks and half until I got my visa to Senegal which was much longer than I intended. 

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