Tunisia was hot. I lay in the sun, eyes screwed shut, to no avail, your eyelids are just too thin to keep out that intense beaming natural light, and it felt like someone was holding one of these electric fires about a foot from my face, these old fires with electric bars and the fake coal and the shimmering lights to fool you into thinking it’s a real fire, and you can always smell the dust burning on it. That’s how hot it was. And we went inland for more. We had to see those Roman ruins. Columns and mosaics and walls but never a roof. Statues with no heads so tourists could stand behind it and take the corny photograph and think they’re being original. And we dehydrate - scared to re-hydrate because there’s no toilet on this bus and the driver won’t stop. Ruins and then home to try to stop what’s already happened. You can eat as much watermelon and drink as much as you like but you’re gonna feel bad because that one pee behind a cactus, that bursting bladder and that bottle you needed to drink from but couldn’t because the driver won’t stop at any more cacti has taken it’s toll.
So you get back and you make a toga from your sheet and relive the day under the ceiling fan and swear you’ll never dehydrate again. They all want a piece of you these Tunisians. So friendly but they want you to buy.
"Hubble bubble pipe? Camel? Cheaper than Asda!"
They’re on holiday too. Laughing, joking, selling. Too hot to work.
"How much for the girl?"
More tomorrow...
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