Jebel Nafusa, Tea with Mamma

Jebel Nafusa is a two hour drive from Tripoli. My guide/guard and I spent those hours in relative silence, grooving to his cassette tapes of Libyan and Berber music and watching the towns roll by. The road we took leads from one side of the country (Egypt) to the other (Tunisia) and looks appropriately long and impressive. The roadsides, however, were no so thrilling. Lots of tiny, one-mosque sort of towns. Lots of billboards bearing patriotic proclamations. Lots of dirt. Nothingness.



The first stop was at an old granary called Qasr al-Hajj. It was built in the same style as related structures that dot the south of Tunisia - in fact, several sites of the day (and all of the touristic merchandise) were highly reminiscent of Tunisia, to the point that my guide/guard got rather disappointed at my low ooh-and-ah quotient. I was rather jaded when it came to potteries, troglodyte houses, harissa. Tunisia may be the Thumbelina of North African countries, but dang if it isn’t comprehensive! And maybe I was in Libya during a particularly poor stretch of weather (Cairo suffered under horrible sand storms too), but I rather missed the blue skies of Tunis. In what I saw of Libya, the sky matched the landscape - tan.



This particular qasr, unlike those I visited in Tunisia, allowed visitors to clamber up its stairs and take photos from the second level. I was the only tourist to do so, although I do believe that the group of American and British retirees down below looked up with envy. In the distance, I spotted the mountains. In the sky, dust, sand and more sand.



The abandoned Berber city we visited was perched on the side of a mountain at whose base stretched an endless-looking expanse of land. We sat on the edge, listening to the whistle of the wind. I felt like I had visited the moon, but only for a moment. We had to hurry off to get tea.




The local inhabitants have since moved into modern, concrete-centric homes in nearby villages. In one such city, Jadu, lies the home of my guide/guard. And he refused to rest until I visited his mother.




This is the symbol of the Berber people, in their own alphabet:


The mother is a tiny woman. Friendly. She insisted upon serving me tea and cookies and nuts and pointedly forced me to eat some of everything. She has had something like ten children. We sat on couches close to the floor and I submitted to questioning. No, I am not married. Yes, I am traveling alone. No thank you, I would not like any more cookies. No, really. Oh, alright, maybe just one.



Two of my guide/guard’s sisters were also in attendance, and a young neighbor stopped by. When the guide/guard suggested we pose for photos, she proceeded to take several of us two and of me alone with her cell phone camera. I can’t imagine what she’s doing with those pictures - I, as you can see, am putting the one I took on the internet. The neighbor took me to the roof of their house and pointed out the local landmarks. Here is the school, there is the mosque, here is the store, that is my house. Here is my life, what do you think? She smiled the whole time and giggled when I spoke Arabic.

It was impossible to not be charmed.