This Was Not in the Travel Book!

I can’t breathe. I think I’m gonna be sick. Am I about to pass out?

I leaned my head against the airplane seat and closed my eyes. This was not in the travel book! Everything is going  to be OK, I told myself. I wasn’t convinced. But there was no going back. And I wasn’t about to tell my husband. I had to be brave.

My hands squeezed tightly around the only book I’d found on Eritrea, as if strangling it. The  author had not bothered to  mention possible fits of fear upon entry to this foreign country.

And now here I was, having my own private little panic attack. Of course, I’d never had one so I wasn’t sure. And there was no Google back then to look it up. But we sat there on the plane—a couple of twenty-three-year-olds—headed to a strange country we knew nothing about. (Like I mentioned, there was no Google.) I had managed to find one travel book about this obscure little country and I’d read it from cover to cover and memorized the black and white pictures. No one we knew had ever lived there, so it’s not like we could ask anyone questions.

Mr. R

We were supposed to meet a man at the airport (I’ll call  him Mr. R) who would be our supervisor. He didn’t live there either, but had entered the country a few weeks early to try to set up some things for us. He said he would be easy to find.

Mr. R had instructed us to bring a lot of cash with us since there was no other way to have access to money. Like a lot. We carried thousands of dollars stuffed in a money belt, our carryons, and in our pockets. I was terrified we were gonna get mugged.

So all of this, combined with the fact we’d just signed up for 2 1/2 years (that was a LONG TIME to my twenty-three-year-old self) in a little-known country all by ourselves, equalled a mini panic attack for me. It didn’t feel “mini” though. 

We’d flown from Dallas to Frankfurt and now were on our final flight. Somewhere in the skies between Germany and Eritrea, I gained my composure and we landed, emotions intact (even if a little frayed). 

Arrival

When we arrived in the small airport it was late at night. We descended a rickety set of metal stairs and walked across the warm tarmac  from the plane to a building and navigated immigration. After having our passports stamped, we entered an open area with tiled floors and cement walls. A crowd of people waiting for the arrival of family members greeted us. Happy voices and shrill ululating commenced as reunions sprouted around the room. 

 And sure enough, there was one white man standing in the crowd of North Africans. That would be our supervisor. Mr. R wore a tan colored shirt with big patch pockets and matching tan trousers. I didn’t know this at the time, but it was his uniform. I don’t remember ever seeing him wear anything but that outfit. In fact, he wore multiple outfits just like it on all his trips to see us. And when we moved in to our house, he just left a set there for us to keep for him so he wouldn’t have to bring it back and forth in his suitcase.

After introductions yelled over the din of a hundred other greetings, we waited with Mr. R for  our luggage to arrive. Before long, men in work uniforms pulled a large wagon-like cart into the middle of the room. It was piled high with baggage from the airplane: suitcases, duffle bags, even cardboard boxes: balanced like a precarious version of Jenga. Commence the free-for-all. 

Passengers and those who came to meet them pulled bags onto the floor, picking through the pile to find what belonged to them. We brought six suitcases between the two of us, plus our carryons. I guarded the carryons while Kris and Mr. R dove into the chaos to find our luggage. 

Is that a Taxi?

Thankfully, Mr. R negotiated with a couple of  men to help us get  our luggage out of  the  airport and to the pick-up area. And there, we saw that he  had  already arranged for two  very old looking Italian Fiats (which he assured us were taxis) to  take us  to the hotel. 

I eyed the two decrepit vehicles waiting for us at the curb. Could  they actually survive long enough to get us to our destination?

It was at this moment, as I watched the men shove our bags into the trunk and back seats, that I remember taking my first look at this new land. I remember seeing women crawl into the bed of a white Toyota truck. Their gauzy white dresses flowed in the slight breeze  and their matching white scarves only partially covered their hair that tightly framed their heads in tiny braids and then poofed out dramatically at the nape of their necks. Their chatter  was indistinct but melodious. The black and white sketches in my travel book did not prepare me for the strong sense of “foreignness” that washed over me. 

But there was no time to process this feeling because Mr. R  had directed all the bags be loaded in the two ancient  cars and had jumped into the passenger seat of the  first car. 

“I’ll meet you there,” he called as his taxi pulled away from the curb. We scrambled into the second taxi, hoping that the driver would  follow Mr. R and take us to the correct hotel. This was many years pre-cellphone, so we had no way to find Mr. R again. And there was no plan B. Our taxi pulled away from the  curb and drove down the quiet streets of Asmara. We were relieved to see Mr. R’s taxi parked in front of the hotel when we arrived twenty minutes later.

The Hotel

It was late at night, so we checked in and went straight to our room. The hotel was an old Italian-style relic with tiled floors and a musty smell. I remember walking down the hall to our room and seeing what looked like large beer bottles outside the hotel room doors, like they were set out for room service to pick up. Had Mr. R set  us  up in a seedy hotel? I found out later those tall brown bottles were actually carbonated water bottles. The bubbly water, called maygas, was a cheap way to buy clean water for drinking since the tap water was  not potable. 

A wooden-framed bed, an antique Italian wooden armoire and dressing table, and a musty oriental carpet furnished the hotel room. The hotel staff unloaded our bags into our room and we counted them. We  were one bag short. One bag was still sitting at the arrival hall in the airport. Unless it wasn’t…and someone had  taken  it.

 Hurriedly, Mr. R and Kris took off to find a taxi and return to the airport in hopes of retrieving the forgotten bag.

Left Alone

I sat on the edge of the bed of this old hotel in the middle of the night. Alone. Somewhere in Africa. I thought about the ladies piling into the back of pickup truck at the airport. Strange ladies in strange clothing speaking a strange language. I recalled the beer bottles stacked in the hallway. What sort of hotel was this? My feet felt the cold tile. Old Italian tiles, laid many years ago in a different season of history. I could smell the musty carpet that had probably been on the floor just as long. I felt excited and nervous, and a little scared being left in the hotel with no idea how to get help if I needed it.

Had we made a big mistake? 

The rollercoaster of emotions was intense. In a  span of twenty-hours we had packed our life into suitcases, said goodbye to family, boarded a plane headed for a country whose name we  weren’t sure how to pronounce, landed in Africa, lost a bag, barreled down the road to who-knows-where in a taxi, and checked into a hotel that looked like it had been dragged out of Italy through a time machine and perhaps was  full  of drunkards. And now I sat alone in said hotel, wondering if I’d see my husband again and what to do if he didn’t return. 

What’s a Newbie to Do?

Nope, there’s not a lot to prepare a newbie for the overwhelming feelings that all come crashing in at once. But you know what? The guys did eventually return, bag in hand. We said goodnight to Mr. R and went to bed: exhausted but thankful to finally be in Eritrea.

Those first moments of our new adventure are burned in my memory. Over twenty-five years later, what once felt scary and foreign now feels nostalgic and magical. Like, “Hey Kris, remember when we lived in the best kept secret in Africa?” I think back to that evening  many years ago, before internet and digital photos. In those days, sights and feelings came and went without documentation in the annals of Instagram or Twitter.

In one way I’d love to  have pictures to share every moment of that adventure. But in another way, it’s more endearing to recall those moments that I never downgraded to digital format. They are the sights, sounds, tastes, smells, and feelings that only come clear when I close my eyes and remember.