I made my way into downtown Djibouti recently with a few guys from work, to be honest I was not culture shocked. It is everything you would expect to see on TV and in the newspapers. It was interesting to see and cough cough smell where they lived. It's a very smoggy city, and don't expect to see many people actually working after 3 pm, because most of them are high off their asses, and on a 4 hour siesta, I'm not kidding.
The Djiboutian Government hands out Khat (cot- like in cotton)( a narcotic similar to marijuana), mainly to keep the people calm and rumored to keep them from revolting. I was nervous at first to go into the city considering that Djibouti City is mainly comprised of Somalian refugees. I only had one hostel comment made to me and that was from an older muslim man who came up to me yelling "You Americans are HORRIBLE, you kill women and children!!!" referring to the war in Iraq. I kept walking to get away from him, mind you, that apparently this happening was a rare occurance. It ammuses the hell out me that the people here give NO mind to cars, I dont think they could care any less if they saw a 2,000 lb. car speeding at them, and dont even think about using a horn, it doesnt work, TRUST me, they just stare...almost like a deer. They dont even notice you! I assume its the khat.
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1 comment:
This is great, Pat. We are learning from you new world and your great writing about it.
Keep us posted.
Gram
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