Yes, 'once feared'; now the biggest fear is getting stuck in traffic for hours or getting harassed by the Algerian police, who, in effect, still run the place.
A tentative power sharing agreement was hammered out in 2002 and major European airlines endorsed it by resuming flights into Algiers. Though anyone outside of France could be damned to think that the country is 'safe' again: ask anyone about the place and you'll get the usual rounds of fearmongering. Though this is not without any validity, as our Air France plane was surrounded by gunmen upon our arrival, a sight I had not seen since Mogadishu. Security here is a fragile thing, but the good news is that it exists.
Algiers, though, is an amazingly bichromatic capital, an ocean of faded colonial grandeur straddling the sea of the Mediterranean. With almost no exceptions does the city boast vast swaths of white buildings with rot iron balconies dotted by grids upon grids of baby blue wooden window shutters.
The official story was (and/or will be) that there was a problem with my credit card and I was denied access to my reservation at the Sheraton Hotel; downtown then to the cheaper places which a cash only budget could manage, most were surprisingly full and a pleasant taxi driver took me to several before I could settle on a fading white and blue tower which could only offer me what seems to be an abandoned presidential suite on its top floor for the extremely low price of 11 Euros; though perhaps the fact that there is no electricity or running water( I, having a flashlight, am only miffed about the water, though the rusted bathtub and non-flushing toilet do not lend well to oneself getting to cozy for a shower) might have something to do with this cheap price.
Algiers is a clash of the secularist and Islamist traditions, a cosmopolitan and medium sized city with a few standardized sites but is best taken through a wandering method; I wandered through its busy shopping streets with an interesting mix of French and Arabian traditions, cafés and kebab parlours sitting inconspicuously beside one another, and noticed that I did not stick out nearly as much as I had anticipated. Indeed, the lack of apparent surprise to my being on the street has been noticeable. People may notice I am foreign but do not care to any extent. For a nation whose guerillas were intent on killing foreigners upon sight less than three years ago, this comes as quite a surprise.
North to the Place Des Martyrs I walked, to find a less than scenic square made more interesting by its mass of people. Under tall white archways were crowds like veins, moving north and south, a pedestrianized city though the volume of automobiles remains astronomical; Place Des Martyrs is the centre of the Casbah, the old town per se, boasting three mosques surrounding it and I could hear the wailing of the day's final call to prayer from my own hotel a half kilometre south.
In spite of Algeria's elections and numerous parties, it became very apparent who runs this country upon my arrival: the national army, and the police. Algeria is an interesting case of police state that knows its boundaries, where military leaders remain military leaders while continuous legions of politicians bungle things up at the presidential level. It is hard to say that this is a 'good thing', but it does mean that democratic elections mean less with the persistent interdiction of the army.
Though to stay here, when Algeria's two other main coastal towns call, may be to my detriment. And on the other hand, perhaps it will be the choice thrust upon me as the customs people were intensely curious about my motivations for being here (tourism just doesn't cut it, no matter how many times you say it) and may want a hotel booking in Oran or Constantine before allowing me on the plane.
Such intense monitoring of foreigners is difficult to imagine when the rest of the world has become so freewheelingly capitalistic in recent times but perhaps this is the only way a state maintained by the military can work. It is also the first country I've visited where they take their currency declarations seriously.
So we shall see, and in the morning I must head back to the Place Des Martyrs. Then, hopefully, onward.
Oran
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