Hargeysa is a busy town when it's not raining, with a few of those Arabesque attractions that a tourist brochure would put in when there isn't really anything of interest: a few mosques, a market. A main street. Government buildings. But like most of Africa, it's far more interesting than it looks.

On my way to immigration a babbling man on the street began to follow me, holding his arms out. "Five hundred years ago the slave ships began their way across the ocean," he shouted, "and the chains of west Africa still burn on my wrist!" I gave him a curious look, and he was eventually called aside by some older men, who probably told him not to bug the white man like that. A few minutes later a group of women began to follow me; I felt a pinch on my shoulder. They had thrown a rock at me.





"Have you ever been in a war?" the officer at immigration asked me. Ths boss wasn't there yet to stamp me in; he was supposed to arrive at nine, and now it's ten thirty. I told the officer I was talking to that I had never been in a war. At least, not my own. And I've certainly never fought in one.

"It's not good," he replied. "But in 1988 – we had to fight."

Tensions were escalating in 1988 – the marxist regime down in Mogadishu had ordered several thousand people killed in Hargeysa. Even now war damage is one of the most prevalent sights in the city.
The officers were all decked out in army uniforms, nicely pressed, with clean black berets on their scalps. The officer I had been speaking to grinned. I asked him about the fact that no country recognized Somaliland. He grinned again.

"It makes no difference to us. If they want to recognize us, then let them recognize us. If they don't want to recognize us, then they don't recognize us." He continued. "We are nomads, you know? Life is simple here. You wake up, eat, chew Qat, tend the animals, eat, and sleep. Political things matter little. If people want to fight us, then they will lose, because we have nothing to lose."
I found it odd that he would bring up fighting, when I simply asked about recognition. Obviously war is still in the hearts of these men. But they are good, and honourable I think, and realize the prupose of war and that it must eventually end; unlike their brothers in Mogadishu.

"They use the corrupt Italian system of government," he said, "and they fight always. Never is there an end."

I finally got my entry stamp, on a completely different page. Why they did that is beyond me, but I would learn to thank them later.
I had met a doctor earlier in the day who was looking for a western reference, as Africans often do (no matter that they're also looking to make some cash by helping out foreigners). He invited me for tea after I ran into him a few hours later, and we chatted. He was very interested in studying his PHD in Canada. I offered to mail him a university catalogue. He gave me a tour of his hospital: clean but bare, and no sign of any patients or medical supplies. I posed for some ridiculously stiff pictures with them as well. He then offered to arrange me a private car to Boorama, for cheap. But first there was the matter of lunch.





Me, him and a friend of his wandered over to a large open restaurant, with dirt floors and a dingy dark indoor room. We sat outside. Mango juice, water, a dish of spaghetti with sauce, and a large dish with rice and two loins of sheep meat; and also some very awful tasting "animal" soup. All fine and dandy you say. And yes, it was all fine, except that you have to eat all of this with your fingers.
If you've never eaten rice or spaghetti with your fingers, I recommend getting some practice before you visit Somaliland. Otherwise you might end up with many spaghetti sauce stains on your pants, such as I did. The upside to all of this is that a gorging amount of food for three costs a whopping 10,000 Somaliland shillings – or just about three bucks US. And yes, people wash their hands before and after meals. Abdi Rahman Ismail was his name, and he directed me toward the private taxi stand after our lunch.

Soon we became surrounded by men – shouting, pulling, pushing, surrounding us. I was asked to sit down while Abdi negotiated. Five minutes later I got up and moved through the throng into a taxi, shrugging off hands pulling at me and my bag, always mindful of my bag. The taxi was stuck, we locked the doors as the crowd persisted. One man reached through an open window and tried to unlock my door; I pressed against the lock quickly as the taxi finally sped off. We stopped several blocks away to negotiate a price.

USD30 for the trip, and I guess that's okay; but actually, extremely expensive for the region - however my time constraints forced me to accept it. Abdi took down his car number, his name, his tribe's name, his grandfather's name, and the make of his car and threatened to throw him in jail if anything happened to me. Yet another example of how your fellow African does not trust his fellow African.

Remember Said Jama? He runs a company called Somaliland Aerolite Telecommunications in Somaliland, with offices in Hargeysa and Boorama. We couldn't find the Aerolite Telecommunications office in Hargeysa, so off I went to Boorama. Said would probably be in Boorama anyways, I thought. I gave the doctor the equivalent of US$5 for his help. The taxi driver's cut was such a large amount of bills that he had to stuff several stacks of them in his glove compartment – here, people have an incredible skill which is flipping through dozens upon dozens of bills very quickly using their thumb and forefinger. I never did get the hang of it.



Boorama

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