Africa

Hanging with hyenas in Harar

Harar is considered by Ethiopian Muslims to be the fourth holiest city in the world (after Mecca, Medina and Jerusalem), and the old city has 88 mosques within its walls (a mere few square kilometres).   Apparently, there are almost as many bars as mosques in the old city, and one of the busiest chat

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Facing old demons in Tigray

The Tigray was one of my favourite regions in Ethiopia.   Rock hewn monasteries perched on top of steep mountains, to be closer to god and protect from invaders.  I was looking forward to revisiting the lovely monastery of Maryam Korkor and also managing to visit Abune Yemata – I didn’t make it last time,

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Loving Libya

Planning a business trip Getting into Libya isn’t easy, the government stopped issuing tourist visas many years ago, so the only way in is on official business. If you know who to ask, you can sort yourselves out an official business invitation, and if you pay an extra fee or two (what might be referred

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Negotiating in N’djamena

I am on the final count down to my list of 197 – just 7 more to go.  Most people quickly figure out from that number the implication is that the remainder are largely sketchy countries.   And they would be right.  This week we have a trifecta of UN development index winners.  There are

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Chilling in Sao Tome

Arriving in Sao Tome (especially from Angola) is like having a balm applied to your soul. The immigration guy was so friendly he even gave me a big thumbs up. No visa required here for under fifteen days, so nice relative to many African countries. Nunes was there to pick us up, and we cruised

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