Taking advantage of the last calm before the storm: we are waiting for an invasion of The Beast, (the full hotel).
Noone would believe it: an eerie calm reigns- all the rooms are in order, the only sounds are the chirping of birds in the flamboyant tree. Everyone is arriving from Bamako towards sunset, just in time for a sunset cocktail. This is also the evening when the angry Spaniards will arrive for their complientary Djenne Djenno cocktail on the roof. (See blog entitled On Human Frailty and error below).
La patronne herself has noowhere to sleep tonight. So I will sleep under the stars, which is no great hardship really.
A few days ago there was an Englishman here researching what remains of the once great West African equestrian culture. When the great battles of Sundiatta Keita's empire and the early Malian kingdoms were faught, this was done by cavallery. All across the Sahel, and much further south into Cameroon and Nigeria, the great plains of West Africa were ruled from horseback.
I called for my old friend Haidera, one of the last horsemen of Djenne of course, and he arrived resplendent on the no less magnificent Xaloc...