We're just come to a screetching halt after almost plowing into the

side of a truck suddenly pulling out from a parking spot; the old,

colorfully dressed lady behind me and to my right screams out in

Arabic - apparently she's hurt her knee pretty bad, but from the

reaction of others this kind of thing seems to be pretty par for the

course. There have been some amazingly brave / stupid drivers on the

way, including this one guy who thought it clever to slalom between

trucks going both ways on a two-lane road.

The louage (shared van, apparently a little unusual for Americans in

transit) from Tunis to Hammamet ended just a very little short of our

destination when the engine went bust just as we pulled into

Hammamet. Jamil and I walked around the touristic part of Hammamet for

a litte and we ran into an old friend of his on the street. The beach

part of Hammamet had a lot in common with Waikiki Beach; large, fancy

hotels (some undergoing renovation or additions), lovely sandy shores,

thatched huts and umbrellas by the beach, and a warm, azure blue, and

very welcoming sea. At the same time, the atmosphere seemed contrived,

an attempt to sanitize the true Tunisia to make it palatable for

tourists. The "medina" there (which we had to pay to enter) was clean

with straight and wide paths....it had none of the vivacity or genuine

nature of the real medina in Tunis, which is dirty, complicated,

winding, dark, loud, and busy. And the entirety of the town was under

this really kind of insane lockdown; apparently the Israeli delegation

was staying in Hammamet. At every intersection in the town there were

about a dozen officers (including some in BMW cop cars, which Jamil

had never seen before), and national guardsmen with automatics. There

were police checkpoints everywhere, and the hotels all had special

guards as well. Insane. I literally saw more policemen than people in

the town, and the town was definitely not empty.

Jamil, his friend, and I went to claim the free drinks that we got by

paying to enter the medina at a cafe on the second floor. The whole

place is kind of like an odd two-story outdoor mall. Jamil's friend

generously buys me a cup of coffee; I thank him and drink it. I find

out later that this was a faux pas, as he had actually bought the

coffee to share with me and I had gone and downed the whole thing

myself. Gah, there I am, giving America a bad name again. The waiter

comes over and says hi, and shows us the way up to the

roof. Delighted, I scramble up to check out a view of Hammamet from

the top of the medina. It's almost painfully bright out, and the

wisdom of having thin streets and tall buildings begins to dawn on

me. (The sun never shines directly on you that way.)

We did get a little bit of time waiting for the louage from Hammamet

to Kerouan to wander around "the real Hammamet". I got Jamil a tasty

kefteji sandwich, which has eggs and peppers and harissa. I also got

tuna and egg chabatis for the both of us that were really just

amazingly tasty, even (according to Jamil) by Tunisian

standards. Maybe we were both just hungry, but the subtle texturing of

the grilled bread coupled with a little bite from the harissa, the

meat from the tuna, and the body of the grilled eggs combined very

nicely. "Now you can say you have seen Tunisia," Jamil

explains. "Tunis is not all of Tunisia." He seems pretty excited to

see Kerouan; it'll be a first for both of us. :)