Easy as pie

The sun rises in a fury, matches the morning’s mood with brilliant fuchsia, scarlet, blood stained clouds. I sink my teeth into a ripe pear and wipe the droplet of juice trailing from my lips.

I wonder, sitting silent and pale, a nasraniye among garage hounds, if I smell more of visas or money.

A self appointed spokesman interrogates me brusquely, squatting before me, expelling his inquiries like rude spittle. The nasraniye is going to Aioun, he dutifully reports. The nasraniye is waiting for the first car. The nasraniye is writing. Within 15 seconds, I am surrounded by a blue cotton wall, leather belts swinging like phallic pendulums, eyes cast down over embroidered collars.

The single most imposing feature of the Mauritanian landscape is an entitled man in a boubou. Entitled? To share my business, my space, my attention. That I should write of them so frequently is indicative of their omnipresence, omni-influence, and omni-annoyance. I don’t so much fear them as cringe away from them en masse.

I suppose I’d cringe away from an imposing circle of questioning slices of meringue pie. But I imagine tolerating the bitter filling with more grace.