Down With The Sickness

Africa is becoming a popular destination. However, many travellers report experiencing illness during their voyage to the Dark Continent – perhaps due to water or diet changes.

If you venture to Africa even if you escape physical sickness, after your trip you will, once home, suffer from mal d’afrique, aka African Sickness. It is real. It is agony.

Afflicting all who visit her welcoming people and diverse cultures mal d’afrique produces soul-wrenching pains of the homesickness type.

Africa, you see, gets in your blood. The sickness gets in your blood. It is there forever. Sadly, African Sickness has no cure. Once you have it, you have it for life.

Some people ignore the sickness hoping the pain will subside if they ignore her calm, beckoning waves. To ignore her is folly. She will not go away. She has now infected more than your blood. She is in your soul, whispering. She is your soul.

Some folks, on the other hand, foolishly think the sickness will abate somewhat if repeated trips are made hoping feeding the sickness will lessen the pain. Sadly, this is not so: the more one steps on her seas of desert sand and inside her village huts the sickness worsens.

It’s a vicious circle: stay away and her gentle voice summons you forth, upset almost, as to why you don’t visit anymore; visit more often and you find she has mysteriously tightened her loving clench around you.

Should you be fortunate to visit not only will you come down with the sickness you will also develop a love-hate relationship with her. This, too, is unavoidable. It will happen.

You will love her for she is fascinating; you will hate her for the heartbreaking, gut wrenching existence she is. You will love her for her gift of grace and madness; you will hate her for her perpetual state of disrepair and despair. You will love her for her innocence; you will hate her for keeping boys and girls so hungry they clean the scraps from your lunch. You will love her for the smiles on those young faces; you will hate her for those smiles.

You will love her for her bush taxis; you will hate her for permitting more guns than schoolbooks. You will love her for her remote villages; you will hate her for her wretchedness and valuing a chicken more than her daughters, a cow more than its keeper.

Warning: should you not be prepared to be left helplessly stupefied for life by mal d’afrique please, for goodness sakes, stay away.

However, if you think you are ready to witness sights of unimaginable beauty and mysterious cultures, have a go at cracking unsolvable riddles, are ready to be mesmerized by radiant smiles having no equal worn by hungry children half way from nowhere and half way to Timbukto and are ready to experience memories that will be forever etched in your soul and on your heart, go forth.

It is, simply, worth it. Every precious second.