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Beyond the Resorts: Exploring the Tunisian’s
Tunisia
Amanda Kendle
Africa.
It’s the land of lions, giraffes and tribesmen,
right?
Sure,
there are the safari countries. And then there’s
northern Africa. On
the top corner, almost spitting distance from Sicily,
you’ll find Tunisia.
You won’t find too many elephants, but there are
two million and one other
mind-blowing things to see and do. It’s increasingly
common to pop into your
travel agent and pick up a one or two week all-inclusive
package to Tunisia.
Such holidays are enticingly cheap and the destination
sounds exotic: but
you won’t see the real Tunisia until you strap
your backpack on and get on
the train or bus with the locals.
I
spent two weeks traversing Tunisia and marvelling that
there was truly
something new to look at or experience every day. I
started at the top,
flying into Tunis-Carthage airport and settling into
Africa in Tunisia’s
capital city. Tunis is part-European in feel and the
breadstick and street
café French influences are obvious. The souq
or marketplace of Tunis is
particularly memorable. It’s thirteen centuries
old in parts, and made up of
hundreds of stalls winding their way through a warren
of alleyways and
skinny covered streets. Some sections are the haunt
of the package tourists,
stall upon stall of Tunisian crafts, postcards and alleged
antiques; but the
rest are where the locals really shop. Shoes and clothes,
dress material and
linen, herbs and spices, and trayfuls of butter and
honey-laden Tunisian
pastries are all there for the taking. I spent half
a day meandering
through, sometimes retracing my steps by mistake, sometimes
on purpose, and
occasionally popping out into another part of the Tunis
medina, including
the large Zitouna Mosque, where modestly-dressed visitors
can enter as far
as the courtyard.
To
pretend I was in Greece, I spent some time in handsome
Sidi Bou Said, a
short train trip north-east of Tunis. It’s one
of those places where
manufacturers of white and blue paint have become wealthy,
while those who
tried to sell brown or green have faded into obscurity.
Although I was
sceptical at first – was it just a tourist attractor?
– I later found the
same colour scheme in tiny, untouristed villages, and
felt convinced that
Sidi Bou Said was just a typical Tunisian village that
was better cared for
than others. The elaborate blue-painted wrought iron
work around windows and
on balconies was something I wished I could transport
to my dream house back
home. Just walking brings the most pleasure here. At
a small souvenir stand,
a balding vendor with a gappy grin hopped like a kangaroo
when he found out
I was from Australia, and in exchange for a quick kiss
on the cheek gave me
a present – a postcard of a grinning camel which
he told me was his
self-portrait. There was quite a likeness, actually!
Would-be
archaeologists are in their element in Tunisia. The
Bardo Museum,
on the outskirts of Tunis, displays intricate mosaics
and other Roman
relics. Only minutes east of Tunis, Carthage was a name
vaguely familiar
from school history lessons, but I would never have
counted on finding it in
Tunisia. Even more impressive was the town of Dougga,
the remains of a large
Roman city perched on a green hill overlooking farmland.
Small herds of
goats, intermingled with a few sheep, navigate around
the various walls,
pillars and mosaics en route to their home field. Riding
a train further
south, my idea of a future trip to Rome was scrapped
when I found El Jem’s
Colosseum – it’s nearly as big as Rome’s
and could seat thirty thousand
people, but it’s far less crowded and especially
impressive as it rises from
a one-storey Tunisian town, and can be seen from whichever
point of the town
you reach.
Coming
some time after the Romans, but still significantly
old to me, were
more uniquely north African constructions. The ksour
are fortified grain
stores, made up of long cave-like rooms built in rows
and stacked two or
three high, where the precious commodity of grain was
stored and protected
for years on end in the perfect Tunisian climate. Narrow
stone steps zig-zag
across the front of the ksour, but it’s hard to
imagine successfully
clamouring up these stairs juggling sackfuls of grain.
The most
well-preserved ksour – in fact, some are still
in use – are found in
southern Tunisia, particularly around Tataouine. Just
north of here,
underground troglodyte homes are also still in use,
and I spent a cold night
in a surprisingly warm cave in a Matmata hotel.
I
couldn’t leave Tunisia without stepping onto the
sands of the Sahara. A
day on a camel showed off the desolate dunes and it
lived on in the form of
a sore bottom for several days longer. In January the
international Sahara
Festival hits Douz, and watching a so-called camel race
taught me never to
bet on a camel, as I saw each of the dozen entrants
head in a different
direction, blatantly overlooking any instructions from
their jockeys.
Heading
back to Tunis to fly out, I reflected on the expectations
I’d had of
Tunisia before I’d arrived. It was my first journey
to Africa, and above all
I’d expected it to be different to any other place
I’d visited. It was.
Unusual architecture, friendly people and restaurants
headlined by tasty
cous-cous dishes had all been on my list of things to
find, and I could
certainly check them all off. But there were so many
extras: the ornate
black studwork on bright blue or yellow doors, the sight
of El Jem’s
Colosseum through the wrought iron decoration of my
hotel bathroom window,
and the pear jam that regularly accompanied the French
bread at breakfast.
Even for just another taste of that, I’d go back
in an instant.
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