Day 75-80: More Adventures in Gammarth (Tunis

(I wrote this post in chunks, trying to get everything down while it was fresh in my mind. Looking back at it, I see I changed tenses a bazillion times. I’m too lazy to change it, though. You’ll just have to have lived with it today and then and in a month.)

Since our crazy welcome to Tunisia that first day we arrived, things have been far more chill. We’ve caught up a bit on laundry, school, and life back home. The garage door style of window coverings that seal us in at night have turned us into late-sleeping cave dwellers, so we sleep in a lot.

We had enough groceries to get us through the first few days, but then we started relying on the hotel restaurant for dinner. And finally, we had to admit it was time to venture out for more groceries.

Normally, grocery shopping in foreign countries is one of my favorite things to do. Because of the resort-y area we’re in, though, there really isn’t a good option within walking distance. That’s been the weirdest thing about this stay to me, really. It’s nice not to be bombarded with vendors and to feel ripped off with obvious tourist prices for every item you buy. But it would be nice if there were an item to buy. Like, anything? Toothpaste? A shirt? Food? There’s truly not a single store around.

We don’t mind long walks, but walking something like a 90-minute round trip walk in the North African heat, along what feels a bit like a highway, carrying bags of groceries…nah. This was going to require a taxi.

Mike had done a few runs in the area, so he had a better lay of the land than the rest of us. Problem was, Mike wasn’t feeling well. Nothing major, but something had him fairly shut down for a couple days. So this would need to be an Alison-led mission. I can’t lie. While I’ve been the mostly-fearless leader for a lot of this trip, there are times and places where I am very intimidated. In Tunisia, there’s been no real reason for that. People have gone above and beyond to be helpful, and everyone’s been nice. The concerns (too strong a word…maybe questions is better) I had about the local customs and dress have been proven to be completely n/a. I thought Story and I would need to cover our shoulders and knees in public at the very least, but nope. We’ve seen the whole range of attire from modest head coverings to girls who looked like they were about to go clubbing. Many years ago in India, a very nice Muslim shop owner politely refused to shake my hand, explaining that it wasn’t proper to do so in his faith. And I never wore shorts or tank tops because it would have been the equivalent of going topless at a public pool in America.

Tunisia is something like 98-99% Muslim, so it seemed like it would almost have to be similar to India in that aspect…right? I took all the various tidbits I’d learned about more traditionally Islamic countries to try to guess how it would feel to be a woman in this place. Would I feel safe walking around alone? Would it be a faux pas not to have a male member of my family along? I mean, seriously, I’ll say it again. I barely knew Tunisia was a country until a couple weeks ago. I’m not proud of my ignorance, but I admit it. Our quickie attempts at research were a bit like going to WebMD for a weird pain you’re having. The information and advice on Tunisia was all over the place. Most of it sounded fine or good. But you also got some hits with mentions of terrorism and misogyny.

Anyway, Tunisia turns out to be a unique place (at least the small part of it we’ve seen so far) in that it is an African, Middle Eastern, Mediterranean, and (more or less) European country. Street signs are in English and Arabic. Most menus are in French. French is spoken by everyone, as far as I can tell. English is far less common but not rare. The cuisine is all over the place. Lots of pasta. Tuna on everything (blech). Generous plates of fruit served everywhere. We ordered a “Tunisian salad,” “Tunisian beer,” and “Tunisian soup” one night, and we still aren’t sure how to describe Tunisian food. The Gammarth area in particular (zone touristique!) it’s even harder to get a feel for the real vibe of the country, because it’s meant to be an escape from reality for visitors.

I’ll have the shrimp lawyer, please.

This was very yummy, but god I miss seedless grapes.

I’m getting off track here. Back to needing groceries. I wasn’t feeling like going for groceries alone would be unsafe, but I still felt way more comfortable having a guy along with me. Lucky for me, I brought two of those along on this trip. I know that Sagan’s still my itty bitty baby, but strangers see how tall he is and probably assume he’d protect me instead of vice versa.

We debated about whether we should try to catch a taxi out on the main road or head to the hotel and find one there. The road won, because going that way meant that we would walk by the trash cats that Story had come to love. (Side note: Tunisia is cat central. They are EVERYWHERE. Mostly sweet or at least not mean. This has kept Story occupied daily.)

Despite BabyTrashCat’s glare in this photo, she was actually very happy. She followed us all over the place and loved cuddles.

Taxis are also everywhere, so it only took a minute to wave one down. (But here’s another side note: taxi drivers in Tunis don’t use maps and also don’t seem to know where they’re going at all. We aren’t entirely clear what information we’re supposed to be giving to them, because addresses and our own Google maps pointing actual directions to places don’t seem to be enough. ) So we show this guy my phone, where I’ve opened up Google Translate and changed English to French to say, “We need to go to the market to get groceries, and then come back.” He looks at it, keeps saying somethingsomethingmarKET, and I keep saying, “Oui.” (Yet another side note: I think maybe most Tunisians don’t read French or something? Because showing them French words does not help a whole lot. I mean, I get it. French spelling vs pronunciation is ridiculous. Arabic works better.) After a lot of repeated back and forth, and some pointing at signs I can’t read, and pulling over once or twice, I see that he finally knows where we want to go and is heading in the right direction. Whew.

No functioning seatbelts and roll-down windows with broken handles. The kids were loving it! I was most impressed by the piece of cardboard the driver shoved into his own window for an impromptu visor. Who really needs to see out the window anyway, amiright?

So we get to the same market we went to on our first night here. It was the closest to us anyway, and this outing wasn’t meant to be extra adventurous. Just getting through it was adventure enough. The driver parks his car, and I’m trying to determine whether or not he understands that I’d like him to stay and bring us back. No time to figure that out, though, because the next thing I know, he’s getting out of the car to join us in the market.

Oh boy.

He sort of ushers us in, as I frantically write in my translator “We’ve been here before. You can wait out here for us.” He does not like that plan. And I don’t mean he’s grumpy or mean about it, or that I get any sense that he thinks I’m going to run off without paying him. I think it’s more along the lines of, “There’s no way these dumdums are going to make it through a store without my help.” Now, he’s not 100% wrong on that, because I definitely missed the fact that you’re supposed to have the produce-area employees weigh the fruits and veggies before going to the cashier. But the rest of it…I really didn’t want or need any assistance.

I gave the kids a basket, and I took another for myself. Divide and conquer. Let’s get this over with.

Nope. He didn’t like that, either. He kept bringing us back together, I’m sure thinking it was like herding cats. He rushed us down various aisles, randomly pointing at things I didn’t need. Meanwhile, I’m trying to go aisle by aisle with my list. At some point, I realize that this isn’t a language barrier. This guy is a little bit nuts. Nice nuts, but still nuts. I gave up any hope of getting anything beyond the basics and just aimed to make it back home. (Spoiler alert: we did.)

Grocery shopping success…?

The next day, when Mike was feeling better, we walked ourselves (no taxi, please!) to a place he’d run by. We were a little unclear why this place exists where it does, but it looked like fun, so we went for it.

It’s called Geek, and it’s like an upscale Chuck E. Cheese that doesn’t suck. Like most things around here, it’s a shiny diamond surrounded by a whole lotta coal to dig through to get to it. We walked along the main road, which is lined with trash in many parts, then through a parking lot with feral dogs and their puppies hanging out, to get to it. For the record, I’m not trying to shit-talk Tunisia. But it is fascinating to us how common it is to see roads/buildings/signs that are basically rubble, and then to have something really special and beautiful mixed in.

Geek is a great hangout spot for adults and kids alike. As long as you buy a meal, your kids can play in the huge indoor playground or on the Playstation 5s they have downstairs. There’s also an arcade with all the usual goodies.

We ate a good amount of food and let the kids be entertained. When it was time to go, I just about had a heart attack at the bill they gave us for 116,00. I mean, I know it’s in dinars, but 116,000 anythings is a lot. I was familiar with the comma instead of the decimal point. It was the three zeroes after the comma that threw me off. Thank god for the internet, just to be sure I wasn’t handing over my credit card to buy someone a new car.

Ummm….

Whew! And also…really?

All in all, our time in Gammarth was good. Interesting and enlightening, but good. We still have one more week in a different area of Tunis, so it’ll be interesting to see how they compare.