One thousand metres over zero always westwards, through Massaii-land, Maai-Mahiu - and the Jeep ploughs through the red earth, through the red whirled up sand - Eldoret. A name like Eldorado, boom town, rise and fall, chaos and beginning surrounded by wind spouts, little dust storms and the everlasting biting throat-closing vapour of the coal fires by the road. Another day in this Africa below the equator, somewhere at Lake Victoria. Africa...
They want you. Here - in Africa. There - in the North. At the flight to Berlin. To stand the heat. To arrive. Who arrives when where? At what place you are going to arrive? You don't know. You even didn't ask yourself if you'd like to go there. On the way in that Africa with these hot days. On the way through life.
"The magical mystery tour is going to take you away, dying to take you away" and there it is - suddenly - the African night and another one of these hot days finds its end.
The door is closing behind you - one bed, one table, one wardrobe, one chair, one mirror - you are switching the TV mute, taking the tooth-mug and sitting on the bed - full of hope that the pounding in your head will stop and the pain in your eyes will finally leave.
South-African MTV, interesting - and you are falling on the back, the eyes fixed towards the white ceiling.
Nairobi, Nyanza, Nakuru, Eldoret, the coffin-maker of Kisii, Kisumu, Nyabisawa - people are taking a new coffin out off the neighbour's house on that early morning, Nakuma, Huruma, Itibo, room number 88, Rift Valley, Naivasha, the Vic Falls, the Zambezi, the Bronté's hotel bar, whatever - just very slow disappears the pictures' flood while you are lying on the blanket, in this small room with the pressing air.
The ventilator at the ceiling whirrs and hums and whirrs and hums and buzzes and swings and drives you against
the wall. While the cold sweat is running down your skin and the Gin makes your tongue's tip numb and you're
waiting for something new.
But for minutes, eternal, numb seconds nothing happens. After a while something is coming from the far and suddenly you are looking at the world, standing on the temple's battlements in that silent wind watching the kingdoms and power - and the whispering at your side is far away. Today the room in His mansion has the number 88 and He is gone, far - far. And then the Other by your side disappears and you're alone again.
Hello, Ticket to Death, sit down and take a drink...
And again the pictures are running and running and mixing together with all those, which are around you - since years and all the old dreams are returning:
An expedition into the no man's land - discovering a black octagonal tower inside the mighty Vikings' chieftain Varin sits, howling about his slew son while the police is scouring the river with drag-nets and every corridor in your hotel has no rooms. Varin, Dublin, the Massaii, Lieutenant Stuart from the Artists Rifles, fallen at the Western Front, France, the Archipelago, the Baltic Coast, the Vikings, the silent, silent nights and Värmland's lakes. The neighbour's girl sits together with you in the grass at the green
hill and the afternoon's sun is shining after the summer rain through the leafs of the hazelnut tree,
throwing speckled shadows on the faces. Above, by the big gravel slope is the construction hut and she
says: It's nice, being here with you - in the sun. - One single shot is yelling through the night -
Grace!
Grace is not fast enough. The dogs! And they're licking his blood… Livingstone, Rhode, Maleme Ranch, Africa,
flickering-glittering merciless heat that is not setting you free - and again, that girl from the crossroad, even here in Africa:
"De senaste dagarna har jag tänkt och tänkt på nordlandssommarens eviga dag."
- Ja?
- Girl from Rök, where are you?
Rök -
That stone - chilly and one thousand years old and
mighty and mysterious beyond that baldachin -
the runes carved from the great Viking Varin -
they're glowing in my eyes and confusing me,
telling from the grief about Vämod, his son.
My head aches, Chieftain Varin. What do you want in Africa? What do I want in Africa?
And the sleep is overwhelming you, finally.
At the next day nothing is left. Just the echo in your head and you're sitting in the midday sun's heat at the pool, still calm and silent and chocked. Chocked about the sum of the losses, that huge mountain, that heavy load - that you're still carrying, even here. Because deep inside of you the gaps, beaten by life, are not containing any offer for forgiving…
For that reason you're going on, stumbling down that long, long road, hunted by longing, that yearning deep in you - homeland, eternity -
But in the end our names are gone with the wind,
blown away in the unnamed dusty Wadi of life -
away, driven by the desert breeze
like the rotten pages of the Daily News ...
