We had indeed just left Ed-Debba and in our 4WDs it had taken us just over an hour. "Have you just come from Ed-Debba?" one of the Kababish asked.
We refused politely, not wanting to abuse their hospitality and knowing that their supplies probably had to get them to Egypt, or certainly to the next town. " Allah yisallimak." God keep you in peace.Īnd on and on like this until eventually one of the nomads invited us to join them for tea, which another man wearing a stained jellabiya and long white turban was brewing up over a charcoal fire. " Wa aleikum as salaam." And upon you be peace. A solid handshake, a firm clasp of the shoulder, and the familiar ritual of greetings began: In the desert everyone is a stranger but no one is ignored. We hung back cautiously but one of the nomads beckoned us forward.
We pulled close and the mirage didn't falter - we'd stumbled across a group of Kababish nomads travelling across the desert, a caravan in the true sense of the word, transporting their cargo of a hundred camels to the Egyptian markets. But surely here, in the dried-up riverbed of Wadi Al Malik, that was a herd of camels lying in the sand ahead of us? A shadow on the horizon becomes a shepherd's hut a plastic bag skipping in the breeze resembles a prancing goat.
The vast, flat deserts of northern Sudan play curious tricks on your faculties.
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