Sunset falls over an old German colonial town in Namibia. A surreal place located at the place where the desert kisses one of the least hospitable coasts of the Atlantic. Diamonds, a ghost town, and mysterious wild horses - it’s all there.

ASFALT EN EEN SLAAPZAK: Nairobi, 22:07

asfalteneenslaapzak:

Het is net Safaripark Beekse Bergen; Kenia. Zo presenteren ze zichzelf ook: op het visum staan de Big Five, op het etiket van ‘s lands meest gedronken bier Tusker staat een olifant en op een briefje van 1000 Keniaanse shilling staan er maar liefst vier. Dat is grappig, want als je als mzungu –…

Although we really had to hitchhike to the border, he was determined to pick up his laptop to communicate through a translation program.Zhao Jian Ge (46) is a Chinese engineer who works together with Ethiopian colleagues at the construction of the Mombasa-Nairobi-Addis Ababa road. This road is in poor condition and at for a few hundred kilometers not even paved. In 2014, a brand new road should have been realised hat increases trade between Kenya and Ethiopia. Some Ethiopians merchants selling coffee and tea to the workers, laughed at and ridiculed Zhao when he passed by. “They are eating dogs and they can’t talk English!” shouts a man. Zhao is happy when I greet him. He invites us for lunch at his place, but we explain that we have to be movin’ on. Then he decides to place his laptop in the loft of the guards of the compound and talk via a translation program. “You are only 21, such a baby,” he replies after exchanging our age. China has a powerful presence in Africa. “From the dams in Ghana to the vast housing tracts in Mozambique, the Chinese are changing the face of the continent.” This presence is heaven and hell at the same time for locals, it is said.
He used to be a rebel. Nowadays, he is a documentary maker. A rockstar look a like. A friendly man who offers his cigarette to the hitchhiker waiting for a ride.Meet Habtesilasie Teklemicael (48). Born in Asmara - by that time still Ethiopian territory - he decided to fight against the Ethiopian rulers and fought alongside the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF) for the independence of Eritrea from Ethiopia.In 1988 he decided to resign that same rebel army and migrated to Sudan as a political refugee. Six years later, when Eritrea became independent, he moved to Addis Ababa where he aimed for a career as a moviemaker. That is what he does now: making documentaries.
Istanbul, Turkey.
Published in Leeuwarder Courant, September 13, 2012.