Due to some bad planning on my part this will be a mondo-entry stretching from Gonder on our way to the Sudan border all the way to Khartoum. Sorry. Hope you can endure.

As usual it was stll dark as we made our way to the Gonder bus station to head toward Sudan. The only thing that makes the madness of Ethiopian bus travel manageable is that the insane crowds are kept out of the bus station till about a half-hour before departure time. Tourists, however, are allowed in to claim a seat and brace themselves for the rush of madness.

"A roar in the distance grows louder and envelops you."
It truly is a bizarre thing to stake out your spot on a bus and be sitting there in the dark and quiet when the gates are opened. A roar in the distance grows louder and envelops you until you start to see furiture and bedding moving by your window and people getting on and off and back on your bus.

As we headed west from Gonder we were riding off the edge of the Bradt "Southern and East Africa" guidebook that had been with us since Cape Town. We were on our own, save for a few pages in the Lonely Planet: Africa that basically said don't go to Sudan.

"One of the grubbiest hotels of our whole trip."
Gonder is only a few bus hours from the Sudanese border, but it's tough to get all the way there in one day. A tiny village called Shedhi is kind of a waystation about two-thirds of the way there. We arrived around noon and checked into one of the grubbiest hotels of our whole trip. Generally on par with the place in Lalibela, the difference was that the rooms here were tiny, dirty and a bit smelly. I hesitated to even put my backpack on the floor. My room was next door to the "toilet."

It was also hot. Having come down from the Ethiopian highlands, we were already in Sudan... though we wouldn't cross the border for another few hours. Walking around in the early afternoon was miserable. All you wanted to do was find some shade and sit in it. It was hot and blinding... like somebody turned up the brightness knob on the universe till everything was almost white.

"A sense of dread decended on us."
Shedhi is a good place for sitting in the shade, because there's absolutely nothing to do. This is a village of maybe a couple hundred people in one of the many middles of nowhere. Dirst roads stretch for miles in both directions with no other town in site. A sense of dread decended on us when we realized we had six to seven hours to sit before we could go to bed. We found a restaurant that was more of a couple of beat up couches in a family's dirt floor house. We didn't bother asking for menus. It would be njera. By this time Matt had learned the name of a particular kind of njera that wasn't too offensive and they had it. We killed as much time as we could eating.

Dinner brought a rather odd experience. We found another restaurant in a fairly similar setting. As we sat down I caught a glimpse of a glass panel in the corner and my mind identified it as a television. Given a few seconds of thought about our remoteness and seeming lack of electricity, I scoffed at myself. It must just be glass on a cabinet or something.

We had our njera and at six o'clock the power came on. Light bulbs flickered to life and the woman running the place turned on what had been a television after all. But the best part was yet to come. We were, of course, out of range of any broadcast channels. Not to worry, though. She had a VCR, too. And rap videos. Just as we worried that we'd be watching this all evening, the tape was removed and a movie inserted.

It was in English and was horrible. "Desperate Measures," it was called. Obviously made-for-tv, it was amazingly bad... so much that I'd bet it was never even released on American television and sent directly to the overseas markets. I think it was originally shot on film of some kind, but it was so poorly done that it looked like porn.

"It was cool enough to sit in your living room watching the moving pictures."
But the Ethiopian audience was rapt. Without speaking a word of English and without subtitles they stared at the screen the entire time. As bad as this movie was, I envied them for not being able to follow the plot. There was a time at home, I think, when television was kinda like this. When it was still a novelty, it didn't really matter what was on the television. It was cool enough to sit in your living room watching the moving pictures. It's still the case here.

Getting to sleep was nearly impossible. There was a light just outside my window that shined right on my face. But worse, it was still really, really hot. I resorted to my emergency trick of a wet towel wrapped around my neck. This was gross in the dirty room, on the dirty bed, but I felt a bit better. I expect I finally got to sleep around midnight. Six hours before our last break-of-dawn Ethiopian bus ride. The next morning would see us to the point of no return. The plan was to cross into Sudan and get about halfway to the capital, Khartoum.

I didn't write about it at the time, but this is a good place to do a little flashback. Think of this as the part in the movie where the mysterious truth is revealed and you jump back to all the moments that foreshadowed the ending. Let's go back, shall we, to Nairobi.

We'd heard getting a Sudanese visa was difficult and required a "letter of introduction" from your own embassy. This would be a piece of paper from the American embassy to the Sudanese embassy saying "please give this guy a visa." There's a Sudanese embassy in Nairobi so we headed to the U.S. embassy to look into getting a letter.

"A warmup for September 11th."
We went of course to the "new" U.S. embassy, the old one having been destroyed by Osama bin Laden as a warmup for September 11th. It was a little eeire to arrive at this sparkling new building in the suburbs knowing why it was there. The new place looked like an airport and was bigger than some. There really could have been a 737 in the parking lot and it wouldn't have looked odd. It wasn't, though, as secure as I expected. I figured you wouldn't even be able to see it from the road... that there's be a high fence and trees and razor wire and a few acres of farmland between the street and the building. But there it was, right behind an ordinary iron fence.

It's always interesting going to the American embassy. The only other one I've been to was in La Paz, Bolivia to get pages added to my passport. But I imagine it's the closest I'll ever get to the feeling of walking into the first class lounge at an airport. You're hundreds of miles from home, but here's a little island of familiarity... fenced off from the madness around you, air conditioned and English-speaking.

+pulllout "Wide eyed, she disappeared to find a supervisor."
We found our way to citizen services... which seems always to be the one window without an enormous line snaking back from it. Everything was fine until we mentioned that we wanted to go to Sudan, and it got worse when we told her we wanted her to give us a letter so we could do it. Wide eyed, she disappeared to find a supervisor.

This is when we met Edward. Edward's one of those guys who's probably about thirty-five but looks fifteen. He came charging up to the bullet-proof window, his id badge on a lanyard around his neck, his round wireframe glasses perched on his nose. He looked like he'd just finished typing the minutes from the last meeting of the Nairobi Young Republicans.

"So you want to go to Sudan," he said something like.

"Yes. And we understand we need a letter from our...."

"Listen. I don't know anything about a letter. All I can tell you is that Sudan is a STATE SPONSOR OF TERRORISM."

There were expressive facial contortions and hand gestures here. I think at one point the name badge was flopping in the air.

"And the United States government is not about to do anything to facilitate your travel to that country. As an official of the US government, I can say to you in no stronger terms, "DON"T GO TO SUDAN!"

"He should look after people stupid enough to want to go to Sudan."
We took him seriously and replied that we were not sure we were going, just looking at the possibilities. He was actually a fairly nice guy who liked being able to say he was "an official of the US government," and felt he should look after people stupid enough to want to go to Sudan.

"Good luck," he said. "If you survive, send me a postcard."

We did. Written with the cheap Bic pen I "borrowed" from his window. It was labeled "US Government" and nearly got me in trouble in Sudan.

"You bet your ass. It's safe."
We would later find that Sudanese visas aren't issued in Nairobi anyway and the embassy in Addis Ababa does them without the letter... if you're willing to pay the $150 fee. When asked if Sudan is safe for travel, the Sudanese embassy official said with an almost cunning smirk, "Yeah. [You bet your ass.] It's safe." I don't think I actually heard the ass part, but I'm pretty sure it was implied.

Sometime just before or during our visit to Sudan, the State Department updated its travel advisory on Sudan. Not much really changed from the previous edition, but it's interesting to look back on. Some highlights:

• The Department of State warns U.S. citizens against all travel to Sudan.
• The U.S. Government has received indications of terrorist threats aimed at American and Western interests in Sudan.
• Terrorist actions may include suicide operations, bombings, or kidnappings.
• Demonstrators have thrown rocks at the U.S. Embassy and Westerners.
• The embassy's ability to provide consular services, including emergency assistance, is severely limited.
• Fighting from the civil war affects southern, western and eastern Sudan.

"We weren't the only ones insane enough to try this."
It's easy to chuckle at this having made it though Sudan without the slightest problem. We took the warning quite seriously, but had heard from numerous travelers coming south that things were ok. Admittedly none of these travelers were Americans, but we knew of two others going north around the same time as us. We weren't the only ones insane enough to try this.

There was also the manner in which we were traveling. We reasoned that as budget-minded backpackers we were likely under the radar of any terrorist act. Traveling on local buses, sleeping in inexpenisve hotels and eating in Sudanese restaurants, we would be nowhere near any potential bombing targets. The talk of kidnappings, though, did give us pause. On the streets we were anonymous. We could be any variety of Europeans. Checking into a hotel, though, we'd have to show our passports. Somebody would know both that we were Americans and where we were sleeping.

"We were in Sudan."
But we were going anyway. Our last Ethiopian bus dropped us at the border in the mid-morning. If we thought Shedhi was a dust-blown speck of a town, the border outpost of Gedaref was its suburb. We got off the bus and were led by enterprising and slightly annoying kids to Ethiopian immigration. I kid you not Ethiopia's border post is located in a mud hut marked by a faded wood sign.

We got stamped out of Ethiopia and walked across a bridge over a dry riverbed... the point of no return. We were in Sudan.

By contrast the Sudanese border station was a clean and large, if spartan, freshly painted cinderblock building. The large border official behind the glassed-in desk seemed a bit stunned to see two American passports but went dutifully to work stamping us into the country.

It took a total of about two hours to get officially stamped into Sudan. This involved two visits to the immigration office, punctuated with a forray into the market-like area of shacks next door to change money to pay the "registration fee." Then it's on to customs, where I was a little worried about a few items in my pack that weren't exactly up to Islamic morality standards. No worries, though. The guy asked me to open the pack, took a glance in and waved me to close it up.

Not satisified with two border stops, Sudan adds "security." This your third stop. Security, as I recall, was more of a reed hut covering a guy at a desk and his buddies. Your visit to security consists basically of sitting on a bench while the official and said buddies talk about you in Arabic.

"90 degrees on a cloudless day in the Sudanese desert."
Yet to come was the most miserable road journey of the entire trip. Worse than the cattle truck in northern Kenya. The only way from the border to the first Sudanese town of any size is in the back of a Land Rover pickup. This wouldn't be so bad if you weren't sharing it with twenty other people... and if it weren't about well over 90 degrees on a cloudless day in the Sudanese desert... and if you had a place to sit rather than standing awkwardly hanging onto the bars around the truck bed. It was awful. Trying to make it more bearable I shifted to sit entirely on top of the bars, kinda like we'd done in Kenya. Only here I found myself barely able to hang on and unable to climb back down. I was nearly thrown from the truck more than once.

At immigration we'd met up with an Ethiopian guy returning to Khartoum where he'd lived years earlier. He spoke pretty good English and I think excellent Arabic. He'd helped us through the border formalities and getting on the truck, but his usefullness ended there. He led us to what he called a "hotel" run by Ethiopians. We'd crossed the border hours earlier, but we still couldn't escape the Ethiopians!

This "hotel" turned out to be a mud hut and adjacent wood lean-to. I plopped down and was feeling terrible. I was desperately thirsty even though I'd drunk over a liter of Stim, Sudan's excellent apple soft drink, at a stop on the road into town.

"An excelent blended fruit beverage."
My stomach felt terribly bloated, I was fatigued and wanted only to sit and drink. I bought a big bottle of an excelent blended fruit beverage and drank the whole thing. I passed on dinner, unable to put anything else in my stomach... though I still felt thirsty. I reasoned that I'd become extremely dehydrated on the truck trip and just needed time to soak up some fluids. This turned out not to be the case.

We went to bed shortly after dark outside in wooden leanto because it was far too hot inside. My stomach was even more bloated and I had worse gas than I'd even experienced in my life. An hour or so after going to bed I realized it wasn't getting better. I would have to go to the "bathroom."

This wasn't the most repulsive toilet of our trip, but it was probably the most interesting. First it was located in what you might call the front yard. In front of the house's fence, right on the dirt track that passes for a road. It's about a six-foot by six-foot "room" open on top and, with a hole in the floor and surrounded by sticks standing about six feet in the air. Many of the sticks long ago ceased to provide any privacy and the "door," also made of sticks, was just propped agianst the entry. It seemed to be held together not by wings or prayers... but by a good sense of humor.

Matt referred to it as the "Area of Nearly Upright Sticks." Only later would we realize the moniker's perfect anagram... A.N.U.S.

So realizing my gas was getting far worse I made my way for the A.N.U.S.. Fortunately for all involved it was dark ask I assumed the position under the Sudanese stars.

I'll warn you now that a fairly graphic description of the effects a serious intestinal infection follows.

"Jet packs that shoot fire and smoke."
Think now of the loudest, longest fart you've ever heard in your life. If you've come up with Jeff Bridges in Ace Ventura you're almost there. I seriously scared myself with the first blast. I figured the people in the house surely were hearing me. You know those guys who land at football games wearing jet packs that shoot fire and smoke? That's what I felt like.

I left the A.N.U.S. feeling much deflated. I'd figured out what was wrong with me. Giardia. It's a parasite I think you get from dirty water. It sits in your guts, digests stuff and creates a lot of gas in the process. But it's easily treated and does no damage if you take the pills in a reasonable amount of time.

I would make a couple more visits to the A.N.U.S. that night but would feel good enough to travel in the morning. Definitely not wanting to spend another night facing the Area of Nearly Upright Sticks, we were headed for Khartoum.