Casablanca...

Wow! I'm tired... we got to the airport at 1:15 this morning. This time we waited and watched our bags... mainly the bass and keyboard get loaded onto the conveyor belt. Then, on top of that, our expeditor went outside and watched the crew load them onto the plane. We're not taking any chances this time. Our flight was scheduled to leave at 3:45... it left at 5:20. I didn't feel comfortable falling asleep in the Conakry airport... everyone else had, so I guess I was the lookout. About half of the passengers on the plane were pilgrims heading for Mecca... about half of them probably had never stepped foot on an airplane before. Needless to say, there was quite a bit of confusion at first. Once we got off the ground, I attempted to go to sleep. I was successful at first... the lights were turned off in the cabin, so it was an easy attempt. As soon as we hit ten thousand feet, the lights came blazing on... instant wake-up call. I did fall back to sleep and slept for most of the flight except for the four or five times that the person sitting behind me elbowed me in the head... oh well. Now we're sitting in the Casablanca airport, which is quite a nice, clean looking establishment. One thing that isn't a regular practice in Western Africa is cleanliness. It must be different in Northern Africa. Everywhere I look here in Casablanca, someone is cleaning, or sweeping, or mopping, or polishing the hand rails, etc, etc. We have about two more hours before we board the flight for Brazzaville, Congo. We'll probably get something to eat before the flight... I'm kinda bummed though. I was hoping to get some Moroccan cuisine while we were here but all the food court has is a French pastry shop, a chwarma place and "The Flying Hamburger"...
Well, I guess that's all for now... I'll have to post this once we get to the Congo because I cant get internet here. Frankly Scarlet, I don't give a damn!... or is that from Gone With the Wind?

It's a bit later now... we're flying over the Sahara Desert. Unfortunately it's hazy. Hopefully it will clear before we cross the entire thing. We just had some lunch served to us... that's something that's different than the States, they have served meals on every flight we've been on in Africa.
I'm still tired but I'm going to try and stay awake on this flight. We have one stop in Douala, Cameroon, then it's a short flight to Brazzaville. I figure if I sleep for an hour on that flight, I'll still be able to sleep tonight. We're staying at the USG Villa in Brazzaville... that's United States Government Villa. I hope they have laundry services there. It's definitely time to clean. I had our hotel in Freetown do some of my laundry... they washed my white socks with my black dress-shirt. Now it looks like I have really bad dandruff. Maybe we can do our own laundry this time... that would be nice.
-Looks like the haze cleared... but no sand dunes just yet. I'll fill you in...

Well... missed out on the Sahara but what we did accomplish is seeing the sun rise while we were on the plane and seeing the sun set when we were on the plane. We'll also get to fly in Fall and Spring on the same flight... woohoo!!
I'm wrapping this one up, I'll talk to you later.