7. The millet bags

One morning I went to Abdurrahman the manager of the Hendrina Khan hotel. He helps the poor a lot and I asked him to buy millet for me. H informed me that these Tuaregs are so poor that they don’t even have camels and that I would have to carry the bags myself to their tents.
I asked him to find transport for this too, and he very kindly accepted to help me.
Friday is the blessed day of Muslims to feed the poor and Abdurrahaman cooks every Friday for 50 families. The children come with empty plates and take them home full of rice with meat.
When Abdurrahman drives into the street, the children applaud him as if he were a football champion.

After Friday prayers we left for the desert with half of the millet, as the car could not carry more than 10 bags of 100 kilos.

We immediately understood that the driver did not know the desert and the car began to be covered up with sand. He also confessed that it was the first time he had driven a diesel car and it was clear that he could not drive it.

We arrived at the Tuareg camp and unloaded the bags, Ali left for a second trip but I decided to remain in the silence of the desert with the Tuareg chief waiting for them.
Ali was very late in picking me up because the driver was inexperienced and the car, being light without load, was even more buried in sand, so when they arrived in Timbuktu, Ali Maiga had to find another driver and another car. We waited until late at night drinking tea near a friendly tent.  

We will return tomorrow with the engineer to go down to the well so we can understand if it can be adjusted to be able to give water to the Tuaregs, allow the animals to drink and to grow vegetables and dates.
I understood the poverty of these people when they had me eat with them at night.
It was a plate of boiled millet with very little salt. I have never eaten anything poorer or more tasteless. There was not even a drop of oil.