THE NORTH RIDING PROJECT

I caught the plane at lunchtime for Fort Lamy in Chad.  By local standards, Fort Lamy is a big city and I was looking forward to a clean room and, by God’s will, air conditioning.  I also had romantic dreams about Chad, though all I knew about it was its name which appealed to me from childhood.  It was boiling hot, even in the plane, and for half a hour before reaching Fort Lamy we flew over poison green swamp.  Horrible country.  I began to feel depressed about Chad.

Gellhorn/Travels

Chad had no government but plenty of gun; gasoline was sold in green wine bottles.  The tracker I hired in what was then the Central African Empire had followed the BaAka Pygmy custom of chipping his front teeth into sharp points, giving him the fearsome grin of a piranha.

Steinmetz, Geographic