Attacked!

My bus for Ouagoudougou was due to leave at 6 am, so I got up at about 4:45 and did my hair and got dressed. It was raining quite heavily when I first woke, but eased off a bit when I was ready to leave. First obstacle - the hotel was all locked up and there was no-one around. However, after searching, I discovered that the key to the reception area was in the door, so I went in and fumbled around in the dark until I located the front door key. After unlocking the door, I dropped my room key and the front door key over the reception counter onto the desk, and left. Next problem - it was still dark, it was raining lightly, and not a taxi in sight.

I headed in what I thought was the direction of the bus station, hoping to flag down a roaming taxi, but I didn't see any. I did see a man I took to be a night watchman, and called out to him to ask for help finding a taxi; He came towards me, but instead of helping, he grabbed my handbag, which was over my shoulder, but under the strap of my backpack; I yelled at him to stop, that there were only books in the bag. He pushed me to the ground, broke the strap of my handbag, broke open the shopping bag containing the bottles of water, and ran off. I scrambled to my feet, gathered as many of the rolling bottles of water, plus the waterbottle Mike and Anne had given me, and hurried further along the street towards where I could see the lights of a gas station. This time there was a real night watchman, an older man sleeping on a bench in one of the bays. I woke him up and asked for help. He called another young man over, and sent him in search of a taxi. In the meantime, I saw the man who had stolen my bag coming towards us. I pointed him out to the night watchmen, saying that that man had attacked me and robbed me. The watchmen went over to see what he wanted, and the thief threw my bag at his feet, apparently disgusted that it did after all, only contain books! Then he stalked off.

Shortly afterwards, the young man returned with the van from the Hotel Terminus, which was apparently just up the street. The driver of the van insisted that he would only drive me to the bus station for 5000 CFA, highway robbery of a more legal kind. However, I was in no condition to argue, and he drove me safely, if expensively, to the bus station, where for once the bus actually left on time.