140
N’djamena, Chad: The maps still call this town “Fort Lamy”, but the residents now call it N’djamena.
I am sharing a small shabby room in a four-room hotel, with a white man who says he is from New Zealand.
He is quite literally crazy.
He claims to be twenty-five years old but looks at least forty. He says he is on his way to the United States to find a black American woman to marry because “You can beat them and they love it”. He wants to be an American citizen too and this arrangement seems to him to be the best way to achieve that goal.
He says he has been around the world three times and has been a patient in mental hospitals in Australia, Europe and America. From his detailed descriptions of life in these asylums, I think he is telling the truth about that.
He says that the pollution he has seen in every country will soon mean “…the fucking end of the bloody world!”
I am not sharing the room by choice but because it is the only shelter I can find in this parched, dusty little town.
...
2 comments:
Really quick,
I noticed on your workshop blog that you've been introducing other people and their crafts, etc. Even the security guard is it? I really enjoy this process, I think you have such great images and material on that blog as well. I see a book or even a small collection flash fiction/non-fiction in the works!
Back to this post. I think something I love is using a word, place, any pronoun that the reader probably can't pronounce. This one has "N'djamena". In fact, it comes out as a word spelled wrong when I look it up. I just like this because it encourages the reader to look up what they do not know, and the writing opens their mind in a way.
I think you might have missed an "is" in "He quite literally crazy."
His quote sounds believable, I see him saying this: "You can beat them and they love it." It's great material for characterization. I could even read another whole page on just this guy who says he's twenty-five but looks forty.
Always with rich content, I wish you the best,
Angela
Thanks Angela--good, positive criticism--I am glad you are enjoying the story and thanks for catching the typo. Carry on! TW
Post a Comment