by Mark Emery
Naturally, American influence here is strong and the country of Liberia to this day functions on the US dollar as its currency. I loved this because no foreign currency permits were needed! Just make the order and set up the L/C with the bank.
Most of the more successful businessmen in Liberia were either from Lebanon or India. Lebanon at the time was still feeling the effects of a vicious civil war which turned it from a luxurious modern coastal paradise on the Mediterranean to a dangerous heap of rubble. Many of the merchants escaped to other places where they could do business in peace. Liberia was one of those places being a gateway to West Africa.
The Indians were very prevalent along with the Lebanese and both groups were most gracious hosts. I’ve had nothing but wonderful experiences with the great people from India and Lebanon, wherever I was in the world. They’d invite me in to their private quarters in the back room which were luxurious and quite unexpected from the dingy outward appearances of their place. I’d be seated on fine upholstered French colonial style furniture. The floor was covered with a work of art in the form of a Persian rug with exquisite tapestries on the wall. They’d offer me anything I’d like to drink and I usually settled for their famous Turkish coffee. We’d talk about the world, culture, global and local politics, the general business climate and more.
While drinking their strong Turkish coffee, not only did I learn to love it but I learned their custom of reading the dried coffee grounds to tell your future. Let me explain. When finished with the coffee, you turn the small porcelain cup over and let the coffee grounds which remained in the cup, slide down onto the plate. When they dried, it was the custom for certain soothsayers to be able to read the pattern left in your dried coffee to tell you things about yourself and your future, much like a palm reader. I love strong coffee and fell in love with this Turkish coffee, Lebanese style!
Beyond the in-suite hospitality, they’d offer me one of their cars and a personal driver during my stay so I wouldn’t have to humble myself in the dirty taxis that ran through the city.
I felt like a king. All of this would occur before we’d even start to talk about business. By that time, we had developed such a friendship the business was almost an afterthought and pretty much automatic.
It was through experiences like this which taught me early on that being the ‘visitor from afar’ had some very distinct advantages. I could get used to this!
Pulling Rank in Morocco
I had planned a long trip for North Africa which started in Morocco then led to Algeria, Libya, Tunisia and finally Malta. I had a very detailed and complex itinerary meticulously laid out and prepared down to the last detail which took quite some time to arrange. Arranging all the flights, hotels and meetings took me several weeks to accomplish. This was going to be an important trip.
So my flight lands in Casablanca, my first stop. Before I even checked in to the hotel I learned that the muslim holiday of Ramadan was just beginning and the country literally shuts down during the day. How could this happen? How could I be in communication with so many people about the trip and nobody even mention this? My entire schedule was shot to hell. I had to start over but I was already in Casablanca. Now what?
Man! Where is that Scotch when you need it? The odds of finding Scotch whiskey in a muslim country during Ramadan are about the same as stumbling into a forest fire in the Arctic. It ain’t gonna happen!
So what’s the only thing to do when you can’t do business for a few days? Have fun of course! I decided take advantage of the opportunity and go on a little tour of the country. I rented a car and made the drive of several hours from Casablanca on the highway down to see the historical and exotic Marrakech.
This was the very first time I had ever rented a car in a foreign country. Some of the road signs included some French which I could understand, but many of them were only in Arabic so my navigation relied largely on instinct and luck with the help of a roadmap I bought. It was a bit nerve-racking.
But the trip down to Marakech made me feel like I had gone through a time warp to travel several centuries back in time.
Out on the open road I had passed an old man with his camel pulling a bucket of water out of a well with the rope tied to the camel. This was in front of a small ancient village out in the middle of nowhere which was encircled by a mud packed wall. I didn’t see an electric line anywhere.
There were various instances of camels roaming free on the barren countryside. I had spectacular views of the Atlas Mountains off in the distance.
Finally I arrived in Marrakech just outside the ‘old city’ which was walled in from ancient days. A young kid saw me get out of my car and instantly recognized me as a foreigner which was an opportunity for him. He convinced me to let him be my tour guide and it was a good decision. It was the best five bucks I’ve ever spent.
He took me into the back rooms, back streets and the belly of the ancient city and I saw it in a way that probably few ever have. We walked casually through a back private room where a group of old Moroccan men in their traditional Arab garb were sitting on the floor around a water pipe (Shisha/Houkah) and smoking whatever it was they were used to smoking. I got a whiff and had a pretty good idea.
I remember seeing an old man sitting, practically sleeping, on his burro which carried him and some packs one step at a time through a narrow passage way. I was looking over my shoulder expecting to see Humphrey Bogart. It was a scene from a time gone by, except it was today!
Then came the bazaar full of merchants selling their beautiful copper ware, rugs, tapestries, woodworks, and you name it. It was there and the products were beautiful.
In the common public square it was a free for all with a variety of sights, sounds and smells. I saw an old man sitting on a very small stool in a tattered suit. He looked to me like a drunk trying to recover from the night before. He had a blanket laid out with various instruments on it and a few bottles of colored liquid. I asked my guide, ‘Who is this guy? What does he do?” He replied, ‘Oh he’s a dentist. He can fix your teeth!’. At that point in time I was eternally grateful that I didn’t have a toothache.
Then there was a guy talking to a big crowd gathered around him. I asked about him. “Oh he’s a story teller. He tells good stories and people give him tips.
And of course the story wouldn’t be complete without the snake charmers. Yes, There was an actual snake charmer there with 2 cobras. He kept them under a lid and when I came up to them they’d lift the lid and handle the snakes. He let me take a picture but of course that cost me a small fee.
So, I head back to Casablanca and get caught up in traffic which was terrible as people seemed to be going in every which direction without any order. Another little surprise which snuck up on me was the fact that, if the signs being in Arabic weren’t enough of a hardship, the city had just changed all the circulation patterns in the city streets so even the local people were disoriented and ended up going the wrong way when they went the way they were accustomed to going which wasn’t correct anymore. It was a mess.
I was due to leave the next day and was happy about that even though I had the experience of a lifetime in Marrakech.
On my way to the airport I was going down a narrow one way street and noticed a police officer pulling several cars over to the side ahead of me. I tried to pass and he insisted I pull over as well.
We were all going down a one way street the wrong way. Just last week it was a two way street so even the local people were being caught off guard.
I finally realized that the cars he was pulling over ahead of me were being towed away and I started to panic. The police confirmed that I would have my turn with the tow truck as well. I was on my way to drop the rental car off and catch a flight. I had no time for this falderal.
I had to think fast and get out of this mess. I started trying to talk logic to him. Didn’t work. He didn’t care about logic
. I pleaded with him to have mercy on a foreigner. Nope. He didn’t care. He was making money for the city and would surely be applauded for his efforts. He wasn’t budging.
Finally I started to raise my voice and get irate. I took my passport out and flashed it for him and I said, ‘Do you know what this is? It’s a US passport. I work for the U.S. Embassy as a special attach֥e´. I opened my passport book to flash my credentials (which was nothing) in front of him really fast as if to prove my status. He didn’t challenge me on it. The bluff worked.
I started ranting and raving that he already had plenty of ‘customers’ but that he didn’t want me because I had a high level meeting at the Moroccan presidential palace I was expected to attend and if he was responsible for detaining me any longer, he could be held responsible for an international incident. I went on along this theme and made it clear that he was clearly outranked in this situation and after I started asking for his information and ID he realized that the easiest thing to do would be to let me go rather than face the potential consequences I had built up in his mind. Key point: I did not willingly submit to his authority and I asserted my own by taking control of the situation.
I didn’t wait for or ask for his approval. I made my point very clear in a strong and confident posture and affirmatively ‘assumed the close’ praying that my bluff would work. It did. I got in my car and he let me drive away. I got the car back to the agency and got to the airport on time.
This little escapade taught me a little bit about psychology and how by combining a little bit of dramatic theatrical flair along with my American passport, a little confident creativity could go a long way!
I felt totally in control of my own destiny and this victory put the icing on the cake for a wonderful adventure with fond memories of Morocco.
My foundational field training to be a ‘PT’ was well underway!
Finally! Homeless at Last!
My job with EKCO had run its course in Chicago and I ultimately decided that climbing the corporate ladder wasn’t for me. I didn’t like office politics and the required conformity to the corporate culture so I broke free and went out on my own as a business broker.
With my international background, the C.I.A. had found me and was actively recruiting me. Out of curiosity I played along with them until the last minute before I backed off the process. No way was I going to sacrifice my life working on government scale. More on that subject in my other book mentioned below.
I moved from Chicago to Denver where I started to learn first hand about tyranny and government abuse of power. I started studying the law intensely and developed myself into a professional troublemaker with my newly acquired knowledge of the law. I got my own radio show focusing on these subjects and caused enough heartache with the local crooks that I spent a year in prison as my reward. This was one of the best years of my life. You can read all about that in my other book:
ONE FREEMANS WAR
IN THE SECOND AMERICAN REVOLUTION.
Upon release from parole I moved to Oklahoma, just a block from the bomb site of the Federal Murah Building. I got married to an Oklahoma girl and she had a little ‘Yorkie’ Yorkshire terrier who was a real cutie.
My independence had allowed me to make more than I ever had previously as an employee and I was blessed to be able to buy a 37’ Itasca motorhome with two slide out sections. It was beautiful. This was in 1998 and the ultimate objective here was in planning for the big Y2k meltdown scare everyone was talking about in those days. If you’re too young to remember that, it was said that the computers were not properly programmed to roll over from dates in the 1900s to the 2000s and that nearly all computers could go haywire and possibly put us back into the dark ages.
I wanted to be mobile and thus bought the motorhome.
We maintained a small apartment in Oklahoma City (OKC) and when I pulled up to the apartment complex for the first time in that luxury land yacht, a feeling of excitement and pending adventure started welling up inside of me which I couldn’t hold back. We got it provisioned and equipped and were ready to head out on the open road.
From OKC I first headed to Colorado for a family gathering in the mountains. The house where my family was staying was full and overflowing with family and kids. I was very happy to have brought ‘my own place’ with me and we even had room for a couple of kids from the overflow. It was so nice having a comfortable peaceful spot to get away from the crowd.
On the way back we found a spectacular campsite to park and spend the night, right on Grand Lake. The RV was parked in amongst the pines looking right out over the lake. It was heaven.
The following day I climbed Trail Ridge road and crossed the Continental Divide on the way to Estes Park. I remember taking in the spectacular views and thinking that this was just too beautiful to just drive through and pass by. So I found the perfect place to park the RV up on a perch on top of the world and we soaked in the incredible beauty while we had a relaxing lunch which we were in no hurry to finish. I was getting used to this mobile lifestyle believe it or not!
My wife had relatives she wanted to see in the Ozarks so we headed over to see them in Eureka Springs and stayed in a gorgeous spot in the hills there before heading over to Branson to see a couple shows, again staying amongst the pines in the fresh air of a national forest.
All the while, I was towing a beautiful white and gold Jeep Grand Cherokee behind the RV so we could get out and explore each local area or city we came upon with ease.
Next stop was Chicago to see my aunt and her family. She lived on the north shore so I found a beautiful spot in the Illinois Beach State Park right on Lake Michigan to park ‘the rig’. Aside from the curious skunk who wanted to share our space with us for a time, we had a great visit with Maren and her family before heading up to Door County, Wisconsin.
Along the way, as we approached Green Bay I stopped at my alma mater St. Norbert College and walked the grounds stirring up fond memories from the college days and seeing what was new after 20 years.
It was fall, and I had my sights set on getting to a Packer game even though I had no tickets. Lambeau Field was just a couple miles down the road from St. Norbert College.
But first we headed north to the peninsula and arrived in Door County. We encountered a spectacular display of nature, history and culture. The beautiful fall colors were setting in on the trees. We attended a famous Door County ‘fish boil dinner’ which was a dramatic cultural and culinary event. But the important event for me was the Sunday Packer game against the arch rival Vikings coming up in a couple days.
Sunday morning arrived and we headed to the stadium parking early in search of tickets. Ha! Tickets to the Viking game? Are you kidding? Dream on, right? I circled the stadium several times and found nothing!
I did find a scalper asking ridiculous amounts for his tickets and passed, holding that option as an absolute last resort. I’d wait until kickoff time if I had to, when the price comes crashing down. But in the meantime I kept searching.
I went to the ‘Will Call’ ticket window and they had nothing and the girl shot me down. I was just standing there off to the side pondering my next move when a guy came up to the window to get his tickets which were set aside for him to pick up. He asked the price and apparently was not prepared to pay what they were asking for them and he walked away. I asked the clerk in the window, “Hey, are those tickets available?” She replied, ‘Yes’. I was in! Not only was I ‘In’ but these were Sky Box seats for only $103 each! I was like a dog rolling in clover! This was a miracle!
Living in luxury in the Sky Box with waiter service watching the game live and from all angles with replays on the TVs all around us in the midst of the energy from the crowd at Lambeau Field could only be matched by the finish to the game.
The Vikings just scored a critical touchdown late in the fourth quarter to take the lead in a tight, hard fought game. The Pack
ers were now behind by 4 points and needed a touchdown with only a minute left on the clock when they got the ball back for a last ditch effort. It looked bleak for the Packers. It was the ultimate pressure cooker.
Brett Favre, the Packers Hall of Fame quarterback worked the clock and frantically drove the Packers offense downfield to the red zone inside the 20 yard line. They were at the 18 but time and hope were running out. It was fourth down with the clock stopped at only 4 seconds. A first down would do them no good, the clock would run out and the game would be over. They needed a touchdown on this play. Last chance. One play. It was do or die!
Brett Favre takes the snap and almost gets crushed from immediate penetration but he frantically spins away from a sure sack. Minnesota put on a ferocious rush and a sack would have been ‘Game Over’. Right then the play they had called was now scratched and it was a sandlot football free for all. He looks right. Pumps. Nothing. Being chased he runs back to his left. Time has run out. Zero time on the clock. He’s still scrambling, looking, trying to buy time for someone to get open. He backpedals under pressure then spins to his left and drills a pass into a crowd in the end zone….. Caught! TOUCHDOWN! GAME OVER! PACKERS WIN! The crowd went absolutely nuts and a frenzy like I’ve never seen before lasted for a solid 20 minutes or more!
It was party time at the tailgates in the parking lot!
That was the game experience of a lifetime. The entire experience was completely AD HOC and improvised each step of the way with nothing planned or arranged in advance. It came to fruition for no other reason than this PT willed it to happen and with his freedom, mobility and lust for life.
These are the types of situations and life experiences a free and mobile PT can create for himself.
The only way I could have possibly enjoyed this ‘homeless’ lifestyle was due to the fact that I had an internet based business which I could manage from the luxury of my mobile office. These days nearly every park or campsite has WiFi. It’s a standard service.
