'Sudanese Bubba' will show you Sudan

You might not even remember it, but for a short time in the fall of 2020, we thought the pandemic was over. We were just too cute.

Wrong as we were, I went to Sudan then. And there I met a spectacular person called Salma EL-Sheikh, who smoothed my way around the country.

Well Salma is doing her part to drag the world kicking and screaming out of the pandemic, and she now has her own tourism company, Sudanese Bubba. The name "comes from our Sudanese jewelry (Gamar Bubba), moon–shaped golden earring (Gamar Boba)," Salma explains. "Kind of earrings women used to wear at the ancient time, until this moment."

I receive absolutely nothing but a karmic re-balance when I tell you, Salma has my absolute and unqualified recommendation.

Local kids atop Jebel Barka (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 RJ Peltz-Steele)

Sudan is a stunning place. Its pyramids and ancient sites are magical. You will find yourself scrambling up and over remote dunes to see the next marvel with a feel of wild intimacy that is unknowable in well trampled tourist traps (I'm lookin' at you, Cairo).

Sudan likewise offers a fascinating ethnographic and political experience. Its pioneering efforts to mix Islamic and western law into a republican formula, and its fraught relationships with neighboring South Sudan and Ethiopia all amount to a nation that is very much a work in progress. 

For all the range of experience on offer, my fondest memory is sitting with friends and locals on crates in a Khartoum street at the serving station of "our tea lady."

Let Salma help to make your memories of Sudan!

Me and my mates on the road in Sudan (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 RJ Peltz-Steele)