the Adventure Lifestyle magazine

ALL THE SPECULATIONS HAVE SOLID FOUNDATIONS, ALL MAY BE TRUE AND ALL MAY BE FALSE. WHAT IS TRUE IS THAT 50 TO 200 PEOPLE DIE EVERY DAY. MOST ARE KILLED LIKE SHEEP, THEIR THROATS CUT AND THEIR EYES GLAZING OVER AS THEY WATCH HOT BLOOD SPRAY OUT OF THEIR SEVERED NECKS UNTIL THEY LOSE CONSCIOUSNESS. BABIES' HEADS ARE BASHED AGAINST WALLS, PREGNANT WOMEN ARE SLIT OPEN, BODIES ARE CHOPPED LIKE SIDES OF BEEF. THIS IS NOT A WAR ABOUT RELIGION; IT IS ABOUT CREATING A TERROR DEEPER THAN THAT INSTILLED BY ANY MILITARY CONFLICT IN THE LAST 50 YEARS. I de.cide that Algerian history pales in com,j panson to wnat IS - nappenlng arounu me now. "{HE FAN CLUB The next day I check out the city. If you hold the world map sideways and imagine the Mediterranean as a bay, North Africa could be the extended shore of Europe. Both have a simil-ar climate and Arab influence. Algiers and Marseilles could be kissing cousins. I grab a dilapidated cab and try to convince the driver that I don't have a security detail. He drives straight to the police station so I can get one. I explain that security is journalists, not tourists. I pull out the only comforting statistic in this bloodbath: OffiCially no tourists have been killed. Then again, I have yet to see or even hear about another tourist. He shrugs. He lectures me about traveling in Algiers without an armed guard. To make sure we shake anyone that may be tailing me, I head to a shopping cen- below the Martyr's monument. I tell my cabbie to meet me in an hour. The modern center is full of bored teenagers listening to music. At the monument soldiers tell me not take pictures. Somehow it is OK to take pictures from afar but not close up. I sneak some anyway and the soldier reprimands me in English. You quickly learn that no one wants their picture taken in Algiers and that this country was built on martyrdom. I sneak into the nearby slums and talk to people. are amused by the sight of a tourist and they stare. An old man is reading an elec­ tion brochure. He waves at me, and when he realizes I am taking his picture, he hides the brochure behind his back. The slums are one of my favorite places. Children laughing, women cooking and chatting and old men walking with hands clasped behind them. A young man in a car pulls up and tells me I am crazy to be walking here. He then smiles broadly and asks me to take his picture. Hanging out on a street corner with some students I find the real event is not the elections but the Miss Algeria contest. The students want to know why I am not afraid and I ask them why they are not afraid. They say, "Because they will kill you." I remind them that 99 percent of the deaths have been Algerian and they smile and say, "Yes, but they want to kill you '" Back at the hotel I am visited by Mr Ray Ban-he doesn't tell me his real name. He is the head of security for Algiers and is accompanied by a stone-faced bodyguard. He wants to know what I am doing here. I tell him I am a tourist. He smiles and very politely and firmly asks to see my passport. "Your passport says you're a tourist, but I think you are a journalist," he says. I smile and say, "If you know of any articles, films or work I have ever done for a newspaper, radio or television company please make sure they send me a check." He smiles and tel ls me in his polite persuasive way that I have come to Algeria during a very, very, very dangerous time. He is so polite that he even stops to gently correct my bad French. Now it's pretty much impossible to prove that you are not a journalist, since both rists and journos carry cameras and video cameras. To prove who I am I get a T-shirt nd a copy of my book. Upon seeing my photo on the cover he smiles broadly and says, "Hah, you are a journalist. " I explain that a journalist works for a news organization nd writers are unemployed artists who have no agenda other than understanding e world better.

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