I’m sure that many of you will know what I’m talking about when I say that I can still recall the wonder I felt as a child when first hearing about the Roman town of Pompeii and how it was famously buried under volcanic ash clouds. Even back then, it was a place that I longed to visit one day.
In my case it took many years until that chance came, but finally, early last autumn, as the first wisps of winter wrapped around southern Italy, I found myself in Pompeii. And yet, after all those years of waiting, Pompeii left me cold. It was just too sterile and, despite the murky winter weather, the thousands of other tourists I shared the site with gave me no chance for quiet contemplation.
That evening, as I sat in a café feeling a little cheated, I started talking to another Pompeii tourist who turned out to be something of an expert on Roman sites. When I told him of my slight disappointment with Pompeii, he smiled knowingly and said simply, “Algeria. Go to northern Algeria.” And so I did.