Some vignettes:

I had to go to the internet cafe to copy some cds, but before I went up I decided that maybe I would have a snack. I went to the store and bought a little pre-wrapped ice cream cone, like the King Cones they sell in New York. I went outside and sat on the stoop to eat. It was around noon time, and the day was clear and bright. I sat and gnawed on my too-frozen ice cream, and thought nothing in particular, when I saw my bike roll by. What's more, there was a man on it, and he wasn't me. Now, I had stuck a football sticker on the front of my basket, and it was not there anymore. Because of this little detail, I almost didn't lazily get up and call 'brah, brah' (come, come) to the man on the bike. But, considering that my bike had been missing since yesterday, when I had left it unlocked outside an internet cafe with only a security man's word for protection, I figured I had nothing to lose.

The man immediately returned to where I was waiting for him. Not as sure a sign of guilt as pedaling off furiously in the other direction, true, but when he brought the bike to me there could be no doubt that said aluminum single speed be-basketed Shiki bicycle, with 27" wheels and orange wire to hold the fender where it was rattling, there could be no doubt that this was my baby.

'This is my bicycle.'

'This is your bicycle?'

'Yes, this is my bicycle. You are riding my bicycle.'

'Hmmpphh. Lets go see the owner.'

'I'm the owner.'

'No, someone gave it to me. Lets go seem him.'

'Yeah, well, first you stop riding my bicycle.'

'Fine. Here. You ride it. But come with me to see the owner.'

I mounted my machine and did a joyful victory lap around this would be joy-rider, and then I parked the bike in the near-by yard of my muscular friend Edmond. The man, a sort of dumpy short fellow, at least thirty, promised he would return with the owner. Well, I hung out in Edmond's room, and we listened to Bob Marley and waited for the real 'owner' to come. So up shows the guy again with a skinny kid of twenty. Edmond tells him in the local language all the identifying marks on the bicycle that make it mine mine mine, and then the kid promises to find the 'real' 'owner', the guy who had given it to him. These African chains of command!

Well, Im sitting at home now, waiting for the phone call from Edmond telling me that the , the phone call will never come. So, I'm happy to have my bike back, especially because its a worn out piece of junk that makes my ass ache and I am going to trade it to a Rasta man for a nice drum.

It was midday and I was walking on a section of sidewalk. Now, real side walk is rare here, generally there's just the middle of the road where the cars go and the side of the road where you and the sewer ditch goes, so it was nice to walk on a real piece of sidewalk, even if it was no longer than twenty feet. But, the change of terrain must have been too sudden for my footwear, because the strap on my flipflop suddenly broke. What happened exactly was that of the soft plastic piece that reaches down between your big toe and your second biggest toe broke and came lose. Well, I didn't fall, and I hadn't payed more then sixty cents for these flip flops, so I wasn't too broke up about it.

But the man walking immediately behind me instantly sprung in to action. First, he informed me that there was a place just up the road where I could buy a new pair. Then, his mind made a further logical leap.

'Give me your slipper.' He then opened a little bag he was carrying, pulled out a section of wire and cut it and stripped it to its metal core. Then he took a out a metal gouge and put a hole in the plastic strap of my flip flop. He pulled the strap through the hole in the flip flop and put the wire through the hole. Voila! Good as new.

The whole process took no longer than a minute. At the end, we shook hands, exchanged greetings, and made vague plans to meet in the future that we both knew we would not honor. Then he went off his merry way and I went mine.