A small country between the sea and the desert, Tunisia absorbed such a Babylonian variety of all that the unusual for this multi-faceted exotic tourist in the early days just head goes around . Attack by the richness of smells, sounds and colors is carried out according to all the rules of the "science of winning": " to catch the enemy by surprise, without having to recover, to surround and smash, and as usual - to conquer, forever making a faithful slave of the Mediterranean-Saharan vassal . And, returning home, the smell of a bunch of jasmine, granted about the gray-haired old man, the yellow edge of the low-low hanging month, the taste of the "herd" bread, dipped in a cocktail of olive oil and honey and the rough-hairy wood of the palm tree, from which the doors of houses are made in the south . In a word, Tunisia penetrates the soul through all the five senses granted to us by nature - and each can hardly contain the impressions that are generously poured from all sides .
Sniff ...
Perhaps the nose is the first thing that gets to know Tunisia - at the very moment when in the airplane with another, if I may say so, Russian air opens the door, its iron platform, we take the first step . And then the damp, hot and inviting, unfamiliar but secretly native Africa smells in the face . The first sip of Tunisian air - someone smells in it the salinity of the sea with the notorious beneficial ions who it is a dry and spicy smell of the soil, or, perhaps, it will fly from the airports x flower bed aroma of oleander and jasmine . And this is just the beginning - every day of rest in Tunisia is guaranteed to bring fresh oleofaktornye impressions . In the morning, for example, over the coastal tourist zone often hangs the smell of squeezed olives - it can not be confused: tickling nose aroma cake, in which the power of the earth, and the wandering juices of berries, and even if you like, the century-old peasant hand-made labor . By the evening of the nearest residential houses, the smoke of "bhura" - incense smells, but not the densely sweet "hemlock" a-la Bollywood, and in the east of The exquisite aroma of burnt exotic grasses and roots .
... see ...
In Tunisia eyes are "loaded" no less than the nose - for the richness of landscapes, concentrated in a small area, this country will easily "skimp" most of the popular tourist destinations . And they are replaced in the literal sense in no time: just outside the window of the sightseeing bus I kali neat mounds-islands in the sands of the Sahara - and suddenly invisible features of stretches after light coffee perfectly smoothed the tablecloth dried-up salt lake Chott el Jerid . What's equator line of the Tropic of Cancer and Other! - just a schematically indicated virtual border and a hand-crafted explanatory post with the signs "north" and "south" . And here you can stand with one foot on the moiré surface of the dune, and the other - on the crystal of salt, sparkling with salt crystals, lifeless crust of the ancient seabed . @ There are many contrasts in Tunisia: the remnants of the great civilizations of the past - the ruins of Carthage and Duggie and the eternal landscapes of the Sahara, a civilization that has not been touched, human labor - laboriously cultivated oases and endless olive plantations and a witness of the neuma the natural beauty of nature - sat on the border with Algeria, the dizzying serpentines in the Atlas Mountains and the Selja Gorge, the cork forests of Ain Draham and the cool shady oases of Tozer, the blooming citrus orchards of Cape Bon and the cliffs of El Hauaria ...
... hear ...
Tunisia sounding is the calls of the muezzin to the morning prayer , when the dawn is just barely getting busy and the month has not yet turned off , and the bird twitter at sunset; opening only to the dedicated song of the sand , when the wind rolls into the quietest sand grains and from their friction there is a slightly audible melancholic sound , akin to the singing of the cane flute , and the continuous sound of the surf - affectionate in the calm and formidable in the storm; horns of the wedding procession (according to the strictly established scheme , by the way - two long , three short ones) and peaceful "Ouda" tunes - Tunisian lute Finally, here you can hear the most valuable sound - the sound of silence ! Simply quit at night from the hotel room in Duse, walk a bit along the sand and sit under the amazingly high and black southern sky with a scattering of stars - in a pristine silence in which it seems that the world has not yet been created !
... taste ...
However, among the "everyday" impressions you can find many new things: for example, simple, but without exaggeration, the divine taste of homemade couscous and sweet Green tea with mint and pine nuts, tartness of wine from the grounds of Cape Bon and tender sugar taste of dates, spice of salted olives and "uh! "- the sharpness of" Harissa "- the local adzhika
... and touch
Finally, we can not fail to mention that such an interesting in Tunisia can be touched . First of all, these are the tourist" default options "- silk sand on the beach, in which it is so nice to lazily strip the strip with your thumb, blissfully falling apart on the deckchair, a little "thick" because of the high salt content of the Mediterranean Sea and other hotel gadgets in the form of a shaved lawn, rough trunks of palm trees and olive leaves, smooth and dark green from the face and rough and horny from the turn . Travelers across the country have great opportunities: for example, you can feel the warm and unusually cozy walls of the Berber dwelling in Matmata dug in the malleable rock or immerse your fingers in beige curls on the camel soft side . Here you will be surprised at the smoothness a silk cloth woven in Mahdia on an old machine, and with pleasure you will stroke the soft felt of the national red cap-fez - "sheshi" . (By the way, it uses dried dried speleas of a special kind .) in Tunisia - there is more than enough: to sniff, and to clasp your cheek, and to try it .