Also liquid and cool. We splashed in it and took pictures. He wanted us to admire the mirages, but there are mirages in Spain, too. The Spaniards felt excluded and unfulfilled. This was Tunisia, the impenetrable Sahara.
Morocco is worse.
Algeria is better, maybe because thirty years ago the Algerians threw the French out. Algerians have become proud and somewhat distant. If they are poor, they are not hungry. If they hustle each other, they do not bother strangers. In the vast south, which is the desert, they themselves are accustomed to travel.