Roger Rambler        page 2             Roger Rambler Class Page

Having rambled across every continent but one, and I will leave it you to figure out which continent I am referring to, I have kept to the villages and small towns. I make it a habit to visit just about every out of the way place that you can think of and hundreds more that you have never heard about.

Speaking of out of the way places, Libya is a place where rivers rarely flow.  My Tuareg friends are rather cautious about venturing there so we agree to head east.  After a solid two weeks of walking and camping out every night under the stars, we enter northern Sudan.   Eventually, we reach the Nile and follow it north to Abu Simbel ,  a place not to be missed for history is precariously preserved there.   It was then that I made a decision to use my time powers.  At the time, we were in the present.   Lake Nasser was huge.   I thought long and hard and eventually recalled that Lake Nasser was created during the 1960's. 

I entered my time mode and was soon back in the early 1950's.  The Nile was it's old self once again.  Before we could blink, a boatman appeared and offered to take us across.  Money changed hands.  We set out.  We were soon in the Nubian Desert.   I was bent on seeing a Nubian Ibex for I had heard they are magnificent creatures.   The next morning, as we headed towards the mountains at sunrise, I did spot one through my binoculars but only for an instant. 

As we approached the mountains, I unzipped my backpack and was about to get my digital camera out when I realized that digital doodads had not yet been invented.  I made do with my old Nikon and got a couple of good pictures, I think.  Then to be sure, I decided that I wanted to use my digital Canon as the scenery was splendid.  I did not know when I would be back this way again.  Innocently, I went into the time mode and dialed fast forward.  No sooner said than done.  No sooner said than Al Said, the leader of the Tuareg, approached me with a sour look on his face.

"We need a private meeting now," is what he said.  We went for a stroll and found a patch of shade.  "It has been said," said Al Said, that Osama Bin Laden is in the neighbourhood."

"I know how to avoid him," I replied.

"You do?"

"Yes," I said trying to sound serious.  "Do you know what year he was born in?"

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"If I am going to eliminate him, at least for the time being, I hastened to add, I need to know his date of birth.  I also need to know how long you intend to stay in the Sudan."

"Just how are you going to bring this about?" Al Said asked.

"Can you keep a secret?" I asked smiling the instant he nodded.

"We are going to do a little time travel.  Let me see.  The year is 1996.  We'll go back to 1952."

"That's five years before Osama bin Laden was born."

"That should do nicely. At that stage, I don't think he can be very dangerous.  You'll need to tell your people to take an afternoon siesta.  We'll wake them up tomorrow morning sort of."

"It's kind of complicated, isn't it."

"As soon as everyone is asleep, except for the two of us, we'll go into the Dreamtime and scoot back to Osama minus five."

Involving Al Said and his group turned out to be a fairly easy time change.  Time in the Sudan creeps at a snail's pace.  When our companions woke up, they did not notice a speck of change although Osama may have.  Let's hope so.

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