We did expect problems at borders, we did expect to pay bribes. But we didn't expect them to not accept bribes and to tell us we had to leave the ambulance in the customs, by law! We first lined up behind all normal cars but when we said it's an ambulance we were shown to the customs for imports. We tried arguing, begging, sweet talking but nothing worked. We were close to get in when they realised we weren't stopping in morocco, but last minute they said no. Everyone told us different things, but we eventually worked out that they wanted papers from the hospital saying we're going there. We phoned the ambassador - my mobile bill will be astronomical! I don't even want to think about it - and he got on to the hospital. Bloody nuisance that we arrived on a saturday... No one was working! At the same time as we kept ringning the ambassador i rang dad and asked him to fake something. He got it together and after struggling with finding a fax and work out what the number was to it we finally got dad's fax through. We then thought it had to be in french. Dad got hold of someone with good enough french to translate his english and after googling the hospital and nicking the logo and finding the name of the hospital director he produced someting that looked official enough. It was bloody brilliant!Before we got that though i had turned on the waterworks. I broke down and 'cried hysterically' and mark tried to 'comfort' me. Halfway through my repertoire i got the text from dad saying he had faxed it. Mark had gone back to the truck so i discretely texted him telling him to go and get the fax whilst i sat crying in the customs directors office. They kept telling us that big boss wouldn't come until tuesday and they couldn't let us through. But then they told us there was a middle boss who might arrive today... Now, when i turned on the waterworks i had five blue coats gathering around me trying to console me so reading dad's text and texting mark without them noticing wasn't the easiest. Finally mark came running with the fax and things started to look better. The middle boss saw us, looked at the fax from dad and decided to let us in. Then they stopped for lunch! Eventually someone came and told us mark had to go up to the police to sign in and get his passport stamped. Mark toddled off and i kept 'crying' and looking lost. In the passport queue Mark got talking to a girl that looked british. He was telling her about our problems and she goes; are you mark by any chance? It turns out she works at waterloo ambulance station and knew all about us! We did get out in the end and the feeling when he opened the big metal gates were incredible. "Drive mark! Drive!!" The hardest for me i think was to do all the arguing in french. They didn't speak a word of english...The boys are sleeping now and i will go to sleep as well. We're in a campsite near rabat and the rest of the teams are here. What a good story we had to tell them. They had all seen us locked into the compound... Anyway, night night and thanks for all cheering on and help! We couldn't have done it without you, especially not without dad's fake fax... (Publicerat av Owe)

 

Sabina

31 december 2006 12:39

Oh så otroligt härligt att läsa. Eller tja, missförstå mig rätt. Men jag har passerat den där gränsstationen så otroligt många gånger och ser hela scenariot framför mig.

Och nu är jag förstås otroligt avis för att du befinner dig i närheten av Rabat, hade gärna varit där med dig. Gott nytt år till dig och Mark och ambulansen. =)

/Sabina

 

Bonita

31 december 2006 13:45

Hejja Er!! Fasen va ni är bra!! Go Go Go!!!

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