Sunday, November 10, 2013
Gao
We surprisingly reached Gao with very little trouble. After a fairly quick journey with only one long stop in Timbuktu we were at Gao and ready to trade. The people of the Songhai capital were very excited to see us and our wares. However, very few people had money. A great caravan had previously came in before us and many citizens had bought goods from it. We were only able to sell about half of the things we had brought which meant we could not head to Tripoli yet. We would have to make another stop in Jenne to get rid of our other goods. At Gao we traded our goods for large amounts of gold, surpassing the amount of gold we started with. We almost had enough to be able to travel all the way to China without monetary worries. We just needed to get to Jenne. Our new friend, Ibn was an amazing salesman as well. He knew many languages and understood the local customs and was able to flatter the locals and make them happy. We stayed in Gao for 10 days, long enough to sell as many goods as the people were willing to buy. We enjoyed the city very much and even visited the tomb of Askia, the former emperor of Songhai. Ibn himself “ lavishly praised the good character and generosity of the local rulers he encountered and was very pleased with the abundance of food and the fertility of Gao.” The rulers were generous as well and let us stay at their palace. After our time in Gao we doubled back towards Timbuktu and towards Jenne in the Malian Kingdom.
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