Dispatches from Mali

Travel Blog • Jim Benning • 08.02.05 | 12:38 PM ET

Cynthia Barnes is filing travel stories from Mali this week for Slate. “This is my first visit to Africa,” she writes in the first installment. “As long as I’m making the trip, I plan to stay awhile. Normally, I’m the queen of the quickies. My professional specialty is swinging through somewhere like Shanghai and churning out facile features that suggest insider expertise but are actually the product of 48-hour press tours. I want, for once, to go slowly. To meet someone besides the local tourism authorities. To understand a tiny piece of one place. To have an adventure that’s at least a little unscripted. My return flight is 10 weeks from now.”