Passengers pile in, as many as 25 per vehicle,
each carrying no more than a knapsack. They
wear sunglasses and scarves to fend off the sand,
along with heavy coats for the biting-cold nights
on the three-day journey to Libya.
Their youth is palpable. Squeezed together
among strangers, they fidget and stare listlessly
at the empty landscape awaiting them. Vendors
with rusty pushcarts hawk thirdhand coats,
sugarcane, plastic bags of water, cigarettes, and
wooden poles to use as braces against the pos-
sibility of falling out and becoming stranded in
the lawless, desolate Sahara as the unpitying
motorcade recedes.
Trucks keep arriving. More than a hundred
will assemble by the time the procession begins.
Two military vehicles lumber forth—one to
lead, the other to guard the rear. As night falls,
a swarm of motorcycles materializes and surges
past the city’s checkpoint, ferrying a frantic,
last-minute wave of aspiring travelers who
wish to negotiate their way into the overstuffed
pickups. Amid the swirling sand and the pell-
mell assimilation of the stragglers, one motor-
cycle skids to a halt. Even seated, the rider is a
A teenager is dusted
with sand from toiling
in a mine. He is one
of many Nigeriens who
joined the rush for
gold in the north, the
last hope for jobless
men after tourism
plunged, uranium min-
ing declined, and a
law made transporting
migrants a crime.
JUST BEFORE DUSK,
THE FIRST PICKUP
TRUCKS ROLL PAST
THE CHECKPOINT
AND ARRAY THEMSELVES
ACROSS THE DESERT
ON THE OUTSKIRTS
OF AGADEZ, NIGER.
116 NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC