The Sheltering Sky

[first lines]

Port Moresby:
Well, terra firma.

Tunner:
We're probably the first tourists they've had since the war.

Kit Moresby:
Tunner, we're not tourists. We're travelers.

Tunner:
Oh. What's the difference?

Port Moresby:
A tourist is someone who thinks about going home the moment they arrive, Tunner.

Kit Moresby:
Whereas a traveler might not come back at all.

Tunner:
You mean *I'm* a tourist.

Kit Moresby:
Yes, Tunner. And I'm half and half.

Tunner:
You've been to North Africa before, Port. Kit and I will just follow your plan.

Port Moresby:
My only plan is, I have no plan.

Kit Moresby:
Other people's dreams are so dull.

Port Moresby:
Kit has days when everything in the world is merely a sign for something else. A white Mercedes can't just simply be a white Mercedes. It must have a secret meaning about the whole of life. Everything is an omen. Nothing can just be what it is.

Kit Moresby:
Oh, Tunner, stop trying to be interesting. On you it looks terrible. And you're too good-looking.

Tunner:
Do you and Port ever... share the same room?

Kit Moresby:
Tunner, when you travel for months on end, you have to set it up this way. But if you're talking about sex, the first rule of marriage is never to confuse it with sleep.

Kit Moresby:
Now we're going to have to choose between two tortures: taking the train or driving with them.

Kit Moresby:
Champagne yes, philosophy no.

Port Moresby:
You know, if Tunner didn't take such long siestas, I'd never be alone with you. I think he's in love with you.

Kit Moresby:
Port, don't be silly.

Port Moresby:
Sillier things have happened. The way he hangs around making inane conversation, the way he looks at you when he fingers his DDT can...

Kit Moresby:
What else?

Port Moresby:
Oh, the ferocity with which he counts your luggage.

Kit Moresby:
Oh, he counts yours too.

Port Moresby:
It's not the same.

Kit Moresby:
Someday they're gonna kick the French out of this country.

Port Moresby:
Well, with trousers like that, who can blame them?

Tunner:
Do you think, uh, Port suspects something?

Kit Moresby:
I think he knows, but he doesn't know that he knows.

Kit Moresby:
According to Port, everyone eventually gets used to anything.

Tunner:
If that were true, it would be the end of progress.

Kit Moresby:
No, I'm sure it's true. I just don't know whether it's good or bad.

Port Moresby:
Neither.

Port Moresby:
Could you be happy here?

Kit Moresby:
Happy? Happy? How do you mean?

Port Moresby:
I mean, could you like it here?

Kit Moresby:
How do I know? God, I wish you wouldn't ask me questions like this! Really! I can't answer them. What do you want me to say? "Yes, I'll be happy in Africa"? I like Ain Krorfa so much, but I can't tell whether I want to stay for a month or I want to leave tomorrow.

Tunner:
You couldn't leave tomorrow even if you wanted to. Can't get any information about how to get out of this place. No buses, not even a fruit truck. Nobody speaks English. Anybody for a nightcap?

Kit Moresby:
Is that the plan?

Port Moresby:
More or less, yes.

Kit Moresby:
More or less?

Port Moresby:
Uh... Less, actually.

Narrator:
Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well, yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that's so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four or five times more, perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless.

Kit Moresby:
I hate choices.

Tunner:
Do you think Port suspects of something?

Kit Moresby:
I think he knows. But he doesn't know that he knows.