My husband has reminded me of his own experience of the “camel post” from his time as a volunteer teacher in Dar Kababish in western Sudan:

“Whilst travelling by camel on a track between Hamrat Esh Sheikh and Umm Badr, I was surprised to see a police land cruiser speed past in front of me and then momentarily stop for a split instant to enable a policeman inside to toss out an envelope in my general direction. Couching my ever-grumbling camel, I was astonished to see that the envelope was addressed to me and contained letters from my family in the UK. Apparently they had been sent to the town of El Obeid which was about three hundred miles away across the qooz (dunes of sand and poor soil) of Northern Kordofan. From here they had been sent courtesy of a helpful lorry driver to a bank employee who was a friend of mine at Hamrat Esh Sheikh. Knowing that I was to be away for several weeks, he had seized the opportunity to hand them to the police car, which was how I received some unexpected news in the late afternoon on a deserted path in the middle of the Sudan.”