- 行程 itinerary
- 第一个惊喜 my first wow
- 海豹，狮子，象与其它 seal, lion, elephant 。。。
- 水, 沙漠, 生命 water, desert, life
- 种族隔离 apartheid
- 警察 police
- 小偷 thief
- 欠条 i.o.u
- 维多利亚瀑布 Victoria fall
- 马拉维 Malawi
- 桑给巴尔三日（一， 二， 三） Three days in Zanzibar (one, two, three)
- 内罗毕的出租车 Nairobi's taxi
- 埃及航空 EgyptAir
行程 itinerary
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When people heard my intention to visit africa, they inevitably asked if I was going on safari. Hmm, yes, there would be game drives, but that was not foremost on my mind. I wanted to see the landscape of the african continent, see the savanna from which human ancestor emerged walking erect, see african people and their society for myself. That's the reason I traveled with an overland company, to be close to the land and to the people. The fact that it's cheaper is also a big bonus point!
So from Nov 28 2009 to Jan 7 2010, for 41 days, 14, 9, or 11 of us (at various segments) traveled in a truck from Cape Town, South Africa to Nairobi, Kenya through Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe (barely touched its soil at Victoria falls), Malawi, and Tanzania. According to a Livingstone T-shirt company, the journey covered 11,832 km which is probably erroneous. To the right is the mileage chart from our truck driver which doesn't include distance covered "locally".
第一个惊喜 my first wow
Second day on the road, camp site by orange river near Namibia border: The river was pretty murky and the current a bit strong, went for a quick dip/swim in the river before reporting to duty as cook. The novelty of setting up tent and doing the chores hasn't worn off. Even though guys decided to sleep under the open sky, my tent-mate and I dutifully setup our "house" and slept in, until toilet break at 4:30am. I was so dazzled by the stars and couldn't take eyes away. So I drag out the sleeping mat, laid down and let myself be mesmerized by the beauty of the universe.
As a child grew up in China in 70s, the sky was dark without the city lights, and I had spent my share of summer nights gazing into the night sky. But as I searched back in memory, I couldn't remember another time to be so enthralled by the stars. For the next few nights, I gave up the tent (well, setting up tent became a chore quickly, all the better for not doing it) and was hoping for another treat. But that's not to be, the sky was either too cloudy or the moon too bright. Before you know, we were in the wild animal territory or were in malaria zone to be allowed to sleep outside. But it's a memory I will cherish and it's an experience I wish everyone would have at least once!
What wild animals did you see? asked everyone.
Also on the road leading to Maun, we got really excited when a dozen or two vultures circling in the sky came into view. Maybe it's much hoped for cats hunting/feeding? No such luck! a roadkill: a still intact horse and an empty overturned jeep. As far as animal sighting is concerned, not much more to write about. Rest is a laundry list of other animals we saw: giraffe, zebra, various kinds of antelopes (wildebeest, springbok, impala, kudu, oryx, gazelle, etc), hedgehog, baboon, monkey, jackal, hyena, buffalo, cheetah, warthog, hippo, rhino, crocodile, various kinds of birds (flamingo, eagle, heron, etc), and whatever I don't recall.
What wild animals did I taste? no one asked me this question, but here is the answer:
In Windhoek, I had a kebab of ostrich, crocodile, zebra, kudu, and chicken, each a piece of about 1 square inch. The crocodile is a fatty white mass so smelly, one small bite and I almost threw up. Zebra is not much better, I don't know why lions like them so much. Kudu is passable and ostrich tolerable. I left most of the meat uneaten, not sure if it's the way of cooking or lack of seasoning that made them so disagreeable. In Swakopmund, I had a pretty good springbok steak for lunch. The oryx pancake, thin strip of meat stir fried with veggie and wrapped in crepe, at Village Cafe in Swakopmund was so delicious, I decided to return there for dinner. But the lady was closing the restaurant when I arrived shortly after sunset. She put up a sign showing following 3 lines ... alas, my mouth was and is still watering at the thought of it.
BUSINESS HOUR
Open: when we get here
Close: when we leave
I had 3 years to fret about the best time for the trip: I wanted to see wildebeest crossing river in Serengeti, I wanted a green landscape, but not too wet for camping. Finally it's the work schedule and the desire to minimize number of vacation days determined the who and when factor, and the timing couldn't have been better.
It's the beginning of the short rain season.
Did we get wet? Yes. The first downpour came at campsite in Maun. Thunder and lightening hit the lawn where we setup tents, and the depressed lawn flooded with water almost 8 inches deep. With 2 other travelers, I spent maybe half an hour in pouring rain dragging all our tents to higher ground. From then on, quick rain accompanied us for the rest of the trip. My tent was forever damp and smelly. But with rain came life. Shooting of the young grass, greening of the trees, birthing of the animals more than compensated for the inconvenience and discomfort brought on by the rain. We saw hippos mating, hyenas pregnant. We saw babies everywhere: baby seals, baby baboons, baby monkeys, baby rhinos, baby elephants, baby lions, baby warthogs, baby giraffes, baby zebras, baby wildebeests, ... and more babies.
I chanced upon a chinese restaurant when walking the street of Swakopmund. The front door was ajar and a young black women holding a chinese baby was standing in the door way. It's empty inside. The walls were decorated with chinese paintings and calligraphy carved on wood made to look like traditional chinese brick (青砖). There was a courtyard behind, with more stone tables, and deep pink flowers blossoming on vines hugging the walls. Around the courtyard chinese vegetables were grew as decorative plants. At the far end of the courtyard, a wooden screen carved with traditional chinese patterns was painted bright red, and partially blocked the view of a simple house with what I thought as tin roof (but told was fiber glass) that served as kitchen and living quarters. A women was washing/braiding the hair of a girl around 10. A Chinese man greeted me. I told him that I just had lunch but was curious about him and his establishment, and if I could stay and chat. "Welcome, welcome (欢迎，欢迎)! and let me get you a cup of tea. It's this year's new leaves my Mom just sent me". So in 10 minutes, I found out that he came from Chengdu, Sichuan. The woman and girl was his wife and daughter. She was ethnic 傣族 from Yunnan. The girl was lonely being the only chinese girl in school/neighborhood. The baby was his son. I smiled to myself: "ah, the second child!". The calligraphy, wooden screen, chinese veggie were all his handiwork. But the block was bought by a real estate developer. If I were to return in a year, the restaurant won't be here anymore. He introduced me to his brother 蔡国刚 who was visiting from Cape Town. "Let me guess, your name is 蔡国强!". He confirmed before disappearing into the kitchen.
So for the rest of the afternoon, sipping cup after cup of Chinese green tea, I talked to 蔡国刚 and his 2 friends. I asked him what made him immigrated to South Africa 20 years ago, and what made him got his brother and friends out 3 years ago while China was blooming and people were returning for opportunities. I asked him how he could keep dual citizenship while China doesn't allow it? I asked him about Tibet after I found out that he grew up there as son of PLA officer. I asked him about his life in South Africa, as well as other Chinese people's life. I asked him African's opinion of Chinese. I asked him his perception and experience on race in South Africa then and now. I asked him if he planned to raise his 6-year old son in Africa. Well, he emphasized that being almost an orphan, his wife especially liked the Chinese culture, the sense of closeness and warmth that came from his parents and extended family. She turned down the offer to join her father near Philadelphia. Instead, she was learning Chinese and planned to live part of the year in China with their son. Thus started the story of his wife ...
Her father was white, whose mother immigrated from Tallinn and whose father was a member of British Royal Air Force and stayed on in South Africa after WWII. Her mother was a descendent of Indian farsi. They met, fell in love, but could not marry under South African's law. Despite the opposition from society and both families, they had her and lived together for 2 years before giving up. Her father immigrated to US, joined CIA and started a family. Her mother was banished from her family. To return, she had to gave her up for adoption. Not knowing her own parents, she was raised by a Malay family, and was a troubled/rebellious kid, against her adopted family, against her adopted family's religion. It wasn't until 2003 she met her father who came back to South Africa to look for his lost daughter. She never met her mother again.
I would have stayed longer, to find out the stories of 蔡国刚's friends, who said their life in China in the past 20 years could fill a book. But the sun was setting, I remembered our tour guide's advice not to walk around town alone, especially after dark. I would have tried the chinese food for dinner, but oryx pancake was making my mouth watering, so I said good bye and good luck!
I am terrible with directions. When living in Cambridge Massachusetts, I used to go to this India restaurants with friends. After being there at least a dozen times, it was my turn taking someone there. Guess what, I couldn't find it! We spent at least half an hour walking the neighborhood block by block before locating it. This almost happened again in Swakopmund if not for the help of the police.
I went to an internet cafe with M & T, and had to rush back to hotel to be picked up for quadbiking. M & T asked if I would be OK going back alone. "No problem, it's not even 5 minutes from here!" I waved and headed out. Well, I don't remember the way after first 2 returns. Some passer-by pointed and told me it's right around the block, and I couldn't find it. Instead I found a traffic-police station. They pointed and told me again it's right around the block. Before I left, they told me to wait and pulled out a directory and confirmed the location. Well, I still couldn't find it! So I went back to the traffic police, "hop in the car", she waved at me and drove me to the hotel.
Was it right around the block? yes, but in the opposite direction pointed.
And how was the quadbiking? not bad, it's a first for me. But what's really great was the sand dune, undulating sand dune stretching to as far as eye can see, a sight to be remembered!
While waiting in shopping center in Maun, we saw a huge commotion outside supermarket Shoprite. Someone was down on the ground, a policeman was stumping on him while the crowds applauded. After much confusion, we found out from our truck driver P, a native Kenyan, that we just witnessed the scene of a cellphone thief being apprehended by a policeman. P went on telling us that there was usually very little petty crime in Namibia and Botswana, but in East Africa you need to watch out!
D from our travel group told us that the day before, he saw a headline in local newspaper, a cow thief getting 30 years jail time! Wow, 30 years! We thought it was really harsh. D went on explaining that cow was pretty sacred in Botswana, and the thief being a repeat offender against cow (he stole or murdered a cow before) got him the extra harsh sentencing.
Hmm, I am wondering how many years the cellphone thief would get?
I met the most trusting business people during this trip.
In Swakopmund, I went with the rest of my group to this travel agency recommended by our tour guide. We mentioned that we were with tour company X, and booked various activities. Most of us haven't been to the bank/ATM to get local currency, and didn't want to pay the 5% credit card surcharge. "Don't worry, just stop by before you leave town". So I went on quadbiking owning them 500 rand (~ 70 USD), no deposit asked, no i.o.u signed, no I.D. checked. They simply trusted that over the next 30 hours, I would return with the money instead of skipping town.
In Nairobi National museum, the lady wrote "200" on the back of my ticket since she didn't have change, no other signature. The window was closed on my way out. So I asked someone working at the museum restaurant, which was also closing, where I could get the money back. The guy made a call on his cellphone and counted out 200 shilling (~ 3 USD) from his wallet. What a contrast with my experience in Tibet, where I made a 2-day travel arrangement with a tour company, and left a deposit for a borrowed item to be returned at the end of the trip. The boss gave me a signed I.O.U. But his worker won't give me the money back at the end of the trip and told me to find the boss instead. Where is the boss? Don't know. When will he be here? Don't know. Can you call him? No! Well, if I cannot find the boss, I can find a police, so I did :) ... by the way, the tour company was run by Han chinese.
Victoria Fall was not impressive at the time of my visit, much less so than Niagara Falls. It's almost dry, but the trade off is the ability to swim in Angel's Armchair or Devil's Pool at the edge of the fall. On the day of our visit, many of our team members waded over to Angel's Armchair while I rushed over to Zimbabwe for a more frontal view, and they came back raving about the experience. That got our teammate L really excited. For the next 2 days, she tried to convince me:
L: did you see J's video? let's go to Devils Pool!
I: yeah, to cross the river to the pool, the guide threw a few stones to tell them first swim here, then there. I am not a strong swimmer, there is no way I am going to swim against the current at the edge of the fall.
L: the guide will help you to swim.
I: right! did you hear the story of the guide who died like 3 weeks ago? He was taking some tourist across the river. The tourist slipped, he tried to saved the guy but got washed over the fall! (P.S. the tourist saved himself by grabbing a rock)
L: that's because they were using an unofficial route. This costs $65 and is the official, safe route.
I: doesn't matter, I didn't come to Africa to die!
L: what are you afraid of? you just did bungee jump!
I: there was a string attached! and you saw how scared I was. They literally had to move my legs to get me to the edge of the platform. No way I am going to swim, maybe I will wade over to Angel's Armchair with you.
L: oh, that's 2 days ago. Since it has been raining, the water is much higher, you cannot wade anymore. This is the only safe way. Another couple of days, you won't be able to swim over either. Just think, where else in the world they let you do this, and with such perfect timing? Maybe they will change the policy next year? Don't you want to cross it off the list of i've-done-this-once?
I: No, it never got on my list to start with.
Eventually I went with L on the last day at Livingstone because I ran out of things to do. I could relax and read a book. But the previous afternoon when I relaxed on the lawn and read a book, I was covered by ants in no time. That's right, we were infested by ants from that point on.
So L and I took a boat ride to Livingstone island in the middle of Zambezi river from where we swam/wade to Devils Pool. During the boat ride, I was nervous looking at the current, but decided to be brave after the guide threw the stones and told me to go. I aimed, put my head down and went for the first landing spot. Just as I was congratulating myself for getting there so quickly after only ~3 breaths and right on the spot, the guide was shouting at me: "You need to keep your head up! You need to see where you were swimming to!".
I asked the guide who found Devil's Pool? A fisherman! That got to be one really crazy, desperate, suicidal fisherman! Believe or not, there were indeed fish inside the pool, we were told to move our legs. The minute I stopped moving, I got nibbled by some hungry fish.
I spent all this time writing about Devil's pool, but it's not the highlight for Victoria Fall. To experience it, you need to see it from above or from below.
I took a 15-minute microlight (similar to this) flight over Victoria Falls. The aerial view was amazing. Above the fall, in the shallow and broad Zambezi river, you see elephants, hippos, crocodiles. Below the fall, you see zig-zag of the 7 gorges, including the new gorge that's being formed. It really put everything into perspective.
Below the fall, I went for 1 day rafting. What a trip! We traversed the 7 zig-zagging gorges where river dropped 400 ft over a distance of 24 km, including 25 rapids, all level 3 and above. 3 of which are level 5, 1 level 6 named "commercial suicide" that we walked around but the guide rafted/kayaked over and it's a treat to watch them in action. The only regret was being assigned to the rescue raft equipped with oars and wooden board secured with steel frames. I decided not to buy the video, because it reminds me while it's exciting to see every other raft flipped once, twice or three times, it's just as disappointing to see our raft sailed through every single time. The only consolation was I did fall into the river once during a level 5 rapid. One minute I was completely airborne, the next I was in the river, but still holding on to the rope. But before they could pull me up, another wave came, and I lost hold of the raft and was completely under water until we passed through the rapid.
Even if not for the excitement of rafting, I would have sailed that stretch of the Zambezi river just for the view of it. The gorge was 400/750 ft deep at the starting/ending point of the trip. It reminds me a bit of Three Gorges along the Yangtze river. 两岸猿声啼不住，轻舟已过万重山 was what crossed my mind as we passed calm stretches of river and I could relax and enjoy the scenery. By the way, the river guide mentioned there is 7-day rafting on Zambezi river. If you are interested, let me know, maybe I will join you ...
Malawi is probably the poorest country visited during this trip, and I was definitely the poorest during this stretch of the journey.
Next it's Malawi. The first sign of trouble was the night before we were to enter Malawi, our guide told us we won't be able to get money out of ATM or from bank. Instead we were to exchange US dollar into local currency on black market through her contact. Whoops, I was counting on withdrawing money from ATM along the way!!! So $50 has to last through next 4 days/4 nights which is a bit short of the tour company recommendation of $20~$25 per day for spending money. Considering room/board is already paid for, if I am careful enough, I should be able to stretch $50 to cover water, drinks/snacks/trinkets which could be minimized if not skipped entirely, tip for local guide, internet, postcard/postage, and most importantly to cover our much anticipated Christmas party.
I got the impression that Malawi was the poorest country visited because paddlers were more than willing to barter for the trinkets they were selling. Since I was counting every penny, I often told them that I had no money to buy whatever they were pushing on me. The paddler would point at my T-shirt, or shoe, or pen, or at my broken watch (the belt fell off the day I left NYC), or whatever they saw on me, and want to exchange. They especially like T-shirt with logo. I have seen paddler pointing at my truck-mate's old battered T-shirts and want to exchange. I saw people wearing T-shirts with JPMorgan and other U.S. companies name on it. Had I known, I would have packed the dozen new T-shirts with various company logo that are collecting dust at home and give to someone here.
At Kande beach, we spent a morning visiting a village and had lunch in someone's home, what I saw reminded me of 70's China. In addition to our official local guide, each of us were flanked by 2 young men who wanted their captured audience to visit their shop at the end of the village tour. First, we stopped by an orphanage mphatso run by an Aussie Robyn Casey who spent part of the year in Malawi. We brought a soccer ball and a bag of millet for children. But everyone, including Robyn, had gone home for the Christmas holiday. Our next stop is village's elementary school. En route we saw fields planted with cassava, corn, rice, sugar cane, pineapple. There were also mango trees everywhere. You can pick as many mangos as you want from ground or from trees. The young men who accompanied me was a great guide, he pointed out the grass that would grew to more than a person's height, that would be harvested for roofing in October. He told me that the tribal chief owns all the land. If you need a plot for farming, you go and ask the chief.
"There is more and more people in the village, need more and more land to grow food", he pointed at the plot of land that was cleared with fire for planting.
"So, how large is the family?" asked I.
"Large".
"Like 5 kids?" I pictured the scene of Chinese villagers with 5 children that I once saw despite the 1 child policy.
"Five, that's a small family!" he laughed at my suggestion, "it's more like 10 to 15 children!"
After school, we visited local clinic. It's government-run and staffed with one doctor's aid and 2 nurses, providing free outpatient and maternity care. Medicine is also free, but often there was none, the nurse pointed at donation box. Later while waiting for massage in Stone Town, Zanzibar, I asked a German healthcare aid worker vacationing there about the lack of medicine in government clinics. She had been in Malawi for 2 years, told me that there were rampant corruption, and medicines just disappear before reaching the clinics. There was no system to track them, and there was no accountability what-so-ever.
Later that night, as we stayed by the camp fire after dinner, we asked our Kenya truck driver K how much truth there was in our shop-guides' stories ... they were all around 20's, all wanted to go to college/university to become engineers, accountants, doctors, businessmen. Unfortunately, their fathers all died, so have to work at the shops to get tourists to buy trinkets. K laughed and said most were made up stories to get our sympathies... hmm is it, given the high aids rate? and isn't that a curse on your father to be dead while he was not?
Along the way, we have always stayed in gated campsites/motels run either by europeans or white locals, with high walls, barbed wires that was sometimes even electrified. Our interactions with local black people were mostly limited to paddlers who wanted us to buy things, or school principal/nurse who wanted donation. I was thrilled when our itinerary gave us 3 days of free time to do whatever we want, to stay at wherever we want on Zanzibar. So when our guide C, being a mother hen, mapped out the plan for us "1 hour of free time in Stone Town on day 1 before going on Spice tour, then head out to north beach. Spend the rest of time in the beach resort until returning to Stone Town on day 3 evening", I immediately told her that I wasn't a beach person, I would like to stay in Stone Town instead. "North shore is very nice, you should get a sense of it", C convinced me to go to the north beach with them.
7:23am: took the fast ferries from Dar es Salaam to Stone Town.
9:26am: arrived at Stone Town, went through Zanzibar custom, free time until 11am.
11am: City and Spice tour: visited slave market. 1pm left for spice tour in some village near Stone Town.
2pm: lunch at a villager's home. 3pm left the village for north shore.
5pm: arrived at Sunset Bungalows in Kwande beach. Once there, I headed to the village outside the resort. There were many women around the village well, their plastic buckets were brightly colored and would have made a beautiful picture. Not far, 4 or 5 women sat on the ground braiding grass, which were connected to make sleeping mat, or basket. Each grass blade was about 25cm long, 1cm wide and separated into 3 strains. I gestured to the women if I could try, and got a patient demo from her. Next hour I sat among giggling women to learn their craft, and the result was unevenly woven 10cm long piece of straw braid. The women tied a few glass blade together with the result of my labor as parting gift.
7pm: returned to the beach for a swim. The sun had set, and didn't have to worry about the brutal sun light. The water was warm and calm.
Day 2:
The fornt desk guy at Sunset Bungalows told me to be at the gate at 10am for a shared van ride to Stone Town, which costs 10000 tsh (~ 7.7 usd), private taxi would have costed 5 times that. I pressed him on how the locals would travel, and got the result I wanted: walk 30 minutes to the main road to take Dalla-Dallas for 1500 tsh. A taxi driver tried to dissuade me saying that it's a minimum 45 minutes walk. Luckily, less than 20 minutes later, I was at the main road. And a Dalla-Dalla was passing through that minute, with the conductor hanging off the back and yelling "Stone Town! Stone Town!". I hopped in.
"have a seat" said the conductor.It took a little over an hour to reach Stone Town. The Dalla-Dalla got even more crowed with 22 people jammed into maybe 4 square meter. But people were extremely friendly, they squeezed and squeezed to make room for others, especially compared to the nastiness of people on NYC subway.
"but where?" asked I.
A man padded the bench next to him, one-hand-wide, "here", people around him squeezed and made room for me.
"How much to Stone Town?"
"1500 tsh" the men next to me replied.
It was crowed, I couldn't reach for money in the pocket. "Don't worry, wait until you could", the men said.
When I was finally able to get money out (and get a picture taken), the conductor said something in Swahili, and the men translated: "oh, I made a mistake, the conductor said it costs 2500 tsh", and everyone was looking at me smiling.
I smiled back "no, it's 1500 tsh". Everyone laughed good heartedly, including the conductor, he accepted the 1500 tsh.
Day 3:
I had breakfast with an Aussie elderly in hotel. He was on his 89th country, and was heading to Sudan afterwards. His most favorite places: Europe, England, US, Canada. His least favorite place: Manila where he was drugged by 3 young girls and robbed. Maybe it's coarse for me to think "why someone as old as you hanged out with 3 girls in their late teens or early 20's? you asked for it!". He had been to China too by himself, not with a tour group, and didn't have a good experience either. I had some problem understanding his English (or British & Australian English), didn't get the full gist of his stories. Regardless I think it's commendable for him to travel all over the world, especially when the experience wasn't often positive.
After breakfast, I went to visit Darajani market, where a small bag of cinnamon costs 500 tsh, subject to negotiation. Later in a store, I saw a local woman bought a huge bag of loose cinnamon at least 5 times the volume for 1000 tsh, by weight. The woman told me the loose ones were for local consumption, the packaged ones for tourist. So I asked the shop keeper for the same ... I got a bag of cinnamon at home now that I have no used for :)
I came upon a historical house by Tippu Tip, a notorious slaver, plantation owner and governor in late 1800's. The house was in such disarray. I walked into the courtyard and just as I was wondering if I could see the place, a young women L (below) said she lived here and could show me around. It was very dark due to the blackout, and I automatically walked towards the light (a room with a window), and got a glimpse of the room L lived in: bare walls with a dirty mattress without sheet, and no other furniture. L quickly closed the door and steered me upstairs. The staircase was falling apart, some wooden boards were missing, and the ones still there were inclined at maybe 10 degree angle precariously. L told me ground floor housed her family of 18; 2nd floor a family of ~10 (one door was open, there was a nice sofa facing the door and a TV); 3rd floor 2 families of 20+ people; the top (4th floor) was a balcony with one big open-wall room, occupied by a single woman. Since there was no electricity for the past 3 weeks, L wanted to show me the beach where she hauled water each evening for cooking and washing (they bought bottled water for making tea only). She went on telling me she had Form 4 education, and was taking English and Computer certificates but ran out of money. She had 8 brothers and sisters and none of her older brothers were working. She relied on 150 ~ 200 tsh donation from tourists who visited the house. But that won't last long, the property was bought by British, they were told by the government to move.
Does your father work?L and I walked back to her house, as we passed Amore Mio, L mentioned it had the best ice cream and said she would wait for me outside. I asked her to come in with me, for 2000 tsh (~1.5 usd) you get a small scoop of gelato. L wanted strawberry flavor to go and walked extremely fast to share the little bits of gelato with her 3 little brothers/sister ... I should have bought her extra 3 portions had I known.
Yes, he drives a car for government, and important people too.
So he makes good money?
Yes.
Why don't you ask him for money to finish your certificates?
He has 3 wives and doesn't support us anymore
After Beit el-Ajaib, it's time for my appointment for "Singo Scrub & Message" at Mrembo. It's a great treat, but only got 40 minutes of message/scrub instead of supposed 60 minutes (40 USD). And because of blackout, I got a bucket of hot water to wash off instead of a nice hot shower, well that's still better than the trickle of cold water in my hotel room.
Before you know, a beer was down and it was 8pm, time for me to leave. "Sure you don't want another beer?" "One is enough, besides", I looked around, "I am the only woman here". Hahaha, they all looked around and someone pointed in the far corner, "there is another woman there". "But she is with a group, not by herself". "True, she is with her husband, but you are with us". "No, no, no, but you are not my husband". They all laughed and waved me off.
Now it's completely dark and no street lights. I was regretting that I didn't bring a flash light. Even during the day I was quite lost in the maze of narrow streets of Stone Town. I paused at every intersection and waited for a passerby to tell me which way to turn for Forodhani park, where I expect to meet the rest of the tour group (Guide C said they would be back to sample the night food markets at Forodhani). The second man I stopped told me to follow him, and berated me for walking the night streets alone. "Oh, I was to meet my group at Forodhani", I was a bit sheepish. "But you need to be more careful, not to be separated from your group", he admonished. Luckily, 2 more turns I was at Forodhani. Of course, I didn't find anyone from my group, so went back to the hotel which was right around the corner, where I was told that my group just checked in an hour ago.
Right outside my hotel room, there was a small table, and I said Hi to the guys sitting there drinking, since they seemed to be regular and I saw them yesterday. Turns out, this was their "private table", the hotel's bar was on the ground floor, not the first floor courtyard here. Following are some of the conversations passed between us:
I: so you are friends? having a drink here everyday?I went on telling them stories of L, they sighed greatly at the mention of 3 wives and 9 children. I asked if E's story is likely, that they would sometimes go to bed hungry. S thought so, and said sometimes young girls came into his shop asking for a bit money to buy sanitary napkin. So I asked again what they think should be done to help alleviate poverty? What should happen when parents have so many children that they won't provide for and sometimes seem not to care? For a landlocked country like Malawi, small, lack of resources, with high birthrate, what would the remedy be? Chinese government could dictate to its people one child per family... Before I even finished my sentence, S was saying "No!!! that's against people's religious believe ... God gave children and God would provide for them". But he went on saying there should be family planning, but done gently by working with tribal chief. You first chief's opinion and through them to influence the villagers.
they: no, we are family ... went on explaining relationship between them (see photo caption, right to left: Uncle T, Nephew, In-law S).
I: why here instead of home?
they: wife won't allow alcohol at home.
I: yet you still drink, are you good Muslim? ... I was joking.
they: no, we are not good muslim ... laughing and went on discussing what meant to be a good Muslim.
I: as I walked around the town, here and there I saw a few women fully covered in black with only eyes shown, what do you think of that?
they: they cover themselves because they have something to hide, because they go around town doing shameful things and don't want people to see who they are (... hmm I never heard this theory before). By Koran, women only need to cover their hair, which is reserved for their husband.
I: so what do you think of tourists like us walking around? does it offend muslim sensibilities?
they: you are not muslim, you don't need to follow our code. As for muslim women, they don't even need to cook for their husband if she doesn't want to.
I: really? what's expected of them then?
they: three things: take of her husband when he is sick; bear children for him; ... I forgot the 3rd thing they said, take care of children?
I: As I traveled through the land, I saw mostly institutions such as orphanage, clinics, schools built or sponsored by foreigners, locals like school principals only ask for donations. I don't mean to be critical, but as a person grew up in dirt poor China, this really bothers me ... before I even finish, S interrupted me:
S: I know you are not criticizing and just want to discuss an issue. I know how poor China was, and how hard working Chinese people are. I've lived there ... this time it's I who interrupted him:
I: really?! when?!
S: I arrived in Beijing on Jan 20, 1964 and stayed there until 1968. I was invited by Chinese government to teach Swahili and help translating Mao's 4-volumes（四卷毛选）into Swahili ... S went on telling stories of his stay in Beijing, his oldest child, a girl, was born there. His boss in China (I didn't catch the name) was educated in either Cambridge or Oxford, heads the bureau responsible for publishing Chinese in foreign languages. Not to be outdone, T said something got more exclamation from me.
T: I have been to China too, and I have shaken hands with Zhou Enlai.
I: really???!!!, when???!!! you met Zhou Enlai while visiting China? ... Turns out, as a trade-unionist, T had visited pretty much all the communist countries. He rattled off Soviet, East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Czech, China, Vietnam, North Korean, Cuba, etc. He had the honor to shake Zhou's hand when Zhou visited Zanzibar in 1965. When asked his impression of Zhou, he thought for awhile, and said "very distinguished"
... to be continued
coming ...
coming ...
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