Malawi - Part 2

Despite a good deal of early morning running around, Liam, Gavin and I were out of our room at a sluggish 7:40am, ten full minutes after the hotel’s 7:30am (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) checkout time. The receptionist kindly didn’t mention our tardiness and instead pointed us toward the restaurant for our free breakfast.

Shortly after sitting down in the dingy dining room, an overly, awkwardly, submissive waitress brought us our fare. Kneeling on the floor and bowing her head, she clasped my hand and asked if I needed anything else. Tempted as I was to ask for a normal breakfast, I held my tongue and dismissed the woman. Hot water, a tea bag, sugar, a piece of toast, and a big plate of French fries. Disgusting! After drinking my tea plain and eating the toast with my sugar sprinkled on it, I picked at the deep fried potato strips, trying to will the greasy mess into a fruit salad smothered in vanilla yogurt. French fries, we would learn, are the staple Malawian breakfast food…gross!

The dissatisfying meal ingested (and quickly beginning to block our arteries), we jumped in the back seat of the Presbyterian pickup truck we’d travelled with the evening before. The city of Blantyre finally seemed to be within our sights.

On the way there, we learned that Malawi was less than a week away from its controversial presidential elections. Election time can be tense anywhere, but when a nation has only had 2 previous elections, peaceful democracy has the potential to break down into chaotic violence, so it’s not necessarily the most auspicious time to visit a place.

Before we could say ‘scandal and political infighting’, it was time for a quick lunch. Our ride pulled over and 50 kids ran to the windows hawking bananas and fried, shish-kebabed parakeets. Well, maybe not parakeets, but tiny birds that you were in theory supposed to pop into your mouth whole, bones and all, but in reality, I had to take in 2 crunchy parts, each speedily chased down by an entire mini-banana. Gavin had just found out in Beira that his childhood pet parakeet had died of (very) old age and I think he felt as sad about lunch as I had felt about breakfast.

Seventy-five hours after deciding I wanted to get there, our group managed to the cover the implausibly long 150 miles and finally (FINALLY!!!) arrive in the city of Blantyre. It was everything I’d wished for and envisioned it would be. The crumbling dilapidation and neglect so afflicting both Mozambique and Zimbabwe was behind us. Ahead, lay spotless avenues lined with flowering trees and streetlights, crisscrossing through a city of dazzling, modern buildings. Internet cafes, supermarkets, bakeries, banks, and restaurants bustled and beckoned. We had at last reached civilization.

Saying goodbye to our Godsent lift, we set off looking for accommodation. Wanting to recover from the accident and journey, Liam and I were eager to splash out a little more than usual at the Henderson Street Guest House, but after walking through its idyllic gardens, we discovered at reception that we weren’t the only ones with that idea; the beautiful place was completely booked. Unsure where else to go, we popped into a café advertizing itself only as “PIZZA AND ICECREAM!” for an early dinner.

“Hello! We were wondering what kind of pizzas you guys had here.” Liam said to the waitress.

A blank look was followed by, “We don’t…serve pizzas here…But this menu.”

Liam took it and chuckled, “Well, do you have any ice cream?”

“Umm…I have to check first…” replied the slow (to the point of handicapped) woman, “But I don’t…think we do.” I have found on this trip and my previous one, that Africans, in general, are intelligent and often witty, if not particularly entrepreneurial, but despite the huge percentages of English speakers in most countries, waiters and waitresses are possibly the most useless, unintelligent people on the continent. All street children speak far better English and are usually a good deal sharper.

We ordered scrumptious and, surprisingly inexpensive, chicken and rice dishes. While the three of us ate, the manager, an energetic, (intelligent) racially mixed girl named Taz came over to chat. After recalling our luckless hotel search, we asked if she had any recommendations. Running off first to call her roommates, she offered to let us stay in the guest bedroom of her home. Without more ado, we accepted the proposal, lady luck smiling on us once again. (Taz, we found out later, was not shockingly, Zimbabwean. She probably moved to Malawi just to help tourists out with free accommodation.)

After successfully making our way by minibus to her home in the suburbs, Liam told the guard at the gate that, “The madam sent us.” He let us in and we walked above 5 impeccably manicured acres to Taz’s 4-bedroom home and met our new housemates. First there was Chris, a white, very laid back, out of work, pot smoking Zimbabwean who was either playing X-Box or watching movies during the entire duration of our stay, then there was Thomas, an immense, Schwarzenegger-esque German guy who loved travelling and hiking and was stuck working in Malawi, frequently doing the latter until he’d saved enough money to do more of the former (in light of where and how he lived, he wasn’t trying too awfully hard to save his paychecks), and, the most recent addition, besides us, was Jules, a pretty German girl, and Thomas’ girlfriend of slightly less than 2 whole weeks (there was a surprisingly, and weirdly, high number of lovey-dovey couple collages taped around the house for the two of them having been together such a short time).

One by one, we abandoned conversation with our new friends for the blessedly running water of the in-house HOT SHOWER! Whether it was exhaustion, the glorious feeling of being clean, or the marijuana fumes emanating from the living room, Liam, Gavin and I all slept like the dead.

Day 11 Budget

$0.12 Bananas

$0.42 souvenirs for girls I nannied for

$5.12 lift to Blantyre

$2.73 dinner

$0.46 minibus to Taz’s house

$6.36 oatmeal and powdered milk

Total: $15.21

Mozambique - Part 3

Screeeeeeeeeech!! Eighteen wheels skidded to an abrupt halt. Liam protectively pulled my head back to his chest as a pothole bounced me toward the ceiling. I couldn’t understand why the truck was stopping, but the driver and his two cronies jabbered on excitedly as they jumped from the cab. Squashed against Liam, I sat up, rubbed my drowsy eyes, and tried to stretch my sore back.

That morning, I’d awoken far more gently to the soft, muffled lapping of the Indian Ocean. When I peaked outside the tent at 6:00am, I saw a pallid, grey mist blanketing the sand, the sea, and the local fishermen. My tired, slightly irritable boyfriend refused to get up and going so early and groggily bear-hugged me back to sleep for another 40 minutes.

It was 9:00am before the 3 of us were packed, ready, and gathered on the road leading away from the town of Beira. Despite the cloud cover, I stood, sweat soaked in the humidity, my left thumb out and our freshly made cardboard sign held high and enthusiastically by my right hand. “EN 1”, the name of the Mozambique’s only major north/south highway, running 3 hours west of Beira, stood out in bold, purple marker. As the only girl, I was the “face of this operation”, so I smiled big and toothy, trying to grin us passage toward the southern town of Vilankulo.

A man in a beat up truck stopped after only a few minutes and told us he could take us, but only 4 miles. Liam, with tremendous foresight, quickly agreed, and we threw our stuff in the bed before hopping in the back seat. Carlos, about 45, was a Portuguese man who had lived in Mozambique for 30 years as both a horse veterinarian and a bakery owner. His warm, convivial manner covered any language difficulties, and he practiced his English while I practiced my Spanish. As it turned out, he had just taken a blood sample to Beira from his ranch to get it tested but found the lab shut down for the day. Since I didn’t trust my Spanish enough to believe there was actually blood the red cooler on the floor, he was obliged to show us the vile. His horse was mysteriously sick, and he was running home before driving all the way to the Chimoio laboratory. He could drop us off at the EN 1 if we didn’t mind running by his house.

We didn’t mind, and inside his apartment we met his bright eyed, 8 year old son, introduced as, “This is my children Manuel”. Seated at the huge dining room table, we were served coffee, tea, Neapolitan-looking cake, and a huge bowl of BBQ flavored cheese balls. We feasted, and upon leaving, switched to his comfy, new SUV. Two speedy hours later, Carlos dropped us off with two big bags of bread rolls and a sack of cashews, refusing a cent in gas money. It was a hitchhike for the record books. He’d picked us up going only 4 miles, but thoughtfully switched to a more comfortable car, fed us, gave us extra food, and drove us 2 ½ hours further.

We stood at the EN 1 intersection in the tiny village of Inchope. An hour passed as the sun did its best to melt us. Our gung-ho determination began to falter as cars failed to go by. Eventually, a flat-bed semi-truck stopped and agreed to bring us about 215 miles to the Vilankulo intersection for $7.14 each. We agreed and piled into the back seat (well, really the soft mattressed bed) of the cab. A plump, unfriendly, black woman with a space hogging bootie sat with us, and two cheerful guys shared the passenger seat.

The truck hauled enormous bags of peanuts and a flock of goats tethered to a center strap, but despite the living, bleating, slowly cooking load, our driver was not in a hurry and we took several hour-long stop breaks. A Dire Straits CD played on repeat hour after hour as the hot, sundrenched day dropped into a dusty rose colored dusk and sunk finally into darkness. Liam and my song is Dire Straits’ “Romeo and Juliet”, so that was romantic, but only the first several times. The cab regrettably had ZERO suspension and the smooth looking road prevented even reading.

When we switched provinces, the road worsened considerably, 4 inch deep potholes often ran the width of it, corners sharpened, and pavement came and went at random. A few hours after sunset was when we halted so abruptly. Liam, ever curious and energetic, hopped out after the driver and the two guys.

A few minutes later, they all returned and Liam sat back down next to me with an amused smile and big eyes. He explained that the truck had hit a rabbit and the guys had retrieved the ill-fated bunny from the ditch and excitedly tied it onto the back of the truck for a later meal. Up front, the animated men babbled loudly. At length, the driver sat back a bit and said joyfully, “Ahhhh, Delicioso!!!!” no doubt imagining the delicious taste of his upcoming road-kill feast.

At 10:30pm, the semi pulled off of the road and let us off at the intersection, 12 miles from Vilankulo. Several drunk, money hungry guys arranged a ‘taxi’ (the back of a pickup) for us and a few others. A guy in his early 20s slurred loudly in accented English, “YOU PAY 50...AND YOU PAY 50...AND YOU PAY 50...cause you WHITE!” And, turning to 2 other locals wanting a ride said, “And you pay 20 and 20”. For no reason beyond alcohol, he said this in English, and when we tiredly protested, he agreed everyone should pay 50 ($1.79), though I seriously doubt that happened.

On the way, the 3 drunkards tried to beg everything from drinks to money to sunglasses off of us. “You give me money cause you’re white and you’re rich ! Hahahaha. What do you give me? Give me your hat!” We were way too weary and sober to take this in good humor and they refused even to drop us off at our hotel despite the exorbitant price. We shivered in the cold, windy truck bed, annoyed at the 3 guys and hoping they wouldn’t rob us upon arrival.

A soft spoken passenger eventually got our attention. He wasn’t going as far as we were, but he kind-heartedly gave us clear directions in perfect English as to where to go once we were dropped off. We thanked him appreciatively and he explained how he was a Zimbabwean who’d been working here in the area for a few years. Of course! Obviously, the nicest person on the vehicle was Zimbabwean. When our friend disembarked, Liam joked quietly how Zims must just travel around looking for people to help. “Let’s gather together and form a gang... a Help Gang! We will just surround tourists and make sure they get where they want to go! And get there as cheaply and easily as possible! What’s our motto? Be polite and HELP PEOPLE! Yeah! Let’s go!” He laughed, referencing our many experiences with the highly civilized, extremely educated, ridiculously nice and caring Zimbabwean people.

In Vilankulo, following the advice of our Zim friend, Liam, Gavin and I walked along the beach path directly to the playfully named Zombie Cucumber’s Backpacker Hostel. There was no camping available, but, too tired to search any further, we crashed onto dorm mattresses in a circular hut.

Day 3 Budget

$0.18 city bus

$2.14 two pastries and plain yogurt

$0.18 hard boiled egg

$0.45 water

$0.71 bill collected for girls I nanny for

$7.14 semi truck ride from Inchope to Pambara

$1.78 pickup truck ride from Pambara to Vilankulo

$10.00 hostel dormitory bed

Total 22.58