Hayestack

We rushed through Raleigh/Durham Airport and descended the escalator.  At the bottom, Emily stood rocking a bundle in her arms. A tiny face appeared in the bundle and we had our first glimpse of Poppy, our first grandchild. With her mop of dark hair and pretty little face she looked the most adorable baby ever. It was love at first sight.

“Drew told me to use the GPS to get home as I always get lost,” said Emily as we shot down the highway missing our exit. The coloured line on the satellite navigation display doubled back on itself. Emily looked annoyed. “Don’t worry, I’ll sort it out,” I said, ” Keep straight on,”  We shot past another missed exit as I peered at the screen. The Satnav was talking to me. A disembodied female voice, indistinct, but, I fancy, slightly tetchy seemed to be saying, “Idiot, you missed another exit.”

At last, we swept into Juniper Avenue and came to a halt outside Drew and Emily’s house, an imposing building bordered by a church, a cemetery and funeral home. “Be careful as you get out,” advised Emily, torrential rain swept half the drive away yesterday.” We opened the front door and we walked into Christmas. The tree and lights were stunning.

We had arrived in time for graduations, Emily for completing her Nursing Qualification and Drew for his Master of Divinity. We had arrived in time to attend both.  In the meantime, there was Poppy.

She smiles at the drop of a hat and really seems pleased to see you. She has the prettiest face topped by a thick mass of dark hair. Complete strangers would stop us in the street to admire her. One elderly woman accosted Poppy and I in a mop-cap shop in Williamsburg. After cooing over Poppy for some time she began to tell me about her grandchild. She took my polite nodding as genuine interest and began recounting the life story of her grandchild.  I seemed to have joined the Grandparents’ Club.  I only wish I could have been as interested in her grandchild as she was in Poppy.

The phrase,”I’m going to climb into bed” was literally true for our bed at Emily and Drew’s. Any higher and Georgina and I would have needed a grappling hook and crampons and oxygen for the altitude. Fortunately, neither of us suffered from vertigo. It had been made by a friend’s father who had assembled it using the wrong sizes screws, a thing we found out when I tried to move it flush to the wall.  The earth would have certainly moved for us had we been in it at the time.

We had come from an African summer of 37 degrees Celsius to a North Carolinian 7. I, for one had forgotten what it was like to feel cold. In the event, I took the precaution of counting my fingers and toes every morning to make sure i had not lost any to frostbite in the night. Georgina was less concerned. Her body naturally runs at a temperature at least 5 degrees higher than ordinary mortals. To say she is “hot stuff” is literally true. I could fry egg and bacon on her back in the night and have breakfast already in bed in the morning.

Drew and Emily’s house was quiet and relaxed, as one would expect when bordered by church, cemetery and funeral. But it has bags of character. We saw little activity from the neighbours. The business at the funeral Home seemed particularly dead.   Everyday, sometimes twice a day, I enjoyed the mournful hooting of a train in the distance, a hauntingly romantic and evocative sound as only an American train can be. The low rumbling of the wheels would reach a crescendo then gradually disappear.  Georgina and I would rush to the bedroom window to see the locomotive pulling a long line of freight wagons as it passed by the end of the road. Occasionally, if you were lucky, there would be two locomotives pulling the wagons, a “double-header”, as rare as an egg with a double yolk. But, even greater fun could be had in the bedroom – Drew’s super broad and super fast wi-fi internet connection.  Back in Rundu we have a dongle which is so expensive to run you need permission from your bank manager to switch it on.

We did venture out of the bedroom occasionally. Most days we took Poppy out in her stroller. We braved the arctic chill to visit the local library, the post-office, the emporia and the  Olde English Tea Shoppe where Poppy’s parents worked. The Union Flag at the entrance welcomed us.  The interior was snug and homely. You might have been in a maiden aunt’s quaintly decorated parlour, one who collects bone-china teasets and decorates the walls with them. It was a charming place in which to partake a cup or two of Earl Grey. Judy, the proprietor and an obvious anglophile, was delightful and effusive. She greeted us like long lost friends, a skill for which Americans have a particular knack.

We stayed in Rundu for the next few days to catch our breath before heading south to the Etosha National Park and the coast. This gave us a chance to chill out, and for Sally to visit Georgina’s school and meet the learners. On our way to Etosha we camped overnight at Treesleepers where elevated platforms allow you to pitch your tent amongst the branches of the trees. A wooden spiral staircase is built in, so you don’t actually have to climb the tree. It is a long and perilous way to the lavatory from the platform, so if you think you can hear the distant sound of Victoria Falls in the middle of the night you can imagine what is occurring. Unless the moon is shining, the total blackness and absolute absence of artificial light will protect anyone’s modesty.

The Etosha National Park is the main Game Reserve in Namibia. It covers a vast area and has a large, dried up lake at its heart. If you’re lucky, you can see any number of zebra, springbok, Kudu, giraffe, wildebeste, elephant, etc. You have to be lucky to see lion and rhino, and really lucky to see leopard or cheetah. Buy a lottery ticket on that day. Naturally, when the animals hear that we are arriving, they scoot over to the other side of the park which is closed to visitors. In the several times we have visited we have seen most animals in various numbers, but we have not yet had occasion to do the lottery. With Sally we took the main route through Etosha stopping at the best waterholes on the way. Leaving one, we saw the biggest herd of zebra we have ever seen, coming out of the bush and heading straight towards us in our parked car. I hesitate to say this but no doubt they were looking for the zebra crossing. One of the most striking features of Etosha is the dried up salt lake at its heart. We drove onto the pan and surveyed the stark whiteness all around us. It’s an amazing sight. The Halali rest camp, with its shop, restaurant, information centre and watering hole, is a tourist village half way along the main route. The camping site resembles a hardcore car park which did not look at all appealing. I am told that the once pristine ablution block have deteriorated a lot. At the Anderrson Gate, the Park’s exit, we climbed the old brick tower and watched 2 old elephants destroying a tree just below us. As it would soon be getting dark we found a campsite just down the road. We arrived just before a large safari bus full of intrepid explorers who, fortunately preferred exploring the other side of the campsite.

We set off early the next morning for Outjo and, beyond that, the Atlantic coast. Sally was driving and enjoying the blue skies and empty, straight road. We were travelling fast, but safely. We could see as far as a mile ahead. The two black dots on the road ahead gradually turned into little figures, larger men and then full-sized policemen. Unfortunately, one had his arm raised, beckoning us to stop. “What’s your hurry?” he asked, good-humouredly. It was 7am on Sunday morning, no other cars in a five mile radius. Why were the police mounting a road block just for us? They didn’t seem that serious about it anyway. They sent us on our way with the advice to drive more slowly as we were just entering Outjo. He was right and the whole town seemed asleep apart from a few pedestrians and a couple of bare-breasted Himba women plus baby sitting by the side of the road selling jewellery. We took photos and Sally bought a trinket. Suddenly, a line of police cars shot around the corner at great speed, sirens blazing. Was the US President in town and under terrorist attack? The police response could not have been greater. We drove around and discovered police officers on every corner. At 7 o’clock on a Sunday morning this must have been a training exercise and explained our road block on the edge of town.

From Outjo we headed towards Khorixas. The deserted road was metalled, the scenary picturesque. Instead of the ubiquitous, flat, somewhat tedious, Namibian scrubland, we had interesting, rolling, Namibian hills. I was looking forward to getting to Khorixas. The name sounded exotic and alluring, like Timbuktu or Xanadu. In fact, it turned out to be a dilapidated, one-horse town, with a donkey instead of the horse. It was shabby and sleepy, the people looking as though if they were still suffering the effects of too much homebrew the previous night. But there was a filling station, and it was foolish in this semi-arid desert to pass a filling station without filling. Who knows where the next one would be? A group of aging Hell’s Angels had parked their huge machines by every pump (at least 2) and didn’t seem in a hurry to move. I had almost decided to send Sally out to give them some grief, but they moved off before she could get at them, the cowards. Next to the garage was a supermarket that had a group of males hanging around the shop entrance looking bored and thirsty. They did not look too intimidating but they followed with their eyes every movement we made until we were safely inside the store. The best crisps in Namibia are Simba Creamy Cheddar. We could only find small bags but we bought them anyway. Talking about cheese, there is confusion about the different varieties in Namibia. There is only one sort of Cheddar that tastes anything at all like Cheddar and that is made by Parmalat. The rest is rubbery and processed tasting as though it was made of plasticine. There is Gouda which is actually Edam, and Edam here is more like Emmental. The fridges are stacked with feta cheese and there is a South African version of Brie that is quite pleasant. Variety and choice are two unknown words in the Namibian English dictionary.

We backtracked a kilometre down the road leaving Khorixas behind us without a second glance and headed for the Brandberg mountains. The tar soon gave way to gravel and we began to leave a large cloud of dust trailing behind us. There were no cars following us to be inconvenienced and we met few cars coming towards us. The journey was long and arduous, the highlight being when we passed through the sign saying we were crossing the Tropic of Capricorn, but it felt just the same on one side as the other. Although the mountains and undulating road made the scenery much more interesting than the tedious flat scrubland of our usual Windhoek – Rundu route, we were being constantly bounced up and down and buffeted by the gravel roads.

Before scrub gave way to desert, we came across a group of huts all selling small Herero rag dolls. The ladies selling them wore traditional Herero costume including the headdress that resembles a cow’s horns. This exhibition was pulling in the tourists and the ladies were doing a steady trade. The amusing thing was that the Herero costume was not traditional in that part of Namibia. Evidently, someone had decided it would be good for trade, and it was.

I am told that Katima is the only place, or at least, one of the few, in the world where four countries meet, viz. Namibia, Zambia, Botswana and Zimbabwe. We hopped over the Botswana border to the Chobe National Park.

In fact, “hopped” was nearly literally true. To keep out foot and mouth disease and other nasty things, every vehicle entering Botswana has to drive through a sheep dip, and every person has to stand on a footpad of disinfectant. We have done it before and has not been a problem. This time, the lady in charge was exceptionally officious. We gave the board, listing prohibited imports, a cursory glance. No, we didn’t have animal horns, hides, bones etc. “You haven’t read the list,” she insists, suspiciously. Of course we hadn’t. We don’t go in for buying bags made of crocodile skins. “Read the list,” she commands. What’s that at the bottom? Dairy products? We don’t want to lose our lunch especially as it will be inside us within the next half an hour, so we confess nothing. No, we have nothing like that.

“What about your shoes?” she asks. “We’ve done our shoes.” “What about your spare shoes?” “We have no spare shoes.” “Yes, you have.” This woman must have x-ray vision. They are packed securely at the bottom of the car’s boot and were not going to see the light of a Botswanan day. “You have to do all your shoes.” We didn’t have to do anything like this last time we visited. Georgina manages to dig out a spare pair of mine and slap them on the disinfectant mat. This appeases the lady and she lets us go into her country.

Once inside Botswana the road surface becomes appalling. Maybe the deep potholes are deliberately not repaired as a traffic calming measure. Driving becomes exciting as we swerve across the road to avoid the bottomless pits and crevasses. Fortunately, the road is deserted. When we reach the gate of the the Game Reserve, the Wardens won’t let us in as our car is too small. Presumably, an elephant could pick us up and chuck us into the river? We drive on to Kasane, the nearest town, to take a look. It is more lively and impressive than we had imagined. There seemed to be a lot of tourists, many of whom, no doubt had been refused admittance to the park.

We took the pock-marked road back to the border. You have to play the game of swerving to avoid the pot-holes, which is OK until swerving the other side of the road would make you crash into an on-coming car. For us, this coincided with one of the largest pot-holes in Africa. It must be visible from space and , once filled with water, would rival Lake Victoria in magnitude. No, I exaggerate, maybe Lake Malawi. Anyway, we hit it with a heart stopping metallic bang. The wheel must have been torn off? The engine ripped out? No, the tough little car kept on going. It was only later, after we had driven the 700 kilometres back to Rundu, that we discovered that the tyre had developed a large swelling like a huge boil and could have burst at any moment.

Sally suddenly burst through the Arrival doors at Windhoek Airport and we through our arms around her. It was great to be with one of our children again and reminded us how much we had missed them after eleven months away. We picked up the hire car and set off for the City. Windhoek is much the same as a European city. It is not large and you can see the main sights in a few hours. We saw the Christus Kirche, the equestrian statue, the fort, the meteorites, the shopping mall and set off for Rundu

The small, black Daihatsu Sirion was smart and fun to drive. Like Dr Who’s Tardis the interior was surprisingly huge. But the build was cheap and plasticky. The interior trim felt as though you could easily put your finger through it, but, on the road up to Rundu, the car felt nippy and reliable compared to Linda’s Pajero, a lumbering monster which growled and groaned and spent most of its life in a repair shop, retaining few of its original parts. We stopped once for fuel at Otjiwarona and I was impressed by the small car’s fuel consumption, perhaps too impressed, since, with this full tank I judged we had enough fuel to reach Rundu. In the end it was touch and go. The Daihatsu Sirion was a fast little car and the faster we went, the faster it drank fuel. Though we were still 60 kilometres outside Rundu and it was pitch dark, the fuel indicator had sunk well below empty and we were travelling on petrol fumes. At last we passed the Rundu boundary sign and, with the help of gravity, we rolled to a stop at the Engen Service Station.

We spent those first few days chilling out in Rundu, giving Sally the opportunity to meet our new friends and to visit Georgina’s school.

  Sheena, Georgina, me, the wall and the rockery.

The sudden and unexpected nature of the encounter made it quite shocking. It happened like this. We had had a wonderful night at the luxurious lodge at Ghaub saying goodbye to Addy and Barbara who were returning to the north of England after a three and three quarter stint with VSO at Katima.

“Have you seen the meteorite?” asked our good friend Sheena, a lively 66 year old from Scotland who had come to Namibia shortly after us. She was driving us back to Rundu in her bakkie and was having trouble locating the main road. The more we drove, the more familiar the roads became so that we began to think we were in a vortex loop like the Bermuda triangle from which we would never escape. If you can read this, then we have escaped. If we have not, we are still there and you should come looking. Let me know if you can’t read it.

“No, we have not seen the meteorite,” we replied. Let’s go and see it. It is the largest known meteorite in the world and is 800,000 years old, at least. We parked the car and wended our way to reception. Opposite the rockery is a suntrap wall perfect, with hindsight, for basking snakes and other reptiles. We walked in a line towards this wall, Linda, myself, Sheena and Georgina. As Linda was passing the wall I saw a movement out of the corner of my eye. I looked down and saw a snake wriggling in the short space between Linda and me in an agitated state. One more step and I would have blocked the snake’s escape into the rockery, a most unfortunate occurrence. The word “snake” involuntarily escaped from my throat and I instinctively took a step backwards. Fortunately, Sheena moved in the same direction and Georgina shot off behind the wall. The snake, which seemed just as anxious to get away from us as we from it slid in front of me into the rockery. Between 1-2 metres in length it was brown and closely resembled the black mamba we had seen dead on the road some weeks previously. Not wishing to believe that I came so close to the deadly fangs of such a poisonous snake I am happy to believe it was a less harmful mole snake, though this is shown as being more orange in one book. The lack of obvious moles is inconclusive since the snake may just have eaten them all.

The meteorite looked like a big chunk of metal with silver streaks where people had scraped slithers off. It comprised iron, nickel, cobalt and other metals. It seemed strange that this large object was once flying along in outer space. It was not far beyond the bounds of reason to imagine this to be an alien spaceship and I was half expecting a hatch to open and strange creatures to emerge. I have been standing in the sun a lot recently.

Why is it the roads that seem perfectly flat when you travel along them in a car become death defyingly steep when you cycle them? We cycled to the campsite at Samsitu last weekend. It is a five minute car ride, or 2 hours by bike, and uphill, so it seems, all the way. The strange thing is that it seems uphill on the return journey as well.

The road takes us through many traditional homesteads and little children wave and shout, ”I’m fine!” forgetting that the convention is for us to ask, “How are you? “ first. People stop and stare and we realise that they have probably never seen a woman on a bicycle before, not even a white one. To them, Georgina is an oddity, a freak of nature – something I’ve suspected for years. Georgina makes a point of saying “hello” to everyone and they generally respond favourably. There is a certain reason in her thinking, as these are the communities we shall be cycling through on the way back, and we may need help.

We are riding parallel to the River Kavango which always bursts its banks in the rainy season. This year is no exception and we cycle through tented villages set up by the Red Cross for people along the banks who have been flooded out. Each year after the floods have subsided, these villagers go back to their homes along the river and look forward to next year’s camping holiday. The idea of moving to higher ground may not have occurred to them, or they may just like camping. We do, and eagerly erect our little tent on a pretty site next to the Kavango River, paying little heed to the mud caked to our feet from having to walk over the last bit of flooded track. Our pitch at Samsitu overlooks the river and on to Angola beyond. We look for crocodiles but don’t see any. Instead, an Angolan fisherman stands on the opposite bank, and a canoe and small observation boat float lazily by as the sun sinks slowly into the river. The pitches, secluded by trees and undergrowth, are all empty but one, occupied by a mother from Botswana visiting her son up from Cape Town. We meet in the bar in the early evening after dinner of cold chicken pie and a hot mug of tea. Georgina amazes me by boiling a pot of water over a fire made from a few twigs she has gathered nearby. She tells me it is a skill learned as a Girl Guide. I wonder what other skills she learned there. Maybe she can track a wild boar, skin it and roast it on a spit made from knitting needles and knicker elastic?

Everything here, including the bar and swimming pool, is open air and looks over the river. Andy and Karen, the site owners are pharmacists in Rundu, and know everything about malaria. Andy who reminds me of a slightly rounder Clive Anderson, says we are safe from this parasite now that winter temperatures have arrived. It has headed north towards the equator with the sun. Andy is not unduly concerned about malaria. He has had it 41 times and says it is OK as long as you catch it early. He has learned to recognise the “ping” in the small blood vessels in his fingers (the parasite in the red blood cells makes them swell), the aching of the joints and lower back. Treated early, you don’t even have to stop work. Caught late, you won’t be needing a job. Being a pharmacist, Andy has medication readily available.

On the wall is a sign warning visitors to be aware of snakes. I ask Karen if they see many. “All the time,” she says as if it were the most common thing in the world, and this was not just bravado on her part. “I had a cobra in the lounge the other day. “ she tells me. “ Just put my glasses on in case it spat (deadly venom) and managed to shoo it out. It was no problem.” Andy says he trod on a puff adder behind the bar the night before. Fortunately, he was wearing his leather shoes which took the full force of the fangs (and poison). He was OK, but the shoes died. He had a fright at what he thought was a black mamba in the gloom, but it turned out to be a hose pipe. Karen reassures us they have not lost a camper to snake bites yet. Those who die have usually trodden on a snake, something that snakes aren’t partial to. We made a mental note not to tread on anything resembling a hosepipe, in fact, not even a hosepipe, though we would like to see some snakes before we leave Africa, but at a distance.

The ELCIN Church in Namibia is crazy. Take the other week, only the most important Sunday in the Christian year, viz. Easter Day, Nico and Margreeth, our Dutch friends, were away on holiday, so the congregation had to sing the hymns without the support of an organ. This would not normally daunt them. It usually makes them sing louder if the hymns are good and they have a fair wind behind them.

However, somebody had the bright idea of setting up the organ in “demonstration” mode to entertain the congregation before the start of the service. It is one of those small “Casio” keyboard things that you might give to a child for Christmas. But in the Rundu church with its weird acoustics it can sound vaguely, and I emphasise vaguely, like the organ in the Royal Albert Hall.

Anyway, the “demonstration “programs on these keyboard jobs are designed to cover all seasons and anniversaries so that the proud owner can pretend he can play the thing without the drudgery of practice. We sat in the front of the church staring at the lone keyboard playing such sober and edifying tunes as “Greensleeves” at a very subdued though clearly audible volume. Though Nico’s organ chair was empty, we could almost feel his ghostly presence. Our sombre meditations on the death and resurrection of our Lord were rudely interrupted by the exuberant strains of “Happy Birthday” coming from the mischievous organ. I couldn’t believe it. To laugh or the cry, that was the question. The surreal tone was set. The pastor will turn it off when he comes in. He didn’t. He walked straight past, oblivious to the sound. Easter hymns and prayers were performed to the strains of Christmas Carols in the background. The creed was recited to the accompaniment of “Jingle Bells”, the gospel to “Oh, Suzannah”. You may find this hard to believe. I did, at the time. I pinched myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. Was that a Sousa march? My foot was tapping. Does God have a surreal sense of humour or was the devil playing tricks on us? I was certainly distracted and inclined to sing alone to the catchy tunes in the background. Nobody, not even the guy who had switched it on, stood up to turn it off. Maybe, and understandably, he did not wish to identify himself? Maybe everyone was enjoying the anarchy as much as I?

Eventually, towards the end of the service the pastor suddenly and without a word turned the organ off and spoilt our fun. Soon Nico will be back and we will have to sing properly again. Still, I’m looking forward to singing Easter hymns at Christmas.

                          Boarding the Intercape, Christmas Day

Early on Christmas morning we trudge through the Company Gardens for the last time. Now seasoned backpackers, we are comfortable carrying our rucksacks and other bags and no longer feel conspicuous as the ridiculous geriatrics we undoubtedly look. Hopefully we would inspire sympathy rather than violence from any mugger. David has dashed off at the last moment to buy his Christmas dinner and doesn’t return in time to say goodbye. We have cold chicken, olives, crisps, chocolate and other treats for lunch on the Intercape bus to Namibia. The station is already alive and a queue is forming. It must be about this time that two of our fellow travellers, a mother and son, are mugged here and lose all their possessions. We see and hear nothing and only find out about it once we are on the bus. Their lack of passports is a real problem at the border and delays our bus considerably. Our discomfort must be nothing to that felt by the victims who, so easily, could have been us.

We travel all day and night and arrive in Windhoek on Boxing Day. It is a public holiday and everything is shut. The lack of traffic makes it feels like a ghost town. The only people on the streets are young men who seem to be looking enviously at our possessions. We feel very vulnerable and a sense of panic rises within us. We’ll find a backpacker’s hostel and take refuge there. The empty streets fill us with concern. Every car seems dangerous. The backpackers is on the other side of town. We can’t find it. They have shut down. It no longer exists. The next one is a short walk away. They are open and will let us use their facilities, which includes a swimming pool, for just N$20 (£1.40) each. Our feeling of relief is palpable. But we have to cross the city again later that evening to catch the bus to Rundu. Windhoek is supposed to be a relatively safe, law-abiding city, and I was not expecting such a tangible feeling of menace when it is empty.

                                                           African sky

We arrive back in Rundu about midnight and, although relieved to be home, we are still suffering the after effects of our recent experiences. We decide to take a taxi even though we live only a short distance from the bus’ drop off point. The journey takes about 2 minutes, but since it is after midnight, the driver charges us at least double the usual rate (N$20). As the taxi drives away we realise we have left our tent and another bag in the back of the car. Forgetting paranoia, Georgina runs back through the dark streets to the taxi rank with me in hot pursuit. The driver hands over our luggage telling us what a good service he gives. He also tells us that the twenty dollars we gave him was not enough. We still owe him N$20. Unfortunately, we have left all cash at home. Besides, our ride had been short and we feel we have given him enough. He takes it in good part and, instead of running us down, offers us a free lift back home. Feeling brave, we decline his offer, preferring to walk the short distance home under the stars. Our Christmas in Africa 2008 draws to a very pleasant close.

  East London

After a couple of days Willy Junior gives us a lift the short distance from Kei Mouth to East London. We have enjoyed our stay but the relief on departing was like leaving home for a second time. The feeling of independence was palpable and the world was waiting to greet us.

East London, like its UK counterpart is run-down and dilapidated. Its wide streets remind us of former, grander days but they are now quiet and deserted. The promenade has more life. The southern end is more opulent with a beach recreational area, comprising trampoline and other amusements. A smart, promenade shelter is spoilt by a large dollop of human excrement on the seat. We move on and eat our spam sandwiches on a bench overlooking the Indian Ocean. East London is predominantly a black town. We seem to be the only white faces around. The guide book advises travellers that the northern esplanade is dangerous. We wonder why and head north. We pass through a gated fence monitored by police. Families are sitting around eating picnics as if this were a bank holiday. This is not dangerous. We are most at risk from the sand blowing into our eyes when we sit on the beach. We walk further up to see a crowd of people bathing in the sea. A massive crowd has gathered and seem to be hanging around waiting to see someone drown. We don’t linger. The males are in groups and their eyes follow us as we walk around. We head south and feel less uncomfortable when we leave the gated northern esplanade. The town has an old colonial feel. The houses and streets are grand but dilapidated. They have seen better days and the roads are eerily quiet.

The Nic Nac backpackers hostel is an oasis of charm and tranquillity. Our tent just fits into the secluded garden bordered by banana plants and other exotic species. There is a pool and good cooking facilities. We are in paradise and will be reluctant to leave.

Nic Nac Backpackers

Camping in a backpackers’ hostel is one of the cheapest and most enjoyable forms of accommodation available. We are travelling light, so we have a tent, a sheet sleeping bag, but no mattress. Who needs luxuries like a mattress? Humans slept on the ground before mattresses were invented and it is surprising how quickly your body becomes accustomed to it. Try sleeping on the floor for a few nights. You’ll love it and, either your spine will benefit, or you will be crippled for life.

We are on our own now and have to get to Cape Town by Christmas Day when the Intercape bus will take us back home to Rundu. The main buses along the coast are prohibitively expensive. Georgina is feeling adventurous and wants to take the black minibus taxis which are much cheaper and within our price range. The taxi area is a sprawling, chaotic mass of people. One man can make sense of it and tells us which minibus will take us to Port Elizabeth. We squeeze in with our entire luggage so tightly that we can barely move. The rucksack wedged on my lap must be a sure proof against any accident. I feel safe, though I cannot move my legs. This is fine for five minutes when I decide I want to move my legs. This casual desire rapidly turns into an absolute necessity. The very fact that I cannot move them makes me crave it even more. I will go mad if I cannot move my legs. Do I have legs? I can’t feel them. Just as I begin to panic the bus stops and the rearrangement of one bag turns hell into heaven.

Nineteen of us are travelling at great speed in a minibus taxi allowed to carry 12 people. Georgina and I thought we were the last to board but we waited for at least a half a dozen more people to squeeze on. We feel safe and everyone is friendly, but I wish the man behind hadn’t been eating garlic for breakfast. Who eats garlic for breakfast?

“Whatever you do, don’t use the minibus taxis,” everyone has warned us. There are a variety of reasons for this. The vehicles are not road worthy; the drivers take unnecessary risks; they may even fall asleep at the wheel; you may be kidnapped, mugged or worse. There is a cemetery in Rundu dedicated to the victims of one minibus accident. The entire complement of 18 was killed outright in a horrendous accident on the Windhoek road some years ago. Drivers are not regulated and can be reckless. They drive fast and sometimes overtake on dangerous bends. The driver might have driven too long without a break. The vehicle may be mechanically unsafe. There are many reasons why not to use the minibus taxis. Our experiences, on the other hand, are generally pleasant. The exclusively black passengers, are friendly and helpful. One young lady even tolerates our luggage on her lap on one journey. The drivers are caring and considerate. The taxi ranks may be dens of thieves and muggers but we see none. Above all travel is cheap and affordable. The vehicles range from new and clean to old, battered and dirty. Only one vehicle felt unsafe and that was between Stellenbosch and a town on the outskirts of Cape Town. The driver takes 6 attempts to shut the crumpled door next to me and the rusting vehicle bounces along at break-neck speed, threatening to roll at every corner. The journey is mercifully short.

Willy and Hilion on their cell phones.

We couldn’t find Kei Mouth on the map because Willy, Danie’s aged parent, insisted on calling it Kei Mon. Willy had a strange sense of humour. I’m still not sure whether the biltong he gives us to eat is actually giraffe as he claims or not. “I good at English” he tells us. “Speak me no question,” he says to prove it. This, of course is just part of his act, which he rehearses a surprising number of times while we are with him. As you can imagine, he is an absolute scream.

He and his wife, Hilion, have kindly consented to give us a lift to the coastal village of Kei Mouth, just north of East London, where they will spend their annual vacation with their four children and assorted spouses. Lifts in Africa are paying affairs. No-one has much money so you, quite rightly, pay your share of the transport costs and accommodation. Willy had been a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church until they had a falling out about something fairly crucial, namely, amongst other things, the presence of Jesus in your life. Since then he has been involved in a number of money making schemes. He has been a melon trader and currently runs a pancake stall in the Saturday Farmer’s Market in Bloemfontein. Neither of these has dampened his evangelical zeal and is keen on an organisation from the USA called “Christ Love”. “Willy loves to preach,” we are warned. “When you have had enough, tell him so. My husband just walks away,” says one well-wisher. In fact, Willy is quite refreshing. We were growing tired of the “prosperity gospel” that we have heard preached so much in Africa. You know the sort of thing, believe in God and you will have a big car and a grand house. To hear the message that the only thing worth having is the living presence of Jesus in your life has the definite ring of truth about it. After all those years of being a minister in the Dutch Reformed Church it is wonderful that he has at last come to recognise the living presence of Jesus in his life.

The day of our departure from Bloemfontein does not start particularly well. We have been told that Willy and Hilion would be making a leisurely start, say about 11am. At 9am Kathleen says that we have to be ready to go in 30 minutes. Panic stations. We haven’t begun to pack. We bundle everything into our rucksacks and we are ready to go. It is sad to say goodbye. Kathleen and John have been such good hosts and have practically made us members of their family. Marie did a very efficient job organising our travel to the coast and booking our bus back to Rundu on the internet.

As Kathleen drives us to Willy and Hillion’s house we worry that we may be delaying their departure. We arrive to find Willy outside in nothing but a pair of shorts cleaning a large tarpaulin. They won’t be ready for a few hours yet. This gives us time to accompany Kathleen on her weekly visit to John’s mother who lives in an old folks’ home a short distance away. “She can be a difficult woman,” warns Kathleen, “so don’t mind what she says.” Old people are supposed to be cantankerous, aren’t they? I look forward to being so when i get old, which is a long way off. We stop off for a few groceries and cigarettes. These are rationed as mother would smoke them all in one go if she could. She has good fug going by the time we reach her room. Is she smoking or burning a pile of wet leaves? Her outline emerges through the smoke. She is pleased to see us and is on her best behaviour. She speaks fairly good English with a deep, husky voice. She sounds like and elderly Lauren Bacall and the atmosphere is pleasant and warm, in fact, disappointingly, no drama at all. A sepia photo on the wall shows a smartly dressed young man and a beautiful young lady. What couple they must have been in their heyday. On the way out we pick an apricot off one of the trees in the grounds. Someone taps on the window. The apricot is hard anyway so we chuck it away.

Willy and co. are still packing so we go back to Kathleen’s for a cup of coffee. When we’d parted an hour previously I had wondered if we would ever see this family again. I never dreamt it would be so soon.

First goodbyes are difficult, second are just plain embarrassing. However, we survive.