Sunday, February 27, 2011

The Long Way to Lilongwe

All events depicted below are true and have honestly happened to me while traveling in Malawi over the last 6 days. In order to make a more engaging narrative, however, I've taken liberty with the timeline and combined entertaining parts of several bus rides into one day's journey.

It is 8:30 a.m. I've already eaten a few slices of bread for breakfast, taken my doxy (for malaria), had a cup of coffee, checked out of my last hostel, and headed out for the next day's journey. I am carrying my large 60L pack on my back, with my smaller day pack on my front. I reach the bus depot around 8:45. They call it a "depot" because "station" would imply there is some sort of building. There isn't much for a station in any of these towns, just a designated dirt lot where vans, taxis, and buses congregate. A friendly Malawian man greets me as "My friend!" and he undoubtedly has a friend who is going my way. I arrange a 45-km ride in his friend's shared taxi for 400 kwacha ($2.70). The friend drives a mid-size Toyota SUV, the kind that normally fits a family of 5 fairly comfortably. We have at least 10 people and 1 chicken in this car. The chicken is in the lap of the woman next to me, and is surprisingly subdued for the journey.

Every 10 - 20 km there is a police roadblock. It's not entirely clear what they are looking for, but my backpack apparently looks suspicious. They inquire to the driver and all he says in response is "mzungu" (white person). This apparently suffices for an explaination and we're let through the gates without hassle. About 20 minutes into our hour-long journey, the car coasts to a stop. It appears something is wrong with the battery, so the driver flags down another car and pulls out some "jumper cables." These "jumper cables" don't have clamps on them, nor do they look to hold much voltage, and it's no surprise (to me at least) when the cables fail to deliver enough assistance. So the driver jumps in the helping vehicle to go buy a new battery. Sensing this might be a long wait, I pull my luggage out of the car and wait for a passing minibus to flag down.

A van pulls up within 10 minutes of waiting and I've arranged the remainder of the journey for only 200 kwacha ($1.35). I give the guy my bag to throw in the back and I crawl in. These minibuses are slightly smaller than a normal 12-passenger van and fit anywhere between 16 and 20 people in them. I cram into the back seat, along with 3 other people (including one man with two chickens in a bag. These chickens are not so subdued.) The van smells strongly of fish and body odor. One-fifth of this country is Lake Malawi and someone is clearly bringing their catch to market.

We arrive in the first town after about 2 hours or so. As soon as I step out at the bus depot, I am in a sea of touts all trying to get me to go with their friend. Without much effort, I'm thrown into one of the other minibuses bound for my next stop. I arrange the 60-km ride for 450 kwacha ($3) and ask if the driver knows the turn off for Kasito Lodge. He does and I asked to be dropped there. Considering the haste in which I was thrown into this minibus, there is a considerable lack of hurry to actually leave. I sit in the minibus at the depot for 2 hours until the vehicle is sufficiently full to leave. I eat a few slices of white bread and buy a Coke for lunch. When it comes time to leave, both the driver and the money-taker (the guy who sits by the door) hop out of the van, start pushing (ala Little Miss Sunshine), the driver hops back in while the vehicle is still in motion and revs up the engine. We're off.

Again, I am sitting in the back and from here I can keep an eye on my luggage in the boot. The rear hatch doesn't actually close, and there's a two-inch gap of air between the hatch and the car. But a frayed looking rope seems to be doing the trick of keeping everything bound in well enough. About fifteen minutes into the ride, it begins to rain. Good thing this minibus has working windshield wipers. Oh wait, I forgot we were in Malawi. The good news is that I'm getting a nice steady stream of rain from the open rear hatch to cool me off. After 2 hours, the bus pulls over at the sign for Kasito Lodge and lets me out.

Turns out both Kasito Lodge and the neighboring lodge recommended by The Lonely Planet are closed. No signs saying why, but they both appear empty and no one answers the locked door. Back out to the road.

It's 4:30 by this point and I'm sitting on my bags on the side of a road running along Viphya Plateau. I can see a distant thunderstorm moving my way. It'll get dark in two hours. Hmm.

I wait about 20 minutes before a flatbed truck pulls over and the driver asks in very good English where I'm headed. I ask him the same. He says he's going as far as Lilongwe and I'm welcome to a lift, free of charge. Only catch is I have to sit in the back of the truck among several bags of charcoal. No problem, I say. I don't want to be on this lonely stretch of road when night falls. I hop on and we take off. As we pass small villages, people on bicylces and children playing in the roads all turn to look at the mzungu riding in the back of this truck, smile, and wave. I spot a sticker on the windshield reading "This Car Fueled By the Blood of Jesus." I think I have just met a real life good Samaritan.

Around nightfall, the nice man pulls over to rearrange some things in the cab of his truck. He points ahead and says "It's raining ahead. Get in the truck and you'll stay dry." So for the remainder of the 3.5 hour ride I'm inside the cab. My new friend, Tregia, speaks pretty good English and rants for a while about how he can't get a tourism visa for the US. But he never asks me for money and refuses it when I offer. He even takes me directly to the hostel where I've decided I want to stay in Lilongwe. When I asked him why he picked me up he just says, "You looked stranded. You can be on that road for hours until a bus pass. Maybe 11 or midnight you not arrive in Lilongwe."

And that, is a solid dose of traveling in Malawi. Often it's the getting there that's the biggest adventure. I'm headed to a small town outside of Lilongwe for a couple of nights and then back here to catch a bus to Lusaka and then on to Livingstone.

Dugout canoes on Lake Malawi



These minibuses fit between 16 and 20 people in them

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Fried Chicken at 14,000 ft

I am standing under a small patch of shade on a hot dusty two-lane road waiting to flag down a van going south. There aren't any vehicles in sight, just people walking and riding at least two-to-a-bike. There's unmistakeably African music pumping out of one of the concrete buildings on my left. There are some guys under a bamboo structure grilling meat on a stick, and kids are all running to and from the school around the corner. No doubt about it, I'm finally in Africa. Malawi, to be precise, which seems only to have one main road running north to south. It's easy enough to find a ride because anyone who owns a car here is running a taxi service...or at least that's what it seems like.

5 days in Dar Es Salaam and Zanzibar, 9 days around and on Kilimanjaro, 2 days on the road south into Malawi. It's been a wild trip already and I've got weeks to come. I've already taken a dip in the Indian Ocean, watched sunrise from over 19,000 feet above sea level, and spent over 35 hours on various buses. In keeping with my usual format, there are some musings of the Kilimanjaro expedition and subsequent adventures below.

  • The Lion King is actually useful research before coming to East Africa. People honestly say "Hakuna Matata" (no worries) and "rafiki" is Swahili for "friend."
  • Our Kili trip employed 35 porters, cooks, and guides for 10 hikers. We could hardly believe it took that many, but after our first meal of epic proportions we understood a little better. Especially on day 3 when we lunched at 4300 meters above sea level and they fed us fried chicken. It wasn't the best fried chicken I've ever had, but it was still fried chicken...at 14,000 feet above sea level.
  • Our hiking group eventually used the law of averages to get any sort of understanding on what we were doing/where we were going/how long it'd take to get there. We had two guides, each with a different answer each time you'd ask. English isn't their first language and you can tell.
  • We went on a pretty basic trip - luxurious for backpacker standards but cheaper than many other outfits. At first we wondered what that extra $1,000 got you, and then we realized at the second campsite that it gets you your own group outhouse instead of sharing with all the other hikers and porters. Nice I suppose, but really a grand for an outhouse??
  • I am sure that all the trekking companies summit Kili at sunrise so you don't know what you're getting yourself into as you walk up. Coming down in the daylight it seemed far steeper than I remembered staggering up in the dark...
  • Everyone knows the word "yes" but not necessarily the words in your question. I have learned it best to not ask yes/no questions because you'll get an answer, but not necessarily the truthful one.
I'm in Malawi for another 10 days and then over to Zambia to meet the rest of the Munfords in Livingstone, where Sister is working. What a life...

Sunset on Zanzibar


Sunset at Shira Cave Campground elev. 3,800 meters above sea level


Sunrise hits Kili at camp on day 5


Sister and Me at the top of Kilimanjaro!

Friday, February 11, 2011

Jambo from Zanzibar, a small island off the coast of Tanzania!

Well, here I am - on the last leg of my world tour, on the continent I've been most curious about. I flew into Jozi (Johannesburg) last Monday, spent a day without my luggage, and then flew up to Dar Es Salaam. My luggage just barely made it from ATL in time for my DAR flight, but alas, it did. Though it may come as no surprise, it is warm here - like really warm. Not quite northeast Thailand warm, but something akin to southern Vietnam warm. So I've busted out the sunscreen and shades and welcomed a real summer back into my life. I'm on Zanzibar for the big East African music festival, Sauti za Busara (Sounds of Wisdom, in KiSwahili). I'll return mainland on Sunday, meet up with Sister, and then we head to Moshi on Monday to start hiking Kilimanjaro on Tuesday. And with any luck, we should summit on the 19th, which I am sure you haven't forgotten, is my 26th birthday. Initial insights and musings below:
  • People in Tanzania speak Swahili, not English. I keep having to stop myself from attempting to speak Spanish. It seems to be my "go-to" language when I feel like people aren't understanding me. I'm pretty sure the people who don't speak English, don't speak Spanish either. So it's back to my days in Southeast Asia, where you speak really slow grammatically incorrect English and just keep smiling - surely they'll figure out what I am saying eventually.
  • Who knew that Africa would be the place I felt like I fit in? Okay, okay, my skin color may be a bit more fair than most but in general I'm the right height and normally proportioned. After months of being that ridiculously tall, skinny kid walking around, I actually feel less conspicuous in Africa than I ever did in South America or Southeast Asia. Plus, there are white Africans, so it's not immediately obvious that I'm American.
  • Dance is equally as important to a performance as music. Every band we've seen has a few people whose job is primarily to just dance. And holy moly, these girls put Shakira to shame - those hips don't lie, they don't lie at all.
  • This is my first time traveling in a Muslim country. The biggest drawback that I have found thus far, is that on a really hot day, when you'd like to get a cold beer and relax on your veranda it's nearly impossible to find a shop that actually sells beer. There are bars and restaurants that sell alcohol, but it is rarely found in the local shops because many of the local people don't drink it. Second biggest drawback is the very loud calls to prayer at 5 am. In the afternoon it's quite lovely to hear, but not so much in the wee hours of the morning.
Next time you hear from me, I'll be down off the mountain.