THE SMOKE THAT THUNDERS!

21^st May – Day 234 – Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe

Staying put in Victoria Falls town for a couple of days was nice after all the tarmac we'd seen in the past three days. The town itself is obviously built for tourists and doesn't have all that much to offer apart from the nice lodges and a couple of decent places to eat. But just as obviously people come there to see one of great natural wonders of the world, and so did we.

Dr. Livingstone, they presumed? "YES", said the statue.

The day we went to see the falls was a very nice and sunny one which is an advantage since you will invariably get soaking wet at this time of year when the falls are at their most plentiful in terms of the amount of water that flows through (yearly average is 1 000 000 litres per second but we unfortunately don't remember the wet season average). We managed to soak our camera to that extent that it wouldn't recover even after two days of trying to “dry it out” in the sun. Somehow we managed to get the pictures out of it at least. After a tour of the falls we popped a bottle of bubbly in the afternoon sun as well while trying to dry ourselves out.

The mighty falls.

The smoke that thundered turned out to be water vapour.

Voyagers in the mist

Slippery when ultra soaked.

But they found the rainbow!

Late afternoon we embarked on one of the river boats that cruise in the upstream of the Zambezi river. Supposedly you get to see wildlife from the boat but that's not the point so much when your ticket entitles you to free drinks for as much as you can down during the 2 ½ hr cruise. In our case the departure of the boat was delayed by more than an hour because of a party of Chinese people who were also booked on the same cruise were nowhere to be seen. We enjoyed our beverages to the fullest while waiting for them to arrive, cursing them under our breath. Once they finally joined us, we found out that it was the Chinese ambassador to Zimbabwe and his friends and varied work related acquaintances, one of which had lived and worked in Finland as well. The ambassador himself took a great liking to T in particular as they had a chat while going to the bar for a refill at the same time. Sooner than we noticed, the ambassador joined us at our table for some casual conservation about the role of the Chinese in Zimbabwe and in Africa all in all. He was very impressed about our long and eventful journey as well and insisted on taking photos of the young couple (sorry parents but I think that was us). The boat eventually returned to its docking point and we had seen two hippos, a beautiful sunset and were in a very happy mood.

Yeh folks, it's a hippo eat hippo world

Before sobering up too much we moved onto some fine dining to honour our last night in Zimbabwe. The next day we'd be crossing into Botswana and onwards to the Caprivi Strip in Namibia to start another looooooooooooong bus journey down south to Cape Town via Windhoek. I was keen on seeing how the older generation would manage some of the style of travelling we'd been doing for the past eight months. They clearly deserved some pampering before that.

Photo credit: Chinese Ambassador, Harare, Zimbabwe

Le Tour de Zim

18^th-20^th May – Days 231-233 – Great Zimbabwe National Monument and Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe

My Dad had organised a rental car for us in advance from Finland. From what he had understood, the car would come at quite a cost as we would be dropping it off at Victoria Falls from where the agency would pick it up and charge us an extortionate fee of 150USD for the pleasure. However, having your own – or in this case rented – wheels in Zimbabwe is by far the easiest way to get around for someone with time constraints but not enough cash to fly. More importantly, we were not going to risk facing the consequences of not getting to Cape Town in time for my mother's liking. This is why I found myself making coffee for the whole Europcar office in Harare in the morning while Dad was sorting out the paperwork. I managed to come up with some absolute bland mud water, as often happens to me if I don't know the particular machine I'm using, and the manager of the office decided to make a new pot after tasting it. At least I got a cup of actual coffee and he had a good laugh out of my intended philanthropy. My Dad being my Dad, he'd insisted we take the TomTom as well (even if T pointed out this was unnecessary as there are about four main roads in the whole country and the chances of getting lost are therefore quite minimal), so after only minor circling around in the outskirts of Harare we got on the road south towards Masvingo and the Great Zimbabwe National Monument.

Busy man, busy road

My parents have never been to Africa and probably would never had made it here if it wasn't for our adventure. This is reflected well in their take on travelling around here. Before coming over, my mother had come up with only two things she wanted to see on their trip: Victoria Falls and Cape Town. This was why they flew to Harare in the first place, to gain easier access to the falls. As the distance between the two desired locations is over 2000km as the crow flies, we sure had some road to cover. Both me and T had tried to get her to read about Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa to get some other ideas as well but she had been so busy at work right up until the trip that we were still stuck with the same mantra. Dad at least had read about the national parks of Zimbabwe and some sights in the Western Cape so we had something to elaborate on. As T had been to Zimbabwe before, he had some ideas which we used in order for my parents to get more out of their trip. Great Zimbabwe was one of these ideas.

The mean machine on the highway to Masvingo

The trip down to Masvingo and onwards to the ruins surprised us all in how few vehicles there were on the road. Apart from some large trucks, we hardly saw anyone ahead or behind us at any point. Once we got to Masvingo we started seeing some life around us again, nothing much worth mentioning in itself, though. As we had left Harare after 10am, we made it to the ruins quite late in the afternoon but still managed to get a tour around the site. What surprised us even more was that there were no other visitors at the site either, apart from one young couple from Zimbabwe who were sitting up on the top of one of the Hill Complex. Great Zimbabwe was impressive and we got to enjoy our tour in peace. We'd heard before that it's the kind of place where you can just walk around and sit to admire the surroundings and the historical value of the monument, and this is exactly how we found it as well. We decided to stay in the bungalows next to the monument for the night rather than drive back to Masvingo. The electricity was off and we had not brought any food supplies, so we headed to the nearby hotel for an African buffet and some expensive drinks before turning in.

T's got the guide cornered

The Hill Complex

The great enclosure. It was, as its name promised, great.

We presumed that Great Zim didn't look exactly like this back in the days

The conical tower. It was, as its name promised, conical

The next day we set out for the long drive all the way to Victoria Falls. Lunch stop was in Bulawayo, an attractive town with colonial architecture and long and wide streets crossing each other in a perfect grid. It reminded me more of American towns from the 1800's than of the British legacy. When we returned to our car we found a parking ticket on the windscreen, we'd have to pay four US dollars at the town hall. We sent T to run after the parking warren and sweet-talk us out of the ticket, which he successfully did in the manner only too familiar to anyone who knows him. Dad handed the car over to me for the drive up to Vic Falls, and halfway there I managed to pick up a speeding ticket from the police with a radar by the roadside. I'd been doing a pitiful 94 km/h on an area with an 80 km/h limit. It was my turn to do some sweet-talking, which to anyone who knows me sounds rather hilarious. The conversation went on for about 45 mins and followed a repeated pattern described below:

Officer: Sister, you know we have to fine you for speeding.

M: Yes, Mister Officer. That's all very well. How much is that?

Officer: It'll be 20 US dollars.

M: Great. Could you write me the ticket and I'll pay it wherever necessary, in the next town with a police station, or however it works here.

Officer: That's not how it works. You give the money to us in cash right here.

M: Oh, is that so. Well, as it happens I don't have enough cash to pay you that right here. Could you just write the ticket for me and I promise I'll pay it later.

Officer: We can't do that.

M: How do you mean you cannot do that? If you can fine me you can surely write me a ticket as well?

Officer: No, in fact we can't. We can fine you, but we're not allowed to write you a ticket because you have a foreign license, you see. You will get a receipt for your payment, however.

M: Aaahha. Well that's all good but completely useless for me. Besides, I told you I don't have the money. I'm telling you, just write the ticket and you can even escort me to the next town if you don't believe me. I go and get the cash and then we go to the police and pay the ticket.

Officer: Listen, Sister. We're not going to escort you anywhere. You go ask your friends for the money if you don't have any. You admit that you were speeding? In that case you must pay the fine.

M: Listen, Officer. Yes, I admit that I was speeding. And exactly because I am the driver, I am responsible for the ticket. My friends have nothing to do with it and I won't make them pay for my mistakes. So, how do you suggest we proceed?

Officer: Well then you have to pay us.

M: I told you I don't have the money.

Etc. etc. etc.... After repeating this for a good while we finally reached a consensus:

Officer: Sister, why don't you just say that you are very sorry and that you won't do it again?

M: Oh, well because where I come from there is no way you can worm your way out of ticket like that and I respect you enough not to try.

Officer (smiling): Why don't you give it a try this once?

M (looking bemused): OK then. I'm very sorry for speeding, Officer. I promise I will drive slower from now on.

Officer: See now, it wasn't all that hard, was it? (hands back the license) Have a nice day and drive safe.

T attempted not to antagonise the Zimbabwean police by not openly taking a picture of them attempting to elicit bribes as a proud mother looks on

I walked back into the car to some amused giggles from T and amazed shrugs from my parents but having avoided paying the fine. As a result I can still say I've never been given a speeding ticket in my life. My driving instructor would call that pretty amazing as he nicknamed me “Miss Straighten-out-the-corners” already nine years back.

We arrived at Vic Falls late in the evening after making a small detour to one of the safari lodges close to Hwange NP for some sundowners. My Mom was thrilled to have seen her first herd of buffaloes and a couple of elephants by the pond right nearby. We decided to make a trip inside the park the next day, and I sensed my parents were slowly starting to get into the Africa mentality. After all, my Dad was already nearly comfortable driving in the dark even if he had earlier sworn he would not have any of it where he doesn't know his way around.

The next day we got up early and I drove us to the park (paying attention to the speedometer this time). We drove far into the park before any sightings of animals but were eventually rewarded with Mom starting the spotting with finding some kudu in the bushes. All the expected ones (elephants, giraffes, impala, warthogs, baboons) soon followed with quite a few different birds and sightings of jackals and sable antelopes. At sunset we drove to one of the pans to see hippos and crocodiles as well and also welcomed a herd of about 25 elephants coming to splash around, which got my Dad working with his snapshots for real.

The Jackal, not starring Bruce Willis

Anyone seen enough impala yet?

Siamese giraffes

No introduction required

On our way back to the gates at 5:45pm, 15 minutes to closing time, we burst a tire while Dad hit one of the all too many potholes he'd been hitting throughout the day. Brilliant. Out we got into the fading light of the evening with our torches and noticed that the hub cap was tied to the tire with cable ties. None of us were carrying a knife or sharp enough object of any sort to cut them off and actually get to the bolts. Could we be spending the night with lions? Luckily a 4x4 soon appeared from behind us, it was the group we'd seen at the pan earlier. South African as they were, of course they carried knives! Dad got to work, and we arrived at the gate together with the South Africans at around 6.30pm to find someone still there to open it for us. What's best, on our way there we spotted what we later confirmed to near certainty to be the African wild dog. It was not too bad a place and time to get a puncture, then.

We're in wheel big trouble now! (apologies)

Parental Invasion part II

15^th-18^th May – Days 228-231 – Harare, Zimbabwe

Mugabe names streets after his cronies...

Oh Zimbabwe!! The country which cursed me, the place where I took my first African steps 13 years ago and which is to blame for me failing to be responsible and start a career up until now and probably for many years in the future. We'd booked a room in the Small World Lodge by phone a few weeks back and arrived to discover that we couldn't have it. A guy was staying there a few days ago, apparently, and disappeared with the key. So sorry about that. We ended up in separate dorms and rounded off the evening with style by getting takeaway cheeseburgers and our first packet of biltong since Nairobi. And what a feast it was.

Shall we park illegally, dear?

Following morning, we embarked on parents project vol. 2 – M's parents were landing at Harare airport around midday. I'd successfully avoided “walking the plank” (c.f. South Luangwa post) and we nearly managed to give them a rousing welcome – it seemed that some Chinese dignitary was arriving at the same time and a gang of guys in pseudo-African leopard print loin cloths were playing the drums to welcome this dignitary, whoever he was. M's parents unfortunately didn't come out until a while after the performers had gone. These African first-timers were then taxied back into town. “I thought it was winter here?” we were asked from the back seat. “It is”. A confused silence. “Oh really?”. It seemed we had some work to do here. We then spent a lovely evening hunting for vegetarian food for Tiina. This isn't always an overly easy thing to do at the best of times in Africa, but on a Sunday in Harare it's a situation that MacGyver himself would have struggled to get out of. We eventually managed it.

Shop til you drop in Harare's busy shopping district!

Zimbabwe has obviously taken a battering from its total economic meltdown – the circulating currency is now the US dollar, Harare itself looks more tired in many places than it did the first time I was here. People are still smiley and friendly though, and the city is still amongst the more developed looking we've seen on the whole trip – shiny buildings, busy streets and, of course, the gift of the West to the rest of the world – multi-storey shopping centres. How I've missed them (sarcasm intended). We took it easy for the day, wandering around doing our normal things – taking a coffee here, having a bite to eat there, taking M to hospital again. Blobs had been growing on her feet and juice had been flowing out in a way reminiscent of a movie from the Alien series. The result was – stop smoking, go on antibiotics. We went for a beer and a fag to celebrate. We have a lot to see and a lot of distance to cover while M's parents are here so we only really had a day in Harare but M and I are thinking about coming back later, so we'll see what happens.

An extremely familiar sight on this trip

The bustling streets of Samora Machel Avenue

The Amazing Adventures of the Dying Horse

13^th-15^th May – Days 226-228 – Blantyre, Malawi to Harare, Zimbabwe

"Good morning, distinguished ladies and gentlemen!" declared Yvonne, our hostess for the bus ride. We looked at each other sincerely feeling that this would possibly be the nicest bus ride we'd have on the whole trip. TV on the bus, snacks provided and a smiling hostess with polite discourse. The bus was shiny clean and relatively modern, the road was smooth and we rolled on without any suspension trouble.


This lasted for about an hour before the bus suddenly started sounding rather tired while trying to get up a small hill. "Distinguished ladies and gentlemen, we will have to stop for a brief break for the driver to inspect the slight problem we are having." Everyone got out to stretch their legs and inspect the damage in good humour with the driver. I mean, this is Africa and you do get all sorts of trouble from time to time – as we had already experienced many times over – so one doesn't get all too worried about the casual stops along the way. It turned out that the radiator/ventilator of the engine was overheating. Wait for a bit for it to cool down, pour some new water in there and the journey could continue.

Premiers Symptomes

Yvonne served us our complimentary Cokes and muffins. Before I had finished my muffin we stopped again to inspect the engine. Same problem obviously, so more water was poured in. Except for that this time the water didn't want to stay in, but kept dripping through the tank and onto the tarmac. Some African-style headscratching followed. The funniest thing about these moments is that nobody seems to take any action towards trying to solve the problem at hand. It's all about standing there, looking at the thing that is broken, looking around the scenerey for a bit and then more looking at the problem. Not much is said either, the focus is more on the silent discovery of something being wrong. This is what causes the passengers to become more restless and voicing out their opinions of what should be done in colourful display of roadside brainstorming. Sometimes I think Africans would make the best consultants of them all, as they don't waste any time coming up with creative solutions to just about anything. Not all of them are worth considering any further obviously, but at least the effort is there. Back in Europe big money boys need a good ten coffees and a few whiskeys to even start speaking during a case-solving session.

M reads up on bus mechanics

We watched on and got to know our fellow passengers a bit better. There was a girl who lived in London but had come over to visit some family, there was an agitated man who started educating us about how useless the driver and his friends were being about the problem. There was a group of big mamas demanding service and better appreciation of customers. And there was Alan, the mascot of the journey, with his friend the radiographer. These two were a funny pair, the two-metre tall radiographer who hardly said a word and Alan about one metre lower down who couldn't stop talking. They also had some kind of an arrangement over a Justin-Timberlake-trademark hat which they took turns wearing. An hour had passed when we heard that someone from the Malasha office in Blantyre would come over to have a look at the bus and bring a new water tank for the cooling system. We headed off towards the direction of the nearest town to buy some cigarettes knowing it would take a good while for anyone to get to where we were, nevermind for them to fix the problem. We found a hotel and sat down for a beer and a smoke. Not long after, some of the guys from our bus also made their way to the hotel bar.

An all too familiar sight

We didn't dare to stay out sinking pints for too long, as there is always the subconscious fear of things working out sooner than anyone expected. Back at the bus nothing had changed, however. After some more sitting around and an attempt at walking back to the bar, a Malasha pick-up pulled in with the new water tank. Smiley faces and action all around. The kids from the village helped the bus crew out and carried water for them to fill the new tank. I crouched down to look beneath the bus and saw there was still a puddle there. I pointed this out to the mechanic who looked utterly uninterested and, a short while later, rather overwhelmed about having to do some more work. Once it was revealed that we wouldn't be moving on just yet, Alan got busy mouthing at the driver and Yvonne about just about anything, translating to us that he had seen it coming all along but that nobody believed him because he is a foreigner, i.e. From Zimbabwe.


We stood and sat by the roadside for some more hours before there was a decision from someone's part to drive the bus to the Mozambican border post and park it there. It seemed like the damage would not be fixed with what was available at hand, but instead needed some attention at the garage. The evening fell and people were getting more restless and hungry for both food and information. The Big Mama Quartet together with Alan took the lead in pestering Yvonne about the situation and demanding that dinner should be on Malasha. "I need food to take my ARVs (anti-retrovirals, i.e. HIV medicine). If I don't take my ARVs, I will die! Do you want me to die for Malasha??" the head of Big Mamas was furious but also beaming with the attention she was getting for being the troop leader in the passengers' mutiny against « Malasha, the Dying Horse », as the company had been nicknamed by the Big Mamas. As far as Yvonne was concerned, we had stopped being "Distinguished ladies and gentlemen" a long time ago and were not kept up-to-date about what would happen next at all anymore. Yvonne had to battle in between two fires, and the passengers' side was growing stronger as time went on. As we stood united and waited for Malasha's response, Alan kept us all entertained by telling his life story to which the Big Mamas had a lot to comment to. It was like listening to a live soap opera. "Many people think I'm gay just because I don't need a woman in my life anymore after my first marriage. I'm happy being a single father to my son". Alan was truly pouring his heart out. In response, Big Mamas inquired him about all the women in his life and tried to suggest he'd get it on with one of them, a close friend as she was. It was classic motherly herding and pimping in true womanly style, something I recognize in myself all too well.


In the end, Yvonne came around to take food orders from everyone on the bus and we all marched into a restaurant nearby, Big Mama Quartet being the loudest in announcing our deserved triumph. I had started feeling feverish a while before and was not so triumphant, but dragged my shivering self there to have some chicken. After the dinner, the pick-up that had returned to Blantyre in the meantime came back with some more tools and parts. The mechanics commenced work yet again. Yvonne and the rest of the bus crew moved to a hostel in town and left us to sleep in the bus to the outrage of Big Mama Quartet. Alan and few others sought shelter in town as well while the people who remained on the bus took out whatever they had to shield them from mosquitoes. T displayed his lack of experience with mosquito repellent by attempting to spray his ankles in the dark and instead shooting it straight into his eyes. The owner of the restaurant came to the bus to look for Yvonne who apparently hadn't paid for the food. He felt sorry enough for us poor souls onboard the Dying Horse and invited us to come back to his restaurant for free teas in the morning.

The mechanics hard at work...

Morning was tactics time for T and I. We'd now spent the whole previous day and night not advancing anywhere and had only this day left to get to Harare in time to meet my parents the next morning. It had become clear during the night that the mechanics could not fix the problem, in fact they were still at it at 7am when we woke up. We made a decision to try and get on any other bus that would pass through the border if Malasha would not be getting us on another bus by 10am. We all went for our breakfasts while waiting for Yvonne to get back and inform us about what was going on and had a good laugh and a mean dig at Malasha to keep us from getting too frustrated with the situation. After breakfast she did appear but with no news whatsoever apart from convincing us that we would continue the journey one way or another. Some of us were getting slightly sceptical to say the least. One of the managers from the Malasha office in Blantyre showed up at the border as well and had to take the same mouthful from Big Mamas that Yvonne had been receiving the whole previous day. He stood there blank-faced and denying himself of all the blame and responsibility. Somehow he did convince all of us that another bus would come and pick us up and we stayed put.

Free breakfast!! L-R: Big Mama#1, Alan, someone else, Radiographer man, London-girl, ridiculous-trainers-woman from the Big Mama Quartet

At 1pm the rescue came in the form of another Malasha horse, seemingly more alive than our first carrier. We all got in, found space and finally crossed the border after having to wait 27 hours for the moment to come. The rest of the journey was free of complications, apart from the open pisstake aimed at Yvonne for changing her rhetorics during the course of the evolving catastrophe. While we were waiting around at the Zimbabwean border for everyone to get back into the bus, we witnessed something that made our days. Another bus pulled in at the parking area and, while driving past a small building separating the road from the parking space, scraped off half of the windows on one side of the bus as it drove too close to a bit of the building that was sticking out. “It's your fault!”, Alan came laughing and pointing at me, “I saw the driver looking at you while he was pulling in”. The driver seemed just as uninterested about what he'd just done as our mechanic had seemed about fixing our bus. Looking at the damage he'd caused to his shiny luxury coach from his side mirror, he just smiled. We felt the pain of his passengers as we got onto our second horse and drove off into the darkness and towards Harare.



We'd arranged with Alan that we could get a lift with his brother so we had things sorted when we arrived at the bus station in Harare. We said our hearty goodbyes to all the people we'd shared the experience with and got some pointers from Big Mama about Zimbabwe, where she was from as well. It took us a while to find our hotel in Harare but luckily Alan nor his brother seemed to mind all that much after the long long ride with Malasha. Instead Alan focused on playing tour guide of Harare and teaching us how to blow the vuvuzela, so we'd be ready for the World Cup. That is, if we'd actually got a proper one instead of the toy trumpet we got for free in Kampala.