The Okavango Delta Blues

Just a brief interruption from trip stories… In planning for the trip I decided it was necessary to let the face lettuce rage (that means facial hair for all those non-bro readers) to get closer to my inner Neanderthal. By the time I touched down in Cape Town after the trip, I had a solid two week base of growth. Naturally, I trimmed all the unnecessary parts, leaving on my face the essence of what makes a man, well, a Man – the mustache. There comes a point in every young man’s life when he takes a deep look in the mirror, and wonders why the ‘stache had never been even put into action. Sporting a mustache for the first time elicited a multitude of reactions from friends on campus and at parties, but the wildest reaction came from the 6^th grade students I tutor at SHAWCO. Looking in my direction, the girls were talking in Xhosa and laughing, but it wasn’t until Unathi made the finger over upper-brow motion that I understood their amusement. The girls erupted in laughter, and it probably took about ten minutes before they got it all out. Later, it would come in handy for the ultimate peacocking experiment – my temporary fashion conversion, becoming hipster. This guy knows how to party (like an 80's pornstar):

I’m seriously considering rockin’ the mustache through the end of the semester, after hearing some positive feedback. I would love to hear other opinions – write on my facebook wall with your advice.

Now back to the trip:

Having crossed Vic Falls off the list, Botswana’s Okavango Delta was next on the grand plan. Changing plans last minute, we booked a flight at Jollyboys the night before setting off to avoid the sketchy Botswana bus system and to save time. Wake up early, hail our taximan, Bison, drive an hour to the Zam-Bots border, take a barge over the Chobe River that separates the two countries, hop in a packed minibus to Kasane, fly to Maun with Botswana Air, and finally arrive mid-afternoon. After Giulia and Camille had their way bargaining with available cabs, we settled with, as we would later discover, Maun’s coolest driver, Tokololo. By the end of the trip, we had the art of fare negotiation down to a science: Guilia and Camille’s on Wheels (nickname) would descend like bloodthirsty wild dogs, shoving their prices down the throats of sheepish drivers, all shame cast aside, while I stood back and waited to perform my duty. My role was to sit shotgun and put the charm on with small talk to prove to the driver that we know how to treat other people with respect, the ultimate redemption. It was essentially the good cop-bad cop routine in action. Tokololo drove us to our next accommodation, Old Bride Backpackers, where I chowed on a bacon cheeseburger while listening to Arlo Guthrie’s “City of New Orleans” from the bar’s speakers, we set up the tent, and capped the night off with an outdoor shower under the stars. The customary nighttime lullaby, a combination of dubstep and Young Money’s “Bedrock”, pacified our minds as we faded into a deep slumber. Good vibrations.

The next morning, we wake up before sunlight to get all of our gear in line for the three-day mokoro (canoe) trip into the pristine Okavango Delta. Our early morning exuberance, together with a little more dubstep, caused an older dude in a tent nearby to say, “Why don’t you go to the bathroom, there’s no one sleeping there!” So unchill. We packed our backpacks and 25 liters of water into the speedboat that would take us to Boro, a small village whose existence is significantly realized through the tourist industry. Of the approximately 400 people living in Boro, at least 250 are mokoro guides. Boro is the closest thing I’ve seen to a traditional, rural African village that still has thatched-roof huts, no roads, and a toilet that is just a hole in the ground. After relieving ourselves, we headed to the mokoros to meet our two guides, Simon (guy) and Neyo (girl).

Simon was an absolute riot, even if the humor was completely unintentional, and most times this just included his ordinary responses and normal demeanor. For example, when you offered him any type of food, his automatic response was, “YES!?!”, which had the tonal inflection of both enthusiasm and seemed like he was posing a question. Throughout the trip, our topics of conversation included life in Boro, the WWE and famous wrestlers like John Cena, the political system in Botswana, and his favorite music (apparently people go ham for Akon in Bots). Neyo did practically nothing for three days straight, besides being flipped into the Delta with her clothes on when Camille was learning how to pole (row the mokoro). After poling us to the campsite area, she sat around the campsite while Simon would take us on game walks and to the swimming area. Their grasp of the English language was somewhat limited, so often times Simon would respond in ways that didn’t really make sense. Also, Simon briefed us a few times during the trip, using words that were fairly sophisticated, but seemed oddly unnecessary. It was common for him to describe our game walks by saying something like, “We will depart at seven. We will then proceed to circumnavigate the surrounding area to be able to witness some of the diverse landscapes. Our walk will terminate with the setting of the sun, approximately three hours.” Those briefings are extremely hilarious in hindsight. There would be times during the walk where he would describe something specific about a plant, for example, and it felt like he was making it up as he went along, because his short phrases were separated by relatively long pauses. I would say that the little aspects of our trip, like meeting Bison, Tokololo, and Simon, or struggling with the various transportation modes outweighed the larger things you would expect to define a trip of this nature, like herds of elephants or Vic falls.

At the Delta, we went on three game walks, did a sunset mokoro cruise at the hippo pool, went swimming at the waterhole, wrote boatloads of haikus (pun intended), and sang endless verses of the Delta Blues. One night, we were abruptly awoken by the loud snapping of branches in the vicinity of our campsite, and immediately thought an elephant was going on a late night stroll. The next morning, Simon investigated and reported back that a hippo had walked through on his way back to the pool, before dropping his load about 15-yards from our tent. It was probably best we stayed in the tent and did not investigate ourselves, because if you get between the hippo and the water it can react extremely aggressively – hippos kill the most humans out of any Africa animal. The sun was intensely bright, the sunsets were just as majestic as the Lion King portrays, and the full moon lit up the nighttime Delta, during which the high pitch of croaking frogs contrasted the punctuated, booming rumble of hippo calls.


Here's a small sampling of our haikus:

Exemplifying Giulia and Camille's inner cheapskate:

Bitch at the hostel

Ripped us out of our kwacha

Haggle with workers.

Our dubstep alarm, the guy who yelled at us, and dining and dashing due to poor service:

Cockadoo-dubstep

No one’s sleeping at the bar

Pay for toast, bitch please!

Me fulfilling the good cop routine:

Hey Tokololo,

I’ll pay you extra Pula.

Why? cuz you’re a bro.

Guilia Judas-ing Camille to the baboons:

Dog eat dog nation

She used me as a baboon-

Shield! Watch your back

The joke of using the highly inflated kwacha outside Zambia never gets old:

Hey Tokololo

Take us to the market, please

You take kwacha right?

Referring to me at the zam-zim border:

Lets cross the border,

Pics of Zambia police!

No, they kill your face.

Victoria Falls: The Land of Double Rainbows

We set out from Cape Town International Airport early the morning of March 31, had a layover in Jo’burg, and arrived in Livingstone, Zambia midday giving us enough time to drop our stuff at Jollyboys Backpackers then catch our first of many taxi rides from Bison to Victoria Falls. One of our cab drivers back in CT, Marshall, had sent us off giving us the responsibility of reporting back whether Table Mountain of Vic Falls was a more impressive natural feature. I can say that Vic Falls is a better one-time visit due to its sheer colossal size and beauty, but that Table is better for multiple trips because of the various trails and hiking never gets old. After taking out 400,000 of the heavily inflated kwacha currency (~$80), I was ready to make it rain all over Livingstone. Walking through the Zambian side viewing trail for the falls was quite an unexpected escapade, the place was essentially a natural water park. There are dry areas on the trail, but getting completely drenched is unavoidable with the monsoon rains that are created from the splash of the falls hitting the pool below and rising hundreds of feet into the air. One day in and half my clothes were already soaked – I had a very limited wardrobe to limit space.

For Day 2, we embarked to Zimbabwe for the more popular Victoria Falls Park. Zimbabwe, the country infamous for its violently repressive and obdurate dictator, Robert Mugabe, and unimaginable hyperinflation, which peaked in ’08-09 – bills printed were as high as 100 trillion Zim dollars (I bought a 500 billion as a souvenir). Learning about the history of Zimbabwe’s torture factories used to intimidate voters and punish dissidents, the Gukurahundi genocide, and widespread police corruption under Mugabe’s leadership induced what I’ll call the Zim paranoia-complex. Passing from Zambia into Zimbabwe as our first overland crossing was definitely a little unnerving, even though the park is literally just over the border. Before crossing the Zambian side into No Man’s Land (NML), fortified by a barbed wire fence, security shed, and AK-47 clad border police, I thought it was a good scene for a Kodak moment. Bad F***ing idea. With death stares, the two soldiers angrily called me over and made me delete the photo. I definitely felt fortunate that my camera did not get smashed in the severity of my mistake.

Now that the nerves were given a bit of a shock, the sketchy half-mile walk through NML intensified the Zim paranoia-complex. Compared to the U.S., the border security seemed laughable, although we encountered some unexpected security forces in NML. In the distance we could see baboons raiding the line of 18-wheeler trucks, which probably contained some sort of food, and knowing of their aggressive tendencies, this was a little intimidating. Finally coming within sight of the Zim immigration check, a baboon jumps the fence probably 20 feet behind us. The adrenaline spike causes Giulia to have a minor panic and she just about starts to book, using Cams as a shield (not a good idea to run) when Camille, the cool and collected nature whisperer, boldly, but stealthily projects “Don’t run! Don’t run!” Gradually we clear the baboon threat by power walking, the heart rate settles, and we reach immigration. I avoided another minor disaster here through one of my emergency preparation strategies. Zim would not accepted the highly inflated kwacha, ironically enough, but luckily the 300 rand I had stored under the insole of my shoe in a duct tape pouch was accepted and coincidentally the exact amount.

The Zim side was incredibly beautiful and the falls overpowering, without the torrential downpours that characterized the Zam side. It was like the magic of Narnia and Hogwarts combined to create the Land of Double Rainbows, as the mist was penetrated by intense sunlight, fracturing the light beams into the full spectrum of colors (I’ll have to confirm the science here with Bill Nye). Seeing the most distinct and prevailing colors ever from a rainbow with the mighty falls in the background was quite the delight. Bison kept his word and was at the spot he had left us earlier to bring us back to Jollyboys, where we could rest up for the next leg of the journey: the Okavango Delta in Botswana.

Preface to my southern African adventure

Whereas paying a tour company to guide us on a prearranged itinerary through some of southern Africa’s major attractions seems ideal to most inexperienced travelers, Camille, Giulia, and I decided the “free-balling” approach to discovering a few of the lower continent’s gems would be a bit more audacious. No, we didn’t exactly “go commando” the entire trip, but by free-balling I mean our plans were flexible and not at all set in stone, we were just out to blaze our own trail. The plans for getting from place to place and arranging activities at each destination were a bit fuzzy. After reading in travel guides lines like “The public bus from Maun to Nata runs infrequently, on unstable road systems, and will leave once the bus fills completely”, you are kind of left wondering if you’ll end up stuck in some sticks town in Botswana (which almost happened) – not the most reassuring guidelines to say the least. The never-ending streak of logistical difficulties that we dealt with (which are otherwise taken care of by professional tour companies) including modes of transportation, currency issues, security precautions, and accommodation decisions, although stressful, were quite rewarding and afforded boatloads of experience for traveling solely with a backpack. Spontaneity was unavoidable and uncertainty often clouded each leg of the journey. I can unhesitatingly say our trip was completely fulfilling and surprised me in unexpected ways. Here’s a small sampling of the chaos:

We took about eight different forms of transport: Large and small airplanes, public bus, minibus, taxi, various hitchhiking cars, mokoro, and speed boat.

Our math was put to the test using four different currencies (South African rand, US dollar, Zambian kwacha, and Botswana pula)

Crossed international borders five times (also with an unofficial landing in Namibia)

Stayed at five different hostel/lodge/campsite accommodations

Hitchhiked from the first time (and 2^nd, 3^rd, 4^th, 5^th, and 6^th time)

The numbers are daunting given the trip was only 11 days, but the real benefits came from the personal encounters and immersing ourselves in some of the facets of daily life in each country, notably transportation systems and their operators. I can look back and remember calling Tokololo in Botswana or Bison in Zambia for taxi rides, or Thomas and his wife who were nice enough to hitchhike us nearly three hours, or our mokoro guide Simon in the Okavanga Delta. It was our first encounter with “real” Africa – not as real as the child soldiers of Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army in Uganda, but also not as developed or Westernized as Cape Town and much of South Africa. Our first destination, Livingston, Zambia, the tourist hub for Victoria Falls, was the perfect example of what I’m talking about. Here, roads were in disrepair - full of potholes, covered in dirt - and informal exchange and the taxi service seemed to dominate the economy. You don’t drink the tap water, you need a yellow fever certificate for entry, and malaria is still a threat. After spending a day here, however, you realize that your fear of theft is unwarranted and the place is safe and security not a major issue – unlike Jo’burg, which is “the murder capital of the world”, and theft is prevalent.

Traveling with Giulia and Camille was both a blessing and a curse, and that’s me being mild in my judgments. First, their inclination to get down and dirty camping style is not really one of their main features as human beings (as it is for me – the sketchy spot being case in point), and they can often be disagreeable with nature. Although, I must say they handled the tent life (no mattress) rather admirably, with few occasional rants of displeasure. Secondly, with Giulia outpacing Camille, they are literally some of the cheapest, most heartless bargainers/travelers, and have little shame in haggling a cab driver to reduce a fare from 6,000 kwacha to 5,000, even if it is equivalent to only $0.20. We may not see eye to eye on the ethics of free market capitalism, but the savings I incurred from these shrewd calculators saved me a pretty penny without burdening my conscience. Lastly, both are socially conscious humanities majors, with vocal feminist beliefs (as any human should have), again exemplifying the case of the double-sided coin. On the head’s side, we discussed and thought about social phenomena in new and interesting ways atypical to everyday conversation. On the tail’s side, I could easily be judged by using one of my many common phrases like “You chug water like a girl”. All in all, bitchez got jokes for days, and there was never a dull moment between the three of us.

If I had to sum up our trip in one title, I might call it “The Beautiful Disaster: the endless streak of make-or-break moments” or maybe “Tangled Up in Tokololo”. I trust this preface hyped you up as much as the Hunger Games preview, Oh Em GEEEEE!