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.