Waiting for Our Ship to Come In - an Essay

 

 

Can Anyone Tell Us What's Going On?

The last twenty four hours have been pretty eventful, as we made our way from Livingstone, Zambia, to Chobe, Botswana.  However, it was not exactly a smooth transistion.  Even the best laid plans can be thrown off the tracks, as we found out today.

We set out after a leisurely morning at the Hotel.  We slept in today, since the time change and travel have left us a bit tired.  We’ve been on the go constantly since Sunday in Senegal, and you learn to catch up on sleep when you can.  Anyway, the driver showed up mid-morning.  He was not the same guy we were told would pick us up ... a possible sign of concern.  

After working and “being on the clock” in the villages of Senegal, we have now entered the travel adventure phase of this trip.  We like going to places we’ve never been, so here we are in Zambia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe.  There are many spectacular sights to see in this neck of the woods.  

So we set off with this new driver who was going to take us across the border.  Just which border was not entirely clear.  I had understood we were going to Zimbabwe, but no, we were heading one hour’s drive to Botswana.  Africans are able to endure a huge amount of ambiguity.  Their lives are filled with ambiguity. Often, no one seems to know what’s going on, at least it seems that way to us.

Anyway, the vehicle is a nice rig and we drive cross country to our uncertain destination.  The weather is nice, warm and sunny, and it’s a very pleasant drive through the rolling hills of Zambia.  We come to a remote intersection on the road and turn, and by this time it has become clear that the border is a river.  What river, we’re not quite sure, we understand that the Zambezi River meets the Chobe River at the place where we were supposed to cross.

The first thing we notice is a super long line of trucks, waiting to cross the river/border.  We’re talking hundreds of trucks, a line maybe two miles long.  Our driver explains that they have to wait to cross the border/river and sometimes it can take up to two weeks!  What, are you kidding me?  It takes two weeks to get across this river?  No, he says, cars can cross quicker.  

So we get up to the front of the line, and it’s like a frontier border/river crossing.  Hundreds and hundreds of people milling about, countless trucks, border guards with big Automatic Rifles, vendors selling bananas and trinkets, with an atmosphere of general choas and confusion.  We wait for a while ... and realize there is no one there to meet us.  

The idea is that this driver will hand us off to another driver who will take us across the river to Botswana.  We are very unfamiliar with this plan.  We wait and nothing happens.  Our replacement driver tries to find someone or call someone, and gets no response.  He wanders off for long periods of time and we sit there in strange surroundings.  We wait and finally go through customs and enter the large amazing loading zone area on the riverbank - amazing because of the anarchy going on.  

There is still no one to meet us and the driver can take us no farther.  We’re starting to become annoyed at all this “ambiguity”, and frankly, we have no idea what the hell is going on.  People try to help us but have no idea either, and the vendors try to sell us food, and little carved elephants.  “I make you good deal my friend!”

So this goes on for a couple hours.  Why haven’t the guys who are supposed to meet us contacted us?  We can see the other side of the river/border and there are a bunch of trucks over there waiting to cross to our side.  We find out that at this point in Africa, four countries actually converge - Zambia, Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe.  

Finally the original driver we were supposed to have ... shows up.  The new driver and him get into a heated discussion, but we still don’t know much.  How do we move on from here?  Eventually they assure us that the guys from the other side are coming to meet us.  Yeah, right ....

But about twenty minutes later, the small rickety ferry boat (which can only carry basically one truck at a time) shows up and there is our guide "Blessing" - that’s right, his name is Blessing.  I had some thoughts about a name like that after the chaotic day we had so far, but we traipsed on foot with our bags and hopped across the gap onto the boat, (which is probably smaller than the Buena Vista Ferry across the Willamette in Oregon), and we make it to the other side, Botswana.   

As I sit writing this blog post in Kasane, Botswana, on the shores of the Chobe River, I reflect.  Patience has never been a strong point of mine.  You have to be able to adsorb a high degree of amibguity in Africa, and we had our fill today.  Hopefully, things begin to improve tomorrow, and looking back, a day like this can seem amusing.  But not while you’re going through it.  At least I was able to get some decent pictures.

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So we get to our hotel in Botswana and are greeted by signs warning us about Crocodiles. Apparently they are all around and occasionally eat people. I will keep my eye out.

And outside our room, there was a bunch of these critters eating on the lawn. Warthogs are not pretty animals, somebody at dinner told us they are part of the Big Five of ugly animals.

I was trying to get close to get a good picture and this dude charged me! Yikes! I tried to calm him down "easy now, easy fella, just want to get a photo ... smile!"