Round the World

Anybody that works or travels much in sub-saharan Africa comes across TIA. Sometimes it is introduced to them with almost un-African haste. Other times, it slowly grows on them, or dawns. Yet others have their light bulb moment. For some, it needs to be explained to them. But in the end, pretty much everybody comes across TIA.

It's even hard to explain exactly what constitutes a TIA moment. Small things like the drinks delivery truck turning up without either Coke or Green's (Carlsberg green, by far the most popular drink in Malawi) on board. Traffic logjams with no police anywhere, except for 4 all directing traffic at the only junction in the entire city that has traffic lights (which are being ignored by the police). A scheduled bus which is scheduled to leave at 5am or 6.30 or maybe 3pm, or maybe 9am: Basically nobody has the faintest idea what time it leaves, although all agree that it is a scheduled bus and leaves on time. The shipping company that basically takes out adverts to announce that its main ferry is not seaworthy, but continues running anyway; The thieves that stole the double mattress and took half-bikini's but left more portable and expensive items? All incidents of 'TIA'

TIA is used for all those small incidents, issues, problems and kind of 'shrugs. Sh1t happens' moments, and things which just don't make any kid of logical sense, but happen -or not - anyway. Any one incident might happen elsewhere, and bring small amusing stories passed on to friends and families at a later date, but the sheer number of them that you come across leads to TIA. I have had occasion to

To take one small example, i am currently in the Scottish named commercial capital of Malawi, Blantyre. My idea – after the hopeful conclusion of my fight with the Mozambiquian officials, anyway – is to head to Harare in Zimbabwe. It is the next logical destination, and (though I have no intention/interest in avoiding it) to avoid Zimbabwe completely would involve a detour of 6days of solid travel, and significant expense. I really don't have much time left and so could just go straight through to Johannesburg, but as I would still need to pay the required 55usd visa fee to cross Zimbabwe, that seems a little silly. But it isn't as simple as all that. I have so far found nine separate bus companies who operate services between Blantyre and Johannesburg, who offer between 1 and 4 services a week each. Combined, there are at least 20 weekly buses to Johannesburg. All services use the same road through the Tete corridor of Mozambique and then pass through Harare. It is unavoidable. But here's the thing. None of them – not one – offers a service to Harare or is prepared to drop passengers there. I have even offered to pay the full fare to Jo'burg and just jump out early. But none of them will accept that. By now you will have guessed that I haven't managed to find a single company that is prepared to take me to Harare – or offers a Harare service – despite the fact all buses to Jo'burg must go through there, most almost certainly stop there somewhere for a comfort break, or the fact that it is a good 18hours or so closer. Instead, at the moment I am reduced to a trip which at a minimum will consist of 4minibuses and a taxi, 3 currencies, 2 European languages (and countless local ones) in a mammoth of a trip which will probably take me two days. Yup, TIA.

Ah yes, The Lilongwe to Tayport bus...

And as for the Mozambiquian incident described above, it could become a book in itself. Suffice to say that I had found 4 different locations/addresses for the consulate, visiting of which took me 1.5days to visit, only to discover that 3 of them had never had anything to do with the consulate or Mozambique, and the 4th was the consulate – until 5years ago. No taxi driver had any idea where it was (although two happily drove me at random around Blantyre and Limbe for over an hour each hoping they would get lucky and I would pay them lots. We didn't and i didn't). I eventually discovered the consulate is now in a small office block in the centre of Blantyre (with no sign or flag) and which I had walked past at least 6 times during my previous fruitless searches. If that was bad enough, the fight to get the visa I want (It's only a double entry, which is on their price list and so shouldn't be *that* hard to get) is still ongoing, wearying, and seems oddly unsatisfactory to both myself and the consular officials – it is one of those depressing long running 'discussions' in which the only agreement is that we are all unhappy about what is happening, and can't see an end in sight. TIA. There will be no winners here.

When tents go wrong...

As an almost unrelated aside, todays Newspaper watch comes from the Malawian Daily Times. In an article entitle Wife cuts hubby's parts, you can pretty much guess the story and what happened, so i'll spare you the painful (especially if you are male) details. It's the sort of story that does come up every few months even in Europe and is not all *that* uncommon. What makes this one special though, is a throwaway comment near the bottom of the story, which states '... Mverani [the Police officer in charge of the case] said Ndilowe [the wife and scrotum cutter] has in the past been arrested on similar charges but was released on demand by her husband...' . Yes, re-read that. The wife has more than once in the past cut her husbands testicles, yet he has demanded – demanded – her release. My guess is that for that kind of leniency, she either has an absolutely brilliant blackmail photo of him, or is stinking rich and he desperately needs her money. And for the record (just in case you were contemplating it), if anybody happens to deliberately cut my balls – especially more than once – i will not be demanding your release back to me: rather, I will be paying people to keep you away from me for much, much longer....

Moving on.

Yup, This is Africa

Don't know why, but I just like the idea of Solarly.

I had originally planned to cross from Chizi to Likoma by getting a place on a local Dhow, but barely minutes before i started to walk to the dock, I somehow managed to arrange to hitch a lift on a handily timed passing World Food Program boat. As you do.

Likoma is a slight curiosity. A small island with a correspondingly small population, it also houses a cathedral that is bigger than the one in Westminster, and one of the largest in the Southern hemisphere. It is very pretty, well kept, and decidedly out of place.

Though I couldn't tell you why, I much preferred Likoma to Chizi. It was large enough to be able to get a decent walk, with more varied terrain, some good beaches and also some good cheap local restaurants: Rice, beans and veg for about 65p at the Hunger Clinic (and no, i was not spying) became a daily staple. Likoma was also home to hoardes of very friendly young kids, though surprisingly few 'give me's'. Whilst out exploring one day with an English girl called Lisa, we ended up collecting an ever changing mass of kids: At one point I counted 54. All they wanted to do was talk to us in a local language we knew 3words of between us, whilst walking alongside us, preferably (for them) whilst holding our hands. Which meant that I often had one small child hanging off each finger, and a few off my arms as well. At one point, i was convinced I would loose a finger on my right hand to a particularly enthusiastic 5year old. But they enjoyed being lifted up, and just walking with the mzungu's, and even – oddly – stuck strictly to boys to me and girls to Lisa.

Menu at the hunger clinic. No I have no idea what the spy thing is about either

I would certainly recommend that anybody who has time to visit the islands, but time was something I was now lacking. So I had decided to return to Nkhata Bay and go overland rather than wait for the ferry to next head south. But by now the Ilala was properly b*ggered, and the island rumour mill in full swing. Depending on exactly who you talked to, the ferry was definitely coming; definitely not coming; Coming at least 24hours late or Canceled for 3weeks. Inquiries to friends in Nkhata Bay produced more confusion, whilst phoning the shipping company didn't help either – 10 calls returned 4 different answers and 6 non answered. And the 4 responses all turned out to be wrong anyway.

Eventually, consensus said that whilst the Ilala may or may not turn up late to some degree, there was going to be a replacement service to Nkhata Bay (only) the following day. A much smaller boat had been 'borrowed' from the Mozambiquians (Mozambiquei?) and would be leaving at a changeable time that seemed to be being pulled out of assorted hats. On the plus side, there was a boat in evidence tied up near where the Ilala normally moors, which was bigger than anything else around (although admittedly, that isn't saying much).

So at the moment, we basically have no idea what is going to happen, or when. And I don't just mean in the game of beer-dice, to which I have just been introduced, but is fairly incomprehensible to me. We'll just turn up, pray, and see what happens.

Sounds like a fairly typical Rich journey, doesn't it?!

Chizumulu is small, relaxed, friendly, and home to what I can only describe as the most bizarre and inventive set of 'Give me kids' in Malawi. I didn't do much on Chizi: I relaxed a bit, played numerous games of Backgammon and the worryingly addictive Bao. I wandered around the entire circumference of the Island (and yes, if Nose, Fester, Baz or one or two others happen to be reading this, there is a very old joke in there somewhere), collecting kids pied piper style, excepting the lack of music.

But the kids on Chizi were creative to say the least: One kid of about 7 told me long and in great detail about his long struggle, and great jihad he is currently undertaking against his T-shirt (showing me the holes in the T-shirt's back here he had had some victories) to the endless amusement of some of the other kids. I was also bombarded with 'Give me's', which ranged from the normal (money, pen, sweet etc) to the cheeky (Give me cellphone) to the surreal: Give me Grandma, Give me Big Issue and Give me Vagina being the 3 most memorable, though I'm not entirely sure which is my favourite.

About the only other thing that we did was buy and slaughter a goat. And he was pretty damned tasty.

Billy, out goat, before, during and after...

In the end I decided that I had to return yet again, in what I assumed would be a valiant if utterly fruitless attempt to get my police certificate. But in a stunning twist with tradition, I actually got it after only 3 further visits to the police station, and much shouting amongst themselves in Chichewa, of which i have not the foggiest what was being said. And so it transpired that I was in Nkhata Bay on the day the Ilala left for the islands. Over a month ago, I had rocked up in Nkhata Bay with the aim of making just such a journey, but without knowing what day the boat left , to discover I had just missed it. 3weeks in Nkhata Bay and Ruarwe later, and I left Nkhata Bay not expecting to return or be able to visit the islands on this trip.

But being in the right place at the right time (an amazingly unlikely occurrence for me) and just about having enough time decided me. It was now or never. The Ilala in all it's 100+year history is now slightly creaking, shall we say, and all was not well. She had been late arriving after an almost slapstick attempts to fix her had failed, and then only managed an unplanned 2hour tour of the lake at strange hours of the morning (a free journey) instead of actually making it North as timetabled, after breaking yet again.

To be honest, I didn't actually expect it to depart, let alone to go anywhere useful for me. And so we sat in the bar at Aqua Africa talking to people long after the alleged departure time. But at 10pm, we were told that the boat would be leaving soon-ish, so said our farewells and tried to board. The problem was that this leg of the boats journey is by far the busiest, and all the locals had boarded hours ago, leaving the 3rd and 2nd class deck which you board through, erm, quite full. In the end I resolved to cheat, and to the amusement of the many locals watching, climbed up the outside of the boat and in to the first class deck area. My Israeli companion fought her way through the lower carnage and appeared much later. Astonishingly, barely 4.5hours late and without crashing into anything overly significant, we finally left, and after 5hours sat on the open deck (Notable only for the rat which ran over my leg repeatedly during the night) arrived at Chizumulu Island the next morning without incident.

Chizumulu and Likoma are two small islands in Lake Malawi; Malawian due to historical links although well within Mozambique's territorial waters. After a failed attempt to disembark passengers (too choppy) we found another more sheltered bay, lowered our bags over the side and fought our way off.

I never expected to actually make it this far. Anything else is a bonus.

The real steering was completely f*cked, so the Ilala was being piloted from this hi-tech backup system, with guys on the bridge shouting directions at them constantly through the night. The rear compass, alas, does not agree with the front one, and the rear steering is also held in place pretty much by duct tape and bungees, and breaks frequently, so it isn't really a huge surprise that it failed again...

I still cherish the memory of the looks on their faces. It was, I believe, a Friday night in Nkhata Bay, and 5 young English girls wandered into the bar. They were all dolled up as one might be for a big night out in Romford, or, perhaps, the University of Luton, and to me they all looked about 14years old. The came in with a kind of semi-swagger that implied they were used to being the centre of attention, pampered by all, knew everything about everything and generally looked down on us mere mortals that weren't being funded by Daddy's gold card.

Everybody has to start traveling at some point, and you generally start by knowing pretty much b*gger all. Most learn soon enough. Most of us gave them a quick glance, half shrugged and got on with ignoring them and continuing whatever it was we were doing beforehand. But one of the locals in our group had seen something he liked: He walked over to the girls, who were still standing in the centre of the room taking the atmosphere and setting in, with what now looked like faint unease on their faces. Our friend walked up to them, and says 'Hello and welcome. My name is Chicken Pizza. What are your names?'

The look on at least 4 of the 5 faces was priceless. These alpha-girls, who knew everything suddenly betrayed the fact that they had only been in Africa for 2days and really had no idea what the heck was going on. They also didn't seem to be the brightest, as you could see the single shared braincell desperately trying to compute what Chicken had just said, and if they had heard correctly. A combination of semi laughter, confusion, indignation and incredulity washed over them before almost as one, they said 'you what?!'

But they had heard correctly.

Though they certainly don't all have crazy names, in Malawi it is pretty common for the beach boys and those locals who hang around at backpacker haunts and the like to have taken on assumed names which are often a bit daft, but probably easier to remember and pronounce than their real names. Thus, as well as several Kelvin's, Benji's, Koumbe and good solid African names like Innocent and Special, I have also met the likes of Chicken Pizza, Cheese on Toast, Lemon Squeezy, Bacon Sandwich, Eggy Bread, Happy Ending and Bottle of Gin as well as at least a couple that sound more like old fashioned American Indian chief names: Staggers when Drunk and Shits in Bushes both come to mind. One lovely small Mzungu girl had wanted to take on the local name Battery Acid, though it hadn't managed to stick.

As for me? One or two people tried to come up with a suitable name one night, and then came to a happy drunken agreement. You can be sure, however, that I will not be introducing myself to all that many people by saying “Hi. I'm sleeping with sheep”...