Lunch time in the middle of Ramadan, in Tanga town. A huge amount of the inhabitants of this fun-deprived town are Muslims, and apparently that includes the restaurant owners and bar clientele. Hungry-looking, slow-moving, long-shirt-and-funny-little-hat-wearing types shuffle about, no doubt dreaming about mountains of grilled octopus, plates of steaming fragrant rice, cheeseburgers, chipati's and maybe here and there a bacon sarmie. The blood-curdling drone of starving Muslims fills the air, as they wail on the radio and from large, specially constructed towers using megaphones to make sure everyone knows its still Ramadan. Their message, I imagine, is probably something to do with not eating, and god being really fantastic. Its hard to find good food, or a busy bar, no matter how hard one tries. And believe me, I have tried.
We ask the curiously named Black Seed, the local "flycatcher" or tourist hustler, for a good, cheap local bar. No problem! Really good, super cheap place close by! We zoom off, on our spiffy new bicycles, overtaking women in full burqua's, sitting old-fashioned side-saddle on cheap chinese motorbikes, and the usual: chickens running through the streets, men with four hundred kilograms of charcoal on the back of their bicycles, bicycle-riding sugarcane vendors. Tanga is built on a grid, slightly unusually for this neck of the woods, I would think. But the overall effect of wandering through the streets is that everything looks the same- dusty, broken, fixed and then broken some more.
We arrive at our local restaurant. A large, freshly killed rat lies flattened in the road not ten steps from the front door. Our guide promises us that the local dish of plantain and beef stew will be not only delicious and easy on the pockets, but also a cultural experience to remember. Our mouths water at the thought of a hearty beef stew, even if we are slightly uncertain. We sit down at some cramped plastic tables, some chickens milling about and a fan blowing a cool breeze around the slightly squalid, dirty little room.
Cheap African restaurants, in my humble experience, are quite fascinating in their own way. I normally enjoy them thoroughly. Although I can understand why for many mzungus a large chunk of fresh goat meat, or some bits of an unfortunate chicken hanging from a piece of dirty wire over the bar counter, unrefrigerated and popular with flies might seem like dancing with gastroenteritis, I'm generally willing to try it out. Its true, noone uses fridges here, really. The lack of a reliable electricity supply makes long storage of perishables a challenge, and generally people don't bother. So animals are slaughtered in the morning, and the meat is used either that day, or the next. The thirty degree heat generally doesnt get much of a chance to spoil the meat, although its worth trusting your nose, and washing your hands. Besides, its free range! Its generally worth getting past the "why the fuck are you so far from your hotel, honky?" stares one occasionally encounters (very rarely indeed, but it does happen), and the fear so many mzungus have of ugali, or mielie-pap, and enjoying a fine, freshly prepared, locally sourced, home made meal. We're from South Africa! Not New Zealand, or some pussy country where they dont know how to eat with their hands and cook meat on fires!
So when our food arrived, some boiled meat and bits of bone floating in a stodgy paste with some chunks of banana, looking (and smelling) an awful lot like an omnivorous monkeys vomit, we did what I never thought I'd do.
We got up, paid, and left.
Our food untouched. Not a fucking mouthful. Chicken and chips at the hotel restaurant, five minutes later.
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Tanga
Enough of this small village; two chickens and half a donkey. We're off to the suspiciously named, bustling metropolis of Tanga!
Up in the morning, after a night of pillow-biting, nail-chewing, swearword-mumbling and canine-murder-fantasies, thanks to the four farm dogs and one farm puppy. For a while I've suspected them all of being retarded (like, slightly mongoloid). When you throw a stick, they don not fetch. When you call them, they do not come. In the heat of the sunny farm afternoon, when the bees are buzzing and millions of small, frisky nosed and bushy tailed animals bustle about in the nearby bushes begging to be torn limb from limb by any half-capable canine. But no, the dogs lie about under trees, sleeping out their carbohydrate coma's (their diet of ugali is eaten with long teeth, ha ha!) and generally littering the ground, as if some kind of insane doggy massacre has just taken place. But come night time, its Bark O' Clock! Time to bark at things in the darkness! Oh boy! Sleep, for us humans, comes in short, poorly spaced bursts.
Up at the crack of pearly, and out! Sleep when you're dead, or at least, far away from Aurora! Off to Pangani, over the ferry, onto the bus, two hours of being shaken until our insides begin to foam, and just before we involuntarily uncork ourselves, we're in Tanga! No sign of the eponymous jockstraps anywhere, but there are all sorts of distant memories coming back in a wave of heat, dust, car hooters and diesel fumes. Tar roads! Actual shops! Fresh herbs! Oh my fuck, thats a lettuce! Industry! More than three bars! Oh man, the Big Time! Im going to be a part of it.
We're here,Nick and I, ostensibly to buy bicycles. Nick is off to Arusha, where thousands of wazungu (plural whitey) go to climb a retired volcano, or ride about in Land Cruisers and look at animals in parks and have sex in expensive canvas tents. Im off to Malawi, or something, to swim in a big lake, and possibly avoid being thrown in the back of a police truck as the Malawian President (officially called, His Excellency The President, no joke) tests the waters, as it were, for his impending dictatorship. So we're both on holiday, then.
Bicycle buying, like many things in Africa, takes time. 'Polepole', as they say in Swahili. Slowly, slowly. Sometimes, very polepole indeed. First, you have to find a bicycle that isnt made for a 12 year old Chinese girl (everything in Africa is made in China, except the things that are made out of endangered species). Even just finding a shop that sells bicycles is a challenge, because the streets are thick with bicycles- piling up on the pavements, whizzing past on the streets, and furiously ringing their shrill Chinese bells at you to make way. One easily finds oneself seriously considering a bike, lined up in a neat row on shopfront display, when the owner comes out of mosque, or a bar (or both?!), hops on it and leaves you in his dust. Second hand is cheaper, and generally better quality. Choose the one you like, but dont look too interested. Tell the dealer, or random owner, that you like it, but you have another one at half the price. You like this colour better. He'll inform you, with tears in his eyes, that his children haven't eaten in weeks. His grandmother is dying, and the children ate the coffin last month. Eighty thousand shillings! You must be mad! Mzungu, please! A word you hear often is:" Impossible!" After hours of haggling, pleading, stonewalling, on the spot repairs, repairing the repairs, replacing broken parts with pieces from other bikes also on show, he'll take half the original offer, and go home to his bachelor flat and order a pizza with the profits. Or something. This six hour long marathon of haggling, a test of wills, a battle of wits, is all in a days work for the Tanzanian bicycle dealer, I ponder to myself, as I zoom through the dusty and, inevitably, hot Tanga streets on my new, pimped out ride.
Now we have bicycles! The city is ours! The plan is to buy a litre of freshly pressed sugar cane juice, some limes, some gin, some mint, and roam the streets, presenting a menace for both ourselves and the greater community. Tally ho!
Up in the morning, after a night of pillow-biting, nail-chewing, swearword-mumbling and canine-murder-fantasies, thanks to the four farm dogs and one farm puppy. For a while I've suspected them all of being retarded (like, slightly mongoloid). When you throw a stick, they don not fetch. When you call them, they do not come. In the heat of the sunny farm afternoon, when the bees are buzzing and millions of small, frisky nosed and bushy tailed animals bustle about in the nearby bushes begging to be torn limb from limb by any half-capable canine. But no, the dogs lie about under trees, sleeping out their carbohydrate coma's (their diet of ugali is eaten with long teeth, ha ha!) and generally littering the ground, as if some kind of insane doggy massacre has just taken place. But come night time, its Bark O' Clock! Time to bark at things in the darkness! Oh boy! Sleep, for us humans, comes in short, poorly spaced bursts.
Up at the crack of pearly, and out! Sleep when you're dead, or at least, far away from Aurora! Off to Pangani, over the ferry, onto the bus, two hours of being shaken until our insides begin to foam, and just before we involuntarily uncork ourselves, we're in Tanga! No sign of the eponymous jockstraps anywhere, but there are all sorts of distant memories coming back in a wave of heat, dust, car hooters and diesel fumes. Tar roads! Actual shops! Fresh herbs! Oh my fuck, thats a lettuce! Industry! More than three bars! Oh man, the Big Time! Im going to be a part of it.
We're here,Nick and I, ostensibly to buy bicycles. Nick is off to Arusha, where thousands of wazungu (plural whitey) go to climb a retired volcano, or ride about in Land Cruisers and look at animals in parks and have sex in expensive canvas tents. Im off to Malawi, or something, to swim in a big lake, and possibly avoid being thrown in the back of a police truck as the Malawian President (officially called, His Excellency The President, no joke) tests the waters, as it were, for his impending dictatorship. So we're both on holiday, then.
Bicycle buying, like many things in Africa, takes time. 'Polepole', as they say in Swahili. Slowly, slowly. Sometimes, very polepole indeed. First, you have to find a bicycle that isnt made for a 12 year old Chinese girl (everything in Africa is made in China, except the things that are made out of endangered species). Even just finding a shop that sells bicycles is a challenge, because the streets are thick with bicycles- piling up on the pavements, whizzing past on the streets, and furiously ringing their shrill Chinese bells at you to make way. One easily finds oneself seriously considering a bike, lined up in a neat row on shopfront display, when the owner comes out of mosque, or a bar (or both?!), hops on it and leaves you in his dust. Second hand is cheaper, and generally better quality. Choose the one you like, but dont look too interested. Tell the dealer, or random owner, that you like it, but you have another one at half the price. You like this colour better. He'll inform you, with tears in his eyes, that his children haven't eaten in weeks. His grandmother is dying, and the children ate the coffin last month. Eighty thousand shillings! You must be mad! Mzungu, please! A word you hear often is:" Impossible!" After hours of haggling, pleading, stonewalling, on the spot repairs, repairing the repairs, replacing broken parts with pieces from other bikes also on show, he'll take half the original offer, and go home to his bachelor flat and order a pizza with the profits. Or something. This six hour long marathon of haggling, a test of wills, a battle of wits, is all in a days work for the Tanzanian bicycle dealer, I ponder to myself, as I zoom through the dusty and, inevitably, hot Tanga streets on my new, pimped out ride.
Now we have bicycles! The city is ours! The plan is to buy a litre of freshly pressed sugar cane juice, some limes, some gin, some mint, and roam the streets, presenting a menace for both ourselves and the greater community. Tally ho!
Sunday, August 7, 2011
Pangani
Riding on a bicycle to the nearby town of Pangani is always loads of fun. After the recent heavy rains of the last few days, a sunny afternoon is too good to ignore! The road from the farm to Pangani is a mud track, barely more than a glorified path at the best of times. As I ride along, small children run out of their huts and wave. "Mzungu! Muzungu!" Always nice to be noticed. Chickens squawk and leap out of the way; butterflies flit about, playing with death in the form of speeding bicycle tyres. The sun beats down, blasting everything with a cheerful glare and fierce, broiling heat. The omnipresent red dust has transformed after the rains, forming muddy pits you could lose a goat in. Cattle tracks in the mud complete the picture of remote, darkest Africa. As I pedal along, squeaking gently, Iggy Pop wails away on the MP3 player, "Sweet sixteen, in leather boots, body and soul, I go crazy.." Totally at odds with the surrounds. I wonder what the dreadlocked chap sitting by the side of the road pounding mielies, would think if he knew anything about Iggy Pop, and chuckle quietly to myself.
To get into town proper its necessary to cross the river on the ferry, from Bweni. Bweni isn't a village. It isn't anything. A few houses and some scraggly chickens scuttling about in the dirt, eating worms more unfortunate than themselves. It only exists because the ferry needs to stop somewhere over the river. The children here play a game that involves nailing a paint tin lid to a stick, and then running it along the ground. Poor bastards. Someone needs to send an aid shipment of proper toys to Tanzania, desperately. Ninja Turtles, Transformers, Africa needs you!
The river is straight out of Apocalypse Now; small wooden canoes paddle about in the green, slimy looking water. Tropical rainforest lines the sides of the river, coconut palms and their ilk. The ferry is always on the other side of the river. It comes across slowly, fighting the current and the tide, past plastic bottles and other detritus, groaning with the weight of trucks, motorcycles, cars, bicycles and what sometimes seems to be hundreds of people. Snot nosed babies, faces caked with dust, mothers wrapped in elegant kanga's, motorcyclists delivering six cases of beer on the back of their bikes, old men clutching hand woven baskets of live chickens, scuttling and scratching and clucking to themselves. The hoi-polloi that is Africa's public transport- the noise, the spitting of mango pips and nonchalant throwing overboard of litter, the shouting, the crying, the blank faces, the diesel fumes, the sweat.
Pangani is not a tourist town. A few mad mzungu's come here- some lost, some adventuring off the (very) well beaten track (ie: Zanzibar), some volunteers. But, after Zanzibar's heaving tides of pale-skinned vacationers, its a pleasure to be able to spot a whitey out in a crowd. It feels slightly more authentic, for one thing. No queues of safari-suited Americans snaking through the streets photographing everything that moves, no constant smell of sunblock and chatter about hair dryers and nail varnish. Luxury!
To get into town proper its necessary to cross the river on the ferry, from Bweni. Bweni isn't a village. It isn't anything. A few houses and some scraggly chickens scuttling about in the dirt, eating worms more unfortunate than themselves. It only exists because the ferry needs to stop somewhere over the river. The children here play a game that involves nailing a paint tin lid to a stick, and then running it along the ground. Poor bastards. Someone needs to send an aid shipment of proper toys to Tanzania, desperately. Ninja Turtles, Transformers, Africa needs you!
The river is straight out of Apocalypse Now; small wooden canoes paddle about in the green, slimy looking water. Tropical rainforest lines the sides of the river, coconut palms and their ilk. The ferry is always on the other side of the river. It comes across slowly, fighting the current and the tide, past plastic bottles and other detritus, groaning with the weight of trucks, motorcycles, cars, bicycles and what sometimes seems to be hundreds of people. Snot nosed babies, faces caked with dust, mothers wrapped in elegant kanga's, motorcyclists delivering six cases of beer on the back of their bikes, old men clutching hand woven baskets of live chickens, scuttling and scratching and clucking to themselves. The hoi-polloi that is Africa's public transport- the noise, the spitting of mango pips and nonchalant throwing overboard of litter, the shouting, the crying, the blank faces, the diesel fumes, the sweat.
Pangani is not a tourist town. A few mad mzungu's come here- some lost, some adventuring off the (very) well beaten track (ie: Zanzibar), some volunteers. But, after Zanzibar's heaving tides of pale-skinned vacationers, its a pleasure to be able to spot a whitey out in a crowd. It feels slightly more authentic, for one thing. No queues of safari-suited Americans snaking through the streets photographing everything that moves, no constant smell of sunblock and chatter about hair dryers and nail varnish. Luxury!
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