Charlie and Steve's Excellent Adventure

April 26, 2015

While you were working – Sale, Kathmandu, Nepal

Another day comes screeching in the window in this most manic of cities, the regular bleat of car and scooter horns is fast becoming our sound-track to Kathmandu. With passes sorted for hiking Annapurna yesterday we stay the hand of giddy hiking excitement to delve for a more tourist mode, and in Kathmandu that means Durbar square. This most spiritual of cities is a flame for the worlds moths seeking enlightenment, peace or otherwise to flock and buzz in time with the crowded mass. Durbar square forms a particularly dense hub of shrines and stupa’s (buddhist shrines) for those seeking the light or heathens like us just wanting to gawk.

Into the throb once again with eyes a little less wide than yesterday we push on through the crowds as the crowds push on around us. The streets are a tapestry of dilapidation too tight to be multi purpose arteries for pedestrians, cars, scooters, rickshaws, donkey carts, beggars and fruit stalls alike. Something in this chaos has got to give but nothing does, an incompatible world resolves differences on the honk of horns and sharply spoken directions. Like an unexpected chance to breathe under water we spy a stupa in a courtyard and dash in. It’s a small pocket of space and of course we’re guided into an art school selling thanka’s, the impossibly detailed and perfect circular motifs that make up much of popular art here. If there’s one thing this travel has done for us it’s that we’re bully proof, the heavily spiritual ideology of a thanka feels quite distant for me so it’s all appreciation for the skill but no thanka thanks.

Durbar square, Kathmandu, Nepal

On this detour we do spy a semi circle of monks in deep meditation around a golden buddha. Red and yellow robes hang elegantly off the picture perfect forms of stillness in a scene of lavish cleanliness and luxury. Behind a locked door and glass panel they’re a department store window display inspiring desire and aspiration, spirituality and retail marketing sharing some common threads possibly. Looking on at the monks however it can’t be ignored, trite jokes aside there is a world just metres away that, although exciting, is intense, harsh and invasive. We’ve made it less than ten minutes on our walk and already I’m happy just to sit and watch these pictures of serenity for a few more seconds. A place for everything and everything in it’s place the saying goes, we have our escapes that are available to us at home and in this heaving world I instantly look a little les cynically on this action, sitting still in silence doesn’t seem so silly at all when Kathmandu is your world.

Arriving at Durbar square it turns out it’s a festival for mothers, no surprise, there’s a festival most days and we have a chance to see the Kumari Devi, an incarnation of a god similar to the more well known Dalai Lama. As amazing as this sounds it’s not uncommon, avatars and incarnations are pretty common in this shopping mall of salvation and rebirth. The Kumari Devi is however the most important one here, the young girl plucked from nowhere to be essentially locked up and revered until she has her first period and then she’s put out to pasture and another girl is chosen for the life of torment. Sadly the poor girls are deemed bad luck to marry so often lead lonely mortal lives, mystical bad luck or haughty ex goddesses reaching new heights of pain-in-the-ass: no comment required.

Guarding Nasal Chowk, Durbar square, Kathmandu, Nepal

Atop a pyramid like Shrine we gain a commanding view and a space above the throb somewhat, our own little semi meditative silence. The buzz, the life and the vibrance fights with my cynical self as I try to see the Kumari Devi among other things as a beautiful symbol of solidarity and hope and not yet another form of spiritual child abuse. Paralleled with the scene of the monks that seemed nothing short of beautiful, perfect and completely without contradiction, my questioning mind reels with a patchwork of beauty and tragedy that is fantastic to be within but not without conflict. Offerings are made en masse with the whole world seemingly buying favour of some form; health to an ill relative, guidance in a time of trouble, a new iPhone. The vivacity and completeness of faith here does in many ways overcome my cynicism in a swell of colour and life far from the beaten down submission of mono theistic corporations.

Once again we’re on the move, and one can’t ignore a great Asian past time, spitting; not in all cultures of course but it’s a bit of an Asian thing lets be honest. A rickshaw driver pulls up to me seeing a tourist face as money and commences to indulge in the oral equivalent of child birth. Thwack, the frothy pile of sputum lands centimetres from my feet as he makes eye contact, ‘taxi’? With a giggle I politely decline and turn away thinking that I should never hire a Nepalese salesperson.

Feeding pigeons, Durbar square, Kathmandu, Nepal

On a cloud of borderline comfortability with less questioning of a more faith based life we make our way back towards our guesthouse to collect some last items of gear for our trek. In a screech and hail of yelled words the tenuous joy and warmth of a world left to unthinking faith comes crashing down, two men are abusing a rickshaw driver and landing a few punches to his face for good measure. The rickshaw driver doesn’t respond, he takes what seems to be his due; the only conclusion we can draw is one of caste or class differences. In short time more people are in to calm the situation but it plays a harsh display for a spiritual life where a man has no right to defend himself from being punched and abused on a busy street. Castes and spirituality are different yes but blind belief lies at the core of both; I find them hard to entirely separate. With no small sense of shame we walk on without helping. The scene is calming, it’s not our culture we tell ourselves and this is true but the shame clings to our skin like oil. Which shrine do I go to to wash this one off I think but sadly no shrine helps this, we walk on saddened and conflicted again, joy remains in the bounds of Durbar square for those that can afford the rupees to enter.

Trailing a scent of consternation through our shopping exercise our world of outdoor gear lacks a little sheen of excitement. We’re amid a popular western version of chasing happiness still rolling with the memories of the eastern counterparts highs and lows. I can’t help but think that as preposterous as some faiths are, shopping for materials to feel happy is in quite a similar boat. Monks in a shop window, people buying favour or a down jacket; it seems that shopping in Nepal might just have a broader mandate than we perceive. The world is going shopping and everything’s on sale with the currency you’re spending dictating the store you’re in. Our currencies of time, money and effort have bought travel full of hope but the finite goal sits indistinct at the end of the year; I guess we just have to have a little faith.

April 25, 2015

While you were working – New Jacket, Kathmandu, Nepal

More clear headed today we awake with senses more coherent than dazed, more eager than retreating. There’s a world outside the window of our guesthouse but it’s barely outside at all, sounds wedge themselves into every nook of this city including our room. And so the slow resurrection from travel coma takes place, drowning in the sounds and smells of a chaotic and over populated mecca we paddle against the tide of fatigue to be delivered into this crazy new world. It seems the world won’t wait, we have to call a local contact made through a friend at home, a tea trader who wants to catch up. A local interaction is great but the persistence is not, a list of essential chores for our hiking trip awaits us, we put the meeting on hold.

Like a slap in the face the doorway to our guest house seems more like a science fiction portal to a parallel universe. Across dusty broken streets we stumble into a post post-apocalyptic scene roaring at our senses. Humanity has destroyed itself and now rebuilds within the dilapidated structures left behind but without the resources to rebuild effectively, order is so far away and no one seems intent on looking for it. This futuristically ancient style feels like it should be depressing, threatening but it’s quite the opposite. People all around display bright intelligent eyes, an explosion of colour adorns busy postures within the heady musk of incense, victorious people adorning streets of apparent defeat.

Edit

Spice buying negotiations, Kathmandu

Hippies abound in a tailor made setting for middle class righteous escapism, it’s white kid in nose ring and pashmina heaven. Beggars line the streets and cry out displaying their grotesque deformities, scooters pile through laneways made into haphazard streets beeping horns in repetitive predictability. The tide of people flows, there are no rules, we dodge the scooters, the scooters dodge the hippies and the hippies dodge the beggars to the realisation that no one really knows who is dodging who. Across the bumpy cobbles that shout from a time long past we dance, duck and weave in this activity called walking, painted faces move in rhythm, blazing costumes glitter with sparkling gold and a hum of noisy repetition drives the throng forward. We’ve barely walked ten metres in this drag show made into a city that needs no party drugs to heighten the senses, if anything this place needs a downer or two, it feels more like 3am in a gay bar and the crowd is pumping, welcome to Kathmandu.

A quick walk to the tourism office goes more smoothly than planned and before long we’re back in the guesthouse keen for a relax, but no our tea guy Keiron is really insistent and apparently there’s people waiting. People waiting we think, did we ask for people? This is sounding less like a great travelling opportunity to see a local gem and more like a traveller pressure scam as the minutes go by. Scam or not we steel ourselves for some possible confrontation and jump in the cab. The cab ducks and weaves through streets that have no rights to channel cars and onward out of the denser parts of the city centre. Past a putrid river the scene is bleak, the scourge over population is alive and well in Kathmandu, foetid squalor forms a home for so many.

A family making offerings at a shrine, Kathmandu

Moment of truth, we’re greeted more like foreign dignitaries and welcomed into a shabby business building that embodies the run down aesthetic of this city. Formal couches are laid out and we’re ready for the hard sell but oddly feel no pressure, moreso respect. Apprehension flies away on a whisp of incense, it looks a lot like we’re viewed as import opportunities via our friend at home, Mark. An inner sigh of relief envelopes us as we try tea and get an education from a true tea guru Nepal style. The tea god slurps tea and intakes his breath with a pomp and concentration to outshine the most snobbish of wine tasters, this is a true art. We chat as knowledgeably as we can but ultimately defer any hopes to our friend at home. Past a veil of concern for this meeting we have indeed had a rare gem of an experience, we float from a cloistered scene of hidden dealings that make Africa seem like a time before the apocalypse destroyed records, what a difference a day makes.

But as the saying goes, don’t judge a book by it’s cover, Kathmandu looks like a society defeated living in squalor but one taste of a local Nepalese delicacy reveals nothing of desperation or bare necessity. Like Australia, Nepal’s culinary identity borrows from it’s neighbours; Chinese, Indian and Tibetan blend in a spicy mix of flavour, heat and aroma. Momo’s are the dumpling flagship dish but a day filled with noodle soup, hand rolled pasta dumplings, masala and everything in between has us in food heaven. We had thought the food journey would kick off in China but it seems the boat is leaving early.

The tea guru serving Nepalise white tea, Kathmandu

Like a first contraction of pupils in a room with a light suddenly flicked on Kathmandu reveals a crowded space backed up by a flood of smells and sounds too numerous to catch. The potentially forlorn scene to first greet our eyes belies a motivation and energy of a people living big in a place that seems so otherwise. Endless streets of decay support an even greater array of beautiful crafts from fine metalwork, gorgeous textiles, stone carvings and musical instruments. On a canvas of such dilapidation an artwork takes shape of unimaginable colour with no shred of the defeat one senses on that first flick of the light. We look, we digest and at each passing moment the cover to this book seems more and more inaccurate; this book needs a new jacket but we’ll keep reading. Or maybe it’s perfect after all.

April 24, 2015

While you were working – Making Sense, Kathmandu, Nepal

Words are such a powerful thing sometimes, fear, joy, love and despair join a raft of emotions that can be dragged irrationally from seemingly nowhere and laid upon the unsuspecting victim from the utterance of a single word. These unbidden fish are plucked from the still waters of our minds so individually they rarely carry any shred of similar meaning to another person. For any traveller however there is an expression that is as soul dragging as it is universal: travel day. Just when you have clean clothes, the local accent becomes understandable and you start doing normal poo again from a sudden shift in diet you’re off. Not satisfied with just upsetting the apple cart of certainty we opt to do it via the bowel-wateringly sadistic world of plane travel. Travel also turns you into a whining princess with no idea of your own privilege, can someone send me a care package?

And so it goes, we’re off again, this time to Asia for the first time and towards mountains, new culture, a good timezone for Australia and above all: food. For two food junkies we have clearly planned this year on different priorities, we’ve had plenty of great food to be sure but culinary juggernaut cultures we haven’t seen. We climb into the sensory depravation chamber that is a plane with dreams of chilli, lemongrass, mint, sambal and the list goes on, I need to stop because I’m drooling on my tiny pillow. We can nearly taste Asia already, Nepal isn’t a big star of the asian food scene, that will hit us in a few weeks in China but the dream is big enough to keep us going.

First stop Singapore, just a quick stopover sadly, this three flight odyssey refuses to release us from the grip of boredom until it’s finally over. It’s 6am in a typically humid Singapore morning that refuses to reach me in my air conditioned airport cafe. This city of polished glass, clean footpaths and new money wealth wakes as the small rim of remaining coffee clinging so defiantly to the bottom of my cup prepares to say farewell. I’m transfixed, is this the last of my coffee I ponder, the complicated world is so easily simplified by a tired mind; dumb in spite of the coffee. More minutes pass than I have any idea how to count as my unseeing sweep of sight crosses the spacious Changi airport floor once again; this time Charlie is running back. Running; how odd.

“There is no flight, our flight doesn’t exist” he says with commendably measured concern while dragging the iPad out to call home, we thank the stars that it’s daytime in Australia; divine luck, intervention maybe. In no time we are now looking at our proper itinerary and not the old one, whoops, and in a flash our short sharp stopover is now a day in Singapore. Like the hand of a god, modern technology needs just 20 minutes to reach down from the clouds, or is it the definite article singular my short attention span wonders, and deliver us into a conversation with an old friend now in Singapore. Unlike a godlike phenomenon however we have a tangible outcome and we’re on a train to meet up, Singapore here we come.

Steve who I call ‘Panda’ much to his ire on account of his Cantonese heritage holds the dubious honour of being my first ever gay friend, and a friend he still is as much as ever will be. More like a family member, we know more about each other than we probably should, we trust each other more than is advisable and just like brothers care for each other more than we’d ever admit. And here he is, less than an hour ago he was somewhere in the pond of this world just like all the other fish and a few words on a screen later he’s here, this day is feeling more divinely guided as it goes along. It was no divine miracle, just an immaculately clean train shuttling a sea of phone screens being watched too closely by spectacled eyes but a struggling brain will cling for simplicity.

The backdrop of this chance reunion is lunch in a converted carpark of beef soup and nasi lemak that feels more of a spiritual awakening than a quick snack; Asia I love you already even if you are a surprise detour. Where many cities boast historical grace, the boom growth of Asia is right here and now delivering us a city that is clean, polished, perfect and full of architectural daring; a modern city in a way that Asia does better than anywhere. It lacks the gritty heart and soul of a cultural patina but in it’s place this movie set exactness draws you in none the less; well on a short visit it does at least.

Before our vague minds can grasp the surprise of this fantastic ‘bonus day’ we’re back in the chamber and off again into a world of overly important paper, ladies with perfect hair and socially criminal food for one. Time stands still and it spins too fast; it’s probably for the best not to know how much sleep we’ve lost or failed to catch in the dirty, chaotic and unwelcomingly pungent Kathmandu airport. This trip into Asia is full of expectation but lets not talk about food so much, we’re in one of the worlds most spiritual cities after a day that seems inexplicable to common reason. Ignoring that the above words basically have explained it all I’ll put it down to the vague inept headspace of travel drone to deliver me an explanation wrapped in mysticism and miracle. That makes sense; right?

April 23, 2015

What you’d rather be seeing – Southern Africa

Africa…A Disney Production ➡️ The Beauty, Beasts and Others

BEAUTY

On the Okavango Swamps at sunset, Botswana

Sunrise over Moremi, Botswana

The raging Zambezi river from the Zimbabwe side

Sunset over Letsibogo dam while be braaied, Selibi Phikwe, Botswana

Sunset over Moremi, Third Bridge Camp, Botswana

Sunset Okavango Swamps, boating back, Botswana

BEASTS

Elephants drinking, Senyati Safari Camp

Great white shark, Gansbaai

Being watched, Nxai pans, Botswana

The great white rhino, endanged and grand, Kharma Rhino Sanctuary, Botswana

Elephants searching for water, Senyati safari camp, Botswana

Oxpecker doing its job on a buffalo, Chobe national park, Botswana

Curios zebras, Nxai pans, Botswana

Fish Eagle, watching over the Chobe river, Botswana

Young male Impalas boxing, Savuti, Chobe national park, Botswana

OTHERS

Cape Town to Johannesburg train, enroute. South Africa

Alex, captain of the broken down boat at sunset, Okavango Swamps, Botswana

Steve watching the boats, Seapoing, Cape Twown, Soith Africa

Women watching the world go by, Seapoint, Cape Town, South Africa

April 21, 2015

Top 10 – Southern Africa

Like a whirlwind we whistled through southern Africa only too aware that we are putting the merest toe in the water of this great continent. But alas, there is a big world out there waiting to be seen and Africa proper will wait for another time. Botswana played host to us for the majority of the ‘Africa leg’ of this journey with South Africa and Zimbabwe the only two other countries on our list. Africa is indeed wild and unsurprisingly we had a wild time. Without further ado, here’s with we think will stain our memories most clearly as the years roll by.

10- Nxai Pan, Botswana:

Nxai Pan was but one of the National parks we visited and in total a short stopover in the game watching safari of Botswana. The Pans themselves were somewhat without note in comparison to the other camping adventures on our route; with one exception. We failed dismally in our attempt to banish expectation of seeing a big cat and it was at Nxai Pan, on our last day in a National Park that we finally got our sighting. In the few seconds of a bounding cheetah and it’s two cubs, Nxai Pan scrapes into number ten.

9- Shark diving, Gansbaai, South Africa:

This one is a bit of a no brainer, for a couple of scuba divers there’s little to compare with staring into the eyes of a Great White Shark. It would be higher in the list if not for the poor visibility and that we weren’t scuba diving at all, just bobbing on the surface. All the limitations in the world however cannot override the thrill of seeing these beasts in their habitat.

8- Khama Rhino Sanctuary, Botswana:

Take what you expect from an expensive National Park and place it in an affordable, well run park with great roads and you have Khama Rhino Sanctuary. But the stars of the show are undoubtedly the rhino’s themselves, these staggering beasts aren’t shows within a sanctuary, the sanctuary is but a stage on which the stars of the show wow their audience. To think that people kill these creatures just for the famous horn seems tragic beyond measure after seeing them so close.

7- Selebi Phikwe, Botswana:

I’ve heard of this place for over a decade, it’s where a young Charlie grew up, had his first day of school and carries his first memories of childhood friends. For so long this has been just a name to me and in visiting team Germany, Herman and Heidi, 12 letters have now become so much more. Playing golf, venturing into the bush for a braai (Barbecue) and poking around the shops means different things to both of us but equally indelible memories.

6- Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe:

The term natural wonder is thrown about quite easily to many things but few are as worthy of the mantle as Victoria Falls. One of the three great falls of the world and set in the small town named after the falls themselves, this part of the world is a buzz of excitement. Add to the mix jumping off a 100m cliff on one of the worlds biggest swinging ropes it’s one of the places we are sure to visit again some time in the foreseeable future.

5- Cape Point, South Africa:

Africa just trots out wild places like foul language from a sailor, Cape Point is just one of those examples. Not quite the most southern tip of the continent it still retains the feeling of being an abrupt finish, the refinement of a grand funnel of wilderness drawn to a point. Sheer cliffs buffeted by raging winds are equal parts grace and ferocity in a delicate balance. Stand on the edge of the cliff and look north, an entire continent pours down on you from a truly beautiful place.

4- Stellenbosch, South Africa:

Anyone who knows us will know that we’re suckers for a wine region and again we give in to our own cliche. It’s probably not alone in the world for any particular feature but the combination of grand and gracious landscapes, gorgeous historical buildings and university town buzz marks it as a place to be. Oh, and we had really nice wine too, just a couple of glasses.

3- Moremi Camping, Botswana:

Into the truly heavy hitting end of the list comes Moremi and in particular the camping within the Moremi Game Reserve. We camped in a bunch of places but Moremi was the winner. Always on a river running into the Okavango delta we had uninterrupted views of a world untamed, and that untamed world had a good look at us too. The scenery was beautiful and the night time visitors from wildlife ranged from heart racing to awe inspiring in a place that defined the African wilderness to us on this trip.

2- Rafting Zambezi, Zimbabwe:

It’s that word again, wild. Not in the animal sense this time, the Zambezi river lives up to it’s reputation as one of the wildest commercial whitewater rides in the world. Running off from Victoria falls we were tumbled, washed and hung out to dry by a river of humbling power the likes of which I’ve never seen, and this was in the high water tame end of the year. We must return.

1- Okavango Delta, Botswana:

On the back end of what will probably remain the worst week of this year to visit Chobe and Moremi we began the drying out process on the Okavango. Ironically the delta is where the great Okavango river dries out to nothing, sinking into the Kalahari sands to never reach an ocean. Our whole experience in the delta was typified by our boat ride through the reeds and into the broad waters of this famed wilderness. We had drama, we had excitement, we had grace and we had the sunset of the trip. We barely touched a fraction of the delta but in that glance we were taken. If much of Africa has been about a journey into the wild, then the jewel in that crown is the Okavango Delta

April 19, 2015

While you were working – Take a Seat, Johannesburg, South Africa

My sunburnt forearm reaches for a life nestled into a cup holder; spilled trail mix, bottle tops and a lip balm we thought we’d lost are all retrieved from the safety deposit box of life on the road. I sit idly on a seat with no imperfection other than a stain on the left side where a macadamia nut found a home under a bum for a day ready to lift myself off it for the last time. Preparing to leave my mind wanders past a grubby mark on the dashboard not quite removed from the broad sweep of a wet cloth. It’s the only reminder of a drive that seemed more water than road at times, a betraying hint on a plastic tabloid that otherwise conspires with us to hide the secrets of our waterlogged voyage to roads we should have avoided but were never going to. A crime scene wiped clean of clues surrounds me from a journey into the wild and back again. And so the marks we hide from and wash away draw to a close this road trip not to be forgotten anytime soon.

Our final border crossing came down upon us like curtains drawn on a stage show full of spectacular sets, elaborate costumes and fine performances. A lasting final memory will always be getting overtaken by a bus when we were driving at 120km/h, shamefully the bus had a trailer; the trailer had no tyre. A bare screeching rim tore up bitumen from the road to lay a gouge path before us while we simply shrugged and giggled, long lost is the conservative propriety of a country so unfamiliar with breaking the rules. In just one month living from this car we’ve already become somewhat immune to the outrageous. “Only in Africa” we say as the broken record turns yet again.

This 24 hour pass through South Africa came and went in an amber tinge with a few guys forming a new rugby club to provide a social outlet that could never quite dull the realisation that we were leaving, our minds already on the plane we will soon board. I now scratch at a small imperfection on a large gaudy chair made of far too much timber, a throne for African royalty while Charlie races off to wash the car we apparently needed to return clean. My mind wanders to our wanderings and the state of our poor car that we’ve put through hell. The brakes are now very spongey, squeaks and groans cry out but as wilfully as it has carried us through the mire it returns now looking like it never left; appearances can be deceiving.

From planted bum to planted bum this day of sitting finds me on a formed plastic chair of scant padding with no imperfections I can find, we’re in an airport so clean and far from the Africa that overtook us in the bus. So the question remains, what is Africa to me, or more pertinently, what is real Africa? The nagging question that has floated with us this whole trip remains elusive but not as distant as it has been. The immediate premise of this philosophical roundabout starts with the unavoidable ideal of the wild, the untamed, the dashboard before it’s introduction to the wet cloth.

This romantic frontier bravado of the wild is never far from a description of real Africa but a definition for me refuses to solidify, as intrinsic as the wild is to Africa so is the diversity of Africa. The wild might form a popular and apt base but defining a singular definition of a place defined by diversity is a masochistic exercise of no conclusion, just comfortable dead ends placating lazy minds. In this chair that seems so un-African the notion of a real Africa remains as individual as those who care to imagine what it is.

I touched down in Africa with a lifetime of National Geographic photos flashing through my mind to a soundtrack of soothing David Attenborough tones. Bare elongated breasts, painted faces and a disney musical blend with tales of stoic dung beetles, turmoil, a cult figure and a recent history of unrest; a clean wrapping around a rough edged gift. While so much of that notion of wilderness also calls out to me I have found myself increasingly conflicted with it, are the less wild things any less African? To think that Africa must weave baskets, carve wood, paint faces and continue brutal rites of passage to retain identity that is lauded from abroad seems absurd, insulting. If I have a coffee at a trendy cafe in a new suit while checking financial markets on my iPad am I any less Australian? A foreign middle class romanticism cannot entrap Africa to a life lived in decades past for our own ideology, it’s dangerously close to an appalling resolution that the only good African is a poor African.

So Africa to me is wild but not only wild, it’s shedding the skin placed upon it by those of us that would like to keep it on the mantle piece as a novel muse. Africa, like the rest of the world is growing upward, outward and all over the place and it’s in this state of rapid shift that I find my idea of Africa taking shape. There’s no shortage of tragedy and sadness to mix with triumph and bravery here. Africa persists, adapts and keeps on keeping on in the face of disaster so often sadly dealt by it’s own hand.

In the midst of constant struggles the likes of which would bow the strongest of wills the resilience of Africa shines through, here is where I take my Africa away with me in place of the mental pacifier of a ‘real Africa’. My impressions of a wild place, a return to simpler times seems punctuated by such fight, bravery and stoicism that can only draw admiration. In my admittedly superficial glance with Africa I see these strengths beaming out at me from the bent old man in a village to the sharp woman in a crisp suit alike. Africa has been beaten down, thrown through the mincer and derailed even by itself yet a people continue to smile, an African smile. Some smiles are joyful, whimsical, seductive or demure but no smile carries unrestrained fight that will never be defeated quite like an African smile. A history complicated beyond description has never been made so plain by anything in the world like those big rows of bright white teeth. It’s easy to hope for a brighter day tomorrow but why wait till then; we’ll be in a plane seat soon and above all I’ll take memories of my Africa, a day that needs no sun to be a good day, just an African smile.

April 17, 2015

While you were working – Final Whistle, Selebi Phikwe, Botswana

A fleeting glance greets our arrival into Phikwe, the dull thud of bags striking a floor have barely finished their echo as we breeze out of town again headed for the dam, wherever that is. Bundled into a car with another German family we’re buoyed in our little piece of Europe off to see the local sights of Africa. Following Herman and Heidi we venture off the main road and through a tangled web of unmarked tracks that pass for roads today, we all thank our lucky stars that we’re with locals, we’d be lost by now. And on we forge, twist after turn getting further lost as we follow dutifully. Soon enough the brake lights before us light up and Heidi gets out, it turns out it felt like we were getting lost for a good reason, because we are. It’s all a bit comical, a bit of backtracking and some help from a few kids on a donkey cart pushes us in the right direction, voila, the dam. And yes, it’s not an odd African expression, it’s exactly what it is, a dam.

But a beautiful dam it is, the sharp rocky kopjies jut from the waters surface like purpose built islands in this sea that wasn’t mean to be to form a sunset built for a postcard. This dam is not only a cracker of a site for our dinner feast it’s another sign of Botswana’s relative development in a continent known so much for the lack of it. Botswana remains one of the front runners of stability and security in this wild continent, I’d referred to it as the Germany of Africa and with a host of Germans it seems that way still. Botswana boasts the strongest currency in Africa and although it’s far from perfect it gladly skirts the depths of sadness that form the common reputation of so many countries in Africa.

We stared face to face with the messy aftermath of colonial rule throughout South America, every country was somewhere on the path towards recovery. Without travelling this massive continent I’m left to hang on reputations and words from others far more knowledgeable than I but it seems much of Africa is also in the quagmire of slow progression from a post colonial vacuum. I never thought of it before coming to Africa but Germany seems to have had little influence here beyond neighbouring Namibia. It seems that when Britain, France, Belgium and Portugal were carving up Africa Germany was attempting to carve up the likes of Britain, France, Belgium and Portugal. It’s all not so different really but we tend to learn a lot about Germany in our schools, it seems history is written by the victors after all. In an elegant twist we carve out our little dinner spot with a German invasion party in the country possibly most aligned with famed German organisation; that was never invaded by Germany. Until now.

It remains a home coming for Charlie but strangely in our time here in Selebi Phikwe we take only a few ventures into town, we don’t pull up outside Kopano school reminiscing Charlie’s first day, our time is spent mostly with Heidi and Herman who are Charlie’s godparents. In a town that is home it feels that home exists within these walls and in a warm German hug. It’s a popular cliche, Germans are all tight formality who leave passion and comedy to the more flamboyant cultures; here that couldn’t be more wrong. Hermans sharp wit and Heidi’s force-of-nature love pours forth to smash a stigma of staid grey industrialist rationale, these Germans are latin love, french dash and British comedy all in one.

We eat, we chat, after six we have a drink and all the while we smile and laugh. Herman arrives home to an enlivened visage that flushes Heidi’s face so instantly. ‘Schnodle’ she cries out; yes the cutest of cute affectations rings out to meet a similarly beaming face. ‘You look beautiful’ he remarks to a launching hug; after all these years affection is worn so openly it’s impossible for our heart not to go va-va-voom, star crossed teenagers with no plans of being anything different. Germans boring; myth busted. But this stopover is passing too soon, in the morning we move on thinking that we didn’t plan enough time here but then again, there is never enough time in company like this.

Not satisfied to leave without a trace we manage a framed photo from our time in Botswana as a keepsake to leave with Botswana’s favourite Germans. I joke that they may just have acquired another godson, I don’t even know if I have godparents; names aside a fond affection will remain long after the road to South Africa has been driven. Casting my mind back through history and all of the conflict that has come from overtaking land in these parts we sit within the bounds of a great national acquisition no one knows about. under the eyes of the great European powers the Germany of Africa may have avoided the domineering glance of Germany but they somehow managed to whisk away two national treasures that Germany is far poorer without. The full time siren rings: Botswana 2 – Europe 0

April 16, 2015

While you were working – Waking Instant, Serowe, Botswana

It’s a slap in the face, after a plunge into the wild where time stands still and our only marker was the gentle spin of the world on which we stand we are on our last day of Safari. Dragged back to a connection with dates and days that we are yet to be comfortable with we’re in the waking instant that takes an eternity between slumber and a harsh morning light that comes too soon. Just like those days when the rain teems just outside your window and the cosy warmth of a cocoon beyond the reaching claws of time is the only place to be we close our eyes tight and sink into one last day on the road. Selebi Phikwe is our metaphor for a cooked breakfast, we’ll be there tomorrow and we can’t wait for it but the realisation of times and dates has come a little too quickly, for one last day we shut eyes and pretend that the moon kisses the stars in a sky that demands nothing but a gazing eye.

But this moon kisses no stars and our gazing eye falls only to a blanket of pale blue, we’re jumping off the deserted island and into the world beyond in one last chase for memories we can grasp. Serowe is a four hour drive away but the destination is worth the trip, we hope. In a word we drive towards rhino’s, a beast we barely even stood a chance of seeing and of course we haven’t. One of the famed ‘Big-5’ along with the elephant, buffalo, lion and leopard, this list harks to hunting days and although it is a little off kilter to many sighting priorities it remains the romantic checklist for any African Safari. We won’t get the five but hopefully we get over half way, but in truth the rhino is more than a checklist beast, endangered and hunted to near extinction for it’s horn it remains one of the most iconic animals for anyone thinking of Africa; and so we go hunting but not in the Big-5 sense of the word.

Amazing as a Rhino is it must wait for another African sight that attracts just as much attention but is little known beyond local borders, humans. That’s right, people just like you and me but lifted from the pages of glossy magazines and placed onto the dusty red soils of Africa, it’s ‘fashions in the field’ like a day at the races but no one is losing money or cheering on a horse, it’s everyday life. Someone needs to alert Stephen Hawking on some bizarre phenomenons of physics that are yet to be explained by science, that being what African women are able to do with their hair. Braided into impossibly fine strands, straightened, teased, swept up into a sculpture or in any other endless variation that lies beyond my words, wonders grace sculptured faces at every turn. So often we find ourselves in the middle of nowhere to find an athletic sculpture of a person in a dusty dirt road wearing an eye popping cocktail dress set for an evening of high society, a juxtaposition that fashion shoots attempt to imitate but never reach.

In Francistown this phenomenon is all over the place, a sharp looking guy struts, yes he struts with catwalk swagger across a litter strewn vacant block of dusty red soil and defeated plant life. In this nearly post-apocalyptic scene this vision of fashion glam in his polished shoes, suit pants and shimmering pink shirt and vest owns the world. An elegant feline-like woman of fierce grace crosses paths in a one piece skintight black dress sporting flaming red bands down each side just to accentuate her taut body with curvaceous behind, lets not start of African ladies rumps, even a gay man has to look. In an distracted moment I wait for the rest of the backup dancers for this stylised film clip to begin. But no this is not a million dollar three minute extravaganza, it’s just another day in Botswana.

From the wonder that is African style and physical fine tuning we plunge into surely our last game drive of the safari, but we’ve said that before. Like the smell of fresh coffee on a stubborn morning the drive is bliss, good roads and loads of animals, this greeting into a waking world seem so much less daunting already. We sit at a waterhole on a pan with 16 rhinos in one field of vision joined by impala, wildebeast, zebra, giraffe, jackals, vultures and springboks. It’s the African scene I was hoping for throughout Chobe and Moremi, it’s staggering. And just for the record, we have a new winner for the coolest animal, the rhino takes the title; Charlie still likes the pretty impala but I’ll take a rhino any day. Power and purpose built muscularity are defined in this animal; there’s a field of life but there’s only one creature to look at.

It’s possibly a little prophetic but the game drive we searched for has been most closely reached on our final day, maybe we needed to pass our penence for a due reward. This will be our last game drive and we’re thoroughly done. In this rude call back to a world of defined calendar dates we now look forward to Selebi Phikwe and seeing Heidi and Herman again no longer yearning for the soft cocoon of a timeless wild existence. The Milky-Way has bid its farewell and the sun again rises to shine light on a world we could never avoid forever, and now, just now we’re ready for that cooked breakfast that is a return to the un-wild world. It’s a return to childhood for Charlie and for me now it’s a return to a place of security also. We’re metaphorically awake now and ready for a hot breakfast with our favourite Germans in Botswana, someone call Phikwe, we’re coming home.

April 15, 2015

While you were working – Stranded on an Island, Nata, Botswana

Making more or less a big loop of Botswana we breeze through the last few days of the safari throwing ourselves to as many corners of this surprisingly vast country as we can. Leaving Nxai pans we venture back east to Nata, near our first night in this car at Elephant Sands. Now we’re back with the innocence of wide eyes a little more wizened and with the almost-beards quite out of control, we’ve ventured into the wild and emerged looking more like caucasian versions of the famous Kalahari Bushmen than our previous selves. Planning to go to Kubu Island in the salt pans we have sadly had to abort mission as the road is apparently undrivable so it’s with only a slight regret that we pass it up and head to Nata bird sanctuary, far more befitting gentlemen of a certain age.

After a short stop in the tiny town of Gweta we’re pushing on to Nata, our poor car still going strong after what can only be described as a thorough thrashing. With a chorus of squeaks, grinds and moans that weren’t there before, from the car that is, we bobble along the veritable highway that is the dirt track into the bird sanctuary. We’ve been eyeing the grand salt pans of central Botswana on the map this whole trip but have been thwarted at every turn from seeing them, but no longer, we’re camped right beside them and now there’s no stopping us. This is a bird sanctuary but for me I’m most keen to see the pans, such a natural wonder can never be overlooked.

In a relatively small country that is so little known to much of the world Botswana boasts a diversity that few nations can come close to matching, the pans just another example. Ploughing along the bumpy road to the pan edge we are cast into the now common African scene of a never ending sea of flatness, a continent so rich in colour and vibrance painted upon a canvas of such refused feature. Our world is a combination of tusset green and off-white that stretches to the horizon, the sun a stinging governor in this dominion of repetition. Arriving at the pan edge we can see why we couldn’t make it to kubu Island, the salt pan has become an inland sea.

The merest haze ripples the nearest land on our horizon over the sea, the world is a water wonderland rubbing shoulders with the Kalahari desert or near enough, diversity and contrast exist so abundantly to belie the flatness of this land. Perched in a stilted hut made for bird watching we take in the rare opportunity to watch a Botswana sunset over a western ocean, this land locked country never ceases to deliver creative diversity it seems it shouldn’t be able to. This sea is usually a dry salt pan, the remnants of a long forgotten inland sea from millennia ago; the obstructionist rain seems to have delivered an upside for us, a window into what this land once was and rarely ever returns to being nowadays. I can’t help myself, I tromp out into the water; as far as I could be bothered walking the briny water rises little above my ankles in what seems to be an ever possible wade. So this is how Jesus walked on water, seems so simple and I’m probably not even a divine spirit; as the popular TV show says: myth busted. With my saintly miracle for the day done and dusted it’s back to the bird hut to soak up that other divine gift, a cold beer a little before beer time.

The flamingo’s and pelicans are a little too far out to get close to but Charlie finds plenty of birds still to marvel at, a crowned crane the winner for the day. For me though the grace of this place is in its clean vastness, unobstructed by tumult or design. Be it against the waters edge or at our campsite the vastness stretches on forever across the plains and even into the bright starry sky overhead, we’re not far from a major road but it’s easy to feel isolation in its purest form. Space is what we have, of body and mind, I’m not the meditating type but we don’t need to focus to gain a similar effect out here. A crackling campfire flickers under a tree on what feels like a polished smooth world with a population of two, we’re alone on an island with nowhere in sight. It’s the old riddle, if trapped on a desert island, what would you take? It was an unanswerable musing; with a glass of wine, a campfire and some food there’s two people alone on this world with no plans to set out and find any more. It could be a great philosophical epiphany but lets just call it Botswana for now.

April 14, 2015

While you were working – Success, Nxai Pans, Botswana

Like wrenching our heads out of the water in an old fashioned apple bobbing contest we plunge our senses back into the all encompassing world that is the National Parks network of Botswana. It remains to be determined if we are masochistic or optimistic; probably both but it’s the ratio which seems undetermined, and just like an apple bobbing contest it’s water that we’re diving back into. Comically we’re told very specifically not to drive off the roads, there seems one very obvious way to stop people driving off the roads: make the roads drivable. But this is what we asked for, Nxai Pan is in a drier part of the country, south of Chobe and Moremi and apparently it’s through here at about this time of year that a staggering number of Zebra and Wildebeast make their migration so hopes are high.

Entering the pans we do come across a family of 16 giraffe on the road, literally on the road. We can’t go around so it’s time to just wait but with a view like this waiting is no problem, they are a study in grace these big monsters with elegance belying their size. And onward, after we left game driving behind with some measure of relief we’re back into it like junkies that can’t seem to give up what’s not good for us. Our attempt at a game drive in the park does reinforce our less than fantastic experiences with this activity to date. Venturing off to make a wide sweep of the park it seems that we’re not on the popular trails and it’s easy to see why, we’re back in Botswana road hell.

Well we thought it was boring then it became something far more in an instant. Sadly I don’t talk about a great animal sighting, it’s more animal behaviour, that being the best tantrum that Botswana has seen since 1983 when a young Charlie Winn left the country: we’re bogged again. Although I’d been doing all the driving in the parks, it’s Charlie behind the wheel now and you should hear the words, such filth from such a sweet innocent mouth. Oh dear, can you hear the few birds vacating a distant tree? And that poor steering wheel, whatever did it do to Charlie I will never know but it gets what it apparently had coming to it. Like the well oiled machine we are now, we’re breaking branches and wedging them under wheels to get going in a jif. With tantrum ground zero survived we ride the violent aftershocks for about an hour as we battle nearly ten kilometres as our trusty Toyota, Simba, saves us once again to deliver us out of the sodden eastern end of the park.

We should have known we tell ourselves, we should have known; still the filth pours from the mouth of an angel and still we struggle on. The roads are drying somewhat but the temper rages unabated, all we want to do now is get back to the campsite. At the depths of our despair we trudge on, barely gracing second gear at the rarest of opportunities, there’s only one baby cheetah leaping across the road for us to see. Hang on. That’s a cheetah, and another one, cue the filth but now from elation and celebration, two baby cheetahs bound across the road about 20m before us. Dumbstruck doesn’t begin to describe our mood, from glum defeat to triumph in the pad of a paw.

Immediately following glides mama cheetah, barely in stride the machine flows like liquid across the path, each bound clearing about 3-4m with offensive ease. Fittingly it’s all too fast, the road is vacated before our excitement can even peak with the movement, the moment, the rise in emotion all indescribably fast. We’re left to ride the wave of this sudden burst in the eternity after the event that passed too soon. The high we feel for seeing the cheetahs is matched only by the relief of seeing the cheetahs, this sighting means more to our psyches than we thought. In the bounding few seconds the punctuation was placed at the end of this safari, it’s unavoidable that if you don’t see a cat there’s a nagging doubt that you didn’t quite get the experience: box ticked.

Fleeting as it was we finally got the experience. The campfire roars as we opt out of another tedious game drive, it’s mission accomplished and we deserve an afternoon of rest. Strangely enough the conversation doesn’t hang on the cheetah as the hopes of sightings have thus far, there’s more to this trip than those few seconds. Maybe it’s the calm night, maybe it’s the ice cold beer or maybe it’s the over 100 different animals we’ve been introduced to so far but this safari now seems so much more than a big cat. Seeing the cheetah was all it was cracked up to be, an amazing animal, we expected that. What we didn’t expect was that by seeing it the pressure valve of expectation would be released and in doing so the joy of seeing the cheetah is now permeated through the entire trip; the safari was a success all along, we just needed the cheetah to permit ourselves to declare victory