Left my torn trousers and collapsed Clarke's school sandals, both having lasted 23,500 km, in the paddock for any of the locals who brought their dogs to watch us eat breakfast - two fried eggs for me.
Drove into Mwanza, on the shore of the main body of Lake Victoria, through the city's extended outer suburbs: slum-like dwellings tucked among huge boulders and often utilizing solid stone for part of the dwellings. Most of the factories and workshops along the road had Indian names and we often saw Indian owners and black counter staff. Indian spices perfumed the air too.
Having parked outside a hotel, most of us raced to the post office, me with eight letters. I became almost hysterical with joy at the cheap price of stamps: 8 shillings to Australia at black market prices, the equivalent or 15USc; crazy after the costs in Zaire. Back to
Back to the hotel where Nikki was waiting for a phone call connection to Canada so left her to it and headed off to find the market and investigate shops selling margarine, batteries, curry powder, alcoholic drinks, poisons, biscuits, biros, plastic containers and envelopes, to name just a few of the assorted stock. In the market, treacherously muddy corridors ran between stalls piled with woven baskets of rice, flour, salt crystals, packaged curry and chill, beans; solid stores sat on bags and sacks so they didn‘t pick up filth from the floor. Bought a huge sack of stuff and hired a barrowman to push it back to the hotel, following him through Mwanza's back streets. Witnessed a mass attack on a lone man, explained by sign language to be a thief. My barrow man removed his rubber thong and joined the kicking, belting and general mellee around the offender, before laughingly rejoining me and continuing with his load, leaving the gang still beating the offender.
The back streets were lined with huge boulders, tiny stalls, and assorted merchants including medicine men and mystic healers. The almost overpowering smell of spices and incense brought back memories of another, distant continent.
Back at the hotel, I sat down for a well-deserved rest and spent big on a scrumptious whole fish for US$1.10. Kelvin and Ben were still trying to find black market diesel so we decided to spend the afternoon at the hotel. Booked a reverse-charge call home and before I knew it I was talking to Mum and Dad. Caught up on their news - they are moving house tomorrow - and told them about all my recent dramas, without dwelling on them. Mum told me that my ex, Ray, was a very happy expectant dad, and I said I hope we can be friends. Dad has topped up my bank account with enough cash to cover what I spent on my Turkish carpet and the increase in this trip price, so I'm solvent a bit longer.
Speaking with them lessened my urgency to go home and now I've got my sister's wedding date I have options to stay a bit longer in England over summer before heading back. Money - well, the lack of it - is my biggest worry but Vicki’s enthusiasm and confidence inspired me to think seriously about hanging around.
Went stores shopping with Nikki, finding nearly everything we wanted in one shop whose Indian owner offered the services of her black servant to carry our purchases back to the truck. Similar situation to the Greek diaspora in Kisangani (Zaire), though here it seems far more obvious. Didn't expect to find a mini-India here.
Spent the rest of the afternoon in the restaurant talking and writing and watching Kel and Ben pacing the street like two undercover agents, looking for black market diesel. A brand new, bright red tractor, the first farm machinery we've seen in ages, was parked in the street.
Finally, we climbed aboard Stanley and headed out of town, the back of the truck piled with boxes of stores, bags of fruit and veg, a new spade, saw blades, so getting from one end of the seats to the other involved gymnastic manoeuvres. Having pulled off the road and ploughed two massive ruts through a a paddock the consistency of porridge, eventually getting bogged and having to mud mat out of trouble, we camped beneath some beautiful bounders, surrounded by sisal plants and thorn trees.
A colony of grey bats lived between the rocks, their flying shadows visible in the dim light, their clicking like a mechanical pump. A rock hyrax lived here too, but it did not scream like the ones we heard in the jungle.
Somehow, Nikki, Myrta and I completed the mammoth task of organising, labelling and packing the stores before dinner, certain we wouldn't fit everything in until we did. After dinner, sat in the truck chatting with Markus, Myrta and Jim till all hours.
Fortunately, the hyrax we shared camp with did not scream like a woman being murdered, Picture by Calvin Mollett
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