Days 34 and 35

(Dan’s comments are italicized)

The bus trip…😱…oh the bus trip!!

I’d been looking at photos of the luxury buses and truly believed all would go well. I couldn’t believe the low cost of such luxury ($15 each to go 434 kilometers or 270 miles)! Then I saw our old, dilapidated bus with broken seats, and no toilet (for a 9 hour trip). You may be wondering why a mere 434 km would take 9 hours; all I can say is that ‘road’ is not a good descriptor of the tiny pieces of tarmac that sporadically existed in-between the potholes on the Victoria Falls- Bulawayo route!! We had been warned by every local that the road between Vic Falls and Bulawayo was bad, but because we have the experience of having driven 9000 miles on African roads last year, I didn’t think it could be much worse. It was. Now, in hindsight, I’m glad we could not rent a car to drive that route.

Ever the optimist, I thought that it may not be bad if the bus wasn’t full; every single seat was taken! At least there weren’t chickens on the bus (though I was assured there would have been had this been the day bus rather than the nighttime one). We had chosen to take the red-eye bus that departed at 10:30 at night and would arrive in Bulawayo at around 6 (it actually arrived at 7:30).

I almost got off the excuse-for-a-luxury bus when, just as we were leaving, the conductor (?) asked all the men to remove their hats and he prayed that we’d reach our destination safely. What???? This wasn’t my definition of luxury…and I don’t have very high standards!

We stopped twice for pee-breaks. Please note I didn’t say ‘to use the bathroom’ or ‘for the conveniences’. There wasn’t a bathroom (just a hole in the middle of a flooded floor; no, I didn’t ask what the liquid was as it was almost impossible to breathe with the smell, let alone speak…and there was certainly nothing ‘convenient’ about those holes! Also, we’d been given 3 minutes to get back to the bus (and there were only 3 holes in the floor so there was no time to feel sorry for yourself. Amazingly, we were all back on the bus in three minutes as we knew what would happen if we weren’t. Needless to say, I didn’t get off the bus at the second pee-break! Personally, I did not leave my seat once. Only three minutes to pee? The bus would have been driving away before I had got started 😨.

Amazingly, I slept semi-okay though my old, arthritic bones are letting me know just how unhappy they are. To be fair, this wasn’t the worst bus trip I’ve ever taken (I’ve been on those chicken -filled buses many times in my youth); it’s just that I’m too old for this now! My long frame could actually fit on the seat if I sat straight up, but the seat back was broken and kept slipping back into the lap of the lady behind. I did not sleep so well 😪. Still, the total cost of our journey was $30 as opposed to $660 had we flown, so we arrived at our destination safely and pleased with all the money we’d saved.

And then we found out that we’d accidentally taken the local bus, not the luxury one (that left from a different location)!!! I suppose we should have got the hint when we saw that we were the only white people on the bus 😂. My old bones are still complaining about that error, though.

But I did mention all the money we saved, right? 😵‍💫

As soon as we had placed foot on the ground in Bulawayo, we were greeted by an ambitious taxi driver named Shepherd. This diligent man wakes up at 4 AM every morning to greet the first bus that arrives.

We chose a place to stay that was a walk into town. As we’re away from the regular tourist route, prices are more reasonable. Our room costs $40 a night but is certainly in a different league to the last one!

Zoning is very lax here, so walk in stores, car rental agencies and restaurants are run right out of modified residential housing. It feels awkward walking into someone’s yard to rent a car, and then walking next door to a house converted to three clothes shops and a restaurant. But that is what we did, and the food was really good!

The funny thing about eating in Zimbabwe is that just because they have it on the menu, it does not mean they serve it. They serve burgers, they just don’t have buns and cheese. Or they serve breakfast, just not today. But we have their Whatsapp number, so will call ahead in the future to see if they have the ingredients for a meal we want!

Because Africans really want to please you, it sometimes takes a moment to get to that day’s reality. For example, at yesterday’s restaurant we were told that the day’s special was chicken curry but we could order from the menu if we’d like. Dan tried to order the beef stew, only to be told they didn’t have it. He said it wasn’t a problem as he’d have the roast dinner instead. When he was told that they didn’t have that, he asked what they DID have and was told “chicken curry”!!

Similarly at today’s restaurant, we asked if they served breakfast all day. When the answer was in the affirmative, we ordered two breakfasts…but we’re told that they didn’t have the ingredients for breakfast today. I then asked if they had burgers today and was told they did. So I ordered a burger and chips…but was told that they, indeed, had burgers but no buns or cheese.

But, although it sounds annoying, it’s not; this is the real, off-the-tourist-path Africa. In a warped sort of way, there’s something quite charming about it (right, Ron?)

The same is true about other things too. For example, just because something says it’s a gas station does not mean it has gas; or, if it does, it doesn’t mean it has the electricity to pump that gas into your car.

Businesses are finicky about the condition of the money they will accept. This $20 bill was rejected because it has graffiti next to Andrew Jackson’s head. The funny thing is that we were given this note here, in Zimbabwe, as part of our change after a purchase.

But they have no reservations about giving some of the dirtiest change I’ve ever seen.

We did manage to use that $20 to get into the Bulawayo Natural Museum. They museum was a two story circular building about 200 meters from our guesthouse.

The museum displayed collections of animals, birds, insects, reptiles, dinosaurs, planet history, human evolution, local history, and mining and minerals. The latter being one of the best presentations of rocks I have seen. They showed the different rocks that our metals and minerals come from.

I don’t know where the time went, but we spent 4 hours on our feet immersing ourselves in the exhibits.

Zimbabwe has quite a history that we will be exploring during our visit, but one of the more prolific exhibits was about Cecil Rhodes. In the 1890s, he was the Prime Minister of the Southern Cape and he forged a peace treaty the ruling tribe of Bulawayo. Rhodes was a very wealthy mining magnate and established the Da Beers Diamond company. Being British, I had learned about Rhodes in History; but all I remember is that Rhodesia (now Zambia and Zimbabwe) was named after him, and I remember not being too impressed by some of the things he did. But this museum presented a different perspective. I think of all the information, I was most impressed by the following two exhibits:

As with all the museums that we have visited, there were a lot of school groups walking about. But all the children were well behaved. All in all, it was a very informative museum.

I remember liking Bulawayo from 40-odd years ago, and I find myself still liking it. The wide streets are pretty, and the people are friendly. And the cherry on top is that there are huge statues of giraffes all around. I’m not sure why, but we may find out tomorrow…