Days 53 thru 56

(Dan’s comments are italicized)

The last few days have been a whirlwind of travel so this post will be mostly musings!

We drove from Gweru to Bulawayo with the intent of getting a room, booking a bus ticket, and then going to see some ruins before handing the rental car back the following morning. Oh what folly! I never cease to amaze myself as I KNOW how things work in Africa but still, occasionally, make 3-4 step plans and expect them to work out 😂

We got to Bulawayo without incident. We thought the room would be simple as we knew where we wanted to stay and the owner had shown us the room and told us the price a couple of weeks earlier. Sadly, she didn’t remember us nor, seemingly, the price quoted; so the price was higher, which annoyed me, which meant we had to look for a room!! We actually probably would have ended up there anyway, but they could not swipe, which is the lingo for taking a payment with a credit or debit card. We tried to book a room downtown…but they were horrid and too expensive for what they were! In one place, even after I told the lady we didn’t want to stay there as the bathrooms didn’t have showers, she begged me to stay and told me she’d give us a nice bucket to use!!!!

Yeah…no! Thank you, though.

At the same time as trying to get a room, I was also trying to book a bus back to Harare in order to fly to Lusaka, Zambia. There are about 10 different bus companies running that service, but all the offices are in different places. The busses are different, too. They range from Super Luxury (with toilets on board at $30 each) to Luxury (nice seats but no toilet at $15 each), to what Dan and I refer to as, Chicken busses (at $7 each!) These Chicken busses shove in people (and their chickens, pots and pans, and whatever) until the doors barely close. I used to travel on these when I was young and stupid (as they’re cheap); but now…

Yeah…no! Thank you, though. Sometimes, I think I should experience that form of travel just to see how I would feel. It would give me a deeper understanding of the conditions that most of the people in the world live in. Oh…you’re welcome to; I’ll meet you at our destination!

After our last bus experience, we had decided to go Super Luxury! But finding the right office was a challenge. Still, undeterred, I kept going and, finally, I found it. Although it was hard for me to spend FOUR TIMES WHAT WE HAD TO SPEND, I forced myself to go up to the counter. I confirmed that it was a Super Luxury bus with a toilet onboard (yes it was), but then, just as I was about to pay, the lady clarified that there WAS a toilet onboard but nobody was allowed to use it as it got dirty when they did. What?? Pay extra money for a toilet that can’t be used?

Yeah…no! Thank you, though!

So it was back to a Luxury bus station to buy $15 tickets for comfier seats, but no toilet. Now we just needed a room to stay in. When I returned to the car, Dan (who was relaxing inside because he wasn’t feeling well) asked if I wanted to keep looking for a place downtown, and I just thought,

Yeah…no! Thank you, though.

Umm, true that I wasn’t feeling well, but the parking spots were being monitored by a sprightly meter maid Who wanted one of our precious $1 bills to park…

Yeah…no! Thank you, though. So I drove around the block numerous times dodging taxis and pedestrians until Rhia came out.

So we went back to where we’d stayed previously. In hindsight, we should have just started there and saved a couple of hours.

Happily, before handing the car in, we made the time to see the ruins near Bulawayo. There are some 300 sites in Zimbabwe. We’ve seen the biggest (Great Zimbabwe), the most diversely decorated (Naletale), and now we were visiting Khami, the second biggest site.

Again, the ruins were beautiful (albeit in a falling-down way…but I suppose that’s what makes them ruins!) There’s an ethereal, quiet stillness around all these ruins that feels healing. I love walking around through ancient areas. It reminds me that there is so much more to this world than my short 56 years of experience. There he goes again, bragging about how young he is!!

These ruins also contained a gameboard carved into a rock. Apparently, merchants from the east brought a game that was similar to checkers or bao so people started carving the board into random rocks.

The next couple of days were all business; we returned the car, took the bus back to Harare (and spent the night in our favorite hotel) and then flew to Lusaka, the capital of Zambia.

And so, we’re in Zambia; a country I worked in a lifetime ago! This is going to be interesting! The capital city, Lusaka, is certainly more than I expected. I can’t wait to start exploring.