As I struggle with putting into words how unbelievable it is that my last day of work is next Friday, and as I have not yet written about my final holiday here, I'll post something that I wrote a while back after my COS conference!
This is going to be a CRAZY long post,
apologies in advance! The following is a summary of my two years in African transport…
As I celebrate the fact that as of my
return two days ago to Luderitz, I will officially never have to
hitch-hike again, I thought it would be an appropriate time to post
about PC Nam’s methods in transportation. When people want to go
somewhere in Namibia, there are three options that you have –
first, find someone you know who is going there and will give you a
ride in their private car [this almost never happens]. Second, take a
combi – which is a minibus. Odds are if you go this route you will
leave 2 hours later than the driver says, you will be squished, hot,
and not entirely comfortable with the smells of 13 + other people you
are riding with, and if you are me, 1 out of 3 times you ride in one at least one thing in the combi will break down, further
delaying the trip. The third option is hitch-hiking, or as we call
it, hiking. To the majority of readers of this blog, that probably
sounds like the craziest option, but here it is actually the most
preferable. I will never forget the first night in Namibia when the
Volunteer Leaders were talking to us about hiking, and my group was
terrified of having to travel this way, while we listened to these
three experienced people talk about their craziest hiking experiences
[one was in a funeral hearse, as in sitting next to a coffin with a
body in it, nothing will beat that].
Anyway, it turns out Peace Corps
Namibia has one of the highest rates of hitch-hiking in terms of the
rest of the Peace Corps community, and when the African Regional
Security Director came to visit, it was something he wanted to
directly address. He was not a fan of the fact that this is
how we travel. Peace Corps Namibia of course recognized that we
traveled this way, but they did not condone it. After the visit from
the regional security director a few changes came into place that I
think were for the best. From now on, if we are hiking, we are
supposed to sms the Duty Officer where we are going, who we are with,
and the license plate/description of the car we are in – with the
promise that we would not get in trouble. We are also very strictly
prohibited from taking rides in the backs of open bakkies [pick-up
trucks]. At the beginning of my service, this type of ride was even
desirable because it’d be a little cooler/a lot breezier/generally
more spacious. However, this past December holiday when I was
traveling to my friend’s out-of-the-way village, sitting in an open
bakkie with two other friends, we stopped for our driver to help out
at a pretty horrific accident involving an overturned open bakkie and
a man with a metal pole sticking out of his eye [also there were two
police cars with officers literally just standing around staring
instead of taking the seriously injured people to the hospital, which was only 15k
away, what in the world!!!!]. After this experience, I came to several conclusions,
one of which was deciding never to travel in an open bakkie again.
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| That time in December 2011, when 11 people tried to hike to Luderitz... and failed. #heatstrokeistheworst | |
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Anyway, I think the changes in Peace
Corps policy in this regard are really for the better, in that they
are acknowledging the way we travel and hopefully finding
alternatives in the long run. For me at least, I don’t particularly
enjoy standing on the side of the road waving my hand for people to
take pity on me. But it is a much cheaper, more comfortable, and
better - at least in my experience - way to travel. I also do not hike from Luderitz to
Keetmanshoop [the next biggest town] and vice versa. That first or
last stretch of my travels is different for a couple of reasons.
First off, Luderitz isn’t on the way to anywhere except the ocean –
you generally have to pay to get in or out, even if it is a hike.
Secondly, I don’t like hiking that stretch because there is
literally NOTHING on that road for hundreds of kilometers except the
desert, and for 100 kilometers or so there is no cell service, so if
something bad happened with the person driving me I really would be
in very serious trouble.
Getting to the fun stuff, once
you get past the strangeness of hiking, it’s actually overall a
great experience in the kindness of strangers. The fact is, most
times when people pull over to help us out with a lift, they are
doing so because they feel sorry for us. Generally they are really
nice people, and often it isn’t just the ride that they give us.
Without rambling on anymore, I’m going to list the top experiences:
Best Hikes
-From Windhoek to Swakopmund for the
2012 marathon. We got a ride with this really nice guy who worked
with mining in some way. He bought the three of us cooldrinks and
could not stop talking about his new wife, who he was obsessed with
[it was adorable]. Also at the end of the hike he gave us each a
gemstone, and his number in case we wanted to meet up or stay at his
house later on in Swakop! So awesome!
-From Windhoek to Rundu [this is 700
kilometers!!!! Incredibly lucky!] Nice German guy who stopped in
Otjiwarango to buy us lunch, then got us cooldrink in the next town.
Played the same loop of weird Afrikaans music the whole ride, but his
car was so nice and air-conditioned, and he was the sweetest old man!
-From Otjiwarango to Windhoek when we
were in this amazing car with a Namibian guy and his mom!! Seriously
the gages were in miles per hour, there were movie screens in the
back of the seats, and it was an automatic – he said it was 1.2
million Nam dollars! He picked up two of the four of us waiting for a
hike, then after driving maybe 100 meters he felt bad about the other
two so we turned around and got them as well. He took us directly to
the hike point south from Windhoek, and even tried to give us
money when we got out!
-Most rides that gave us food/drink
could make it in here. From Swakopmund to Windhoek we were once given
70 dollars worth of biltong – we finished that off pretty fast.
From Okahandja to Windhoek once our ride gave us some of his homemade
droerwors, it was also really good. Now that I think about it, there
have been a bunch of times we’ve been given biltong, it’s the
travel food of this country! Who doesn’t love game jerky?! Chili
bites, yum.
Weirdest Hikes
-From Tsumeb to Omuthiya, three of us
were crammed into the back of a closed bakkie with four other
Namibians and what seemed like ALL their belongings. One of the
ladies was speaking in a nonstop stream to us, but it was impossible
to understand because half of what she was saying was in Oshiwambo,
which none of us spoke. She became obsessed with Mo, to the point
that Mo pretended to be asleep all while she started shouting
MAUREEN, MAUREEN, I will come visit you in your village!!!! When the
bakkie pulled over to stop for a few minutes we made a run for it to
find another hike while the crazy lady went to the bathroom
-From Luderitz to Keetmans with two
other people, in the back of a police/prison car, pretty sure it was
in the space for prisoners [the hike point in Luderitz is right next
to the prison]. It was actually pretty nice, we had a table in
between the benches we were sitting on.
Worst Hikes:
-From Otjiwarango to Windhoek, a bunch
of us were in a really big van with this Afrikaner lady who would not
stop with her racist rants. The words that came out of her mouth
describing the people in this country were heinous. So glad I wasn’t
in the front seat having to respond to her.
-From Otjiwarango to Windhoek
[different time], this time I was in the front seat with a racist
Afrikaner ranting and asking me how could I possibly teach those
little black children. These were not the only times I had rides
with racist ranters either, but those were always the most unpleasant
rides.
-From Rehoboth to Keetmanshoop, in the
back of a mail carrier truck. This probably fits into the top 5
scariest experiences I’ve had here, I don’t think we realized
what we were doing until it was too late, but we were getting
desperate for a lift. We hopped into the back of this truck without
realizing that it was pitch black, there were four other Namibians
crammed into this small space, and I thought I was going to
suffocate. The driver pulled off the rubber sealer on the door so
that we would get an air-flow. It was stifling hot and not nice.
-Any hikes with the following: a lorrie
[truck], both times I’ve done this the drivers have been creepy and
they also go really really slow; with people drinking and driving,
again did this two times, didn’t realize they were drinking until
we were already on the way, luckily there aren’t many cars on the
road in the south to hit…
In Sum,
if you are still reading this somehow [you must be really bored at work today!]:
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Pros
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Cons
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Hitch-hiking
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Get to talk to some really
friendly and interesting people. Sometimes great conversations,
solid human interaction, point of peace corps
If people don’t want to talk,
generally you get to listen to some quality namjams
Often in much more comfortable
private vehicles.
Generally don’t have to pay, or pay much less than the
public transportation rate
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You never know what kind of
person is picking you up. They could be unsafe. Driver could be
drinking and driving. Occasionally you have to listen to racist
Afrikaners.
Not as reliable – you could
end up not getting a ride/stuck somewhere
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Combi
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You will get to where you need to go… eventually
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Your personal space is more than
likely to be invaded
Odds are high the combi will
break down at some point
You are guaranteed to be late to
your destination
It will be hot
Safety standards are almost
always lower than required [what are safety belts?!?!]
Way more expensive than they
should be, given the quality of the transportation
Your ears will hurt a lot from the music being blasted at
inhuman levels
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I can’t wait to not deal with this
madness ever again!!!!
The next day, two hours after getting back from our Girls Group trip, we headed back out of Luderitz to visit Sarah, our friend who lives at a permanent camp site in the middle of the southern veld. She is doing her PhD on large carnivore-human conflict, which is a big issue in Namibia. Southern Namibia is filled with private farms, and most of the farmers are under the impression that the leopards, hyenas, and cheetahs are killing their livestock. Sarah has camera traps set across a wide range of farms that record where the animals are, and her findings point to the fact that these animals are not generally responsible for killing the cattle. It's a really interesting topic, and Sarah is crazy awesome for living out in the bush on her own to work on it! We've wanted to visit her for the past year, but since she's in the middle of nowhere and we don't have access to a car [nor are volunteers allowed to drive], we've never been able to go!
The next day, two hours after getting back from our Girls Group trip, we headed back out of Luderitz to visit Sarah, our friend who lives at a permanent camp site in the middle of the southern veld. She is doing her PhD on large carnivore-human conflict, which is a big issue in Namibia. Southern Namibia is filled with private farms, and most of the farmers are under the impression that the leopards, hyenas, and cheetahs are killing their livestock. Sarah has camera traps set across a wide range of farms that record where the animals are, and her findings point to the fact that these animals are not generally responsible for killing the cattle. It's a really interesting topic, and Sarah is crazy awesome for living out in the bush on her own to work on it! We've wanted to visit her for the past year, but since she's in the middle of nowhere and we don't have access to a car [nor are volunteers allowed to drive], we've never been able to go! 
Cue a couple weeks prior to this, when we befriended a really fun guy from Walvis Bay, Trevor. He was totally game to head out into the veld for an overnight, so off we went, cooler filled with savannas, chops, and wors for a lekker braai in front of her tent! She really is in the middle of nowhere, but once we arrived it was absolutely gorgeous, right at sunset. She lives on the Namtib reserve, near the campsite of a nice lodge. You can see the red sand of the Namib nearby, and her site is also surrounded by mountains. We were able to go on a great morning walk the next day before we headed back to Luda. The only downer about where she lives is the extreme temperature - in the summer it's the hottest place in the country and in the winter it's the coldest. It was freezing cold when we were there!!! I was so lucky she had an extra sleeping bag for me to use over mine! Overall 
