Pre-South Africa
Ok, so now that I’ve finally (mostly) caught up on Malawi, it’s time to start on South Africa. We’ll start with the day before. I had the day off because of our after hours work, but the notice slip for my mom’s Christmas package (one of two Christmas packages I was to get) hadn’t yet arrived. So I decided to go into town just to see if it had arrived yet. Here’s how it went:
I didn’t have much time because I had been cleaning and procrastinating from packing all morning and I had to get back by 3:30 to meet Henry to get the last bits of information I needed to send our report back to the donors during my holiday. So, I trucked down to the minibus stand and got on the first minibus into town.
About halfway there, it ran out of petrol. I thought about just catching the next one, but I really didn’t want to be out my K50, so I waited as another minibus gave the conductor and his watering can a lift to the BP. He came back after about 15 minutes on a Matawale-bound minibus, transferred the petrol from the watering can to the minibus tank, and still the minibus wouldn’t start.
We all got out and the driver and conductor flipped the front seats back so they could access the engine. They tried to insist that they weren’t giving refunds and we should just wait for the minibus to be fixed, which was sure to happen quickly, but when nothing worked and one of the other passengers began arguing vociferously, they finally gave us our money back. We caught the next minibus into town.
Which ran out of petrol.
Luckily, this one ran out of petrol right across the street from the BP, and there were no underlying mechanical problems, so a few minutes later I dropped at the Petroda and trotted over to the post office.
The door was locked.
I checked the hours-it wasn’t meant to close until 5 on Fridays, and it was just past 3. I stared at the door and jiggled the handle, feeling like maybe I was that kid at the school for geniuses in the Farside cartoon. A security guard came over and told me the post office was closed. I asked why.
They had gone on strike.
It ended up being ok, I guess. The package didn’t arrive anyway until sometime in the first week in January and I had no problems getting home, so I just made it back when Henry was meant to arrive. Somehow, even though I’ve only been on a minibus that ran out of petrol maybe two or three times before and even then the conductor had some makeshift petrol container with enough to get us to a filling station, it felt like a particularly Malawian kind of day.
I didn’t have much time because I had been cleaning and procrastinating from packing all morning and I had to get back by 3:30 to meet Henry to get the last bits of information I needed to send our report back to the donors during my holiday. So, I trucked down to the minibus stand and got on the first minibus into town.
About halfway there, it ran out of petrol. I thought about just catching the next one, but I really didn’t want to be out my K50, so I waited as another minibus gave the conductor and his watering can a lift to the BP. He came back after about 15 minutes on a Matawale-bound minibus, transferred the petrol from the watering can to the minibus tank, and still the minibus wouldn’t start.
We all got out and the driver and conductor flipped the front seats back so they could access the engine. They tried to insist that they weren’t giving refunds and we should just wait for the minibus to be fixed, which was sure to happen quickly, but when nothing worked and one of the other passengers began arguing vociferously, they finally gave us our money back. We caught the next minibus into town.
Which ran out of petrol.
Luckily, this one ran out of petrol right across the street from the BP, and there were no underlying mechanical problems, so a few minutes later I dropped at the Petroda and trotted over to the post office.
The door was locked.
I checked the hours-it wasn’t meant to close until 5 on Fridays, and it was just past 3. I stared at the door and jiggled the handle, feeling like maybe I was that kid at the school for geniuses in the Farside cartoon. A security guard came over and told me the post office was closed. I asked why.
They had gone on strike.
It ended up being ok, I guess. The package didn’t arrive anyway until sometime in the first week in January and I had no problems getting home, so I just made it back when Henry was meant to arrive. Somehow, even though I’ve only been on a minibus that ran out of petrol maybe two or three times before and even then the conductor had some makeshift petrol container with enough to get us to a filling station, it felt like a particularly Malawian kind of day.