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As I mentioned in my last post, we have made it to
Mozambique. The trip up was generally very nice—I hadn’t thought too much about
it until I was discussing it with a friend of mine in the U.S. His response was
“that’s the kind of thing you should talk about in your blog!” So if you find
this uninteresting, go blame him.[1]
With our car out of commission[2]
(see last post), we realized that if we were ever going to get to Mozambique
and be able to accomplish anything, we were going to need to find an alternate
way to get there. Our associate from Moz. had come down to South Africa by bus,
so that seemed the most reasonable way to head up. The bus doesn’t actually go
to Chimoio, but instead goes to Mutare—a city in Zimbabwe on the Moz.
border that is about 95 kilometers[3]
from Chimoio. The plan was to take a bus to Mutare, then cross the border
and take another bus to Chimoio. As we went over the details of the plan, we
discovered an interesting financial fact: it costs approximately R300 in toll
fees and about R1000 in gas to travel from Johannesburg to the boarder of
Zimbabwe, while the entire bus ride to Mutare (just under twice that distance)
costs…R300 per person. Not only was the bus a viable alternate plan, but it
saved us a lot of money! At that point, the bus trip was our confirmed plan B,
and if it went well, we thought it might even become our primary means of
traveling between Chimoio and JoBerg.
Once we had formally decided to take the bus, we went to get
tickets. It turns out that the bus to Mutare is not run by one of the major bus
lines that are found in JoBerg’s large bus station. In order to get tickets, we
instead traveled to another bus terminal a few kilometers away. We discovered
that this was a “national” terminal—that is, it is used primarily by blacks. Al
and I were, therefore, a bit of a curiosity, though the only time we were
inconvenienced were when the people there saw Al’s beard for the first time
and everyone wanted to get a picture with him. After a brief discussion with
the very helpful staff of our chosen bus line, we went back to our flat to
prepare for our trip the next day.
When we returned to the bus station, we discovered that we
had beaten our bus by an hour or so. This gave us some time to watch other
people arrive, and generally see how the bus company handled itself. What we
discovered was a great amount of commotion that centered around a
well-organized system for handling buses and cargo. From the outside, this
system might be difficult to see, but when we took the time to consider how
many people and how much cargo was being loaded, we realized that the job got
done much more quickly than we expected. Our bus was run by a crew of three
drivers, who were very helpful in keeping the ignorant Americans[4]
out from underfoot. Once the bus was loaded, we went off to the larger and more
well-known bus station a few kilometers away to pick up some more passengers
and have a complimentary meal—then we hit the road.
Our drivers worked in shifts so that no one would become too
tired during the 18-hour ride. The trip was very nice, by just about anyone’s
standards.[5]
We had a rest stop break about halfway to the Zimbabwe border, and got to the
border crossing just after dark. That’s where we encountered our first real
obstacle.
We had been informed that the border crossing would take no
longer than two hours. To the credit of the bus crew, we did, indeed, get
through in two hours—no thanks to Al, myself, and the Zimbabwe immigration office.
The crew actually managed to get everyone through the border in about an hour’s
time (quite excellent, considering how many people they were moving through). Unfortunately, Al and I were not South African, Zimbabwean, or from
any other nearby country—we were from a country the bus company had apparently never had to deal
with before. It took several minutes to figure out which form we needed to fill
out, who to give it to, who to go to next, and where to finally get the
passport stamped so that we could get through. Add to that difficulty our
desire to get a double-entry visa and…well…it took a bit of doing. The attitude
of the immigration staff was particularly interesting—complete disinterest. Our
visas were repeatedly ignored, transferred, checked, ignored, passed over for
three or four other entrants, and so forth for about an hour. We got the
distinct impression that they were NOT impressed by the Americans.[6]
The bus staff was extremely patient and very helpful dealing with the rather
unexpected challenges, and managed to get us straightened out in much less time
that it would have taken us alone. With their help, we only caused the bus to
lose an extra hour at the border (instead of the three or four we would have
spent there on our own). Hopefully, going back will be a bit quicker with our
double-entry visas.
Once through the border, we took a straight night trip
through Zimbabwe to Mutare. We arrived around 6:00 in the morning in an open
square that served as a bus station. Our Mozambican associate called a friend
of his who owned a taxi we could take to the border. The Mozambican border
proved to be our second major obstacle.
Like Zimbabwe, Mozambique has a completely different set of
rules for Americans. Our associate, being Mozambican, didn’t require anything
to get in—we required a couple of hours to process, including a visa with a
photo id (taken at the immigration center). As in Zimbabwe, the staff was less
than enthusiastic about dealing with Americans, though in this case, we were
generally treated with no less preference than any other person coming
through…we were just more trouble for them than most.
After that, it was (relatively) smooth sailing. We walked
down to the local bus station, and loaded ourselves and our luggage on a local
bus, called a chopa. The chopa was relatively cheap to ride, though the ride
itself was a bit more…exciting…than we expected. Apparently, our driver was in
a race with some unknown, possibly invisible monster that was going to kill us
all if it caught us. At least, that’s what I inferred from his driving.
Race car buses aside, the trip was uneventful, and we arrived in Chimoio around
11:00 in the morning.
Our conclusion: yes, the bus is a viable way to get from
Chimoio to JoBerg.[7] We
expect to get a bit better at handling immigration and customs over time, and
the money we save will probably amount to several thousand dollars a year. A
final point worth noting: everyone involved in this operation was black. For
Americans readers that may not sound like much of a point, but in Africa, I
have repeatedly encountered an attitude toward blacks that amounts to: “if they
try it, they will break it.”[8]
This trip demonstrated that Africans are perfectly capable of handling a
complex operation and doing a good job of it. Not that we’re surprised by this,
but it is good to have another example in our arsenal to refute the prejudice
against African nationals—prejudice we have encountered even from other
nationals. The fact is that Africans can and, we believe, eventually will build
the kind of economic, social, and political structure necessary to make Africa
a world leader in the 21st century.
[1]
If, on the other hand, you love this post, feel free to give me all the credit.
[2]
Update: our car’s transmission is fixed…but now it won’t shift into 4-wheel
drive. Life goes on…
[3]
About 62 miles
[4] To
anyone from the Americas who is reading this and is not a U.S. citizen: yes, I
know you are also an American—unfortunately we poor U.S. citizens don’t have a
clever country name (Mexican, Brazilian, etc.) that we can use, so I’m kind of
stuck with either U.S. citizen (which is a pain to type) or Americans (which is
easier, and much preferred by my lazy typing fingers).
[5] My
only note on comfort: the nationals appear to like their in-drive music
loud—seeing how I’m the visitor, I consider this less of a problem with
service, and more of a problem with my cultural volume preferences
[6] I
realize this is difficult to quantify, but our associate from Mozambique seemed
to agree about the general attitude of the office staff.
[7]
Also, I like footnotes!
[8]
Again, difficult to quantify, but definitely a common attitude.
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