Friday, March 20, 2009

Going tribal: Malawi


People addressed me as "bwana" and that reminded me Tarzan comic books. Went to the grill restaurant (watch video later), friend Yamo ate with his hand as my wife's grandma used to do. Poor kids retrieved leftover french fries ("chips") served in humongous amount. Regrettably I had already eaten most of my share.

Filled up with diesel the Totoya landcruiser- almost two hundred dollars in fuel! Then crossed croc-infested Shire river in the Zambeze basin, not difficult if there was a concrete bridge as in our case. Crossed Mozambican border. Tried to get some Portuguese wine there. Bumped on a Peace Corps volunteer from MD, advised not to buy that cheap wine. I had tasted cheap Spanish wine in Equatorial Guinea, the worst ever, so we returned empty-handed.

In our way back, we told jokes. Most jokes I heard in Africa are about infidelity, I asked my colleagues what was funny about infidelity when AIDS was killing so many here. They insisted infidelity IS funny. That reminded me of an occasion when I told my mother-in-law (MIL) that I had barely managed to flee when a female colleague entered my hotel room and insinuated herself. MIL laughed hard and said the man capable to flee under thse circumstances had not been born yet. My Malawian colleagues said that MIL thought I was a liar. I had concluded MIL believed me but lost all respect for me because from her perspective, I was not a manly man anymore.