I am back in Vilanculos with a remarkable feeling of having been in this situation before. Except this time, if I see anyone in biker boots I am going to steer clear. Not that the trip with George to Lusaka was not fantastic; it was. It is just that having two broken bikes on my hands is more than enough.
George caught a flight home from Lusaka, sending me off (with some trepidation, I am sure) on his Tenere. I rode South through the first summer rains down to Lake Kariba and snaked my way back up into Zimbabwe, which I shot across, back to Mozambique. I was five hundred kilometres into Mozambique, riding south, when I felt a faint engine splutter that alerted me to the fact that things were not going quite to plan. The splutter examination revealed an accelerator cable on the thinnest of threads, and brake pads down to the steel. Not a situation that was going to get me home.
Now I sit, back in Vilanculos, (trying to be patient on a beach, again) waiting for the parts George has sent, which will, hopefully, arrive tomorrow. As soon as I can, I will head down through Swaziland to Durban, having again been blown on a different course by time constraints, and my need to get home.
With only a few days riding left, it has occurred to me that that I have only ever paid one bribe in my life, and it wasn’t on this trip. My one bribing experience occurred when I took my bike from India to Pakistan, through the Wagha border post. I was assured (by people in India) that I would not need a carnet de passage. Indeed, I didn’t need one for crossing from the Indian side, but I did to enter Pakistan. Alternatively, I was told, two bottles of whisky (which meant a quick return to India), twenty dollars, and a letter from the South African embassy (saying that I was a “bona fide” South African citizen, and would leave the country within thirty days, with my bike) would suffice.
The latter was not too hard to get, it took a phone call and a fax, and they obliged within fifteen minutes (I suspect I neglected to tell them about the other requirements.) Unfortunately, there had been a changing of the guard while we were out gathering the requirements, and the border post boss on the Pakistan side, who had arrived in the meantime, was most affronted by the offer of whisky. “Don’t you know we are Muslims here? Take that away!” he roared. Nothing like complicating a border crossing a little.
I have remained a bit nervous about needing to paying bribes ever since. I had, however, steeled myself for the possibility on this trip, as I was warned by many I would need to. This hasn’t proved to be the case. Precisely the opposite happened when I was returning to Mozambique. I was two dollars short in my wallet on the required insurance for the bike. I asked to be excused to fetch some more money. The insurance man scratched in his pocket and slapped an extra two dollars on the pile of one dollar notes I had kept handy for expected bribe requirements.
The only questionable situation I was in, was crossing into from Zambia into Zimbabwe, where the Interpol man asked me whether I had any Kwacha’s left from Zambia. I said I had a few, but they weren’t mine to give away.
“Are you sure?” he asked. I said I was. He held onto my passport, and we stared into the distance for a while.
“They are no good to you, anymore,” he said, “Why don’t you give them to me? Hm?”
“They belong to my friend, and he is going back to Zambia.” I replied and we stared at the trees for a while.
“Really”, he said, “Some Kwacha’s would be very useful to me, and I am not convinced that they really belong to your friend.”
“Oh, they definitely do.” I said, and we stared at the sky for a bit.
“Oh, all right then”, he said and stamp-stamp, I had my passport and gate pass in my hands.
Even the money changers haven’t proved quite the sharks I have experienced elsewhere. George and I arrived at the Mozambique-Zambia border to be approached by three smiling men, offering money exchange. George asked the rate, and it seemed rather high, so we told them we would go to the other side of the border and change there. “Oh, no, sir,” they said, “The rate is exactly the same on the other side, guaranteed. We are the same there.” We went inside the border-post building to go through the paperwork rigmarole, and then crossed over into Zambia, where we were approached by the same three smiling men, who had slipped over the border in front of us. “Money change, sir?” they said to George. “Exactly the same rates as on the other side of the border, we guarantee it!”
This whole trip, I have only been stopped four times – three to be asked for my driver’s licence, and once to be asked, “Please take off your helmet so we can see what you look like, you must be very strong.”
