The Final, Crazy Post

That's it, kids, it's more than halfway through September already! We're done documented our great adventure, and moving on to new adventures... if you look for us, silly and bold and thoughtful and silly (and libby and billy) you'll find us, soon enough...

Culinary Wonders of the World

We have - of course - eaten lots of food in the last 3+ months. Some of what we've eaten has been quite memorable - either because it was extremely strange, silly, or special. Here's to some of those...

Ola, our couchsurfing friend in Warsaw, was helped in hosting us by her wonderful mother - here depicted making us yummy potato pancakes.

The story of polish "milk bars," communist restaurants for workers, is much more interesting than the food is tasty:

As for really amazingly good food in Poland, Libby's family friends treated us to this wonderful sundae at one of their coffee shops in Warsaw:

Check out the birthday cake we got for billy's cousin, Emily:

Emily's son, Reese, had a great time with his ice cream + chocolate sauce, in solidarity with his mother:

This is simply the biggest carrot ever imagined:

And this simply looks like fast food, not "vegetarian fast food." Amazing, huh?

Speaking of mouth-watering German health food, here's some sauerkrautsaft (in other words, cabbage brine):




More than a meter of cheese rolled up in a little ball:

We only saw these mushroom chips for sale in Hungary. They don't call 'em Hungry for nothin!

Now, now, that's fine french pastry... (See video above)

WOW! Charlie's Bakery in Cape Town is famous for outlandish cakes:

On the topic of outlandish, take a look at that "Eis Lasagna." The Germans specialise in such crazy ice cream creations, complete with coconut parmesan, strawberry tomato sauce, blueberry meatballs, and on and on...

But nothing knocked billy and bear into a sugar coma better than this ice cream mayhem (see video above)...

Ireland

Billy Says:

Libby and I ended up our months of travelling with a week in ireland with my mom, and her partner, alex. It was a bit of a whirlwind tour, looping around the island in a rented car, and cruising down the narrow, winding roads of ireland. We had lots of silly time, a ton of beautiful views, some super touristic moments, a dose of AA, and a smaller dose of visiting family. All around, a nice finale to a wonderful trip.

Let's start with the beautiful places.

On our first day in the country, we went to Howth Peninsula, near Dublin.


There's a cool lighthouse and harbor:


An awesome rock formation in the sea:


And an area where you can walk along the cliffs:


We spent a day on the Aran islands, off the coast of Galway:

"Have you ever seen so many rocks in one place?"

We all had fun playing in the ruins of seven old churches clustered together:


I in particular had fun trying to take strikingly "artsy" photographs:

and making particularly artsy poses for others to capture on film:


We also went to a really cool old fort, in a crescent shape along a huge cliff:


and, while we were soaking in beautiful sites, we had a nice restful night at a vegetarian friendly hostel (that gave their guests awesome bathrobes to wear):


We went to the famous Cliffs of Moher, on the west coast, south of Galway. You start your tour of the cliffs at a walled off area, safe and sound, looking at the views (see if you can spot mr. bear and windman):


From there you can either go to the left (a sanctioned, wide path with railing to protect you from falling) or to the right (totally not sanctioned or protected).

We ended up going down the path on the right, past the barbed wire fences, and down along a super narrow path, till we reached those flat rock cliffs you can see in the background, laid down and took in the amazing view, and wind (to learn more about the physics of that area, check here).


On our last day in Ireland, we drove along the Beara Peninsula, in the southwest of the island, west of Cork. The landscape there is absolutely breathtaking (I posed special for you, so you could tell):

We also visited my cousins, and my cousins children (nephews? wow!). We had a big meal with my cousins Daniel, and Jessica, and her sons, Jackson and Evan:


Here's my nephew, Jackson (he's a really big wingman fan). His mama, Jessica, is in the background:


My cousin Emily had her birthday while we were in town, so we took her out to a fancy meal, and went to lengths to go over the top with happy birthday celebrations, like getting the staff to sing over her cake:


and her brother, Sean, is a chef at the restaurant we went to:


We also spent a day in Belfast, trying to get a sense of some of the political and social history of "the north," and also going to a couple of AA meetings (which were, by the way, way more welcoming and friendly than any i'd ever been to elsewhere).

We only ended up getting photos of the Loyalist areas on our camera (so if you want to see the beautiful and inspiring ones from the Republican neighborhoods, you'll have to talk with my mom). But the hilarious offensive nature of these shots should give you some sense of what it's like to be there:


huh? a big bloody hand as an inspiring symbol for a community, and a politics?

a thousand british flags? Ireland and England are islands, so there's no chance that people are simply lost and confused (at least not in the literal geographic sense).

Oh, but the Queen!!?? What a joke...

While the descendents of British settlers keep hammering away at a Colonialist fairy tale of never-ending domination by the Crown, the "Celtic Tiger" charges forward. Ireland is a beautiful place, and it's changing fast. A man on the ferry told us, "We're losing our souls. We've simply got too much money. We've got more helicopters per capita than any other country in the world. Things are getting worse and really fast." Funny to have gone through so much degradation, and finally come out of it, only to be caught up in the whirlwind of globalization, american technology, etc...

Onward we walk, hopefully towards something more beautiful than where we are now...

Picnic in Frankfurt

Billy says:

Travelling from Dubai to Dublin, we had a few hours in Frankfurt. We decided to have a little picnic in the park. The place that seemed most fun to eat seemed to be the litte playground:


It was a good little picnic, with the classic bread-n-cheese, a little direktapfelsaft, water, and...


a good bit of silliness:


We enjoyed our sunny heathen times in good ole' deutschland, until the ole' polizei showed up. They just stood there, mute, looking mean.

Libby asked, "Can I help you?"
One of the cops gruffly replied, "How old are you?"
"Excuse me?" Libby asks.
"That is only for children."
"Sorry I didn't know that it's illegal to have a picnic."
"There's a sign; read it."
"Oh, I'm not used to reading German."

And what of this infamous sign?

We had to read it ourselves, in order to be well-informed, law-abiding citizens...

Dubious Dubai, where everything is the biggest, best, hottest, and most air-conditioned

Billy Says:

I think going to Dubai might have changed my life forever, in ways that I will only understand years down the line. More than anywhere else we went, I spent major portions of my time in Dubai simply saying, "Wow!" A bit of excitement, a bit of horror, a bit of hilarity, a bit of rage and a whole lot of fascination.

We ended up in Dubai because Emirates Airline is the cheapest way to get between Europe and South Africa and they route all flights through their hub in Dubai. After my six hour layover in the airport on the way to Johannesburg, I was convinced that I need to change my tickets to stay for longer on the way back. The airline played a promotional video as we were about to land, calling Dubai, "21st Century Arabia," and when I got off the plane I thought to myself, "this may be the *only* 21st Century place I've ever been. At 3am, the airport was bustling, everything was open, and flights were departing to destinations throughout the world every 10 minutes. A young Arab kid raised in Canada (who returned to Dubai, to work 12hrs. per day, seven days a week, as a form of re-hab after getting thrown in Canadian jail at 18 on drug charges) increased my sense of wonder about Dubai by telling me many things like that Dubai has elevators that go up from one sidewalk, across the street, then back down, and that there are computer terminals on the street with no keyboard, because you simply talk into them.

Those things are both totally false. But here's some gems of truth that I did stumble upon in my few days in Dubai:

* There are 3 men to every woman in Dubai.
* All migrant workers (more than 80% of the population) are required to be tested regularly for HIV, and deported if they have it. The government is considering screening tourists as well, but Emiratis are still exempt.
* Migrant laborers are forbidden to unionize (and may well be deported for protesting at work, and/or have their passport seized by the boss upon employment), rent a house or apartment (they must stay in company housing, as they must not marry the local population and cannot bring wives or partners) and cannot become citizens.
* The UAE (United Arab Emirates - Dubai is one of seven emirates) is trying to "protect the minority" economically, by enforcing quotas for "emiratisation" of the workforce, and (except for within "free trade zones") requiring that at least 51% of every company operating in the UAE is owned by Emiratis. (For more on the economic aspects see the informative article on Dubai in the New Left Review).
* Dubai has a number of "Mega Projects" (this is a great link; tons of photos) under construction, including building the world's tallest Skyscraper, (which is competing against the second place building, also under construction, also in Dubai) three "palms" and one replica globe made out of islands "reclaimed" by "rainbowing" sand in the middle of the gulf.
* Dubai has already built the world's first 7-star hotel, the Burj Al Arab, with afternoon tea for 50 EURO or a suite for 1000 EURO, a fleet of rolls royces, a helicopter and landing pad, an "underwater themed" restuarant (one of six, offering food 24hrs. a day) and built on a tiny island 280 meters off the coast (which was "reclaimed" from the gulf over two years).
* Other trivial, bizzare futurist constructions include the world's largest mall, an indoor ski and snowboarding center, the world's largest zoo and world's largest aquarium. Somewhat more substantially, "Dubai also hosts or is planning to build a Humanitarian Aid City, as a base for disaster relief; a free-trade zone dedicated to the sale of used cars; a Dubai Metals and Commodities Centre; a ‘Chess City’ headquartering the International Chess Association and designed as a vast chess board with two ‘King’ towers, each 64 storeys high; and a $6 billion Healthcare Village, in collaboration with the Harvard Medical School, that will offer the wealthy classes of the Gulf region state-of-the-art American medical technology." [Mike Davis, New Left Review]

(a construction project being planned, on display inside a mall. construction happens 24 hours daily, with less than 13cm of rain falling annually).

Some quotes on dubai that are absolute gems:

* "Despite its blast-furnace climate (on typical 120° summer days, the swankier hotels refrigerate their swimming pools) and edge-of-the-war-zone location, Dubai confidently predicts that its enchanted forest of 600 skyscrapers and malls will attract 15 million overseas visitors a year by 2010, three times as many as New York City. Emirates Airlines has placed a staggering $37-billion order for new Boeings and Airbuses to fly these tourists in and out of Dubai’s new global air hub, the vast Jebel Ali airport." [Mike Davis again]
* As one developer told the Financial Times, ‘If there was no Burj Dubai, no Palm, no World, would anyone be speaking of Dubai today? You shouldn’t look at projects as crazy stand-alones. It’s part of building the brand’.
* ‘People refer to our crown prince as the chief executive officer of Dubai. It’s because, genuinely, he runs government as a private business for the sake of the private sector, not for the sake of the state’, says Saeed al-Muntafiq, head of the Dubai Development and Investment Authority.
* “We want to protect the minority, which is us,” Mr. Kaabi said.
* [Referring to a protest of 8,000 workers for a wage increase - after 18 years without a pay raise - resulting in 185 deportations, an employer stated] "It was organised violence ... those involved in the violence were educated workers. We have also received letters of apology from remaining workers in which they admitted that they were fooled into staging protests."

***

As for our time in Dubai, we spent the first day jet-lagged, navigating the bus system out to Luke's (our couchsurfing friend) house. We had a meal in an indian restaurant for workers where the food was $1 for both of us to eat as much as we liked and we were vastly outnumbered by people eating with their hands. Libby and I learned that the section "reserved for ladies" can be sat in by men, but not if there are enough "ladies" to fill the available seats:


Luke slept out in the living room on an air mattress (along with two other couchsurfers, sleeping on their own air mattresses):


and let libby and i sleep in his large, comfy bed:

Luke was an extremely gracious host, doing everything to assist us and help us enjoy our time in Dubai. His apartment was amazing and comfortable (in a skyscraper, surrounded by 20+ skyscraper apartment buildings under construction and bordering "the greens," a section of city where grass is being grown -- at great expense), he took us out for a great meal, and told us all about Dubai. As an "expat" from Scotland, visiting couchsurfers help to ease some of the isolation that comes with living in an essentially apartheid kingdom.

We enjoyed our time also with Cyril, another couchsurfer, on his way to Beijing on Emirates airlines:

We went down to the creek with Cyril...

and he helped us fend off the boatmen trying to get 20 Dirhams (about $5) to take us across the creek and instead we took a water-taxi with workers for 1 Dirham (25 cents).


We wandered around the market areas, and Cyril helped break up the monotonous theatre of non-westerners pushing their wares on westerners by requesting leopard-skin fur coats, sun glasses that covered his whole cheeks, and tight pink t-shirts. He also successfully convinced a vendor, in response to the standard, "where are you from?" that he is from "Pimpistan." The man was sure, though, that Libby was "too white to be from Pimpistan." She didn't try and tell him otherwise.


We also did some gawdier shit, like swimming in the 90degree gulf (in the shadow of Burj Al Arab, springing 170 Dirham on "Wild Wadi" water park, and strolling around a mall which has a different section for each region of the world (each decked out in the motif of that place and sometimes even with a painted sky) and so on.

Dubai is a shamelessly unjust society, with all the foulness of a south africa or usa or israel, but a different spin on how to bring it about. With busload after busload of Indian laborers peeking out through the bars on company owned bus windows, deportation of dissidents and people with AIDS, and the king owning absolutely every inch of land, there's a bluntness to the injustice. But then again, the king would rather set up cameras on the motorway to patrol speeding than fleets of cops, and all of the wealth of Dubai is dependant on an image, so the bluntness has to constantly be toned down.

The image of Dubai is being constructed 24hrs. a day, by the 80% of the population that are "visiting to work," for the benefit of the remaining handful.

The image of Dubai is, for bad now or later, working.

nuf said.
but more to say...

Cape Town #2

Billy says:

It was a really nutty flight down to Cape Town from Johannesburg - in cramped seats and full of silly, silly antics between libby and I:


but it was such a good idea to return to Cape Town and spend another chunk of days there. It really helped us both feel grounded in the place, and to enjoy it without (as much) of the crazy white paranoia that we had inherited from white Americans and South Africans upon arrival to Africa. A month in the area had helped us shed some of our unnecessary fear and stiffness.

We attended an AIDS protest put on by the Treatment Action Campaign that was totally uplifting. Lately it has felt like protests are more often depressing or repressing, but this one had a totally different feel. The crowd sang together with a mix of fury and joy that I don't know I've ever seen; it nearly brought me to tears.


The march was delightful, the way that I always hope they'll be. We poured through the streets, running along, singing, screaming, pushing forward. It didn't feel like a stale routine; it felt like a legitimate expression of people who are fed up with horrible conditions in their society and trying to force a new situation. And it is so beautiful to see that the poor people in South Africa are really at the forefront of solving the overwhelming AIDS crisis there.


It was also fabulous to connect more deeply with our friends - particularly Maya and Londi.

Londi, our main host from the first visit, once again generously offered us her space for a bunch of days. It was the perfect location - an easy walk to the train, minibus to UWC, and cheap veggie roti (as big as yer forearm, by the way). Londi is really cool, very giving, and interested in talking and laughing and sharing a good time. She is the child of a Black South African man and an English woman. Her family had to live in England during apartheid because they were officially a "tri-racial" family, and thus not legally allowed to live anywhere. But she has taken on South Africa with excitement, and it clearly suits her as home.

This time around, Maya also hosted us for a couple of days, and we attended some of her classes at UCT, she took us to some cool spots in Observatory, (to get a better sense of where we were staying, and sites nearby, etc. check this map) and even came out to see the UWC campus one day. With family members having worked with the South African Communist Party, it's no surprise that Maya is thoughtful and concerned with politics and economic issues. What's unusual is that she is so well carving out an independent viewpoint, a life outside of both the 'white' and 'communist' moulds that might have forced themselves on her.


It was good to be on the campus of UCT, and to get a sense of just how regal of a place it really is - in comparison to UWC and mostly anywhere else:


They have a lot of resources, and a beautiful campus, and a whole infrastructure to support Americans coming in to study, but I didn't, overall, feel like I would really enjoy UCT more than UWC. UCT is much more of a European oriented school, both in composition and curriculum, and you can feel it as soon as you step foot on campus. Just on the margins of campus is a huge memorial to Cecil John Rhodes:


We had fun with it...

and there's a great view from the memorial...

But Cecil Rhodes is a bastard.

Exhibit A:

“We must find new lands from which we can easily obtain raw materials and at the same time exploit the cheap slave labor that is available from the natives of the colonies. The colonies would also provide a dumping ground for the surplus goods produced in our factories.”

Exhibit B:

“Remember that you are an Englishman, and have consequently won first prize in the lottery of life”

Should I go on? Alright, one more should suffice.

Exhibit C:

"I contend that we are the first race in the world,
and that the more of the world we inhabit
the better it is for the human race"

I'll go with the "University of the Working Class" any day.

***

Libby and I also spent a good deal of time finding fun ways to wander about the city. We walked to De Waal park, in the ritzy Gardens neighborhood:


We took the train down to simon town (about an hour southeast of cape town, along the indian ocean coast).

There we had awesome tea and cake at a Tibetan cafe, and spent a whole lot of time with the Penguins.






On our last day in Cape Town (and in Africa) we decided to drive out towards the wine region around Stellenbosch with our friends Londi and Eric - about 30km outside of Cape Town - and just relax in the mountains and valleys there. We tried for a while to find a friend of Eric's house and have a picnic with him, but we had a hell of a time finding it, so we ended up just pulling off the road and having our picnic in the grass near a vineyard. It was quite a beautiful place to be lost, and we had a blast:


i buried a penny in the sand, near simon town, and made a wish...

Making the Road, per Libby

The border crossing to Namibia is dry dry desert, plus this little restaurant...

********************

Namibia: Culture vs. HIV, and the Ovaherrero Genocide Committee

For all practical purposes, the core of the Making the Road Trip began in Namibia with a meeting with Lucy Edwards, a South African woman who reaserches and teaches Political Economy of AIDS at the University of Namibia. Lucy was one of the most eloquent and knowledgeable presenters we met during the 3+ week MTR trip, responding to our questions with great attention to the complexities and nuances of the structural factors giving rise to Namibia's particular situation.

Lucy asserts that the construction on masculinity and femininity in Namibian culture plays a pivotal role in making heterosexual women the fastest growing and most highly infected demographic group. Gender inequality, evident in cultural practices like polygamy, wife=lending, and wife-inheritance, increase the possibility of HIV exposure. "When it comes to wearing NIke or listening to American hip-hop, the men here are delighted to abandon their own culture, but when it means changing the way women are viewed and treated, forget it."

When the German and British colonial masters of the early 20th Century pushed all the black Namibians (ie., everyone indigenous to the region) into "Communal Areas" up north and established a contract labor system whereby women stayed behind to maintain subsistence farms and men entered into bonded labor for much of the year (confined to compounds near the imperialist mines), they coulnd't have imagined that they were further relegating women to be the most vulnerable when the HIV epidemic hit much later, in the 1970s. But indeed, they laid the groundwork for a migrant labor population, increasing the incidence of casual and transactional sex. Secondly, women were not permitted to work in anything other than agriculture, and thus were economically displaced from subsistence farming after the mechanization of farm labor. Unable to become independent wage earners, many women entered into transactional sex or concubinage as a survial strategy, which to this day remains prevalent. Frequent imbalance in power relations means many women have little agency to negotiate safe sex with their partner(s).

I asked Lucy to what extent the agenda of PEPFAR and other foreign aid programs influenced the allocation of HIV resources. I've heard many anecdotes at health conferences of instances where conservative ideology limits distribution of condoms, or emphasizes abstinence or faithfulness over safe sex. She pointed out that we must ask if HIV interventions, like the "ABC Campaign" (Abstinence, Be faithful, Condomize), are culturally appropriate. In traditional Namibian culture, where lineage is traced through the mother, "being faithful" takes on a different meaning; a man is faithful by providing for his mother's family, and by providing his wives each with a plot of land. Sexual faithfulness is not a concept relevant to most.

"But we are right to ask about foreign inluence, and we must be critical of the knowledge-power nexus. Who is creating the knowledge around HIV & AIDS? Who is profiting from it? And who is setting the agendas?" Lucy Edwards stands out in Southern Africa as a valuable resource and a tremendously empowered, intelligent woman whose analysis is critical to making headway against the AIDS epidemic.

*********************************
BOTSWANA - Dinner with a stranger

In Gaborone, the capital of Botswana, our evening's lodging was a
slightly dodgy casino and hotel, with relatively zero vegetarian
dinner options. That, combined with our desire to engage in African
life outsdie the confines of our tour bus and hotel rooms, inspired
Billy and I to lead a small contingent of likeminded hungry friends
out into Gaborone. Billy's inquiry for an Indian restaurant at the
concierge yielded a hand-drawn map given to him resemble something
like a treasure map scrawled by a 6-yr-old. Nevertheless, we set out
onto the street to try our luck. We walked toward what seemd to be a
market, where endors bustled about under the streelights, packing up
for the day. The women we first asked for directions hadn't a clue,
but fortune had it, another woman passing by heard say the
restaurant's name and stopped. "You are looking for it? I live
nearby. Come with me, I'll show you." And so, delightedly, we set
off with this woman who introduced herself as Anges from Zambia. In
the dark of night, her broad white smile stood out against her skin
and she cheerfully guided us to the taxi rank, where we agreed to
share a private hire.

I'll never know if she atually intended for us to get to the Indian
restaurant; we ended up, instead, strolling through her neighborhood
to a Chinese/Thai place with - gasp! bean curd (tofu) on the menu. We
treated Agnes to dinner while she anwered our questions about daily
life. She said Zambia and Botswana each have a very different feel
for her. "In Zambia, 90% of the people you meet are nice. Here, it
is 50/50." She gave us contacts of her nephew and sister living in
other parts of Africa, should we happen to pass that way on our
travels. (Retrospectively, I regret that we didn't give her nephew a
call when we were in JoBurg). After showoing us her favorte
neighborhood hangouts, she kindly waited with us to be sure we got
safely into a cab back to the hotel. I don't think our paths will
cross again, but it is these tiny moments of humanity that fuel my
love of unknown exploration in places both near and far. How many of
us slow to meet strangers, show them the way, put our own agendas on
pause when the opportunity for a new and unusual connection arises?
We'll remember that dinner with Agnes for a long time, inspired to
follow her example.
Our wonderful drivers for the 3 weeks, Richard and Bartholomew

We've been extremely luck to stay relatively healthy during this trip (esp. since neither of us has health insurance), but a couple kinks gave us a closer look at healthcare in southern Africa. Two weeks after I had badly sprained my ankle in Cape Town, it gave out for a 2nd and 3rd time in Swazilan, landing me on the ground in tears of pain and frustration. A week later, I came down with a case of what appeared to be ringworm (awesome!). I was content to let it do its thing, hoping it wasn't a big deal, but Billy, rightfully disgusted by the festering red circle on my forearm, insisted we get it checked out, and while we're at it, why not have someone take a look at the ankle, too? We were told we could go to a hospital in Rosebank, a wealthy suburb of JoBurg, close our hostel, and that it woud be "absolutely free." On walking into the urgent care, we were told a consultation would be about $115 USD. Across the street at ta private clinic, it was a $30 consult, plus any tests and treatment. In hindsight, that's not much higher than an insurance copay for seeing the doctor in the States, but on our tight travel budget it felt like a lot. The parking lot attendant told us we should try the public hospital downtown. "You won't pay for treatment, but they won't treat you good." Had we had a bit more time, we'd both have like to go to the public hospital for the experience of it.

On average, the S.A. government spends $__ per person per year on healthcare. By contrast, the US annually spends ___ per person. Both countries have parallel care sectors, private and public, which provide unequal services based on socio-economic status. Still, it seemed evident that the magnitude and implications of that disparity are far more severe in South/southern Africa. With 25% of the population living with HIV/AIDS, the ifference between private and public care often means the difference between life and death. See "Capetown #2" for a video of protests led by the Treatment Action Campaign.

Yes, the animals went animal-watching at Kruger Park. If you must go, try to support a locally-run and locally-benefiting guide group like $&@##@
Old gold mines and Johannesburg skyline, now obscured by an amusement park
Fitting an MY trunk in THAT trunk was a true contortionist act...

Above: waiting at one of the borders for our Mexican friends to be let through

*************

SWAZILAND

I confess to going to Swaziland with very little knowledge of the country, save for their high HIV infection rate and being one of the few remaining monarchical governments in the world. I also confess to leaving 36 hours later with little additional understanding. However, a few noteworthy moments can convey a bit of our experience.

Nearly every border crossing (there were 6) proved challenging to 2 of our friends who traveled on their Mexican passports. It drove home for those who were unaware the privelege (desire or not) of traveling on a US passport. In Swaziland, we saw firsthand a glimpse of corruption by border officials, and it generally followed like this:

Border official: There is nothing you can do. They [our Mexican comrades] cannot enter Swaziland without a visa, and they have no visa.
Prexy: We were told there would be no problems.
Border official: Nothin can be done. Please, step into my office.
[15 minutes later, and minus some cash]
Prexy: Quick, let's get out of here before they change their minds.

Sometimes, a little $$ goes a long way... Or takes one a long way, anyhow...

The rolling mountain hills of Swaziland were stunning in contrast to some of South Africans barren plains, and several of us enjoyed a hike to take in the sunset.

We had a free day, and while most of the group went to a local craft market to buy gifts (B & I were still in long-term travel mode and couldn't fathom lugging things around with us post-group trip), the remaining 10 of us opted to go check out the "Cuddle Puddle," a mineral hot spring pool near the town Mbabane. We had a classic "Africa" moment when an already mostly-full minibus pulled over to the roadside where we were flagging down transport, and the driver and conductor encouraged all 10 of us to pile in. This particular mini-bus was distinguished from most by 5 huge speakers installed in the ceiling. As the drive progressed, the volume (which was already bumping when we hopped in) steadily increased, until it threatened to burst our eardrums and had our hearts beating in synch with the reggae-techno remixes.

The Cuddle Puddle itself cost only $1 for a swell, hot mineral pool (imagine a warm delightful swimming pool). Billy and I "splurged" and spent 25 bucks each for 30 minutes in the spa/sauna complex, plus a 30 minute massage. Besides feeling good about the TLC, we also felt good to be supporting an establishment that wasn't a mere tourist trap and acted as a local hotspot for Swazi folks.

(below, the Cuddle Puddle)

The Ovaherrero Genocide Committee performs their battle cry, above.

Also, they kindly let us join them for dinner at a local joint.

*************************************

MOZAMBIQUE: A non-racialized African society?

Mozambique is a vibrant coastal society full of charming quirks we couldn't hope to master in the one week we were there. Take, for example, the organization system in operation at the small market near our hostel. Within a concrete-walled quadrant of the block sat hundress of vendor stalls, selling mainly fruit and veg, canned household items, woven baskets, and in one corner, chickens slaughtered upon sale. All this was shaded under a makeshift roof of corrugated tin sheets, haphazardly perched atop wooden poles, and letting daylight slip in between the gaps to dimly illuminate the space with the same ambience as an arabian souk. The small cocinas there - mini-kitchens comprised of a few small propane cookstoves - served beans, rice, and meat... a heaping vegetarian platter was 20 metacaish, about 75 cents!

"International solidarity is not an act of charity. It is an act of unity between allies fighting on different terrains toward the same objective. " - Samora Machel, Mozambican liberation leader, President 1980-1985.

What does it mean to act out of solidarity rather than charity? This is a question Billy and I sought to define for ourselves and to engage others on the trip in thinking about as we found ourselves in various scenarios where status and privelege could sway us toward more conveneient alternatives, like giving money. Recognizing someone else's struggle as part of your own and devloping projects of mutual aid, on the other hand, require more sustained dedication.

The day-long conference of Making the Road and Mozambique's "Consejo Nacional de Jovenes" (CNJ, or National Youth Council) was one of the most clear examples of an opportunity for building bridges between "allies." To our surprise, many of our Mozambican peers perceived America to be the utopia (or dystopia, depending on your perspective) that it's portrayed to be by popular and mass media. They were stunned to hear that we don't all have big-sreen tv's, that we have a separate, unequal, and failing education system, that 1/2 as mnay black women as white women get breast cancer, but 3 times as many die from it. In breakway session, we had an hous to discuss topics like Art & culture, Entrepreneurship, Development, etc. As the discussion of development unfolded, it became clear that we needed to shift away from the paradigm that considers the US "developed" and Mozambique "developing." In reality, both our countries have a lot to do before they can claim to be meeting the needs of all their citizens. Most of our Mozambican colleages were quick to criticize the US' alignment with the World Bank, the IMF, and the WTO, but were slower in realizing that we Americans are subject to the same policies as those enacted in the "Third World" by those aganecies. Some of the Mozambicans seemed eager to ask for advice and Billy commented to me "If they want advice on successful development, we're the last ones they should be asking. However, if they want to know what it's like to live in a country that's been following the World Bank's advice for the last 50 or so years, by all means..." And indeed, we'd have much to say about the consequences of privatization - a healthcare system that places profit before people; a national budget that diverts funding from education and social services to the heavily militarized defense of capital; the systematic imprisonment of oppressed populations, taking advantage of a legally-captive workforce.

The conference would've needed to be several days long to sufficiently provide enough time for us to establish real relationships and more cohesive project ideas. Barring that, we at least were able to deconstruct some of the myth of the American dream, and to name some of our common oppressions. Mozambique and the US had differences enough to vary our perceptions of the immediacy of particular issues. "Why don't we hear anything about the American AIDS crisis in your media?" asked one woman -- "All the news coverage coming from the States is about AIDS here in Africa." We discussed, in response, how HIV - though present in the States - is less rampant and most people are on treatment and living [relatively] "normal" lives. In Mozambique, by contrast, nearly 1 in 5 people has HIV/AIDS. Again and again, addressing the epidemic manifested as one of the primary concerns of the development discussion. And it makes sense; one can't begin to talk about projects like a massive scale-up of the healthcare sector while the disease continues to take its toll on the material resources and depletes the already understaffed healthcare workforce.

One project affiliated with CNJ this is making strides to preventatively combat HIV is "ESH". Instead of perpetually sending volunteers into the schools to do AIDS awareness education, ESH works with schools to help each develop its own integrated curriculum so that HIV education is integrated into the normal school subjects. For example, rather than hearing bland statiscs about infection rates, students may instead get moath homework that requires them to carry out operation like calculating the rate of infection when "x" people living with the disease have unprotected sex with "y" partners. In this way, ESH acknowledges the tendency of youth to tune out the overwhelming bombardment of public health messages while providing a more sustainable and holistic HIV education model, unrealiant on a steady volunteer flow.

Despite many cultural differences, immediately I felt more comfortable in Mozambique than I had anywhere else in southern Africa. After a week there, I could imagine myself (with time and some Portuguese lessons) becoming a nearly fulid participant in the society. My white skin, though still noticeable in a predominantly black society, seemed less of an impediment to having genuine relationships with Africans that it did in other countries like south Afric. In our final group debriefing, I asked for explanations.

-- "Is it because there was less of a brutal, racilaized regime under the Portuguese than South Africa had under the Apartheid government?" I proposed.

-- "No, to the contrary," Prexy replied. "The Portuguese were more brutal and vicious to the Mozambicans than you can imagine, even more than the Apartheid government. The reason you don't feel its effects here the way you do in South Africa, Namibia, etc, is because Frelimo fought to make clear that their struggle was not against the whites, it was against impreialism. Their 'most sophisticated weapon,' according to Samora Machel, was their determination to create a non-racist society. So you can give thanks to those who used the weapon to fight for what you felt there."


libby