Lake of Stars: "This is Africa" - Part 2

Although the amazing festival and beautiful lake made for an exciting weekend, the most exciting part was our failed attempt to return to Lilongwe on Sunday morning. While the two other Lilongwe residents intelligently left at the crack of dawn, the rest of us attempted to soak in as much sun and fun as possible, hoping to fill up on positive vibes until the next reunion. So around 11:30 am, as we attempted to depart, the fun – and the reminder of what it means to say T.I.A.: “this is Africa” began…

After checking out of our lodge, we rode to the festival site in the back of our friends’ pickup truck one last time, thinking this would get a quick transfer to the bus station from there. The “quick” transfer translated to a bicycle taxi (manual, not motor) to the main road – encouraged by our friend Dezio – and an one hour ride we hitched in the back of a pick-up truck with 17 Malawians (one of whom essentially straddled me the entire trip), two canisters of fuel, and a rope strung with several fish.

Once we arrived in Mangochi boma, we were guided to the bus stop where expected to easily catch a coach bus to Lilongwe. Two hours later, there was only one minibus whose destination was Liwonde, a town one hour south of Mangochi (and in the opposite direction we were intending to travel). Time was ticking, the sun was waning, and we had no hope of getting to Lilongwe. I desperately tried calling co-workers and my few friends here, and the suggestion was what Leah and I had deduced from our travel guidebook: to give up going to work on Monday and stay the night in Liwonde, home to hippos and lots of wildlife. We agreed we’d salvage the day and make our extended trip into a mini-vacation; the catch was just getting there.

As the two-and-a-half hour mark came around, the bus continued waiting for more passengers. So when our friends, who’d spent the whole day enjoying the festival and the lake, offered us a ride to Liwonde, we decided to take that. We attempted to get our money back from the bus driver, which was an epic failure! The driver couldn’t understand me at first, and then gave me a resounding “no refund” when he did understand, proceeding to raise his voice enough to get the attention of other drivers at the almost abandoned bus station. Two drivers began heckling me (to which I started yelling obscenities and telling them not to touch me), and when Leah tried to descend from the bus, they wouldn’t let her. One grabbed her hand and tried to close the minibus door on her, which resulted in her punching him, and the driver proceeded to enter the driver’s seat and try to drive off. And in the midst of our yelling, I realized that Leah’s bag was in the trunk. My tone completely switched to those congregating around the bus – “please, sir, just help us get her bag” – and thankfully, someone unlocked the trunk so we could grab it before the driver recklessly drove off. We walked as quickly and purposefully as we could to the main road, attempting to hitch a ride to Lilongwe but eventually settling for our free ride to Liwonde with our friends.

And although this would have been a nice end to the adventure, our arrival in Liwonde kept the sense of adventure alive. We decided to splurge for the only hotel whose listed number was in order, a spread known for its view of hippos with its cheapest rooms at US$80 per night (a huge jump from the typical $20 accommodation and a substantial portion of our monthly stipends). But when we saw how dumpty the least expensive rooms were, all we could is laugh. We decided to pay a little more for an upgrade, but the $90 room was covered in cockroaches and ants. We decided to enjoy a yummy Indian dinner at the hotel before heading to a nearby bed and breakfast, where we ended our long day on the riverside drinking Carlsberg and listening to the hippos snoring before retiring to our single twin bed.

The next morning, we hoped to finish our journey with as little adventure as possible, but as luck would have it, the “T.I.A.” weekend was not complete! We enjoyed breakfast on the riverside while watching hippos before attempting our journey back. After 10 minutes, we caught what we were told was the only coach bus to Lilongwe for the morning, along with the 80 or so people already on the bus (half of which were standing in the aisle). We set our backpacks on the floor, created makeshift seats, and tried to ignore the few cockroaches that scuttled by. There was a kind woman who adopted us throughout the journey, ensuring that newcomers didn’t steal our standing space. And eventually, I was promoted from sitting on my backpack sitting on a fuel canister for the remainder of trip.

The day – and the Lake of Stars extended weekend – ended with a fantastic lunch of nsima and beef stew, some fun discussions with the Rastas selling curious in town, an important purchase of Prozyquantil (to treat the Schisto worms I could have contracted from swimming), and – of course – a burger and free beer from, you guessed it, Harry’s bar! All-in-all, it was the best weekend in Malawi thus far. Indeed, “this is Africa.”