The Africa Journals, Ch. 5, Brian and His Best Laid Plans

The Africa Journals

Chapter 5
Brian and His Best Laid Plans

All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.” – Martin Buber

I knew exactly where I was all the time.  I just couldn’t do anything about it.   All I could think about was, “Nobody knows where I am and Brian is going to be so angry when I don’t show up on time!”

I had no idea how to get out of the fix I was in, but I need to back up and explain how I got trapped in the first place.

Back at the Johannesburg airport:   Once Brian, our Program Manager or Tour Director as Vantage now prefers, had corralled all the new recruits on this flight, he loaded us onto a coach and took us to the Southern Sun Hyde Park Hotel.  We were greeted in the lobby with a carafe of cold apple juice  and the key cards to our rooms.

We had the remainder of the afternoon and evening free because Brian had to return to the airport to pick up another tourist arriving on a later plane.

I found my room, and figured out I was 11 hours off my time zone in Alaska.  Actually, if Alaska Standard Time were still in its original, geographic time zone, I would now be exactly 12 hours ahead of it.   So much for the political machinations to keep the capital of the state from being in a more accessible place than Juneau.

Lobby decor.   There's water in there.

I ate one of the manadarin oranges smuggled into the country past uncaring customs agents, showered away the more than 25 hours I’d been traveling from Seattle, and went to bed. 

Lovely, lovely room.

This was the plan as laid out in a folder carefully prepared by Brian:

7:00 AM—Breakfast buffet in the Bice Restaurant on the Mezzanine level.

10:00 AM—Transfer by coach to Mabula Game Lodge in the Mabula Private Game Reserve, Waterburg, South Africa.

PLEASE BE PUNCTUAL!

You know what they say about best laid plans?   The trouble started bright and early the next morning.

The Africa Journals, Ch. 4, But, What about My Mandarin Oranges?

The Africa Journals

Chapter 4

But, what about my Mandarin oranges

Kilometers are shorter than miles. Save gas, take your next trip in kilometers.” – George Carlin

And off we went on the wings of South African Airways.  I pulled the company magazine from the seat pocket.   A tribute to Nelson Mandela was on the cover, a striking black and white photo and the words:  May you rest in the peace you gave us.

This was a long flight, more than 17 hours, though I think that includes about an hour spent on the ground in Dakar, Senegal, for refueling and for passengers embarking and debarking.  Senegal is the most western point on the African continent.

Dawn was peeking over the eastern horizon as we left Senegal, but we had many more hours in the air before we reached Johannesburg in South Africa.

Finally, finally, we landed in the largest city in South Africa and it was here I found the answer to something I had long been considering:   Why are passport control and customs located so far from your gate?   After walking several miles, the answer came to me in one of those light bulb epiphanies.  

 (An aside:  Now that incandescent bulbs are no longer being manufactured, what will replace the light bulb icon for epiphanies?  Those idiotic, twisted, low-lumen CFLs or those cold and heartless LCDs?)

Anyway, here’s my latest epiphany:  If you are able to follow directions and get to passport control and customs inspections, and you able capable of walking that far —you know it’s a bad sign when one hallway has three (count ‘em, three) moving sidewalks— then you are self-reliant enough to enter that country.  And probably conditioned enough to enter that country’s premier marathon.

Once through passport control, I retrieved my suitcase from the luggage carousel, dragged it off to one side, and opened it.  Right there in the lower right corner was my scan-resistance safety wallet, and tucked in an inside pocket was my yellow fever card.  I breathed a big, long sigh of relief.

So far, so good.

 

Landing in Johannesburg.

I breezed through customs with nary a glance from a gaggle of uniformed customs agents clustered around a scanning device meant for luggage.   I wasn’t stopped and questioned.   My bags weren’t inspected.  No one asked for my carefully completed customs form.

Had I somehow accidentally chosen the right line—the one that was labeled “Nothing to Declare”—and that’s why I breezed through?    I kept looking around.  Surely someone would want my form.   All I saw was a dizzying array of uniforms and the wearers of those uniforms had no interest in me, my luggage, or my customs form. 

Would they have taken away the mandarin oranges I’d brought from Alaska and meant to eat on the plane?  The half sandwich from Potbelly’s in D.C.?  Ah, well.

Out the security gate I went and there was Brian holding a Vantage sign and gathering his flock of “new recruits.”  For the next three weeks he would shepherd us around, answer our questions, keep us safe from hawkers and miscreants, and, if need be, bail us out of jail and mediate any international incidents we might cause.

Welcome to Africa!   After years of dreaming and ten months of waiting, at last I was in Africa and anxious for my first safari into the African Savannah to see wild animals in their natural habitat.

But what happened next…   Well, that takes some explaining.