Getting Back to Swaziland

Getting back to Swaziland
This story doesn’t have a point or a punch line, it was just a really long day of travel:

My destination in Mozambique was Tofo, a touristy but beautiful beach town. The seafood was delicious and I had a great time, even got to go swimming with humpback dolphins. But unfortunately, the town is 500 miles from Swaziland, and I had to switch buses in Maputo, the capital of Mozambique. One 8 hour bus and another 4½ hour bus.

It was a 4AM bus, so I woke up at 3:40 and hurried over. But all the good seats were taken, so I was stuck with the wheel-well seat, which quickly made my legs fall asleep. Unfortunately my legs were all that could sleep. The upset seafood in my stomach kept me awake, telling me that I might have to open the window and let it out.

So instead of sleeping, I just watched Mozambique. It’s a beautiful country, and what it lacks in infrastructure it makes up for in bus-ride consumerism. Everywhere on buses in Africa, whenever there is a stop, people run up to the bus and sell any and everything through the windows. But I had never seen bottles of gin being sold at a bus stop before. Especially at 7 in the morning!

At a bus stop

Finally I asked a guy in front of me to switch seats, allowing me both more leg room and somebody to talk to: the only other white person on the bus. (Because Mozambique was a Portuguese colony, Mozambicans generally don’t speak English.) On a 10 hour bus ride I needed to talk to somebody. As it turned out she was American and we had a mutual friend from my high school. That was strange.

Side of the road in Mozambique

After arriving in Maputo, I wanted to see the city a bit but needed a meal. So I sat down at a table on the sidewalk and the waiter said his only two words of English: “chicken or beef.” I said chicken and waited for the food. 30 minutes later and getting agitated, I finally went to look for it inside the restaurant, and saw that it was a ready buffet. Oops.

My next stop was the bus to Swaziland, but I wanted to walk around and wasn’t really in a hurry. I had only gotten vague directions to the bus stand from the first bus driver, but after an hour, I started asking people to point me in the right direction. Unfortunately, they always pointed me in different directions. I’ve been told that it’s a cultural thing in that it’s considered impolite to not have an answer to a question, so it’s better just to make up an answer. Or it could have been a language barrier. I know in the US taxi drivers sometimes don’t speak English, but in Africa they generally do. Except in Maputo, apparently.

Limbless tree in Maputo. Not sure why it's limbless, but all the limbs on all the trees in the whole street had been cut off.

Finally a man came up to me and asked me if I was lost. He was dressed in a suit and tie and sporting a remarkably out-of-place British accent. But he knew where the bus was, and even walked me part of the way.

I caught the last bus to Swaziland and made it back to the hostel at 7:15PM, where I went straight to bed without dinner.