It has been a while, but Cade sent us a burst of new blogs from Africa Trans shipping . Here he describes (in his unique style!) A typical day on the road ....
True to its name, shipping Trans Africa is proving to be exceptional to the rule. Our surprise daily dosage comes in the wake of more twists and turns than the London A-Z, while our endurance is tested by the fact that we are in about as many countries as we do in cheap flip-flops plastic. So much so that to better convey the extent to which the elements of surprise and endurance are obvious, it is best to take a step back and rather than looking at the puzzle as a whole, focus on one piece or one day.
Select and explain a day that truly captures the mood , gasoline and throughout the whole adventure is an option I considered briefly before quickly drop into the basket "too hard." So I choose a day that was just a pretty good laugh, opened my laptop and began spreading my verbal diarrhea on the keyboard. This is my account the day 88 :.
The fire crackled and popped in kettles Pots and pans echoed in the kitchen and at the right time, Dan`s laughter bellowed after he 'd heard what I assumed was said another of his old jokes. Some the wake of the group towards the sun, some are waking up to their bellies and others simply sleep through the static. For the past three months, it is the combination of these three sounds that came to serve as my daily alarm.
The familiar smell of my sweat-soaked pillow crawled to my lips and tickled my nostrils. I carried me out of bed, put on my dirty old four short days and went to the fire to hear the next in a long line of Dan`s self-proclaimed "belters." The tone of my skin was now uniform tone of the earth. My flip-flops were mismatched, my coffee was tasteless and my body odor around me as awkward silence after an inappropriate comment. It was just another day at the office.
First on my agenda as any other day was to remember where we were exactly. This is a task that seems relatively simple in theory, but when your lifestyle is you spend so much of villages that you make to, is much more difficult in practice. In this case, we were surrounded by tractors and agricultural equipment on a common Benin. Where exactly was this town, I could not tell you until my coffee good start, but what I can say for now is that we were two days in a stretch of five nights bush camp begins in a town called Ouidah Benin, and ending in the Nigerian capital Abuja. After a thorough yet quick calculation I quickly concluded that we were currently located somewhere between the two.
With this, the next on the agenda was for me to work on where we were exactly. Fortunately, this morning I am not the only one to do it. Nicola, a worker from the town invited us to his village in the morning so had to take my place in the hot seat of navigation in the cabin and guide the way.
Nicola informed the group that we should be visiting voodoo King his village and if we should be lucky, it might give us a hearing. In the West African nation of Benin, Voodoo remains the religion of the state and is part of the culture of the country so it was not surprising that while in Benin, we had to learn a little more about this culture. Seeing that we rank so highly, it was not surprising that sooner or later we were to be greeted by royalty. He would have our group in his home, we speak through an interpreter, answering all our questions and bless us in prayer before sending us on our way.
I must say that the element of surprise came when having promised take us directly to the king's house, field truck to a stop at a pineapple plantation in outskirts of the village.
See, for 88 days now, trying to convince Gareth as pineapples grow of land has been gradual and painful as pulling teeth. For 88 days Gareth has insisted that the existence of pin trees combined with the fact that Apple grow on trees, is conclusive proof that pineapple grow on trees. So after having a quick note to Nicola, he was more than willing to provide with Gareth closure he needed and organized a small tour and spontaneous pineapple plantation. While the tour was our yawning mouth wide open catching flies, Gareth was forced to stand front and center with attention.
Gareth returned to grateful truck, but assured us that It would be confirming the validity of our "theory of pineapple plantation on Google at the next opportunity nonetheless. And with that, the big pineapple debate of 2013 was on another temporary hiatus and we were back in the truck on the way to the Nigerian border.
Passing through an African border is usually long is fixed and painful and a stage for the endurance element. The problem with crossing by land is that you basically have two immigration points fight, an output and an input. Although generally the officials at the outlet are happy to see the back of you and the entrance officials are looking for any excuse to prevent you from entering, it means that the output is usually fast while the entry is tedious. The officials, however, do not always respect these guidelines.
I jumped out of the cab on arrival at the border and in a case minutes of the Benin immigration had our passports stamped and sitting in the middle of the desktop stack. But before I could say, lickety-split, officials process the request at the end I pay a "processing fee" which prompted to turn an old stand-off. Our passports were sitting in the middle of the table, as the net on a tennis court, while immigration officials and I rallied our respective arguments back and forth on top of them. After a short period of time many jokes, I take a break in the game to lift the passports stack below the ransom they were detained, slipped them under my arm and made my escape.
Our arrival at immigration Nigeria on the road, it was obvious that the officials could not be more welcoming. While our passports were processed at the speed of a snail, officials welcomed us to set up the camp in the field of immigration Nigeria where they were insistent, we had to spend the night as guests. So we set up our tents, our fire started and immediately made us at home.
Due to the fact that no official money changers in Nigeria and the banks will not change foreign currency in Nigerian Naira, if you want to local currency in Nigeria, it is necessary to do so illegally on the black market. Seeking their assistance in this matter, immigration officials are quick to call their contacts in the neighboring village. Half an hour later, their contact arrived and started to exchange our money illegally on the black market, but insisted on doing so in safety immigration reasons. And with that, we knew we had to contradictory colorful world of Nigeria.
Although I have to say that, as sure as it began as another regular day in the office, on the day 88 actually just ended up as just another day at the office. The kingdom to ransom, unpredictability that I am come to expect from each day was as powerful as the stench seeping through the pores of my skin. Although in normal circumstances the day would be classified as memorable, the truth is that it faces the same fate as any other day on the Trans Africa trip: To be thrown back on the stack where it will be lost among the mound made up of memories and mishaps.
I went to bed that night with the knowledge that if I did not know what this trip trans send me through, what I knew was the fire would again cracked, pots would clang again and the old jokes Dan morning have his laughter resounds in the villages. While there was little else I could be sure I knew two things. My alarm was set for another day at the office and in spite of all short and curly, puberty is not got shit on Africa
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