Monday, April 7, 2008
You're From Where? 4.6.2008
On Sunday I was catching a taxi home from the airport when a British chap came up and asked if he could share my cab. Turns out he was a consultant from England brought in by the government to determine the viability of increasing investment in the ---------- industry and, given how everything seems to work here, no one had shown up to pick him up. While we chatted during the thirty minute drive from the airport back to civilization, I found out that he currently lives in a town adjacent to Cheam, Surrey, the town where my parents lived in England for a few years and where two of my older siblings were born. [Note: Why is the airport in the middle of nowhere? I’m guessing a combination of tribal/governmental politics, the universal constant which dictates airports must be located in difficult to reach areas, and the fact that there are relatively few flat areas large enough to build an airstrip in the country. Lesotho is not called “The Mountain Kingdom” for nothing.] After apologizing, he explained how much he disliked Cheam and would have “died of boredom” if he ever had to live there. Ahh, British frankness. Though in fairness, looking back, many of the stories my parents tell about living in England are negative events now fondly remembered, safely ensconced as they are in the past. The bad economy, the rolling blackouts, the bad food. I had always assumed that it was living in England at the time (with four kids) that was the source of their problems, but perhaps the location they lived in had more to do with it.
Hot Water 4.6.2008
Last week I finally got hot water in my apartment. I have always had a geyser, as they call the miniature, ceiling suspended hot water heaters here, but up until last week Friday mine for some mysterious reason did not function. It did not really matter when it was still summer and merely stepping outside reduced you to a sweating mess. My primary use for hot water is showers, and when it is a hundred degrees out a cold shower feels amazing. However, we have officially started in towards the Lesotho winter, and I found myself making excuses to avoid taking showers when I got up because it was cold. But no more! After an amiable chat with my landlord (a rambling story prone 90-year old man who, as the father of the current Minister of Health, is someone I have a vested interest in keeping happy with me), two men showed up in short order to take a look at the problem. Loose wires turned out to be the culprit, and while that diagnosis is somewhat alarming considering my house has the fire safety of a wicker gas can, it is fabulous to have hot running water. I (and no doubt my co-workers) thank the powers at be for this event. Now if only the water wasn’t infected with typhoid (not joking) . . .
Speaking of the typhoid contamination, which is evidently not that big an issue as long as you boil any tap water you will be using, I went to my gym the other day and was surprised to see that the water dispensers located throughout the gym were empty. These are your standard office cooler type dispensers, with a large bottle on top that drains through a cooling/heating unit to the spigot placed below. I have always enjoyed having them there because you have to be pretty careful about tap water and it was nice to have such an abundant supply of bottled water in the context where I drank the most. When I asked one of the staff why all of the dispensers were empty, she mentioned the typhoid issue. I was initially confused because bottled water should not be subject to typhoid contamination stemming from the general supply, right? Turns out confusion was warranted, just not for the reasons I had assumed. Rather than actually buying new bottles of water to stock the coolers, my gym evidently simply has two sets of bottles that they alternately refill with tap water and swap out to keep the coolers stocked. When I noted, somewhat vigorously, to the staff member that this was in line with false advertising, she calmly told me that the tap water in the city is very good. Except of course when it is infected with typhoid.
Thaba Bosiu Hike 3.24.2008
It is Monday, March 24, 2008, and I am currently lying on my couch, pondering if I will ever walk again. Let me tell you how I got here.
[I use a couple of words in this account that may require some explanation. Lesotho – the country I’m living in. Basutho – the ethnic group that makes up the overwhelming majority of Lesotho’s population (‘Lesotho’ roughly translates as ‘Kingdom of the Basutho’). Sesotho – the language of the Basutho.]
[This account originally had embedded pictures. I’ve included some at the end, but if there is a reference to “The picture below” or similar, please just use your imagination.]
About a month ago I was reading the local paper and saw a short article detailing an upcoming hike. Over a hundred years ago the founder the Basutho nation, Moshoeshoe I, made a hike with his warriors from a town called Moakheneng to what would become his mountain fortress at Thabu Busia. Upon arriving at Thabu Busia Moshoeshoe gave a speech that historians consider to been the foundation of the Basutho nation (i.e. Lesotho). The concept of the hike was to follow in the steps of Moshoeshoe. I thought it sounded interesting but completely forgot about it until I was talking to a friend about a week ago who was planning on doing it with his family. He had done it the year before and raved about both the amazing views and the fact that it was probably the most Basutho of experiences one could have. How could I resist?
When I called up the tour director I got my first taste of what I was getting myself into. He raved about how the first day we would be hiking for only seven hours or so, twelve hours on the second day, and another seven hours of “easy” hiking on the last day. Regardless, I signed up and paid my fee (R350, the equivalent of USD$50) which would cover transport to the start and back from the finish, two nights’ lodgings, and dinner for both nights. At the last second my friend’s father had some health issues that forced my friend to skip the trip, but with only two days to make alternate plans and already very excited about the hike, I decided to go anyway.
I arrived at the bus pick-up, per instructions, at 6:00 am. Though told that the bus would leave promptly at 7:00, it eventually arrived and we set out at 9:00 pm (typical local timing).
The composition of the group surprised me. Out of about one hundred there were only four foreigners, a woman working with a UN development project, a couple of Pilipino technical advisors from the local textile mills, and myself. We were kind of a big thing because I guess this is something they have been doing for a while and we were the first foreigners to come along. As I found out later, the trip was being subsidized by the Ministry of Tourism and a bunch of corporate sponsors with the idea that it will hopefully become an attraction for international tourists in the future. Participant ages ranged from upper teens to early fifties, and the quality of physiques ran from traditionally built women to young men who could have doubled as professional soccer players. The mixed composition of the group lulled me into thinking that the trek would be a relatively easy affair.
The only Basutho with the disposable income to come on this type of trip are generally college educated and either highly placed or working for Western corporations. Thus we had the deputy of the Lesotho Defense Force, tax assessors from the Revenue Authority, a number of inspectors with the Police Commission, and related family members of this type of people. There were a few notable exceptions, like one of the greatest guys on the hike who was a retired miner and wore his hard hat the entire time. When I asked why he wore such unusual head gear, he said that he had worn it for so many years that it was the most comfortable hat that he could now think of.
The two hour bus ride from Maseru to our starting point, Moakheneng, was a noisy affair. I had long thought that Americans were the loudest of peoples (as in most foreign countries you can hear a group of Americans coming from two blocks away), but living in Africa has forced me to revise that opinion. Between singing, telling stories and jokes, a little bit of preaching, the two hours was a non-stop jab fest of such volume that I always had to elevate my voice to talk to the man sitting next to me. That being said, everyone was extremely friendly. Any fears I had had about coming on the trip alone disappeared as I made friends on the bus ride up. When we alighted at Moakheneng we were met by a welcoming committee consisting of a rep from the Ministry of Tourism and the local chief.
I did not understand most of the program, as with most of the official communication over the three days, because it was completely in Sesotho. A young reporter in the group took me under his wing and tried to make sure I got everything of safety importance, but I was constantly asking people what was going on. They were very patient.
As we left the first village to begin, I noticed that an older woman had joined our group. She was probably in her fifties, barefoot, and dressed as a traditional healer. She spoke no English, but I eventually found out through intermediaries that the chief had sent her with our party as protection. The traditional healers have claim to a variety of powers, weather working being among the most important and the reason she came along. Whatever you can say about her weather control (and it never did anything worse than rain on us – no dangerous lightening or hail, though we often saw it on the horizon), the lady was tough as nails. She was consistently one of the fastest in the group, walking barefoot, over some of the rockiest terrain. She would not touch or accept anything directly from the foreigners, but was very polite otherwise.
My first real critique of the tour organizers is that I do not think they really understood the type of group they were taking out. We were on the trail for about seven hours, and about a third of the group had to be picked up at a point where we crossed a road because the column had gotten so stretched out. Rather than spacing people with knowledge of the trail throughout the pack, pretty much all of the people who had done the hike previously (all men) were clumped at the front and they set a mean pace that quickly left the others behind.
I hung out at the back of the front pack until about 3 kilometers from the finish when I had to lay down for a bit. I’d been in a rush in the morning and skipped breakfast and had not brought a lunch after having been assured that we would have a chance to pick something up along the way (not true!). I was fine until about 6:30 pm when I suddenly got really dizzy. I quickly lay down in the middle of a corn field because it seemed more graceful than falling down. This event, which only the two guys with me actually saw, everyone made the rounds of the entire group and for the rest of the hike people were constantly asking me if I was okay. At a loss (or perhaps just unwilling) to explain why I had been fasting all day, I just told everyone I had been tired. After a few minutes I got enough strength to stagger into the closest village and found an open café that sold Coca-Cola. Say what you will about Coke, but there have been a few instances in my life where it has functioned as a highly effective medicine, and this was one of them. After a sugar/caffeine infusion and a few more minutes sitting on the ground, I picked myself up and made it to the finish line for the day, an Outward Bound camp we were staying at for the first night. I need not have rushed, as the organizers spent the next hour and a half ferrying in people who had gotten left behind or lost. While I will fault the initial hiking order, we did have cars and ATVs following us in any areas that would support roads (about 40% of the trail) to help those who fell ill or behind.
A word on the first day – absolutely incredible terrain. We crossed practically every landscape you can see in Lesotho, from plateau mountain tops to river valleys to grassy plains and so on. Absolutely beautiful country with picturesque villages placed here and there but largely untouched.
This fine gentleman crossed our path and gave us an impromptu concert. Local music is heavy on the accordion, with call and respond chanting laid over the basic beat. The galoshes he is wearing are part of the standard rural outfit, the utility of which I did not appreciate until this trip when we crossed about ten small rivers a day.
After a fine dinner, we were informed that we would be getting up at 4:00 am the next morning in order to reach the next stopping point before dark. The next morning we were greeted by a steady drizzle that would continue until mid-day. I asked about this in context of our weather woman, and was informed that light rain is “good weather.” Bad weather, which we were being protected from, would include hail, torrential rains, and the ever dangerous thunder storms.
I was a bit surprised to find that most people had not brought flash lights, so the next couple of hours were an interesting struggle. I’d brought a head lamp as well as a hand torch, so I had a group of five or six people who clustered around my penumbra as we made our way up the trail. I should note that most of the trails we followed on the trip were actually water run-off paths, so after the start of the second day we were slogging through mud practically the entire way. Joy!
The second day had its share of highs (awesome views, amazing scenery) and lows (tons of river crossings, mud) but the biggest issue was simply the length. Originally predicted at twelve hours, we actually spent 16:48 on the trail (not counting lunch), which didn’t put us to our second stopping point (a rural school house where we slept on the floor) until around 10:30. I actually enjoy night hiking, but the organizers were making a point of keeping the group together as one and, as the day wore on, that meant the pace got excruciatingly slow. I normally do not consider steep descents that tiring, but when you are forced to take two steps, stop, wait, three steps, stop, wait, etc. they get both excruciating both physically and mentally.
Much of the second day we were passing through regions that can only be reached by 4-wheel drive or, in a few instances, donkey, so we were a pretty big deal. People would come out of their houses to greet us, children would shout and follow us for a bit. Melissa and I, the only Westerners in the group, got stared at most of the time.
When we finally arrived at the school house, we had a great local dinner of pa pa (corn mash), Russian (sausage), veg (boiled spinach), and pumpkin. It was quite good. I should note that whenever you eat at a local restaurant or are served at a local house, they give out massive portions. It seems to be a cultural artifact that could have a couple of origins (authentic food insecurity, etc.), but Basutho can put down food like no one I’ve ever seen outside of Polynesia. Anyway, with a belly full of dinner we all collapsed. My inch thick foam pad over concrete floor was not the most comfortable bed I have ever had, but at the end of that day down padding would not have felt better.
On Sunday morning I experienced a little miracle. While packing up, I discovered that my wallet was missing. After a careful review of my sleeping area, I determined it was not there and, thinking about it, reasoned that it had probably gotten lost somehow during our final descent towards the school house. Losing the contents (USD $45) did not bother me nearly as much as losing the wallet itself, a gift from a dear friend and incredibly faithful church member in Japan. As we were about to leave I mentioned the loss to the other Westerner in the group and she said she had seen a wallet in the field out behind the school house. We went and, sure enough, my wallet was there. The cash was gone, but that turned what would have been a very discouraging start into a very promising beginning. I hope whichever villager got the cash (equivalent to a couple of month’s salary) puts it to good use.
The third day of hiking was uneventful. Eight hours over muddy dirt roads with occasional bypasses through fields of rustling corn and sorghum. For the last two hours a group of guys took turns running in front of the pack, singing and chanting.
I tried to avoid drinking untreated water, but by the third day had to make do with what I could find on the road. If I come down with a parasite, we will know exactly where it came from.
We finally entered Thaba Bosiu in the afternoon, dancing and singing as we arrived. Under a large awning (more rain) we had a very nice reception party that included the Minister of Tourism herself, the village priest, and the local chief. Everyone who finished the trek was given a certificate of completion, which did not feel as silly as it sounds after finishing the hike.
I have heard various estimates of how far we actually hiked, and I feel fairly confident we clocked over eighty miles over the three days, much of that over mountainous terrain. Not insanely long, but considering the composition and relative athleticism of the group, I was very impressed.
So here I am, couch bound for two reasons. First, unsurprisingly, I am more than a bit sore. Second, my new boots (which are awesome and by far the most waterproof/breathable pair I have ever had) also left me with two silver dollar blisters, one on the pad of each foot. But that is okay, because today is a holiday and I work in office. I would do it again in a second.
[I use a couple of words in this account that may require some explanation. Lesotho – the country I’m living in. Basutho – the ethnic group that makes up the overwhelming majority of Lesotho’s population (‘Lesotho’ roughly translates as ‘Kingdom of the Basutho’). Sesotho – the language of the Basutho.]
[This account originally had embedded pictures. I’ve included some at the end, but if there is a reference to “The picture below” or similar, please just use your imagination.]
About a month ago I was reading the local paper and saw a short article detailing an upcoming hike. Over a hundred years ago the founder the Basutho nation, Moshoeshoe I, made a hike with his warriors from a town called Moakheneng to what would become his mountain fortress at Thabu Busia. Upon arriving at Thabu Busia Moshoeshoe gave a speech that historians consider to been the foundation of the Basutho nation (i.e. Lesotho). The concept of the hike was to follow in the steps of Moshoeshoe. I thought it sounded interesting but completely forgot about it until I was talking to a friend about a week ago who was planning on doing it with his family. He had done it the year before and raved about both the amazing views and the fact that it was probably the most Basutho of experiences one could have. How could I resist?
When I called up the tour director I got my first taste of what I was getting myself into. He raved about how the first day we would be hiking for only seven hours or so, twelve hours on the second day, and another seven hours of “easy” hiking on the last day. Regardless, I signed up and paid my fee (R350, the equivalent of USD$50) which would cover transport to the start and back from the finish, two nights’ lodgings, and dinner for both nights. At the last second my friend’s father had some health issues that forced my friend to skip the trip, but with only two days to make alternate plans and already very excited about the hike, I decided to go anyway.
I arrived at the bus pick-up, per instructions, at 6:00 am. Though told that the bus would leave promptly at 7:00, it eventually arrived and we set out at 9:00 pm (typical local timing).
The composition of the group surprised me. Out of about one hundred there were only four foreigners, a woman working with a UN development project, a couple of Pilipino technical advisors from the local textile mills, and myself. We were kind of a big thing because I guess this is something they have been doing for a while and we were the first foreigners to come along. As I found out later, the trip was being subsidized by the Ministry of Tourism and a bunch of corporate sponsors with the idea that it will hopefully become an attraction for international tourists in the future. Participant ages ranged from upper teens to early fifties, and the quality of physiques ran from traditionally built women to young men who could have doubled as professional soccer players. The mixed composition of the group lulled me into thinking that the trek would be a relatively easy affair.
The only Basutho with the disposable income to come on this type of trip are generally college educated and either highly placed or working for Western corporations. Thus we had the deputy of the Lesotho Defense Force, tax assessors from the Revenue Authority, a number of inspectors with the Police Commission, and related family members of this type of people. There were a few notable exceptions, like one of the greatest guys on the hike who was a retired miner and wore his hard hat the entire time. When I asked why he wore such unusual head gear, he said that he had worn it for so many years that it was the most comfortable hat that he could now think of.
The two hour bus ride from Maseru to our starting point, Moakheneng, was a noisy affair. I had long thought that Americans were the loudest of peoples (as in most foreign countries you can hear a group of Americans coming from two blocks away), but living in Africa has forced me to revise that opinion. Between singing, telling stories and jokes, a little bit of preaching, the two hours was a non-stop jab fest of such volume that I always had to elevate my voice to talk to the man sitting next to me. That being said, everyone was extremely friendly. Any fears I had had about coming on the trip alone disappeared as I made friends on the bus ride up. When we alighted at Moakheneng we were met by a welcoming committee consisting of a rep from the Ministry of Tourism and the local chief.
I did not understand most of the program, as with most of the official communication over the three days, because it was completely in Sesotho. A young reporter in the group took me under his wing and tried to make sure I got everything of safety importance, but I was constantly asking people what was going on. They were very patient.
As we left the first village to begin, I noticed that an older woman had joined our group. She was probably in her fifties, barefoot, and dressed as a traditional healer. She spoke no English, but I eventually found out through intermediaries that the chief had sent her with our party as protection. The traditional healers have claim to a variety of powers, weather working being among the most important and the reason she came along. Whatever you can say about her weather control (and it never did anything worse than rain on us – no dangerous lightening or hail, though we often saw it on the horizon), the lady was tough as nails. She was consistently one of the fastest in the group, walking barefoot, over some of the rockiest terrain. She would not touch or accept anything directly from the foreigners, but was very polite otherwise.
My first real critique of the tour organizers is that I do not think they really understood the type of group they were taking out. We were on the trail for about seven hours, and about a third of the group had to be picked up at a point where we crossed a road because the column had gotten so stretched out. Rather than spacing people with knowledge of the trail throughout the pack, pretty much all of the people who had done the hike previously (all men) were clumped at the front and they set a mean pace that quickly left the others behind.
I hung out at the back of the front pack until about 3 kilometers from the finish when I had to lay down for a bit. I’d been in a rush in the morning and skipped breakfast and had not brought a lunch after having been assured that we would have a chance to pick something up along the way (not true!). I was fine until about 6:30 pm when I suddenly got really dizzy. I quickly lay down in the middle of a corn field because it seemed more graceful than falling down. This event, which only the two guys with me actually saw, everyone made the rounds of the entire group and for the rest of the hike people were constantly asking me if I was okay. At a loss (or perhaps just unwilling) to explain why I had been fasting all day, I just told everyone I had been tired. After a few minutes I got enough strength to stagger into the closest village and found an open café that sold Coca-Cola. Say what you will about Coke, but there have been a few instances in my life where it has functioned as a highly effective medicine, and this was one of them. After a sugar/caffeine infusion and a few more minutes sitting on the ground, I picked myself up and made it to the finish line for the day, an Outward Bound camp we were staying at for the first night. I need not have rushed, as the organizers spent the next hour and a half ferrying in people who had gotten left behind or lost. While I will fault the initial hiking order, we did have cars and ATVs following us in any areas that would support roads (about 40% of the trail) to help those who fell ill or behind.
A word on the first day – absolutely incredible terrain. We crossed practically every landscape you can see in Lesotho, from plateau mountain tops to river valleys to grassy plains and so on. Absolutely beautiful country with picturesque villages placed here and there but largely untouched.
This fine gentleman crossed our path and gave us an impromptu concert. Local music is heavy on the accordion, with call and respond chanting laid over the basic beat. The galoshes he is wearing are part of the standard rural outfit, the utility of which I did not appreciate until this trip when we crossed about ten small rivers a day.
After a fine dinner, we were informed that we would be getting up at 4:00 am the next morning in order to reach the next stopping point before dark. The next morning we were greeted by a steady drizzle that would continue until mid-day. I asked about this in context of our weather woman, and was informed that light rain is “good weather.” Bad weather, which we were being protected from, would include hail, torrential rains, and the ever dangerous thunder storms.
I was a bit surprised to find that most people had not brought flash lights, so the next couple of hours were an interesting struggle. I’d brought a head lamp as well as a hand torch, so I had a group of five or six people who clustered around my penumbra as we made our way up the trail. I should note that most of the trails we followed on the trip were actually water run-off paths, so after the start of the second day we were slogging through mud practically the entire way. Joy!
The second day had its share of highs (awesome views, amazing scenery) and lows (tons of river crossings, mud) but the biggest issue was simply the length. Originally predicted at twelve hours, we actually spent 16:48 on the trail (not counting lunch), which didn’t put us to our second stopping point (a rural school house where we slept on the floor) until around 10:30. I actually enjoy night hiking, but the organizers were making a point of keeping the group together as one and, as the day wore on, that meant the pace got excruciatingly slow. I normally do not consider steep descents that tiring, but when you are forced to take two steps, stop, wait, three steps, stop, wait, etc. they get both excruciating both physically and mentally.
Much of the second day we were passing through regions that can only be reached by 4-wheel drive or, in a few instances, donkey, so we were a pretty big deal. People would come out of their houses to greet us, children would shout and follow us for a bit. Melissa and I, the only Westerners in the group, got stared at most of the time.
When we finally arrived at the school house, we had a great local dinner of pa pa (corn mash), Russian (sausage), veg (boiled spinach), and pumpkin. It was quite good. I should note that whenever you eat at a local restaurant or are served at a local house, they give out massive portions. It seems to be a cultural artifact that could have a couple of origins (authentic food insecurity, etc.), but Basutho can put down food like no one I’ve ever seen outside of Polynesia. Anyway, with a belly full of dinner we all collapsed. My inch thick foam pad over concrete floor was not the most comfortable bed I have ever had, but at the end of that day down padding would not have felt better.
On Sunday morning I experienced a little miracle. While packing up, I discovered that my wallet was missing. After a careful review of my sleeping area, I determined it was not there and, thinking about it, reasoned that it had probably gotten lost somehow during our final descent towards the school house. Losing the contents (USD $45) did not bother me nearly as much as losing the wallet itself, a gift from a dear friend and incredibly faithful church member in Japan. As we were about to leave I mentioned the loss to the other Westerner in the group and she said she had seen a wallet in the field out behind the school house. We went and, sure enough, my wallet was there. The cash was gone, but that turned what would have been a very discouraging start into a very promising beginning. I hope whichever villager got the cash (equivalent to a couple of month’s salary) puts it to good use.
The third day of hiking was uneventful. Eight hours over muddy dirt roads with occasional bypasses through fields of rustling corn and sorghum. For the last two hours a group of guys took turns running in front of the pack, singing and chanting.
I tried to avoid drinking untreated water, but by the third day had to make do with what I could find on the road. If I come down with a parasite, we will know exactly where it came from.
We finally entered Thaba Bosiu in the afternoon, dancing and singing as we arrived. Under a large awning (more rain) we had a very nice reception party that included the Minister of Tourism herself, the village priest, and the local chief. Everyone who finished the trek was given a certificate of completion, which did not feel as silly as it sounds after finishing the hike.
I have heard various estimates of how far we actually hiked, and I feel fairly confident we clocked over eighty miles over the three days, much of that over mountainous terrain. Not insanely long, but considering the composition and relative athleticism of the group, I was very impressed.
So here I am, couch bound for two reasons. First, unsurprisingly, I am more than a bit sore. Second, my new boots (which are awesome and by far the most waterproof/breathable pair I have ever had) also left me with two silver dollar blisters, one on the pad of each foot. But that is okay, because today is a holiday and I work in office. I would do it again in a second.
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