Malawi to Mozambique

Lilongwe is not a bad place for a day or two to catch up, but I press on. Six hours on a bus take me to Blantyre, a city named after Dr. Livingstone's home town in Scotland. The most interesting part of the day is that the road runs right along the Mozambique border. In one town, one side of the street is Malawi and the other side Mozambique, with no barrier, barbed wire, or immigration post.

Blantyre, although the setting is pretty, has a vibe of not being safe, plus it's freezing. I put on all the clothes from my backpack to sleep. Lake Malawi and the odd game reserve are the reasons people come to this country (unless you're Madonna adopting another baby), but really, not when you can see your breath.

I head to Mozambique and the town of Tete, located on the map toward the Zimbabwe side. Tete has the fame of Mozambique's hottest town. It's also supposed to be such a hardship post that even the missionaries didn't want to come here.

I show up at Blantyre's bus station at 7am and score the front seat next to the driver of a van going to the border. This is ideal because a) I don't have people squeezing past me every minute and b) I can control the volume of the radio when the driver's not looking. Today's selection is full on Christian music since it's Sunday. I also, for once, get a good view of what's ahead. There aren't that many cars in Malawi, so the chances of being in the front line of a head-on collision are minimal. Driving along, it's not unusual to see coffin builders along the roadside, a cottage industry that probably sprang up when AIDS hit Malawi. I also see very few older people, but babies are all over the place. My guidebook says life expectancy here is 43 years.

For three hours we drop and pick up passengers--always kicking up dust in the process. I've started wearing a bandanna over my mouth and nose, looking like a cowboy driving 50,000 head of steer across western Texas. This helps from getting dust sickness. And today's produce that's being stuffed in the van is tomatoes. One guys comes in with heads of lettuce, another with spring onions, and together the van has a pleasant salad smell.

I'm finally dropped at the border, and here come the money changers. I talk to one guy who quotes me something ridiculous, and I walk off to the Malawi immigration. The officers in this country could certainly learn some social skills from Dickson back in Tanzania; the woman here throws my passport back at me after flipping through a few pages and tells me to find the entry stamp myself (yeah, OK, I do have a lot of stamps).

Finally processed, there is a five-kilometer no-man's land to cross. Really decrepit cars ply the route. And here's the classic African scene: Five guys escort me to the next taxi leaving, but the front and back seats are full. I point this out to them, and frenzied discussion breaks out with everyone. And here comes the money changer guy, offering me more money. I yell at him: "you tried to cheat me back there and you know it. I have no confidence in you and for all I know, your money is fake. Goodbye."And in the next breath to the driver: "Look, there's no room. None. And obviously, these passengers don't want me in there because no one is squeezing together, and I know they can do it. I will wait for the next car."More frenzied discussion, and some people are pulled out. Now there's room in the front. The other guys get in the--and I'm not kidding--in the trunk. It has occurred to me more than once while traveling in Africa that the barbaric ways they used to pack the human cargo on the slave ships isn't that far off from how they pack the matatus, dalla-dallas, buses, and whatever else transports people here. They're good at it.

Anyway, on the Mozambique side, immigration is polite, and another pack of money changers closes in like hyenas with their wads of money and calculators. Too late--I changed money with the immigration officer.

Welcome to Mozambique. A matatu here is called a chapa. This one has a dirty looking Bugs Bunny in an athletic outfit hanging by one ear off the rear view mirror. We stop every few minutes and it's the usual vendors of ears of corn, bananas, peanuts, and Coca Cola pounding on the windows. Notable though, is one kid with skewers of some grayish stuff to eat. I can make out eyes, surrounded by wisps of either feathers or fur. I have no idea what these are and thankfully no one buys any to bring inside the van.

A few hours later I'm in Tete. Bad news is that the few hotels are completely full. "Tete is growing; many people come!" One place makes a call and finds me a place. I'm not sure if it's a hotel or has a name, but it's run by an Indian family and my accommodations are immense. The father even has his son drive me around to do my errands. Gotta love the weirdness of travel.