Out of Biharamulo

On 8/14/08 we victoriously left Biharamulo having completed our  6 week stay and lived to talk about it. Of course leaving Biharamulo may have been victorious but no one said it would be easy. And of course  I would be the last one to  forget George Bushes epic blunder of declaring "Mission Accomplished" too soon. We had lined up the hospital ambulance, a toyota land criuser, to give us a ride to Mwanza.  From there we would eventually get a flight to Addis Ababba and then on to Paris. But as word got out around the hospital grounds of a trip to the big city the ambulance filled up rapidly. By the morning of our departure we had one dying patient ,who was in a coma. One severely burned and disfigured teenager. Two strangers, one hospital doctor, the driver, Barbara and myself. Of course the dying comatose patient was loaded into the back ON his hospital mattress. Add  luggage and 5 boxes of Disani water bottles I was bound and determined to recycle in Mwanza and we had a classic African  road trip.....too many people for one vehicle.

The story picks up with  8 people, one mattress, luggage and boxes  in a land cruiser ambulance pulling into in Mwanza. We have just crossed the Kagera region. The temperature inside the ambulance was above 100 degrees all day. It's been 5 hours of eating, breathing and being coated with red Tanzanian dust. I can't see my hair but Barbara's hair is now red. The African man I do not know  who never got a seat and never spoke a word now has red hair. We have just dropped the patient( still alive ..barely) at Bigondo Medical Center and are headed for our favorite hotel in Mwanza..... 

   We pull into LaCairo Hotel. Hot, dusty, filthy and stinky. The place never looked so good. We are back and this is our portal to the 1^st world. LaCairo is on a dirt road in Mwanza. But once you enter thru the gate it’s all paved and tiled and pretty clean. Its really a transition zone from the jungle, to a 3^rd world city, to TV ,the internet and food and civilization. We turn into the courtyard  and I’m sure we are  looking pretty funky  to the hotel staff ,even by Tanzanian standards. 1st of all we are in an ambulance , not a daily occurance I hope.. 2^nd we are covered with red dust. 3rd we  really stink. The back of the amulance  still smells like the patient. He peed and sweated and I think threw up. But worst of all is the fish. I think the driver bought some fish at the Lake Victoria  Ferry. Its more complicated then that.  At  the market when you buy fish , you buy fish,  that doesn’t mean you get a bag. That doesn’t mean the fish are wrapped. You get the fish. So on top of my expedition bag which is squished in the back of the truck, and covered in red dust are 4 dead, desiccating, smelly, ugly looking Lake Victoria  fish. The bell guy comes out to get the bags. I try to warn him but he is not responding to English.   He opens the back of the ambulance and the 5 boxes of empty Dizani bottles fall out onto the ground. What doesn’t fall out but engulfs the bell guy is a giant cloud of red kagera dust that smells like dead fish and dying human. It’s a hot ugly scene. Barara has gone inside to check in. She no fool, there’s air conditioning in there.

  I  am trying to get the bell guy not to bring the bags inside the hotel. I want them washed off before they are carries into the lobby. He carries them in anyway. Things are getting uglier. The local hang around guys on the street are getting all excited and watching the stinky ambulance unload it’s cargo. I’m sure they are saying how many people are in that  thing anyway?  Its about then that Barbara comes out walks up to me and says they don’t have any reservations in our names and they don’t have any rooms in the hotel.  How could this be ?  I got a e mail reply to my reservtion request. I march into the cool, clean  lobby  and  walk up to the desk. Sling my filthy dusty knapsack onto the counter ( it gets the effect I want) and whip out the apple computer. I  want to show them my email letter of confirmation.  BUT….no internet available!! Arrgghh!  We are suddenly powerless, no evidence of reservations.  Of course it is always at time like this when suddenly no one speaks English. They do not want to deal with an irate filthy mazugu so its really quite easy. The hotel staff, as if by some invisible signal,  switches to Swahili only. Its also at times like this when I have to remind myself…it’s the 3^rd world, it’s the 3^rd world, it’s the 3^rd world. Never count on there being electricity or internet or English when you need it.

   OK, Babs is still in control. She is  moving on , letting it go. She has asked the front desk girls to see if theres room at Talapia, the white peoples hotel across town. The women calls and actually books us a room!!  I'm having a visible melt down but Barbara and the desk lady seem to be having a nice time. I think they are going to have tea together! I feel like Rambo.! Is this a girl to girl thing or is this  just a "we don’t want any Mazugos especially stinky, mazugo around our hotel"?? I never could do the Rambo thing anyway. We march out to the ambulance leaving a little bit of our dusty, aromatic  selves in the LaCairo lobby.  The journey continues...