1-17



wanna buy a chicken?


We arrived in Chimoi Mozambique around 8:30 or 9:00 at night, and some of us wanted to continue on to Tete (tet), but the driver would only do it if he could get at least 10 people, to make it worth it. In the end we only came up with 6, so it was a no-go. Then, through like 4 of the passengers putting their English skills together they told me that they would stay in Chimoi for the night and leave at 4 in the morning. Well that's when I played my cards right and acted like a dumb tourist. I had already been planning on staying the night, I had the address of the Pink Papaya hostel, and was ready to go, but just for grins i told the people that their plan sounded good, but where would I sleep until then?? The driver felt bad and told me to sleep in the bus on the back bench seat for the night when he parked it in the truck stop. So I did of course. It saved me $10 that the hostel would of been, and was just as comfortable. After the 6 or 7 hours to Tete, I was ready to get to Malawi, happy that the constant bus rides were saving me lodging cost so far, so I headed out. First I went to one of my new bus friend's house to eat dinner with him and his family, somewhere I can't pronounce. When I was about to leave, we went to a store across the street and after some convo, a semi truck driver offered to take me the 2 hours to the border for free with him. that was a fun ride. from there I was kinda forced into paying for an expensive taxi, because the Mozambique and Malawi borders are about 6 kilometers apart, and there is no public transport, just expensive taxis.
After getting through Malawi immigrations, I negotiated a taxi driver so far down on his price that I couldn't say no. I negotiated a pretty cheap ride all the way to Monkey Bay, right on the southern end of Lake Malawi. It took 7 hours, but I was glad I did it considering the only transport outside the border fences were chappas. I would rather play leap frog with a unicorn than ride a chappa for 7 hours. I rode one a couple times, and It's a nightmare. They manage to gram about 40 people into this 15 person bus, bags and all, not caring if the door shuts or not. I'm a big dude already, and can't get any leg room, especially with a big bag. Put someone on my lap, and people on the laps of the ones next to me, 9 times out of 10 carrying a live chicken or something weird, and I'm no happy camper. Add to that all the not too shy people poking and rubbing my tattoos on my arms, and everyone in the bus staring in amazement at the white boy with tats, as if i had just lit my hair on fire and was singing something from Bob Marley, and it's a great time.