The Smoke That Thunders

Life is an amazing adventure…such a mix of the sublime and the mundane.  A few weeks ago we were in Zimbabwe gazing in awe at one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World, Victoria Falls… and today we were looking for the water leak under the kitchen sink. Victoria Falls and the environs are certainly more interesting!

In 1855, Dr. David Livingston, physician, African missionary and explorer, travelled down the Zambezi River to see for himself an area that the natives described as “the smoke that thunders.”  In doing so, he became probably the first European to view the falls, which he claimed for England and named for the reigning monarch, Queen Victoria.  Livingstone described the falls as a scene “gazed upon by angles in their flight.”

Statue of Dr. David Livingstone near the falls.  The photo looks blurry, but the constant
spray from the falls always makes it appear that it is raining on the statue.

The sun on the mist creates multiple rainbows

Today Victoria Falls is listed as an UNESCO World Heritage Site. The town of Victoria Falls has a population of 33,748 (2012 census) and an economy that is essentially based on tourism. 

While we were there we stayed at the Sprayview Hotel, a perfectly fine modern establishment.  However, if one wishes to step back into the romance of a by-gone era, a visit to the lovely Victoria Falls Hotel is in order.  Built in 1904, it still exudes the original Edwardian charm.  One is transported back into a time of luxury and privilege.  Even today it maintains its place among the grand hotels of the world.  Its restaurant, The Livingston Room, is ranked as one of the top seven restaurants in the world.  Dining al fresco on the broad veranda, one gets a sweeping view over the perfectly-manicured lawn.  The 1905 railroad bridge over the Zambezi River gorge and the spray from the falls creating rainbows as the sun glistens off the water provide a spectacular view.

Lounge and entrance to The Railway Bar at the Sprayview Hotel

Rainforest bar in the Sprayview Hotel

The veranda and outdoor dining at Victoria Falls Hotel

 

View from the veranda.  The bridge, built in 1905, crosses the Zambezi River.  On the
left end (as you see it here) is Zimbabwe.  On the right end is Zambia.  The bridge
was originally built as a railroad bridge, a link in the Cape Town-to-Cairo railway.

Though you can't see the falls themselves from the veranda, you
can see the spray rising up several hundred feet in the air.

 

Women's restroom off the hotel parlor.  Marble and chintz...the décor
harkens back to the grandeur of the Edwardian period

Portrait of His Royal Highness, Edward VII, the King of England at the time,
the hotel was built.  The King visited the hotel shortly after it opened.

Lounge at Victoria Falls Hotel.  The veranda is to the right,
where the sun is shining through the windows

Door leading out of the other side of the lounge, opposite the veranda, toward reception

Trophies adorn the walls of the hotel.

 

This man was patrolling the hotel grounds.  I asked him what his job was.
His answer?  He was keeping the baboons off the lawn and away from the guests.

 

Baboons were everywhere around the hotel grounds

While the opportunities to shop had been somewhat limited while we were on safari, the town of Victoria Falls offered several chances to part with our currency.  Most of our entourage visited the “tourist market”, more properly named the Elephant's Walk shops.  Several of us, slightly more adventurous, also visited the “local” market, a combination dry goods / flea market / vegetable market / “everything under the sun” market several blocks off of the main tourist area. 

Elephant's Walk Shopping Village...the "tourist" shopping area

 

This craftsman in Elephant's Walk designs and creates
sculptures from wire.  Everything from small pieces....

 

...to this nearly life-sized sculpture of a man reading his newspaper.

 

The tourist areas of Victoria Falls include many restaurants and bars.

We thought this sign was especially colorful and interesting.

There was some pressure in the “tourist market” from vendors wanting to show you their wares (but, thankfully, none of the pulling or grabbing that can be found in markets in other places in the world) and haggling was generally expected.  We had more fun in the local market.  Prices were set but were substantially lower than in the tourist market.  Obviously, there was not the same prevalence of “souvenir” items, but if you wanted something that the local people actually bought and used for themselves – such as brightly-colored fabric – this was the place to shop.  People that we encountered in the market were friendly and helpful and would take you to a specific vendor instead of just giving directions.  One woman, when we explained what we were looking for, took the time to lead us nearly two blocks to a vendor with precisely the right items that we were seeking, and later returned to make sure that her friend had treated us well, and that our purchase had gone smoothly.

 

This woman had a shop that sold brightly-colored material called "chitengas" that serve many
purposes, from apron to skirt to a wrap for holding your baby on your back.  Yvonne bought several.
The man, whose name is Mehiuli, initially tried to sell us a melon but then tagged along with us and
just wanted to talk--and to be in this picture.  Peeking around Yvonne is Hilary, one of our tour group.

Due to hyper-inflation (at one point, the country had to increase the salary of soldiers by 300%, which still didn't keep up with inflation) "re-denomination" - simply printing notes in larger denominations - of the Zimbabwean currency took place in 2006 and again in 2008.  By July of 2008, the cost of one egg was $1 billion Zimbabwe dollars.  Banks limited withdrawals to $100 billion dollars per day, which would not even buy a loaf of bread.  On April 12, 2009, without warning, the use of Zimbabwean currency was suddenly abandoned and foreign currency came into use throughout the country.  Cash that people held in banks, pensions, and trust funds became worthless.  Today the U.S. dollar is the “official” currency of Zimbabwe, but at the present time, there are eight currencies (none of which are Zimbabwean) that the banks are accepting which makes commerce difficult for local enterprises and individuals.



Top bill:  $500,000 (Five Hundred Thousand) Zimbabwe dollars, issued July 2007
Bottom bill:  $10,000,000,000 (Ten Billion) Zimbabwe dollars, issued 2008

The major feature of this stop was, of course, the falls themselves.  Victoria Falls was called Mosi-oa Tunya in the local Kololo language meaning “the smoke that thunders”.   A truly accurate description, for one can see the mist of the falls some fifty miles away; the mist also creates a rainforest ecosystem in the immediate area.  Astounding statistics give mathematical credence to the grandeur of Victoria Falls:
     *   largest curtain of water in the world
     *   5,604 feet wide
     *   plunges from a height of 355 feet
     *   at peak flood times 1.4 billion gallons of water per minute pass over its edge

But mere statistics can’t capture how one is engulfed in the total sensory experience.  The olfactory senses hone in on the scent of mosses, ferns and damp foliage blended with the sweet fragrance of blooming fig trees and tropical flowers.  The spray, as it rises 200 or 300 feet in the air, condenses and falls as rain, permeating clothing and making hair tendrils cling limply around your face as you gaze in awe.  The thrashing waters cascade over the basalt plateau as one – no, two – no, three rainbows appear, arching over the falls.  The air is filled with sound because the falls do, indeed, thunder, yet there is a stillness, almost a reverence, evoked by the magnificence of the experience.

The thunder of the falls....

 

...and the stillness of a rainbow in the mist.

 

So we’ve returned to reality and to the leak under our kitchen sink.  But we can recall the grandeur of Victoria Falls, and we’ll remember that moment in that place as another of our great Road Stories.

There are just some moments and some places you will remember forever.
Victoria Falls is certainly one of them.

 

"Salibonani" from Hwange District







Our African adventure included more than just game-viewing in the bush.  The opportunity to meet and interact with people in all of the countries we visited was a wonderful experience – as OAT puts it in their brochure, a “journey of learning and discovery.”  At the lodges and tented camps we were encouraged to talk with the staff (“Ngiyabonga” [thank you] to Albert at Kashawe Tented Camp in Zimbabwe, for the Ndebele language classes!) We had some very interesting conversations with the staff and drivers in the camps where we stayed about our families, where we lived in the states, and the weather - we had pictures of the snow that had fallen at home just before we left, and several of the camp staff members that we talked with had never seen pictures of snow, much less the real thing.  But stepping, even briefly, into community life beyond the safari camps is really enlightening.

At Kashawe Tented Camp, Albert spent one afternoon teaching Yvonne
and Hilary several words and phrases in Ndebele, the local languag

On one stop, we were split into four teams of three members, and each team was given $2.00 by our tour leader and sent into a community market to buy a specific local product.  Bill, Larie, and Linda bought Chibuku, a traditional beer, fermented mostly from sorghum or millet.  In the past, no social occasion or religious ritual was complete without it — no wedding or funeral, no prayer for rain, no tribute to the gods.  Today, it is the most popular alcoholic drink in Africa.  Usually, one brings his own container to the store and fills it from a large vat of the brew.  Not having brought a container with them, the store sold our shoppers the beer and gave them the container, called a “scud” and named for the missile that we all came to know through CNN’s coverage of the first Gulf War.

Our tour leader, Manuel, with the "scud" of Chibuku that Bill (in background), Larie and Linda
bought in the market.  It may be a favorite in Africa, but I don't think any of us liked the taste.

Chibuku might be consumed while eating the local snack food found by Hillary, Jack and Diane: Mopane worms.  The New York Daily News said “Ready to get more adventurous than potato chips?  In Zimbabwe, mopane worms are a staple in rural areas – and a delicacy in cities.” (January 25, 2013).  Mopane worms are so named because they are caterpillars that feed on the leaves of the mopane tree.  They are dried, then fried crisp, and have somewhat the consistency of fried pork rinds. 


Mopane worms (actually, caterpillars) from the Mopane tree, dried
and then char-broiled.  Tried them once...no, thanks!



Kathy, Ray and “Boston” Ray, in the meantime, located a local non-alcoholic drink, Mague.  While home production is still widely practiced, the drink is also available at many supermarkets, being produced at factories.  Its taste is derived predominantly from lactic acid that is produced during fermentation, but commercial mageu is often flavored, much in the way commercially available yogurt is.  Similar beverages are also made in other parts of Africa.

The final team (Mike, Bryan and Yvonne) was sent after Mutatya, which in the Shona language means “bird plums”.  Smaller than cherries, with a large pit, bird plums taste like dates.  They can be eaten fresh or, like dates, dried and stored for future use.  Since Mike and Bryan had the situation under control, Yvonne wandered off to make some purchases - a cow bell and a wooden spoon - that were not on anyone’s list.  Shop keepers were helpful and simply laughed with us as we mangled the language trying to communicate our product names.

Buying "bird plums"  $1 (US) per cup.  This lady only had one cup left, so
she went to the vendor in the next stall and brought back this pan full

One of the stalls in the outdoor market.  The brick building in the background, made of mud bricks,
is the grocery store.  We bought some gifts in this store for the villagers that we were going to visit.

Never one to miss an opportunity to shop, Yvonne bought a cow bell (in the
foreground, next to the axes) and a wooden cooking spoon from this vendor



Another stop was at St. Mary’s Primary School in the Hwange community.  The school was founded in 1939 by the Catholic Church and is currently supported in part by Grand Circle Foundation (parent company of Overseas Adventure Travel).  The Principal gave us an introduction to the philosophy and the practical daily challenges in creating this educational environment.  All of the students in this school (as in all schools in Zimbabwe) are required to wear uniforms, which their parents must pay for.  We visited a sixth grade and a second grade classroom.  Classes are taught in Ndebele and English.  We were encouraged to chat with the students as such encounters develop their language skills.  The second graders were in the midst of a math lesson - all 44 of them!  The room was calm and the kids all engaged in their work.  I have nothing but admiration for both students and teachers at St. Mary’s Primary School!

St. Mary's Primary School's mission statement



When we arrived, the 7th grade was lined up to greet us...



...and welcomed us with a song.  Note that all the students, including the girls, have their hair
cut very short.  The Principal told us it was worn that way to help prevent ringworm. 



Classes of 40+ students are the norm, but the kids are very well behaved.  Like kids
everywhere, they crave attention and love to show visitors their schoolwork.



Math problems on the blackboard in the 2nd grade classroom.  With few
books, lessons are written on the board, and the students copy them in
notebooks with blank pages, and then solve the problems.  



A fairly modern brick school, but the "restrooms" are all outside, and do not have running water



Three sixth-grade boys in class.  Boys wear khaki uniforms and the girls wear blue with white trim

The Principal (left foreground) and a student from each grade level accepting some of the
gifts our group brought, including pens and pencils, maps and globes, stickers and
all manner of school supplies plus three soccer balls.

This sign hangs in the school library as a "life lesson" for
the kids, but it is good advice for all of us.



After leaving the school we stopped at a family compound in the Hwange community.  The social structure is based on paternal lineage so family units consist of sons and grandsons and their families.  Families work together to provide the daily necessities for the extended family unit. The daughters-in-law of the patriarch showed us how they ground millet, which is very labor intensive.  In order to make the task less mundane, they sang while working, in rhythm with the pounding of the grain.  Our hosts had a huge garden and raised both chickens and goats.   They had the luxury of “running water”, a single spigot on a pipe emerging from the ground outside, near the center of the compound.  Nothing is wasted and everything is used and then re-imagined to be made useful in a different context.  Rusty bed springs become one of the walls in the goat enclosure; an axe is fashioned using an old leaf spring from a truck, honed to a razor-sharp edge, for the blade.  Old tin cans are used to make a bluish-gray dye to color the leaves when weaving baskets.  Other dyes are made from the roots, berries and bark of various trees and shrubs.  Self-sufficiency calls for creative measures.

Grocery store in the village in Hwange District that we visited.  We stopped
here to buy additional food for the family we were going to see.

 

Our host family.  The round building is for cooking, eating and family gatherings.
Individual buildings in the compound provide sleeping quarters for the extended family.



Inside the central building looking up to the roof.  Because of the way it is constructed
the inside is surprisingly light and well-ventilated.



Two of the daughters-in-law grind millet into flour.  In this patriarchal society,
following marriage, women become part of their husband's extended family.



This family is better off than many and are proud that they have running
water, even if it is a single spigot in one corner of their family compound



The family's corn crib, raised on stilts to keep animals out, and their ox cart (covered)



Goat pen.  Nothing is wasted...an old bed spring becomes the back fence of the pen

Cooking pots and baskets dry on a rack outside after meals are prepared

Communal cattle pen.  It is built of poles and looks like a fort.  It is strong
enough to keep lions and other predators away from the cattle at night



The women of our host family bid us farewell

Our brief but interesting visits to a local market, a primary school, and a family compound helped to give a human dimension to our safari experience.  Encounters and interaction with individuals in the community as well as in the camps added a personal touch to our Road Stories.

 

Here's a sign you don't see in the U.S. - Elephant Crossing.