It’s all about good karma when you’re on the road.
As I ride back into town, two bikers who are parked on the opposite side of the road flash their lights. I’m curious, so I stop. We’re having a party in the dunes one says, Wanna join us? So I say yes. It’s New Year’s Eve, it’s getting late, I have not even the slightest chance of finding a room here.. so yeah, what else am I going to do?!
I follow the others into the dunes. There’s not a single living soul to be found here. For a few seconds I wonder whether there’s an alternative meaning to big party which I am not aware of. I’m quite relieved to see three cars showing up with men AND women. The bags of wood, lots of food and all the other braai equipment comes up, but I have some reservations, for a crowd it is not and I do not foresee any party of biblical proportions happening here in the near future. Thankfully, my host -with whom I’ve barely exchanged words so far- shares my thoughts and he invites me to his home.
I am, however, not too keen on spending the night there, even though a spare bedroom is generously offered to me. I just don’t want to get stuck with a family that I don’t know. And somehow, I have a bad feeling about all this.
John, my new best friend in town, understand my situation and is dedicated to somehow find me a room. I know there are none, but still he makes some phone calls… to find there are none. I resign to having to spend the night in windswept and highly unappealing (despite located right at the beach) Mile 4 campsite. But John apparently owns several houses here in town. Usually he rents these out, but it just so happens that they’re redoing one of the rooms in a house two blocks away. If I’m willing to withstand the dust, it’s all mine. It’s an offer I can’t refuse.
As I park the bike and unpack my gear, John disappears leaving me in doubt of what to do now. Are there any expectations here? Am I free to move as I feel? Or am I supposed to head back to the other place and join John and his friends??
I decide to take the middle road. Since I’ve been riding all day I need to stock up on some energy so I have a quick bite in the only fast food restaurant that’s open at this hour. But as the clock approaches 10pm I decide to head to John’s place. Swakopmund is ridiculously quiet and I have but one friend here. On my way over I pick up a dirt cheap bottle of wine in a petrol station to offer as a thank you gift. I compliment myself for being so courteous.
However, we soon discover it tastes like a bottle of crappy dirt cheap wine and my new friends are not too shy to let me know. So much for well-intended courtesy.
Apart from John, who’s apparently not married, there are three couples. I know the calm guy is John’s son-in-law and I figure the calm woman would then be John’s daughter. It would explain them touching each other in otherwise very debatable ways. How the others are related to him, I will never find out.
As soon as I enter the backyard I know my timing is way bad. Clearly most of them are drunk; particularly the guys seem to have had not one nor two too many. And now the level of their conversation (both in volume and intelligence) reminds me of my friend Stefan after a beer or three. It’s LOUD, as if level in volume is inversely correlated to level in intelligence.
One of the guys gives me a third degree on my trip. But he doesn’t really seem to listen to what I tell him. He keeps on firing and firing, and I try to keep my answers short. Had he simply allowed me, I would tell him of my trip to Epupa Falls the other day.
My only reason to travel there was to one-up my Belgian friend Hugo, who during his younger years (a long time ago) had made it there in a VW Polo. Pretty cool, but getting there by bike would be so much cooler I figured. And even though it had rained extensively the day before, the quest to outdo Hugo kept me determined.
“Sadly” it turns out that the road is dry and ridiculously easy. I was on the pegs anyway for most of it, but this was more a matter of form, show and style, than necessity. The falls were absolutely stunning though. To my surprise it’s a series of falls within a very lush setting of palm trees, rocky hills and baobabs desperately holding onto the rocky cliffs. Nevertheless, in the end I guess I still have to give all props to Hugo, as he managed to reach the falls in a time the road had been quite atrocious and hardly suitable for a 2×4. But at least it had brought me to the most tropical sight in Namibia I have seen. So still pretty cool.
But the guy is too hyper and won’t let me elaborate. No, the borders were easy. No, there was no corruption. No really. Yes, it’s expensive; I saved for a long time. It’s the standard questions and the standard answers that no-one ever bothers to listen to. It’s not a true search for knowledge; it’s an attempt to find confirmation on oversimplified opinions. But I suppose it’s the enthusiasm of the uninitiated, of someone who’d like to make a similar trip himself one time, one day.
Then the guy is called by his wife; dinner is being served in the dining room. This could mean a brief respite for me, but I get stuck with the other guy. This one is drunk out of his mind. As he speaks, or rather: yells, he rocks back and forth. I’m afraid he’s gonna hurt the back of his head soon.
John interrupts. The wine is crap, so at least did I bring any marijuana. Damn, it’s the same shit all over again. I’m from Holland, so I must be from Amsterdam and so I must do and/or have drugs. Man, I’m used to having less-than-ordinary New Year’s Eves; I particularly remember being invited for a dance on Auld Lang Syne by a 60+ year old woman.. or being the only living soul on the streets at midnight in hopes of seeing fireworks that never materialise. But this one is rapidly growing into the most awkward one. Christmas had been so much better.
I had met Dutchies Erik & Esther on the road north from Sesfontein. They offered me fresh soda as I had stopped to take a break. We met again at the campsite / lodge in Opuwo, where we spend most of our time next to swimming pool. They were good, fun people and I thoroughly enjoyed hanging out with them during the otherwise painfully lonely Christmas days. I must have been the first people to not ask about any bad things that might have happened. More relevant was seeing Himba women in the local supermarket. Somehow it’s rather impossible to be prepared for the sight of a topless woman dressed in loincloths made of animal skins, with beaded anklets to protect their legs from snake bites and covered in reddish otjize to stand aside you, as you deliberate on which canned food to prepare that night. This was where all those teenage days spent on the Catalan beaches finally paid off. As it was there, where me and my friends had learned how to sneak a peek of hot young girls in their skimpy bikinis (at a time that this wasn’t too sickening for a guy my age). I still vividly recall how Roy in particular never mastered this art (for an art it is) of discretion and secrecy, so I knew I had to vigilant here, many years later in Africa, for my mad skills might be rusty. So discretely I moved away to another aisle that offered me a much better overview without attracting nor displaying any attention. And I have to say, what I saw was very interesting. And even though it would take a bit more for me to introduce one to my parents, these Himba women looked quite beautiful considering they were covered in butter.
Highly disappointed John walks back inside. I try to follow, but the drunk refuses to let me go. He’s now going to give me a lesson in African History one-on-one, through the eyes of a mentally challenged boer. The Namibian blacks he says, they at least speak Afrikaans amongst each other. The South African blacks never learned proper Afrikaans nor English and they are messing things up. I vaguely remember how this might have been because Afrikaans was somehow associated to Apartheid and oppression… wasn’t there a massacre in Soweto because of this… well whatever, this is irrelevant in this context. The fact of the matter is that the kaffers, as we call them in South Africa he says, are messing up and things have been going downhill ever since the ANC came to rule and changed a white supremacy paradise into a rainbow nation. Since I heard the same thing 13 years ago, it must have been a pretty huge hill!!
Of course I’m not a racist he stresses. But I quickly rule out the possibility that the guy is a Muslim and referring to blacks as being non-believers. So there’s as much need for using this derogatory term as there would be for using the word nigger in any pop song. Unless, of course, you’re a fat hip-hop gangsta rapper with six bitchy ho’s dancing in your lap. But yo, he ain’t no gangsta, aight?!
So I want to leave now. I don’t know whether the guy is expressing a shared belief amongst my new friends, and I do think it’s all too easy to portray every white South African as a racist, but still I don’t need this and I don’t want to be part of this. I don’t have an exit strategy though and I struggle as the night continues. At some point John, my host, falls asleep on the couch leaving me in the company of people who clearly consider me persona-not-so-much-grata. And since I don’t want to be there either, it should have been quite easy. But John did hook me up with a really good place to sleep, and I hae no intention of slapping karma in the face. I need my karma.
Things get even worse as the women engage in some really bad dancing. It’s an unwritten rule that white men can’t jump and people over 40 shouldn’t dance. But they do, and I close my eyes, get unstuck in time and travel back two days in time.
To avoid the boring stretch of road between Opuwo and Sesfontein, I take a 4×4 track that will keep me off the main road for a couple of hours. During these hours the road gradually evolves from a wide gravel road into a rough rocky track that sees my tyres wear off by 30%. Very few cars are around as the four villages I pass through are tiny. Each has a store no.1. None has a store no.2.
Having ridden through mountains for an hour or two, the landscape suddenly opens up into an unlimited plain. The difference is astonishing. Perfectly flat the surface is here, for kilometers around. But it isn’t very spectacular though. Impressive, but not spectacular; like someone on a unicycle.
The last bit goes up into the mountains once again. The track narrows as it follows a dry river through a small valley. There are a few dozen crossings to endure, with the deep gravel taking much of the fun away now. Without the cooling effect of the wind, the heat gets turned up a notch as well. So even though I seriously like the harshness of the terrain, I am glad to see the end of it as zebra welcome me as it connects to the main road. Riding south towards Palmwag I still find myself absolutely stunned by the beautiful landscape.
But this is all in the past now, and one shouldn’t dwell on that. As I open my eyes I’m back in a rather dreadful reality. Nobody wants me here; the one that does, is asleep on the couch.
My exit call comes as the bunch gathers to go into town to see the fireworks. They’re going to drive around in the car, and so I tell them I’d rather walk. Now, those of you who got to know me during this trip know there’s only one thing I hate more than taking a shower.. and that’s to take a walk. It finishes level with washing my clothes. But I am aching to leave. It’s a testament to my despair.
I make it to the beach just before midnight, It’s crowded, fully packed with drunk party people. I’m obviously nowhere near drunk and the worst place to be for any sober person is amongst drunk. So there’s fireworks, salty sea water splashing on my feet, and there’s a huge bonfire. But it’s boring.
In no way the experience of this New Year in Swakopmund can compete riding the bike. If there is any comparison to draw, then it would be with boring, incredibly windy stretches of tarmac. Otherwise, it cannot match up to any daytrip I’ve made in recent days, let alone the ride through Skeleton Coast.
It was clouded and cold in Skeleton Coast National Park. Coming from sun drenched Palmwag, I even had to put on an extra layer as the temperatures had dropped considerably. The Skeleton Coast is where desert meets ocean and it’s an uninhabited no-man’s land, but more so a kaleidoscope of uniquely mixed colours, tones and shades. The landscape was empty and boring, but ever-changing and intriguing. The contrast between rocks, sand, ocean, crashing waves, and sky sensational. The cool biker was lone, but happy.
But this New Year’s Eve has got nothing on Skeleton Coast. Any Chinese family in my home village would have easily rivaled the fireworks here on the beach in Swakop. Hell, several years ago I spent this New Year’s Eve in Sittard with my friends. It was misty but we our rockets nevertheless and in vain. Still, it was better than this.
If there was ever a bad omen for the year to come, this would be it. On the other hand, this total stranger had hooked me up with a room for New Year’s without giving it a second thought, and for free. I guess it’s all in the eyes of the beholder. I choose to see it in a positive way. 2012 is gonna be awesome!!
The Long Solo Down 