Sunday, September 19, 2004
Go to Indonesia in 2 weeks, it is now beginning to sink in. Started moving my stuff out to Neill's flat, we had a delicious 'mixed take away dinner', and then watched the Scorpion King (with proper subtitles this time). Dad not too impressed.
Spent most of the weekend in Bilene (Cam, Nina, Dad, Mat). Very hot, slow drive up with judiciously-spaced timber trucks keeping the average speed down. Then on one stretch, the northbound section of the road, which is being rehabilitated, was potted with regularly-spaced rectangular cutouts, sporting nice sharp tyre-ripping edges. They went on for about 10km, and were cunningly laid out to leave not quite enough passing space on the left, so you basically had to drive down the middle of the road and swerve back into lane if something came along in the other direction. Pity as otherwise the road is in quite good nick. Any transport engineers who want to tell me what the holes are for is welcome.
Spent day on beach and then attempted to have a civilized dinner. Slightly spoiled as I was pretty feverish and had to go to bed early - think a combination of a cold, too much sun plus sheer exhaustion from too much work and family over last two weeks, have just not been getting enough sleep. So last night slept for about 10 hours and that seemed to do the trick, am almost back on form today. It was overcast from about 9 in the morning so the drive back to Maputo was much pleasanter, plus the road almost empty.
Nina lives on the northern outskirts of the city so we stopped by at her house so Dad could 'meet the parents'. Everyone managed to join in the conversation in a mixture of English and Portuguese, with some French and Machope thrown in for good measure. In the background Mozambique got beaten by Angola in an extremely violent 'friendly' - at least 5 players were stretchered off.
Well, I'll try and put the paragraphs in my next post in chronological order...
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Spent most of the weekend in Bilene (Cam, Nina, Dad, Mat). Very hot, slow drive up with judiciously-spaced timber trucks keeping the average speed down. Then on one stretch, the northbound section of the road, which is being rehabilitated, was potted with regularly-spaced rectangular cutouts, sporting nice sharp tyre-ripping edges. They went on for about 10km, and were cunningly laid out to leave not quite enough passing space on the left, so you basically had to drive down the middle of the road and swerve back into lane if something came along in the other direction. Pity as otherwise the road is in quite good nick. Any transport engineers who want to tell me what the holes are for is welcome.
Spent day on beach and then attempted to have a civilized dinner. Slightly spoiled as I was pretty feverish and had to go to bed early - think a combination of a cold, too much sun plus sheer exhaustion from too much work and family over last two weeks, have just not been getting enough sleep. So last night slept for about 10 hours and that seemed to do the trick, am almost back on form today. It was overcast from about 9 in the morning so the drive back to Maputo was much pleasanter, plus the road almost empty.
Nina lives on the northern outskirts of the city so we stopped by at her house so Dad could 'meet the parents'. Everyone managed to join in the conversation in a mixture of English and Portuguese, with some French and Machope thrown in for good measure. In the background Mozambique got beaten by Angola in an extremely violent 'friendly' - at least 5 players were stretchered off.
Well, I'll try and put the paragraphs in my next post in chronological order...
Friday, September 10, 2004
Did Bourne ever spin on his heel? That is the question. Those of you who have read the book will know what I mean.... Now Neill has read it but claims that, despite all the other kidney-punching malarkey, JB never once spins like that. Votes please.
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Friday, September 03, 2004
Have added another link to an english-language Moz blog, this time the culprits actually live in Maputo. See Moving to Africa on the left-hand-side. Off to the FACIM now, then having a big party, apropos of nothing much, tomorrow night.
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And then there were three. Luiz has gone - still kind of getting to grips with it mentally as although it has been coming for a while, when he finally decided to go it was very sudden. Can't go into all the details but basically, when the Mozambican State decides it doesn't want you to work here anymore, it can make things very unpleasant. More later.
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