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Maurice
This guy knows how to live.I spent the weekend in Siavonga for an EWB retreat. It was absolutely wonderful, fun, enlightening, and tiring.
I got to the bus station in Choma about an hour before the bus came, but still ended up so far back in the line that I didn’t make the first bus and had to wait for the next one to come. Several EWBer’s were on the first bus coming up from Livingstone, so it really sucked that we couldn’t travel on the same one. When I finally got on the second one with another EWBer who is staying in Choma as well and made it north to Monze we found that another couple of people we knew had bought tickets on another bus line and would be on a third bus. So much for a crazy team Southern Province trip to Lusaka! We eventually made it to Lusaka and made it to the local SPAR supermarket where we were supposed to all meet up, only to find it devoid of EWB. I got a bit confused, realized I had forgotten to read the most recent retreat schedule, pulled out my computer (proving that I really do need to have it bolted
Beautiful Lake Kariba
This is the view from in front of the place I was staying. I felt like I should be paying 500 bucks a night... to my chest), realized that I was in fact in the right place, and everyone else was just off doing something or other. We did some shopping (tons of bread, and PB & J), found the rest of our group, and pilled into the back of a truck for the trip to Siavonga. We stayed with a friend of some of the long term volunteers named Maurice, and he was nice enough to give us a ride to his place from Lusaka. We had some cushions in the truck and a tarp canopy, bet there wasn’t that much room so we had to stick some people at the back on top of all the luggage. We managed to make it to Siavonga in one piece, where the long terms dumped all the Junior fellows in the town to do some more shopping (live chicken and charcoal) and continued on to Maurice’s place. We managed to cross everything off our shopping list pretty fast, found some ice cream (mmmm), then got board. We were missing a football (soccer) match, so we decided to follow some cheering noises into the compound, and eventually found a tv with a big crowd watching the
Courtney and the Dam
This is Kariba Dam, the concrete mammoth responsible for the water seen in the previous picture game. Just as the game was going into extra time (high tension) the truck showed up again and whisked us all off. To further mess with us, we were again kicked out of the truck and made to walk the last bit to the lake in darkness. We took our instructions a bit too literally, walked straight to the lake, and ended up having to wind our way along the shore, into a random home, out the gates, along the road, and back into the right gates. We then made it to the lake at the right point to find the long terms dress up in African costumes ready to start our initiation ceremony. We danced and talked about valley tonga culture, had traditional games, and scared the poor chicken we had bought to death. With no live chicken we had to resort to chasing Paul around. That was interesting.
We spent the rest of the weekend trading stories, advice, updates, frameworks, and feedback. Monday we made it to Kariba Dam, which supplies Zambia with a good chunk of its power. The food was amazing, but I got sick and missed the only spaghetti night (grr). Much drinking occurred,
The valley
This is down stream of the dam coupled with much laughter and introductions of Calgary drinking games (you mean not everyone know Ho-Down?). Breakfasts where made over a fire pit, and generally consisted of tea, oatmeal, and scrambled eggs cooked on a huge skillet better suited to defend against pirate attacks than to fine cuisine. We all showered (or didn’t) in an open stall right beside the toilets, which led to careful time sharing and eye averting. It was true some good times. I have tons of stories but no time.
Peace
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