Africa No.9 - Beauty and the Beast / Zambia

Victoria Falls is one of the biggest falls in the world; the highest feet of 360(108meters), the second highest width of 5604 ft(1708meters, the widest is Iguazu Falls).

Just to think that there is a huge ground crack on the earth along with the bank of Zambezi River in between Zambia and Zimbabwe, and that this great waterfall was originated from this crack. I was totally overwhelmed.

(Getting to Lusaka)

I came in to the capital of Zambia, Lusaka, taking a whole-day bus from Lilongwe of Malawi. Crossing the vast plain of Zambia kept me reminded that I was travelling this huge continent, Africa.

Next day I took a half-day bus from Lusaka to Livingstone, the small gateway town opened for Victoria Falls. I pitched a tent in the backyard of a random backpackers’ hostel, had some local meat in the restaurant, and spent one chilly night thinking about the touristic sight which was waiting for me.

That was in the middle of May which was going to drag southern part of Africa into the winter season. I had to notice that I was coming down south, which meant that it was getting colder.

(Zambezi River)

Zambezi River was spacious as well. This river is the 4th longest in Africa flowing into Indian Ocean. I went on to the river cruise with a friend visiting me from Japan, enjoyed the river view of jungle-like river bank with hippos and birds. I was gradually getting ready for the waterfalls.

Then it came. Crossing the border to Zimbabwe side, the entrance of the national park was rather simple. We rented poncho-style rainproof and got in to the paths of the park which lead to the edge of the waterfalls.

Rainproof? Yes, we need these ponchos for sure. As we are walking by the trail, the open patch appeared. That area was decorated with the white splash and this splash turned out to be the droplets of the falls. Some vast water curtains were spraying water to us. We realized that we were on the edge of the Victoria Falls.

As we got closer, the roar of the falls got bigger and the water spray got harder. It was just the same as a drenching evening shower. We got so soaked and understood that the rainproof was important but not functioning enough to cover us from the waterfall attack.

Wild and splendid. Those were two first impressions that I had on this massive flood-like falls. Then we left this national park, Zimbabwe side.

(Getting soaked)

Delicate and gorgeous. These were the second impressions on the Victoria Falls I had from the Zambia side, and from above.

From above? Yes we took micro-light crafts. It was simpler and more open than a helicopter. A guide even let me fly this craft for a few minutes. We took off the ground covered with the brown soil and this craft sharply blast off into the air. Soon the ground decorated with forest and zebras came below my eyes. It was literally a bird’s-eye view, and I got confused myself with a bird.

(Flight over the falls-1)

There appeared the Zambezi River flowing about, and the line of road crossing the border of Zambia and Zimbabwe. A bridge located in between these two countries was there as well. I was recalling the memory of experiencing the bungee-jumping from that bridge into Zambezi River. (It was 110meters high, I was frightened to death for the first few seconds, flew in, felt like I was floating in the world of non-gravity. Such a unique experience but this was another story.)

Flying up and jumping down were totally different experience. As we flew up things started to show their wider selves. Everything I saw was connected to each other, embracing the waterfalls as well.

(Flight over the falls-2)

The wild Victoria Falls turned in to fragile vapor wafting around over the ground crack. Along with the crack water of the Zambezi River was slipping off in a gracious way. They even created some rainbow arches. Colorful, vague and grace. I gave a sigh over the beauty. I was almost weeping to witness this beauty after a day I witnessed the wild abandon of the same nature.

I wanted to stay in that moment for good. I knew I would miss this 15-minute-flight so much, but I had to come down to earth. So we landed.

Beauty and the Beast. This wonder of nature has dual character.

(Flight over the falls-3) 

Africa No.8 - Lake, fish and settlers / Malawi

It was a crisp morning in the border town of Mbeya. I got out of the Tazara railway, stretching my legs and back torn in the 2 nights’ train ride from Dar es Salam. I smelled the fresh air for a second, and then got in again to the transportation, but this time, a mini-van.

Country of Malawi was formed along with the long and thin Malawi Lake. This lake is located in the southern end of the African Great Rift Valley, third largest and second deepest lake in Africa.

Here is the story travelers kept telling me; You can enjoy three things in Malawi, clear Malawi Lake, fish they caught from the lake, and the habitants who live along with the lake. This was enough for me to decide to go.

(Malawi Lake)

As soon as I crossed the border, I got into another mini-van with friends. (Well, there was a hustle and bustle to get to the border from the bus stop, and the border to the bus stop, but this was another story.) I fell asleep as usual and it took awhile for me to notice that a lady and a baby were sitting beside me.

(out the window 1)

‘Hi’, she said, just as same as the other African ladies.

‘Hi’ I answered, just as usual.

She started breast-feeding with her breast completely open, just as same as the other African ladies. What was a bit different from other African ladies was that she was talking to me with the most fluent English. She said she was working as an accountant in the town of Mzuzu, which I was heading for. She pointed at the boy at the age of 12, sitting right in front of us and introduced him as her son to me.

I asked her if she had more kids between her son of 12 and her newborn daughter, because it is quite common for the African ladies to have kids ranging from 0 to 12 but to have more than 4 in that case.

She said she didn’t have any other than these two. It is a bit unusual, I thought, and we went back to the normal conversation.

(a kiss)

After she finished feeding her baby, she suddenly forced me to look out the window. As I followed her, I saw the silver glittering surface just outside the window, which turned out to be the lake surface. It was a beginning of the Malawi lake, the northern end, and it was also a beginning of my trip to Malawi.

The lady was almost a tourist guide for me. She pointed out the window to let me know the edge of the lake and fishermen. She bought some fish, dried and raw, including the dried small fish like sardines(I believe they were not sardines though) and shared with me. The taste of the fish reminded me of the one in Japan. Different in the richness, but still, fish there was well-seasoned.

When I was picking those dried fish, she again told me to look out, and said that the leaves which shine yellow and green were the tobacco leaves. Those were the tobacco farm.

She was born in one of those tobacco farm families, grew up around that area, married to the husband and gave birth to the first boy. And somehow, she is living only with her kids not with husband right now.

‘It is a bit complicated as a story’ she said, and I knew that I didn’t have enough time to explore her complicated story as the mini-van was getting close to the town of Mzuzu.

(out the window 2)

I knew that I wouldn’t have enough time to see her again and explore her story. I might be able to do that if I would stay in this town more than one night, but I chose not, and I knew I would choose not. Every story which I encounter was left unfinished.

Sun was setting outside, casting orange pinky light on unpaved road extended far and wide ahead of us. The lake was continuously appearing and missing. Silver and gray, orange and pink. ‘This can be the beginning but this can also be an ending’ I thought. ‘Because I already saw the three things which were recommended in Malawi.’

(Clear lake in Nkhata Bay)

(Fish dinner)

Of course it was not the ending, and actually there is no ending for me to tour around, but I have to admit the best part of Malawi passed by inside this mini-van.

The lake view in the Nkhata Bay was crystal clear and scenic, fried fish with rice I had with beer there was toothsome, and the people I met in Nkhata Bay and Lilongwe were all nice and peaceful. But for me, a bus ride with one not-typical village lady along with the shiny Malawi Lake on the first day was more impressive.

(cock boats)

Africa No.7 - Go west / Tanzania

Go to Zanzibar. That’s how I encouraged myself to leave Rwanda and to move forward to a country which lied boundlessly towards the Indian Ocean.

(Nungwi beach, Zanzibar)

Zanzibar is the little island and yet the once-upon-a-time prosperous country located some 30 miles away from the shore of Dar es Salam, the main city(the capital is Dodoma though). The mixture of Arabian and African culture flourished in this island when the merchants from Arabia Persia and India arrived this island and did trading with monsoon wind. From the history this island went through, it has a capital city ‘Stone Town’ with its spicy smell from daily markets and the exotic sound of Azaan from mosques.

What this island boosts is not just the culture but the beach and ocean.

People said that the ocean surrounding Zanzibar had its color of emerald green, and I was suspicious at first. Then I arrived there and noticed that it was so true. The surface of the Indian Ocean there was so emerald.

(Jambiani beach, Zanzibar)

I spent two weeks in Zanzibar, from the northern Nungwi beach to the southeast beach of Jambiani, absent-minded facing this extremely clear ocean. I did nothing but sitting at the white sandy beach and reading, sometimes doing snorkeling and having supper filled with seafood and local beer. Things to come into my view, from the surface of the ocean to the local kids running about, were all crystal clear. Once they ran into the water they melted within. Seemed like the soft things came together to charm each other.

Not a single shadow has been projected on the ocean, but I saw some shadow from underneath the water. They were small silver fish swimming around. This place was completely, a paradise island.

(Stone Town, Zanzibar)

One afternoon when I was dissolved completely under the scorching sun, it just occurred to my mind that I had to escape from here soon, moreover, as soon as possible. Probably it was a dream not really the rational mind which just told me to do so. Or a fictional book which had the surrealism stories. It was for sure anyway that I felt that I got stuck in this so-called heaven which was as hazardous as Eden. This kind of story was so likely to appear on the fairy tales and I was scared sensing the danger. And I ran away for my life as an ordinary traveler.

(Mnemba island, Zanzibar)

Dar es Salam was a big uninteresting city which was dangerous at night. As there were not many things to do, I went out west for the town of Moshi, located at the bottom of Kilimanjaro mountain. Go west Yuko, I thought to myself.

(Dar es Salam)

From beach to a mountain foot, via a big city. My trip came as a roller-coaster. I still left my mind in the middle of the paradise island of Zanzibar. There was only pleasure there in Zanzibar, and there was only endurance in here in Moshi. It started to rain every morning in the town of Moshi and I got caught the whole day in a tiny dorm. The lines of the mountain ridge, the Kilimanjaro, were invisible. I tried to seek for the mountain looking up every morning, every afternoon, every night, but in vain.

  

I went out for Kilimanjaro coffee instead. The café, named ‘Union Café’ was famous for its coffee brand since 1939, and the taste there was for sure delicious. For two days I have spent the whole afternoon there doing reading and writing. After a while I got back to the hostel, noticing the sky was going to be blue. I went up to the rooftop, ordering a bottle of Kilimanjaro beer. Then the dull heavy clouds suddenly started to clear up, showing the edge of the mountain. The Kilimanjaro Mountain was right there in front of my eyes, being accompanied by ranks of cloud troops, far beyond the town of Moshi.

I kept silent at the rooftop, watching over this gigantic mountain until the sunset. It was the beautiful moment and with its beauty I missed the normal life conversely. Things I saw recently have been too ravishing. As ravishing as some dream. I was afraid.

(Kilimanjaro, Moshi)

I went back to Dar es Salam, got a ticket of Tazara railway and got on to move westward to Malawi. This train trip went on 2 nights up until Mbeya, the border town. This was the train Tanzania and Zambia made with cooperation of China a few decades ago, and the conductor told us, me and my friend travelers who are Chinese, about the stories of this huge project.

Daytime from the train window after daydreams and naps was filled with green mountains and little lakes, local Tanzanians at times. Nighttime from the train window before the real dreams was filled with visible fireflies skipping about. Things that came in my sight were still gorgeous like fantasy.

(Tazara Railway)

In the train I hoped I was living not in a world of fantasy, but in a real world containing both pretty things and ugly things. Go west Yuko, I told to myself. Go west to see something more ordinary. Though I don’t think the world appears normal for those who desire the normal, even though it is normal for them as well.

(Tazara Railway)

Africa No.6 - Twins, your other half / Burundi

Burundi is a tiny country located beside Tanganyika Lake.

As I went down to Butare, southern province of Rwanda, I got to know that I was getting very close to the neighboring country Burundi. With two of the other traveler friends, it came up to our mind that we could just wait for a few hours in the bus and get in to Burundi.

Getting entry visas of Burundi was a bit tricky. We Japanese could get visas on arrival but they would expire in 72 hours. It means that we had to get out of Burundi in 3 days, either for Tanzania, which border was not very safe, or for Rwanda, which we needed to get entry visas again. Going to eastern part of DR Congo that time was not a realistic option.

We chose to get back to Rwanda after applying visas online and got ready to get in, went crawling down the hills and mountains in a small van, and got in.

There was a bridge at the border, between Rwanda and Burundi, which was running with muddy stream. It was a bit emotive that this brown river has been separating these two countries; twin-like countries.

(A bridge over the twins / border town)

Indeed, they have been twins for years.

Burundi basically consists of the Tutsi and the Hutu(and a percent of Twa pigmy minority) just like Rwanda. Burundi has been sharing history of colonization of Belgium, experiencing fierce conflict between the Tutsi and the Hutu. Burundi went through the civil war at almost the same time as the Rwanda Genocide, even longer.

The size of the country is also the same. Population, a bit less than Rwanda, still has a problem of too-densely populated. Food is also very similar, Ugali, cassava, potatoes, tomato sauce, green sauce, bean sauce, and barbeque brochettes. Boasting green hilly land, still having difficulties of distinction with Rwanda in terms of climate.

One of the few obvious differences was that Burundi has Tanganyika Lake, a long and narrow lake stretching down south to Zambia(Difference No.1).

(Breeze, the lake / Tanganyika)

And the mess on the street as well. (Difference No.2)

Once we got to the capital Bujumbura and left our luggage in the random hotel, which turned out to be a nice familial one(I felt like I was visiting my grandma’s in the country side), we went out for the town and had similar lunch as we had in Rwanda. Town was very much crowded with the street venders and beggars, which we haven’t seen in Rwanda. Probably Rwanda was getting too much artificial and neat, and it’s hard to compare, but the sloppy street corners in Bujumbura with cluttered locals was far beyond natural. It was messier than any other parts of Africa I have visited then, and it looked much more dangerous than any other parts of Africa.

(A beggar, the town / Bujumbura)

Yes Burundi is counted as one of the poorest in east Africa. Very sharp contrast with Rwanda, which is called ‘a wonder of Africa’ pointing the reconstruction it underwent after the genocide.

Then I got to know the other difference Burundi had from Rwanda. It was the political system with regard to ethnicity. (Difference No.3)

Unlike Rwanda which tried to cease the wordsto stand for tribes; the Tutsi and the Hutu from the official documents(so that there is no distinction between the Tutsi and the Hutu any more in Rwanda), Burundi stated in its constitution after the civil war the shared possession of power according to the ethnicity; in the Cabinet, Lower Parliament and Public enterprises, maximum of 60% for the Hutu, 40% for the Tutsi. Two vice-presidents should be a different ethnicity. Ethnicity of personnel in national defense should not excess half of the position.

Seems like Burundi’s system is more democratic. Rwanda has been developing itself owing to its dictatorship but it is fragile in terms of ethnicity, as with the good and smart dictator the Tutsi is at the helm of the nation and it looks the same as the history it’s been through.

Burundi has not been developed yet because there has not been a powerful dictator who could promote the country to be developed, but it doesn’t mean the conflict between ethnicity was not solved. Burundi might be far ahead than Rwanda in terms of the settlement of ethnic problems. However, there was another conflict between political parties, government party and opposition party, retarding the progress of the politics.

So many factors to think about. The history and politics in this region is too complicated. Even for the eyes of a random traveler like me.

(A mess, the town / Bujumbura)

The next day we went on with motor bikes to Tanganyika Lake. City was hot and humid, and dusty, but once we went a bit outside, it felt totally like resort. Breeze blowing the lake side was cool and mild, unlike the sticky salt air on the beachside.

I have always been for the beach when you compare the beach with the lakeside plateau for spending vacations, because the plateau sounded too old fashioned. But this time I had to admit that spending holidays on the lakeside was by no means refreshing.

This is something I didn’t really enjoy in Rwanda. They have the lakeside resort just next to the messiest part of Africa, and many Europeans come for vacation. (Getting back to Difference No.1)

(A resort, the lakeside / Tanganyika)

And the beer it has. It has brewery of Amstel, and this Amstel is called the ‘national beer’. Rwanda has many original brands such as Skol, Mutzig, Gatanu, Turbo King and Primus. (Difference No.4)

I wanted to ask ‘Don’t you have any identity with regard to your original beer?’ to those who were drinking this dark beer heavily in the bars and the pot holes, but I didn’t. This Burundi-type Amstel was after all, quite tasty. Original or franchise, beer in this region tastes luscious, not just because of their history as Belgium colonies, but also because their way of enjoying their lives in the closed, insular environment in the mountains (Commonness, Important).

(Daintiness, the Beer / Bujumbura)

Africa No.5 - Memory and sequela of red-soil / Rwanda

History is an event happened sometime before my early recollection. Current news is an event happened sometime after I began to understand things.

Rwanda Genocide was in between. It was something I read in the paper, not the textbook when I was 12, and still, looked as if it was a tale, a chiller one. ‘Once upon a time there were two tribes in a small inland country in Africa, and they hated each other. One of them decided to eliminate the next-door tribe, tried to kill every single man from that tribe, and in fact, killed them all. The red-soil covering the whole country was thoroughly ensanguined.’

Well that was all I knew about Rwanda Genocide, or, the history of Rwanda, for 19 years. Even until I got in to Kigali, the capital in Rwanda on 27th of February. What was added to this chiller tale were; two names of the anonymous tribes, Tutsi and Hutu, and the vague impression from two movies, ‘Hotel Rwanda’ and ‘Shooting Dogs’. And no more.

(Hotel des Mille Collines, as 'Hotel Rwanda')

1.  Kigali / To begin with

I went in to Kigali right after getting an entry visa in Kampala, Uganda.

Kigali town was clean and organized. Streets were neat, unlike the rest of the African countries. Motorbike taxis were safe and were obliged to carry only one passenger in one bike and to wear helmet, unlike the rest of the African countries. People I met here were not aggressive; rather, quiet, when I was negotiating, unlike the rest of the African countries. And at night, streets glittered in the orange light of street lamps, which I have never seen in the other parts of Africa.

All these encounters in Kigali had dissociation from my image of Rwanda, which was supposed to hold bloody memory in the recent past.

(Morning town, Kigali)

I went to the Kigali Genocide Memorial Center in one morning, as soon as I got to Kigali from Kampala. The Memorial was clean with the shiny white floor and felt a bit unsettled. I thought it was because I got used to be in the Black Holes of messy lical stores in Africa, but it turned out that it was not the right reason.

Anyway, I started browsing around the exhibitions in Memorial and soon found out that it would take a long time to be fully understood, as the Memorial talked a lot about the genocide in 1994 with lots of panels and displays.

The story went like this.

- The Tutsi is the minority and the Hutu is the majority.

- Distinction between Tutsi and Hutu was not very clear in the old days.

- Just as the other African regions, colonial power came in to Rwanda(and Burundi); It was Belgium for Rwanda.

- As Belgium started to govern, it tried to maintain the divide between Tutsi and Hutu, in order to make the colonial rule easier. Belgian colonialism introduced separate ID cards for these two tribes.

- The Tutsi has been the ruling class under the colonial rule. The Hutus was the subordinate class.

- Anyway Rwanda went independent in 1962.

- Repression against Tutsi dated back to 1959, when Hutu government came into power.

- Hutu government pushed propaganda which inflames Hutu’s animosity against Tutsi.

- There have been some civil wars and many Tutsi got pushed out and became exiles in Uganda, Congo and Tanzania. The Tutsi based exiles formed RPF(Rwandan Patriotic Front) and started fighting back.

- On April 6, 1994, the plane carrying the Hutu president’s crashed down mysteriously, and the president died. Hutu military declared to set out for murdering Tutsi.

- Hutu turned into thugs armed with choppers and machetes, to slaughter Tutsi as well as Hutu moderates. Half to one million people were killed in 100days.

- UN failed to work effectively to prevent the mass murder even though it knew what was happening here. French troop was even worse; they gave arms and trainings for the Hutu mobs to help them murder more Tutsis. The Tutsis had to wait for the Tutsi compatriots of RPF to fight back.

- RPF launched an offensive, took the capital on July 4, and the genocide has ended.

(Afternoon Memorial, Kigali)

As I went through the panels, I encountered some interviews done with the survivors from the Genocide. One of them was the one with a Tutsi lady who has survived from the worst 100 days of her life, witnessing all the murder and torture in front of her. She had somebody helped her to hide from Hutu mobs. In the interview I saw her saying, ‘In this world there is 5% of good people, but 95% are the evil or the normal people who don’t care’.

Normally it feels more real to hear the voice of the actual survivor of an historic event than reading a history book or articles, but this time the voice of a lady sounded somewhat different. Her voice echoed from far away, and sounded a bit unreal. Partially because of the sadness of the stories she talked. Partially because of the way I perceived.

Then I started to realize why I was felt a sense of discomfort during my visit to this memorial. It was not the fact that this place is quite gloomy and depressing.

It was the fact that good and evil are so obvious here. There was a line between victims and victimizers, a clear-cut line which nobody was entitled to challenge. There was good and evil in this situation and these two were completely divided into two, nothing else.

The Tutsi was the victim and the Hutu was the victimizer. The Tutsi was good and the Hutu was evil. RPF, the Tutsi-based government who is in the power currently was the right, and the Hutu who made mistakes was wrong.

‘Isn’t this place too much one-sided?’ I thought. And that was only the beginning of the story.

(Evening hangout, Kigali)

2. Butare / sequela, of history

I traveled to Butare, a southern province of Rwanda, after a few days in Kigali.

‘Mille Collines’, meaning ‘a thousand hills’, is said to be the description for a beautiful hilly country of Rwanda and this was the perfect description. As I went through the mountainous road from Kigali down to Butare, slopes were getting steeper and more like zigzag, and scenery beyond the mini-van was getting rougher and greener. Air was not polluted anymore. I opened the window and breathed deeply. Very quiet, fresh green breeze came in through the window and brushed my cheek gently. Such a peaceful place.

In Butare, there was also a genocide Memorial, which was called Gikongoro Memorial. This Memorial was built in the spot where the genocide took place. It was in the mountain and I had to take a bike taxi for half an hour to get there. I saw rows of prisoners wearing orange salopettes passing by my bike. They were not chained and they were calm and quiet.

(Prisoners in the mountain, Butare)

The sight you see in Gikongoro Memorial is all the same as the ones you see in Kigali Memorial, except this; hundreds of mummies of the victims from genocide.

I witnessed these mummies just as same as the other visitors, I was shocked somehow-probably because of the smell they had which was similar to the smell of gypsum-, just as same as the other visitors. The fact that the dead were sleeping before me was not really pained. The painful fact is that they were murdered brutally and were piled up in here against their will. And I need some imagination which connects these two facts. It was way beyond my imagination.

‘Who funded this Memorial?’ I asked when I got out of the Memorial.

The staff didn’t really answer. I googled it later on. This Memorial -and the one in Kigali as well- was built by the current government and UK-based Aegis Trust.

(Memorial in the mountain, Butare)

This solved one mystery.

I was wondering why Rwanda was a part of the British Commonwealth although Rwanda has never been controlled by Britain, why English was one of the official language in Rwanda.

The current government is deeply connected to Anglo-American government.

And to know who constitutes the current regime, it is the Tutsis, who has been oppressed by the Hutus for recent 50 years, but was oppressing the Hutus before then. Many important posts are taken by the Tutsi, the president Kagame is a Tutsi, Even though the policy eliminated the distinction between the Tutsi and the Hutu, there still exists the distinction.

It is said that the Rwanda Genocide and the civil war was the proxy war between the Anglo-US with Uganda and France with French colonized African countries. It seemed to me as just a ignorant tourist, apparent. That was why the Memorial criticized a lot about the French troops’ movement during the genocide.

Does this mean that the regime just went back to the one before the last regime? Does this mean that the history repeats itself? I was trembled.

Since way back before I stepped into this Memorial, there was a stage set in the base of this Memorial. Time goes back and forth where we didn’t really notice.

(Sunday in the mountain, Butare) 

3. Kibuye / sequela, of space

The last part I spent in Rwanda was in Kibuye, the small town in west province, close to the Congo border. Located in the lakefront of astonishing Kivu Lake, shining gold for the sunset, this small town always got breeze from the lake.

A friend of mine just opened a cottage hotel in the lakeshore, and I was so happy to visit her new place. I took a bike taxi going around the lake a bit up the hill, and went in to the green bush to get to the lakeshore.

(Dusk in Kivu Lake, Kibuye)

The view was breathtaking. From the top of the hill you could see the surface of the Kivu Lake glittering just like a mirror. This surface was waiting for the sunset to cast the golden light.

We had beer together with the brochette of a fresh little lamp just sacrificed an hour before. ‘That island like shape you see in front of you is DR Congo’, a friend of mine mentioned. Congo. What an unknown world.

We started to talk about Congo and soon got into the conversation about the Congo War which was just happening.

At that time, it was just disclosed that the Rwanda government was unofficially supporting the anti-government troop in Congo, M23. Rwanda government, with large numbers of Tutsi military has been fighting against the defeated soldiers of Hutu who were the commanders of genocide and who went into Congo as refugees right after the genocide. The Congo War is the combination of the domestic conflict of Congo and the Rwandan conflict, conflict between the Tutsi and the Hutu which is still going on.

I was trembled again, to know that the history repeats itself, not just inside the country but also outside the country. And with involving so many people outside, who has been nothing to do with the genocide. The genocide is still having a lasting effect, in terms of space as well.

(Congo is close by, Kibuye)

Well, this fact that Rwanda was supporting M23 has been an open secret for a long time, but this time human rights organization reported and the western countries could no more ignore. They are considering cutting off the official development assistance towards Rwanda, which Rwanda has been relying on.

As for the fact that the astounding development in Rwanda-it is referred as a miracle of Africa- was based on substantial amount of these ODA, we never know where Rwanda goes with the cutting off of the aid. We never know where Rwanda goes with this sequel as well.

(Pray in random church)

Africa No.4 - Brochettes and loneliness / Uganda

Staying in eastern Africa for a few months, I was getting fed up of the food. Injera, made of teff in Ethiopia, stinks sour. Ugali, made of maize or cassava, feels flaky. Tough meat. Oily fries. Good or bad, being served the same thing everyday,

Food in Uganda is similar, but somewhat different. They eat matoke, fake bananas or rice for ugali. Fake bananas are a bit like roasted sweet potato with some flavor of apples. Not as dried out as ugali, it goes well with every single meat.

And the meat is also juicy here. Chicken, lamb, all the parts of beef, you name it, they serve it freshly-baked. At the bus terminal, on the random street corner, during your bus ride, you can smell the barbeque brochette meat baked on the cast-irons pans, all over the city.

(hustle and bustle, Kampala)

When I first got in to Uganda with friends travelers, we were supposed to take a night bus from Nairobi heading to Jinja, the small riverside town close to the border and to get there around 4-5am. It was 6am when we all woke up. We heard the hustle and bustle of the city. Seemed like we overslept the town of Jinja and came all the way through to the capital Kampala.

We were too tired. We wanted to get back to the little town Jinja, which we haven’t even seen. We were captured by a random driver and got in to a random mini-van, which would take us directly to Jinja.

To tell you this again, we were too tired. After the stress of getting a night bus in the middle of the dangerous city center of Kenya. After the stress of being forced to get up at the border in the middle of the night and being checked all over. So that we fell asleep as soon as we got in to the mini-van.

*

(wake-up call, on the way to Jinja)

We were awakened out of sound sleep in the van, with the loud scream, rather, roar. I tried to look out the window and found that I couldn’t. All the local women sticking to the window from outside shouted for selling something; barbeque brochette meat and matoke, fake bananas.

We then knew that we were more hungry than being afraid of being eaten by these shouting women. We took some of these brochette meats and gazed at each other. These meats tasted perfect. Salty taste was just, right. They were not as tough and chewy as the ones we had in Kenya. They have varieties of the parts off the meat, starting from a piece of gizzard to a piece of liver.

We were so fascinated by these brochettes then started to look for these in all the place we have been.

While we were enjoying chilling out at the riverside of Jinja, and being impressed by the headstream of Nile; Victoria Nile(This river was a bit red and contaminated but bright and cheerful place with all locals doing their laundries on the riverside).

While we were rushing up to meet the Pygmy tribes in Fort Portal, the area with rain forest close to the border of DR Congo(There were only a few village of Pygmies in the middle of the normal Bantu Ugandan village, but the king of that village was really small, just as the same as our image of pigmy people. They danced well).

And while we were waiting for the Rwanda visa and I was waiting for the visa renewal in Kampala.

(laundry in Nile, Jinja)

(dancing with pygmies, Fort Portal)

Great barbeque meats were everywhere and they were all cheap, from 30 cents up to 1 dollar.

My favorite place was the one in the suburb of the city Kampala, which was a few minutes walking distance from where I stayed. It was a small stall in the small market along with the road, and I always went out when the night has come. This little market started to smoke out for the dinner time, selling everything for the dinner. Meat, fish, chapatti, soup, omelets, pilaf. Fruits, doughnuts and vegetables.

There was a 40-years-old man and a 18-years-old son, sometimes a 22-years-old son in the stall. They baked the meat in good order every day. Starting with beef brochettes, they went on to the whole chicken, then liver brochettes, mixed ones, and gizzard brochettes. The father was baking all the time, the son was making the brochettes with all the spices with ginger and garlic. They didn’t talk much but they smiled a lot. This family-owned business was doing well. Probably because of the atmosphere they had with each other, locals came and talked with them while they were making the brochettes. Having something to eat is for family, for sharing. The food they, a family, made was something they offer for the dinner table, it seemed like they thought so. And this concept made their stall so popular, not just for locals, but for the tourists like me.

(a family stall, Kampala)

When my passport was renewed and I got a new one for the first time in 9 years and a half, I got these brochettes, went back to the hostel and bought some bottles of beer. Ugandan beer was as great as the ones in Kenya and Ethiopia, and with these delicious street foods, even greater than those.

I pulled out the plug and started drinking with these family-marked brochettes. Then I felt so alone. These foods were made by a family and for families.

When I renewed my passport almost 10years ago in Japan, I was not alone. When I started my travel I was not alone. When I came in to Uganda I was not alone. Now I was by myself saying cheers to myself in the most cheerful place with the warmest brochettes, holding a shiny brand-new passport in my hands.

(barbequing with friends, Fort Portal)

Africa No.3 - Co-existence / Kenya

In Kenya, human world and animal world are parallel..

They are mixed up altogether, making a big mess trying to confuse a random tourist like me.

（a beauty, Masai Mara)

As soon as I came in to Nairobi, I made a booking for a safari tour for Masai Mara. 310 US dollars for 3 days including entrance fee for the national park. Not bad.

I felt a bit pressured that time. Pressured to see touristic Africa. Animals in savanna. Lions hunting zebras there. Rangers driving around trying to spot them. These are everyone’s image about Africa and I wanted to finish them before going to off-the-beaten-tracks.

So I went with a tour group out for the national park- which is too huge to be called a national park, by a scrapped old Nissan 4WD. It took us a while day to get there after several times of engine break-downs. It was already eventide when the 4WD opened its roof to make it an open-air safari drive. The red sun was starting to set and trying to add some pink-orange flavor to this originally brownish national park. And there were a herd of zebras.

To our excitement, our driver who was a ranger as well started out the safari car. ‘It is not just zebras’, he said. ‘You will see more than that in a few seconds.’

And there they were. A couple of lions indulging in the dead flesh of a buffalo.

We could almost hear the sound of them crunching. Thud thud. They masticated the dark-red flesh and pure-white bones into the stomach. Then they started to flirt. It went on for 10-20 minutes and we felt a bit awkward than exciting after a few minutes.

(a couple, Masai Mara)

Animals kept on appearing to our sight for the next day and the day after. Hot bonny giraffes, sad fate looking antelopes, monstrous gnus and buffalos. African elephants lumbering around and white little birds singing on gray trunks of elephant. Jackals. Families of cat-like lions and cheetahs relaxing and gamboling at home. And zebras again and again.

What amazed us the most was none of those safari-like animals. It was a single hippopotamus walking on the dry savanna.

A hippo on the land? I was suspicious when our ranger ordered us be quiet. We were enjoying taking photos of a lion family at that moment. Kids were crawling around the mother lion and they totally looked like cats.

We saw the direction the ranger told us to see. There was merely a black and round little thing walking towards us, and this black thing turned out to be quite slimy. For sure it was a hippo getting out of the Masai river.

As the hippo was getting closer, the mother lion started to stare it, getting ready to stand up and fight against the hippo. Lions kids went behind her, watched attentively the situation.

“A hippo is strong.” I read this somewhere. “If they get down to work seriously they can always harm lions. They are the strongest.” Kidding, I supposed when I read this. I knew I had to believe it this time though. The mother lion gave her-and her family’s- way to the hippo.

That hippo was no longer a lazy snoozing hippo which we have always seen. It was a strongest animal which menace a herd of lions simply by walking towards them.

Co-existence, I felt. And compartmentalization at the same time. Some distinct species have their own territory which others cannot intrude. But they still have to encounter.

(a family, Masai Mara)

*

Having 42 tribes in one country, Kenyans speak their tribe language and good English as well, but not that much of Swahili, like Tanzanians do. This implies part of their identity comes from their tribal origins, and not very much from their country-Kenya.

We hear lots of news about conflicts between ethnicities in Kenya now and then. 5 years ago in 2008 there was a conflict concerning the election campaign, of which 2 candidates were from 2 major tribes in Kenya, Luo and Kikuyu. This conflict has been spread out and ended up killing the thousands of people from the ethnicity which opposing candidate belonged to.

The following election in 2013 has been done peacefully and things about the ethnic conflict seemed like slowing down. But there was still smoldering feeling of bitterness even after the Supreme court declared it fair that one candidate won 50.07%.

I noticed how much influence the politics has on their identity, when I went over to the suburban town of Machakos, 2 hours drive from Nairobi and majority of this town is Akamba tribe, who has round little face, amiable characters and uptempo music with peculiar rhythm. They say this town is a town of Akamba tribe. Even outside Machakos they say the same thing. When I talked to a taxi driver in Nairobi telling him that I just visited Machakos a week before, he turned out to be a Akamba tribe and said, ’Machakos is a nice town as it is a town of Akamba tribe.’

This peaceful middle-sided town was getting noisier that time, to prepare for the coming election campaign. Politics here is all about ethnicity, and ethnicity is the origin of Kenyans’ identity.

                                                                                                            

(girls,' I know who I am')

Getting back to Nairobi, there are two contrastive shanty towns that I’ve visited; Kibera slum and Koch slum.

Kibera slum. Located in a bit west but in the center of Nairobi, is the biggest slum in Kenya, second biggest in Africa, with a million habitants living inside. I went there with a tour, paying 16 USD and wondering if this was a zoo visit. Can their normal lives be an exhibition itself?.

There are little blocks which differentiate the group who live in the same area, and these areas have names. The tour guide was from a certain block, and he warned us before coming in, ‘Kibera slum in general is not safe. As long as you guys stick to me you are safe, but only in this area. Because they know me and do not give my foreign friends any harm. I cannot guarantee your safety outside.’

Kibera slum was the slum just as you imagine as ‘shanty towns’. Pavement torn off-or still under construction, dusty area with smell of excreta, garbage found everywhere. Kids run around, women work, men never work. Very much crowded. Staring at foreigners with cameras and trying to tell them this is not a circus here.

When you ask them where they are from, their answers would not be ‘Kibera’. They would answer with the area code of Kibela, or they would even answer with their ethnic origin. I heard that the mobility in this slum is quite high. People come, live temporarily, and go. No wonder they do not identify themselves as Kibera people. No wonder people kill the next door in the next block, even in the same slum area. They are separated in the name of the area name or origin name. They solely kill somebody from different species.

(Kibera from above)

Koch slum-its official name is Korogocho, is located in the east side of Nairobi, slightly smaller than Kibera, 4th largest slum in Nairobi. I was lucky to meet up with my old friend for the first time in 2 years in Nairobi. She started up the music label which release some talented young artists in Nairobi, and during my stay in Nairobi there was a Christmas live held by this music label, and held in Koch.

Driving through the middle of the slum heading for the live show, Koch slum seemed at first just like the other shanty areas like Kibela. Roads were narrow and dirty, noisy and overpopulated. Blocks that separate was invisible that time, but I guessed there were. Women baked corns on the street and this smell of baking made me hungry.

The live show was really cool. Much more stylish than I had expected. It was held in the church hall, open air. They played hip-hop, rap and pop for 3-4 hours on end. They sang and danced, involving everybody at the hall. Audience was so charged up. So was I. It was such an exciting moment. Time flied.

It was only in the after party when I knew that those artists who played that day were all from Koch. My friend, a music label owner said that Koch is full of enthusiasm with talent. This was the place she came for the master thesis and since then she has been chasing the opportunity with Koch youngsters.

‘Why was it Koch?’ I pitched her a question which she must have been pitched thousands of time.

‘It was Koch from my first sight.’ She answered. ‘There was a sense of thirsting for music here, and more importantly, a sense of unity to heap up the town with their voice, rhythm and music.’

It might be the identification, I felt. In Koch slum, people live longer for a few generations. This is not a temporary area of living. They take root up here and as a ‘Koch citizen’, they try to sing and live.

(sing and dance in Koch)

Co-existence, I felt. Or compartmentalization. It means to live side by side with somebody different. It already implies the difference of identities of the ones who live together. Lions and a hippo. Luo tribe and Kikuyu tribe.

But the scope of this somebody can either stretch or shrink. Very easily. Depending on their identity. Either animals or humans.

(Masai, let's go)