Yes.. I identify as…

We are enjoying a few days at the magnificent Victoria Falls. 

I know, so lucky. 

Our resort offers a shuttle service into town. They don’t encourage you to walk too far around here because of the wild animals. Having said that, the locals walk everywhere. Out of necessity one presumes. 

Anyway, after our boozy lunch (always), we caught the shuttle back.

There was a very attractive lady on the shuttle with us and then we stopped again and picked up Casanova. Himself.

Immediately he started harassing her for her details. Including phone number and room number. 

Amazing. 

So, when we arrived, we hung around a bit to escort her, as necessary, because of this unwanted and somewhat aggressive attention. 

Later, when we were having a sundowner, we saw this young lady again and she thanked us for the help. 

She was with her friends by now. (She made a point of telling us, perhaps she thought we would chase them off too). 

Where are you from they asked us. 

This question is almost as loaded as ‘what is your surname’. I am always confused by both and tend to ramble a bit. 

Luckily my lovely man stepped in and explained that we were local. Zimbabwean. 

Immediately we were regarded with deep suspicion. Which is normal. My lovely man never gets asked by a Zimbabwean if he is Zimbabwean. I braced myself for the inevitable.

She doesn’t sound like a Zimbabwean they stated, as expected, moving away slightly. She sounds like an South African. Also, they continued, it’s her hair. Very Pretoria. The one guy actually waving his hands around his head.

No good deed…

Nice though, he said as an afterthought. 

Yes, I said, I lived in SA for a long time, I guess I picked up an accent. 

Not being able to resist rambling, I further explained that, at one point, I even married into the Afrikaans tribe, but I wasn’t accepted. Voted out. The weakest link stuff.

They all nodded… Knowingly.

My lovely man just sighed and ordered another beer. Don’t start with the surnames please he muttered.  

Travelling light

Is it just me, or has travel become a pain? 

Because this is Africa, the rules are a moving target that are never quite fully disclosed. Sometimes your vaccination 💉 certificate is required, often not. Sometimes there is an interrogation around how many booster jabs have been had and how long ago. Mostly, nobody cares. 

Also, because this is Africa, there is someone having a beer 🍻 at the airport. 6:30am. We don’t judge. 

One thing that irks me with air travel, is the request to remove your shoes. I always forget this and wear difficult to remove shoes. 

I have also had to surrender my tweezers at the scanner.

I will be boasting a uni brow in a few days.

Another irksome thing is the different baggage allowance based on destination. These, presumably, are based on union negotiations as to how much weight the baggage handler is prepared to lift. But as a result, one must plan around the lowest weight allowed on a staggered trip. 

I can tell you for nothing that Cape Town need to gym it up. 

Why would they not rather give you a total allowance and then a max per bag? To standardise worldwide? 

Who knows? 

I am, of recent, bucking the system and hoping no one weighs my hand luggage.

Because I have to carry my office with me when I travel, and I REALLY like working with multiple screens, I invested in some portable screens. 

They are great, but not light. 

My laptop bag weighs more than my suitcase. 

If a plane I’m on goes down and they can’t figure out why, you can enlighten them. I am, far from light.

I know you have to carry your office with you when you travel darling, but I observe that I am the one actually hauling this bag around, my lovely man mentioned.

Yes darling, make sure you don’t indicate how heavy it actually is, or they may arrest you.