54. Tanzanía. Rusumo Falls, Ngara to Mwanza

In our previous post we discussed the problems we have been hearing about Tanzanía related to that country´s recent crackdown on black-marketeers and the informal economy. This crackdown had allegedly included throwing all border guards into jail.  At that time Tanzania´s president, Julius Nyerere, had been the head of state since independence in 1961 and Unification with Zanzibar in 1964.  Since the mid-1970s he had been advocating a unique form of African socialism based on the Umajaa, or collective agricultural communities. In terms of food production this was not considered to be a success in 1983.  Of the 21 countries that we visited in Africa it was the one where we had the hardest time feeding ourselves.  It also started out very expensive for us because we had to change our dollars at the official rate, and because much of the transportation had been in the hands of Tanzanians of Asian descent that were precisely the ones that had suffered the crackdown.

  

The long hitching ride in the charcoal truck with two Arab drivers stands out in our memory of the African trip, not least because of the feast that we were invited to share.

We regret not having more pictures of this stretch, including the charcoal production site, but as we have mentioned previously this is before the days of digital pictures and we had limited slide film which we carried over the entire trip.

Our route through Tanzanía.  Yellow stands for road travel, mainly hitching and red for rail travel

Rusumo Falls, Rwanda--Ngara, Tanzania, Satuday, 28 May, 1983

After all the worrying we did, the Tanzanian border officials were very polite and reasonable. (Naturally! After all, we were dealing in a civilized tongue, English.)  This is our third country where English is spoken, compared to 12 where French was inherited. We showed them all of our money (including our collection of bills from each country we had visited) but we had a slight problem with the shillings. The man showed us the law that said no importation of shillings was allowed, but he admitted that the error had been on the part of the misinformed ambassador. They asked us what we carried but did not look at any of our stuff.  All very straight-forward, until we checked in at the police. The officer treated us quite jovially and ended up by asking if we did not want to change money!

There was a truck there from the Tanzanian Coffee Office whose driver reluctantly agreed to take us as far as Ngara. He first said no to Dan and only agreed when the policeman asked. The ride was dusty as we were in the back of a closed-in truck, but from where we sat on our packs, we could watch the mountains through the open quarter of the back. Things are definitely getting drier, but as we got here at the end of the rainy season, everything is still green. The trees in general are the spiny, dry climate kind.

Our route through NW Tanzania in greater detail.  Yellow stands for road travel and red for railroad travel.

Our arrival in Ngara was a bit confusing because we stopped at three different places. A young man who was with us had said the truck was eventually going on to Mwanza on Lake Victoria, but the driver refused to cooperate when Dan asked if we could go along. Every­one was drinking alcohol where we stopped, so Dan had a hard time finding anyone willing to help who also knew English.

We learned fast that English is spoken by only a few people. We were by now very tired, it was dusk, and Dan got the horrible feeling that no one was willing to help us. Our truck driver and the driver of a bus appeared to make fun of him by changing their stories on price, distance, and destination. Finally a man came up to me where I was sitting with the packs, surrounded by staring people, and asked if I knew French. Funny that we would receive succor from a French-speaking refugee from Burundi when we thought we were “home free” in an English-speaking country. When Dan returned, our friend, Sosthene Nutamenia, took us quite a way down the road to the Ngara Guest House. Not only were we able to secure a single room (pretty clean although no lights and not much water from rather dubious barrels) but he insisted on treating us to a good, hot thermos of sweet chai (in this case milk and tea). We spread a rain poncho and our sleeping bags on top of the beds and wearily drifted off to sleep.

We may have drifted off to sleep, but we drifted in and out of it all night long. I am afraid it may have been a Banjul-type lodging place (i.e. brothel) because we heard people all night long. The room right across from ours was especially bad as it had a squeaky door. But it was nice and cool and there were no mosquitoes. What impressed us when we entered the room was that it smelled fresh and clean.

Ngara, Tanzania, Sunday 29 May, 1983

(DAN) A rough night: on top of the opening doors, booming men and giggling women, I had another small touch of what I think is malaria. As last time, two weeks ago, it came on a Saturday evening or just before I am due to take the chloroquin. I think I shall step up the dosage a little.

A bus left for Bukoba that we could have taken for the first 45 kms, but we decided to stay over so we could change some money at the Ngara bank. We laid pretty low during the morning. We slept some more and read. I finished Graham Greene’s autobiography that we got in a swap from the Aussies, and Helena finished Brother to a Dragonfly. Both are rather sad and did not help much to pull us out of our mood.

The water situation made us feel uneasy. The only water we could find was some standing in old rusty barrels. Since this is the textbook breeding ground for schistosomiasis, and none of our purification methods is guaranteed against it, we first filtered the water in our glass and then boiled it on our burner. Even so, it seemed as if we could not get enough water to rehydrate us from our long day in the sun.

We took a long walk in the afternoon which did wonders for our spirits. Ngara is a truly beautiful spot. It is high on a ridge with rolling, cultivated hills on one side and the deep, grass-covered valleys leading to the Kagera River on the other. It is definitely drier here with the grass already hardened and yellowing. We must be right on the edge of the banana-growing climate. The rocks in the area are an interesting mixture. There is a crumbly conglomerate as bed rock, but then there are boulders of granite and something like quartzite.

Rift valley in the Kagera region of Tanzania.

We have been quite impressed by the Kagera river region. We crossed the river twice yesterday, once on the bridge crossing the border and then a few kms. later on a ferry. Much of the river bottom is in papyrus swamp while there are mountains rising on both sides, and then there are the large falls. This area must have been full of game at one time.

We are in one of the most remote corners of Tanzania, so it is going to be a trick getting out of here. There is supposed to be a bus to Mwanza on Wednesday, but we do not really want to wait two more days here. We decided to change our money tomorrow and start walking to Rulenge.  If a vehicle comes along, we can take it, if not it will be 45 kms. of mostly downhill walking in this beautiful countryside.

We got a much more agreeable opinion of Ngara itself as we walked back in. It is full of several kinds of eucalyptus trees and a few pines. It has the slightly sad air of some African towns, with empty or rundown buildings that probably date back to colonial times. Independence came in 1963 here. If nothing else, the colonialists were gardeners and landscapers.

We ran into Sosthene and had a good talk. We had gathered that he was a refugee from Burundi. We had assumed that it was because he was an Adventist (Adventists and Jehova’s Witnesses are really persecuted in Burundi). But he says it is because he is Hutu whereas the Tutsi are the ruling society. I believe that he tried to protest some 50,000 Bfr swindle and sent a letter to a minister and the president; soon he had to hop over the border into Tanzania. (We are actually closer to Burundi here than Rwanda). He mentioned that he lost two sisters and a brother in the 1973 massacre of the Hutus by the Tutsis.

He then asked us what the possibilities are of getting a scholarship in the U.S. He, as with Kasongo, he would not even consider the possibility of Belgium or France. He said he was all set to study medicine in the U.S., but the 1973 problems forestalled that. Now he wants to study international law in the U.S. “I want to come back as an educated and well-known person to fight the persecution in Burundi.” I asked him if he had tried the Adventist channels. He thought for some reason that we were a preferable channel. He said he was on his way to Dar Es Salaam next week to speak with the UN high commission on refugees and that they might help as well. As always, we left it understood that we would help if we could, but we could not promise anything.

There were, as well, a number of fairly new, big houses that looked all closed down. We wonder if they do not belong to some of the Arabs or Indians who are feeling the heat. As in Kalemie, there has been a sharp increase in the amount of Arab blood running around. The one person I found who could speak English was an Arab boy.

We had a much more restful night. Since there is no electricity or candles, we were in bed by 1930. The “other side” of the guest house had many fewer guests.

(HELENA) I forgot to mention an episode that occurred yesterday as we were waiting for the ferry to reach our side. Someone spotted a leech swimming around in the shallows near shore. Everyone gathered around (“everyone” being about 6 people from our truck and several women and children who were there washing clothes in flat metal bowls) to watch him play around and tease it with a stick. Finally he stabbed it many times over. It bled a lot, but it continued to move around. Not a very pleasant thing to think of a thing like that latching on to you.

Ngara – Biharamulo, Tanzania, Monday, 30 May, 1983

(HELENA) We were up again by 6:00, although later, when we reached the bank at what should have been before hours, we found out that there had been a time change. For some­one like me (I work at keeping my poor CITIZEN going. Not only do I have to shake it all day, the band gave out and now I have to keep it in a pocket or the camera bag) it is strange to find out that you have been on the wrong time for 36 hours. Horrors!

So the bank was already open when we got there. They took Dan all the way inside immediately, so it looked as if we would soon be on our way. Dan finally came out again 45 minutes later. Apparently they do not handle much foreign currency in the Ngara branch of the Bank of Commerce. They ended up with three persons working on it. They had every­thing all calculated with a rate sheet from March when someone found one for April. They then worked that out --only to find the one for May. Each time it took ages, and in the end it was not that different. Sosthene was there to say goodbye, and he (along with anyone we would meet who could speak enough English to ask us where we were going) thought we were a bit crazy not to wait for Wednesday’s bus to Mwanza. We walked for more than two hours, pausing often to admire the view. We were overtaken by a couple of primary school teachers with whom we chatted and walked for a while. Since we had left our lodgings this morning without a drop of water (a no-no, but we did not want to contaminate either our canteen or our 5-liter water bladder with that awful water) we decided to ask for some water at the Catholic Mission about 5 kms. out of town. The teachers helped us ask, and we left them carrying 3 liters of good drinking water.

We had just decided to take our first real rest and have lunch under “yonder” shade tree when a big 18-ton truck overtook us. We flagged it just in case, and even though the cab already had two Arabs and one black ayuco (helper) in the cab, they said they would be glad to take us 10 kms, or until they took another road to the Burundi border. The truck bed was another of those completely enclosed dust traps, so all of us piled into the cab; five people, two seats. The Arab who was not driving spoke very good English and was very friendly, so we had an enjoyable few kms. When they dropped us off, they said they would be coming back to go on to Mwanza, so we more or less agreed to go with them if no other ride came along.

Before we even had a chance to pick up our packs and find the next shady spot for our lunch, a 10-seat Land Rover (we see very few short-wheel base variety) drove up and stopped. We had not bothered to flag it because it looked full, but we could not very well refuse an offered free ride, could we? The two of us and our things piled into the back, along with a barrel. Thus we rode into our day’s goal, Rulenga, in style. Different people with whom we had talked said we would take until 1600 to walk it (45 kms), but we fooled them and were there in time to have a good plate of rice and beans at an Arab-owned restaurant. We ordered chai, and this time were presented with piping hot, very sweet tea that we think tasted like hierba Luisa.

We walked on through Rulenge and settled down on yet another shady bank to wait for our friends in the MWACOTRA truck. There were a lot of people walking by on our road --school children, grown-ups (one man insisted there was no truck coming through today so much that we wished our truck would come by while he was there to see he was wrong), and two groups of militia. These last were something new to us. They went by trotting and singing (as we have seen many a group of soldiers do) but each group, about 81 strong, was made up of every sort of person. They were mainly young men, but there were also some young women and older men, all toting guns carved out of wood. We later learned they are groups of volunteers called Ngamba. Each family must provide one volunteer who trains daily except Sundays for six months before being given an appropriate identity card. They are called up when the need arises as it did in the war with Uganda back in 1978. We could hear them working out for two solid hours before they trotted back the other way.

It was 1800, and we were just steeling ourselves for Dan to ask to pitch our tent at some mission when our truck came by. Meantime they had picked up a woman and her baby in the cab and several others in the back, but they said to get on in. Dan arranged our packs in the bed, and we climbed into the cab, six adults and a baby. Luckily the driver was excellent, and there was not dust in the cab because, otherwise, it was an awkwardly crowded two-hour stretch as far as Nyankahura. It was a rough dirt road. The two Arabs went into a house for a leisurely supper.  Dan and I had a bite of bread, granola, and bananas, and the ayuco (as is always the case) fended for himself, as did the others.

We were a bit more comfortable (albeit guiltily, since the woman and baby rode in the back) for the next two-hour stretch, especially since 30 kms. of it was paved. Dan and I were both nodding and jerking awake by the time we drove into our destination for the night. It was past 1:00 a.m., so Dan and I decided simply to lie down on top of the rain ponchos and cover ourselves with Dan’s sleeping bag. Talk about hordes of mosquitoes! Even with our heads covered, we could hear hundreds of them buzzing around. Finally we managed to get to sleep in time to get in a few much-needed hours of rest.

Biharamulo - Mwanza, Tanzania, Tuesday, May 31, 1983

(DAN) We awakened to find ourselves stretched out in what amounted to the town common. The Arabs had said they would roll out early, so we got up while it was still semi-dark and got things ready to go. It was a good thing as kids began to pour in for school about 100 yards away, and they would have been fascinated watching our decamping.

We watched them in turn which was interesting. Not surprisingly, they lined up in front of the flagpole and sang a song. Then they took off, in classes I guess, running in marching formation about five abreast. No adult went with them, but they were gone 20 to 30 minutes, and back they came, jogging and singing in fine formation. A group of older children ran by, each carrying a good-sized piece of firewood. We have seen more evidence of “militant socialism” here than ever in Congo.

One thing we noticed yesterday which held through today was two characteristics that occurred together --Arab features and a pair of shoes. No children except these (Arab features) had shoes, and all that we could recognize had shoes. They were, as a rule, dressed in newer clothes as well. The students were wearing uniforms, but they did not appear to be obligatory as a good portion did not have them. Helena, recalling past gym periods, wondered what a daily half-hour run would do for discipline.

The Arab drivers did not in fact roll out till 0900, so we had plenty of time to read and take in our surroundings. At 0900 we all piled in and went out a km from town and started to load sacks of char­coal. I should say “they” loaded the charcoal --not the Arabs, but the local black men and women who had prepared it. It takes a while to fill an 18-ton truck (SCANIA) with 50 kilo bags of charcoal, 200 of them. As I understand it, the bags cost about $3 apiece here where there is still some forest, and cost $13 apiece in Mwanza where there is no forest for a good distance. According to my calculations, each person theoretically got $30 for what had to be a week of very hard labor --cutting trees, covering, burning, sacking, transporting on foot, and loading. The Arabs in turn make $10 per bag or gross $2000 per two-day trip of 130 miles each way. (They talk in miles here, sad legacy of British days.) This may seem (and is) very lopsided, but there are some deeper significances. In Zaire the big complaint in Sandoa and Kapanga (and everywhere) was that they could not count on transport to take their goods to market; therefore they did not produce any extra so as not to lose anything if a truck failed to come through. On the same subject I asked Bashir, the lead Arab, if the state transportation system was involved in transporting charcoal. He said, “No, because it is too hard work. My bigger brother lives out here almost all the time lining up people to pro­duce charcoal for the truck. In turn the workers have to feel that if they are going to put out a week’s work, they will be paid for it. The government does not have that kind of trust.”

There is the logistical side to keeping a truck running in Tanzania. Yesterday Bashir was telling us about the truck tire situation. Tanzania manufactures the tires needed, and the official price is $450. They export these tires to various countries, but the government need for foreign currency is so high that ALL of the tires are exported, and the only way Tanzanians in private enterprise can get them is to buy them on the black market from Rwanda (tires made in Tanzania) for $1500.

I had several long walks around the charcoal area but saw no efforts at reforestation.

At noon we drove back into town and were invited to have lunch with the three Arabs in the Arab household where Bashir’s brother stays. For a while we sat out on a bench. The men started processing four stalks of sugar cane, and the (black) servant brought out a huge papaya for Helena and me to eat. We could not believe that it was all for us, but the men insisted that it was not for them because they were “grinding”. We left half of it, and Helena thinks that it may have been the ayuco’s only food for the day. Anyway, we were led to a large mat inside a big room that had a fairly large flour mill.  In the center of the mat was a huge basin of deliciously spiced rice heaped over a circle of pieces of chicken (I now know this to be pullao). There were as well lemons to squeeze over the rice; what heights of fine cuisine! I made the great booboo of washing both hands in the finger bowl, but Helena says that Bashir’s brother did as well, so I guess I was O.K. Helena was the only woman to eat with us; maybe they were resigned to breaking customs on this occasion. I am sure I would have gone up in the esteem of the Arabs if I had sent her packing to eat with the women and children in the kitchen.

Speaking of washing hands, when we awakened this morning after several days of travel, and some waterless days in Ngara, my hands were so dirty that when I trimmed my finger­nails, I had to hold a ground-breaking ceremony.

Directly after eating, we got back on the road for a long afternoon of travel. We had long talks with Bashir so are steeped in the situation of Tanzania --from the Arabs point of view. He says there are two reasons for the present crackdown: 1. back in early March they discovered a broad coup being planned by a group of high military officials and one very rich Indian who gave approximately $5,000,000 to the coup funds. Bashir claimed that this Indian was one of Nyerere’s best friends. The coup would have benefitted the rich and commercial class, i.e. Indians, Arabs and Somalis; therefore they are getting the heat now. The other reason is that Nyerere and the government “cannot stand” the suc­cess of the bourgeois class as opposed to the results of the socialist government. It does not help that the economic classes are very correlative with race. Later in the afternoon in Geisa we picked up a Somali woman whose husband has been in jail for two months with no end in sight. His offense was being caught with four unregistered motor boats. (It was interesting when there were four races represented in the stuffed cab: two Arabs, one Somali, one black and two Caucasians.)

Bashir said that Bukoba (on the border with Uganda) was the hardest hit. There are virtually no vehicles running in the street, and all of his uncles are in jail.

We also talked about the situation of shortages here. He says that it is due to the planned economy attempts. The items that are short are all manufactured in Tanzania --soap, candles, batteries, clothes, except for shoes. (Shoes were almost the only thing on the shelves in several stores in Geisa.) There is a soap factory in Mwanza which serves as an example: they have to apply through the bank for all of the necessary raw materials. If they ask for five tons of something, they might only be allotted one ton, and even if they have all of the other materials, the factory stands idle 4/5 of the time. Or, the request may get lost or take several months, etc.

He said that Tanzania assembles Land Rovers, but those that are not exported are all allocated for government use. It is impossible to get a new vehicle in the private sector. Even the safari companies have to buy used government vehicles and fix them up. It is against the law to import luxury cars. I did not mention that I thought this last was a pretty good idea as most of Zaire’s resources seemed to be funneled into that end use. This is especially interesting as the Tanzanian ambassador in Bujumbura seemed ob­sessed with his Mercedes Benz.

We asked about the shattered windshield in the truck. It happened during the war with Uganda in 1977. Bashir was hauling a load of ammunition for the army up by Bukoba. A Tanzanian patrol opened fire on the cab. There were six bullet holes in the windshield and many small ones in the door on the driver’s side. Almost as an afterthought he added, “and I got six bullets in various places in my two legs”.  He was taken unconscious to a hospital “where fortunately there was a missionary”. The military forced them to do the hauling but did not pay for the hospitalization. They did, he admitted, pay good rates for the hauling.

We asked if there are any Arabs in the army. He said that there are a few half-caste officers and ONE Indian, very high-ranking in the army. During the war these Ngambos, militia, (a derisive name for the wooden guns that the militia carry) were “used as bait”. They were made to attack the Ugandan positions with high casualty numbers to be then followed by the regular army. 1977 was a hot year in Africa.

About 1600 we had a flat tire. Without batting an eye our truckers got out, removed the tire, and patched it there in the dust. They were very good at it though the ayuco did most of the work, and it still took an hour and a half.  At times our two Arabs who appeared to get along remarkably well would spar affectionately and then hold hands. There is nothing “gay” about it here, but I would have liked a picture of it for the trucker types back home.

Our next big delay was when we got to the ferry about 2000. There is a long exten­sion of Lake Victoria that goes south past Mwanza, and it has to be crossed to get to the city from the west. There are two fairly large ferry boats (ours was big enough for four large trucks) dating back to colonial times. They have no lights, so the trucks in front turn on their parking lights for the crossing and bright lights for the landing. We actually waited a little over an hour, so we had time to go in for a wonderful, hot cup of chai ya maziwa or tea with milk. They really know how to keep it hot, and each place seems to have its own taste. At first I worried about the raw milk utilized until I realized that the temperature of the milk is high above even the temperature of pasteur­ization, so we should be all right. Flour and therefore bread is scarce in Tanzania, but they had it here, so we got two slezi (slices).

We were so tired that we fell asleep on the crossing; it must have taken about 30 minutes once we got going. After the crossing we did not get very far when we came upon a very recently overturned truck, its load of cotton seed spread over a good area. We stopped to investigate but found that the injured had already been picked up.

It was an Isuzu dump truck of a model that is common here. The Arabs have a nickname for it in Swahili that translated means “it goes”. We continued.

Finally, just before 2300 the lights of Mwanza hove into view. It had been our goal for 39 hours, one of our longer road hauls. We went to drop one of the Arabs off, and on the way checked at a “guest house”--no room. On the way back we saw the Hotel Victoria mentioned in Geoff as being high-priced but serving a good breakfast. Helena had been pulling for the B & B all day. Well, for $19 they did have a double room, and having spent nothing over the last two days, we decided to take it. It had a private bath and shower. We washed off the grime, and I do not even remember Helena’s turning off the light (electricity, too!).