Well after flying and landing and flying and landing for more than 18 hours, I finally touched down at Lilongwe International Airport.. I felt so nauseated by the end of the journey! I swore to myself this is the first time and the last time I ever tortured myself to such agonising journey....!
The flight was supposed to land 230pm – that would give time to my connecting flight at 4pm. However it was delayed and landed at 330pm. By the time I cleared through immigration and retrieved my luggage it was already 4pm! I was hoping the connecting flight to be delayed its departure, praying that the so-called ‘African time’ would allow me to hop on the connecting flight because I just couldn’t stand another torturous 4-hour coach trip!
Guess what – that’s the first thing I learn about Malawians: there’s no such thing as ‘African time’ – Malawian time = punctuality!! The flight just took off without me... wuwuuwuuwuw....sob....! I bumped into another two ladies who would also like to travel to Blantyre: one of them (Asiyati) I met her at Addis Ababa Airport she’s a lecturer from University of Malawi (and I even had done an interview with her at the airport!! So my first interview was actually not done in Malawi but in Ethiopia hahaha!); and the other one was a medical doctor (Sarah) from the UK who is visiting her friends in Blantyre. So three of us decided to get to Lilongwe city centre to try to catch a coach to Blantyre. Luckily I didn’t book the air ticket in advance (thanks to Shamima who advised me not to as Ethiopian Airways could be late sometimes) otherwise I would have lost about £100...
Funny enough that the coach also left at 4pm.. ahhh! What’s the point of having both plane and coach leaving for the same destination at the same time?!? Asiyati has got a brother-in-law in Lilongwe who found out for us that there was another coach that left at 430pm. We left the airport at 410pm – only 20 minutes to go to chase the coach which was 26km away..! ahh Sarah and I were very much doubtful of that anyhow we just hopped on the cab trusting Asiyati, being a local, should make the brightest decision.
The coach left exactly at 430pm (again proving how punctual the Malawians can be!!). The cab driver was driving very fast as he knew we were chasing after the coach.. I was a bit worried indeed.. still we couldn’t make it before time – but Asiyati never gave up! Her bro-in-law called the coach company to find out the coach stopped somewhere near a gas station because of police block. So there was hope that we could catch the coach halfway! Frankly I was feeling so nauseous at that time I didn’t mind to put up one night at Lilongwe and to travel the next day to Blantyre.. Asiyati’s bro-in-law picked all of us up somewhere in Lilongwe in his car and chased for the coach – ahh I felt I could be thrown out of the car any minute!! We overtook all vehicles on the way as if the coach was the last coach ever to Blantyre.....!!!!
We caught the coach at last. I was happy that all effort paid off but I had to endure another 4 hours of coach trip.....
Anyway.. welcome to Malawi – I guess this crazy start in Malawi is a good sign that I would have fabulous adventurous time for the next three months!!
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