I had been quite hesitant in getting to Livingstonia because the only way up is through hitch hiking a vehicle and you need to get through 20 bends through very bad roads.
But in the end I decided to go because I was really curious about how people could build a town up the hill without getting the road done? Why would we have schools, university and hospital so high up even though there is no good route access? What attracted people, for example university students, to travel to a place like this – is this something about the missionary so mysteriously wonderful that I couldn’t understand?
People told me I needed to take a minibus from Mzuzu to Chitimba then from Chitimba roadblock I should get a lift from just anybody who wants to drive up there. If I am lucky I shall wait no longer than 2 hours. But if I am unlucky I could spend 2 days waiting. Opps. But ahhh. I took the risk. I said to myself if I didn’t manage to get a lift by 3pm I would just walk up the hill I don’t believe I couldn’t get there in two hours. Well could be hard with my luggage but if the Malawians can do that, why can’t I?
One thing you shall be very careful about Malawians is the length of time they told you about travelling. Well the information I had got was it should take about 2 hours from Mzuzu to Chitimba. Hmm in reality it took double of that. However I was just super lucky today. I got to Mzuzu bus depot just 3 minutes before the bus left for Karonga (Chitimba is half way from Mzuzu to Karonga). And the minute I got down from the bus, there was already a car which was just about to leave to climb the hill.
But that was a frustrating scene. There were already 15 people waiting to get into the 4x4, which probably (according to ‘normal’ standard) could take only half of these people, I mean without luggage. But we had piles of luggage here. Ahhh.. I thought perhaps I should just wait for the next vehicle, there was just NO WAY I could get into the car.
I ran toward the front seat, pleaded to the driver to take me in. He glanced at me, nonchalantly, while pointing his finger to the back of the car ‘if you can get in there, ok’.
I went back to look at this impossible mission of squeezing 15 people into such a small space. I suddenly thought of Chinese acrobat, or some contortionists, the one that involved bending one’s joints to some impossible angles to squeeze into a small bottle or something.. well UNLESS we could do that, there was no way to fit everybody inside.
But miracle always happens in Africa. I don’t know how but somehow they squeezed everybody in. And all the luggage too. Thank God there was no chicken or pigs or any other animals today.. Of course everybody was in different sitting, squatting, hanging, etc.. positions. There was not even 1 inch of empty spaces wasted. The driver came over to push everybody in just like pushing chicken into a cage.. lol!
I was about to turn away before a local person stopped me – ‘if you don’t get in this, you may not get another vehicle’. Ahhh.. well...
I glanced at the driver – he held his hands up signalling there was nothing he could do ‘no, look at this – NO’.
I got another idea. I went back to the front seat. There was just one guy sitting at the passenger seat – so why not I just squeeze in.. hey I am just size 8!
‘Can I squeeze in?’ – and this time I was lucky.. ‘Ok jump in – we’re going to charge you 500kwacha’.
Ahh well I think they purposely didn’t allow me to get into the back seat so that they could take 500kwacha because of ‘special VIP seat’ at the front. The rest pays 300kwacha. But yay I was lucky! At least I didn’t have to wait for 2 days! And 500kwacha for a lift up the hill is indeed cheap!
The road was soooo bad that people were throwing up throughout the drive. It was one sharp turn after another. No tarred road at all – all rocky, bumpy road. Any slight mistake could really cost your life!
Half way up the hill we had to stop the car because one of the passengers couldn’t stand it anymore. It was a relief for everybody to just come down from the stuffy condition even for just a few minutes. However it was lucky for us to stop because we spotted one of the tyres was already punctured. Phew.. that was a close call – imagine what could happen if we continued driving with a flat tyre..!
After the spare tyre was replaced we continued the second half of the torturous journey. But this time I volunteered to sit at the back because I think the girl (who threw up badly) should deserve the VIP seat at the front. I didn’t know how to just plunged myself into the crowd so I waited until everybody was in – and that actually wasn’t very wise because the later you get in the worse ‘seat’ (well there wasn’t seat but I mean ‘position’) you get. So I ended up having a very small space where I could barely squat. I had to half squat, half sit, half stand.. I don’t even know how to describe that – so in the end I found myself half rested on somebody’s feet and partly on my own shoes; and somebody’s knee was on my shoulder and somebody’s arm around my neck.. it got worse when the car moved I was thrown into different positions but found no grip to stabilise myself.. I was seated very close to the rear of the car – the back window wasn’t close so when the road got really bumpy I felt I could be thrown out of the car any minute..!
Anyhow I found this quite amusing – can you believe some people actually dozed off in such condition, while having another person throwing up beside them! Most were just chatting and looked amazingly calm and easy.. well you know after three months here I somehow learned to stay cool no matter how bad the situation is. So I still managed to snap some pictures, very bad ones of course, despite having to constantly balance myself from flying out of the vehicle! Talking about the spirit of paparazzi! Yay!
And I am now very lucky to be alive to tell the story. He he.
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