We met a Dutch couple at Thebe River Campsite in Kasane. The rain started bucketing down and we retreated to the bar area.
It was a Sunday and the campsite was packed. We all decided to have dinner together and we sat swapping travel stories and laughing about the silly things that we miss from home. After a great night of laughs and meeting new friends we retired to our rain beaten tents.
I fell asleep to the rhythmic beating of raindrops on my tent and intermittent cracking of thunder while smelling the refreshing fragrance of the new rain feeding the dry bushveld. Around midnight we were rudely woken up by drunken shouts. A group of students had arrived back from night out.
Patiently we waited for the rowdy group to tone it down. After half an hour an elderly gentleman came over from the adjacent camp and politely asked them to keep it down and respect other campers.”Why should I keep quite for you! You are not from Botswana and I don’t listen to the boer!”
This comment jerked me out of my sleep and I paused for a moment thinking I had heard incorrectly. The Afrikaans gentleman stayed calm and explained that he would not get into a racial argument with a drunk, a very noble move on his behalf and one that kept us from intervening.
The rest of the group realized that they were in the wrong, but for another two hours the ignorant, selfish racist kept complaining about how he would never stand down to a white man and that all whites are intruders. A really stupid thing for a man to say who is too young to have lived through segregation and oppression.
We woke up early, hoping to make enough noise to get our own back, but unfortunately the groggy students woke up at the same time and made enough noise to wake up not only the campsite but the greater Chobe area too.
Martin and Marloes were disgusted by their behaviour and could not believe that someone could be so rude towards a man asking for some respect. This also twisted my perspective on the locals, but after travelling so far you always remember to look past your first impression and give other people a chance.
Marc and I said our farewells to Martin and Marloes and headed out on our long stretch south to Pandamatenga. Within our first five kilometres we were fighting against the wind again, drained by lack of sleep and moving at a snail’s pace. We encountered a huge herd of elephant 15 kilometres south of Kazangula which, to our surprise, scattered in all directions as we got closer, trumpeting as they ran deep into the safety of the bush.
The temperature started soaring by 10 o’clock and we were sucking down our water. Two punctures left us even more despondent about the ride and we pointed ourselves south east against the wind. By 12 o’clock we had finished all our water.
We stopped at a cattle post 50 kilometres from Kazangula and managed to get some water from a kind elderly couple. The weatherbeaten man did not speak English and his dogs were very wary of this tall white stranger shouting out greetings of “Dumela!, Hello!, Dumela!”
He signalled for me to come over, and scolded his dogs with the universally African, “Voetsak”! The short, wrinkled man gave me a smile and filled our water bottles out of a 25 litre bucket and with only a single word he explained the water was pure and was from Kasane by sipping the water, smiling, giving the thumbs up sign and saying “Kasane”. Then sipping the water out the cattle trough, spitting it out, contorting his leathery face and wagging his finger as if to say “no,no!” He passed me a tin mug full of water and we toasted by clanging the mugs together. I drank down the sweet liquid and thanked him in Setswana, “Kealeboga Ra.”
He smiled and his wife waved from the chicken coop as I walked back to face the heat and soul crushing headwind. Marc asked what took me so long. “I was just chatting to the man. The water is good. It’s from Kasane.” I answered.
