As I start writing this the damn DVD player has started playing “Full Metal Jacket” again, it is such a funny film though (“I don’t know what I’ve been told, Eskimo pussy is mighty cold”). We just finished watching “No Country for Old Men” which was a decent film for about 1 hour and a half but then became shit and just ended inexplicably(it was a bit slow throughout). Also Áine finally won a game of Spider Solitaire after days of trying (it was becoming a bit of an addiction, we considered intervening). So today began late, as I said it’s a bank holiday and it’s also Jamie’s 21st birthday so we decided to have another day off (oh it’s brilliant deciding for yourself).Once we were up the first task for the day was to go to Shoprite to refill our supplies of sausages and chocolate (there a bit of weird innuendo in that sentence so please ignore it). We rang Mr Scrape along the ground again and he brought us there. We got most the food we wanted (including the Hungarian sausages that we plan to have for tea every night this week. On the way out of Shoprite there’s a security guard that has to check everyone’s receipt as they leave the shop (luckily I kept mine cause I almost always throw them out instantly). Once outside we realises we needed a way home (Shoprite is 3km outside town on the opposite side to us). We were looking around for a taxi when one of the guys from the small blue minibuses that are everywhere here asked us if we needed a lift. Usually the go certain routes and only go once full but we negotiated a price and he agreed to take us. It turned out to be an experience. For a start the bus was falling apart, the seats were really uncomfortable and some of the windows and doors were missing or stuck in the open position (not to mention the pile of wires hanging out of the radio and the guy fixing the buses electrics as we drove). Due to the lack of windows and doors it was really really windy in the bus and I had to hold on for fear of falling out. It was the music in the bus however that made the whole experience surreal. It was Zambian pop music (I presume) and for most of the journey it was a song about indicators (it’s the only word we recognised, or course we tried to guess what the rest of the lyrics were “I turn to the left, I turn to the right, put on my indicator and I’m feeling alright” was one guess). After we made in home (in one piece thankfully) we rang our taxi drive to head back into town for food and a bit of sightseeing. We decided to go back and sit in Oasis where we got the food yesterday. I ordered pizza, as did Jamie while Dan and Áine ordered a Shwama wrap each and a shared pizza. The food took and age to arrive but my god was it work the wait. The pizza was absolutely unbelievable. It was slightly different than yesterdays pizza in that most of the vegetables had been replace with BBQ chicken. It was so so so good and I washed it down with a nice cold Mosi beer. It was a really good start to our trip to town. After dinner (as I type I wish I had another one of those pizza’s) we set off to find Willies internet cafe (yes they have willies in Mongu too). It was a much more impressive operation than Mongu with a room full of fancy looking computers. The internet started off as fast as cheetah on speed, but as soon as Dan commented on its speed it quickly dropped until it was unusable so we spent the next half hour trying to log out of our email. It was really annoying. After life in the slow lane we set off walking towards the harbour. It was about a 30-40 minute and from half way onwards they’re were spectacular views over the flood plains. The harbour itself is a unique site. They are tonnes of small stalls around it’s a real shanty town. A canal cuts its way through the flood plains from here to the Zambezi. We stooped an took pictures by the Zambezi River 25km sign and walked out along “Africa’s most expensive road” which is in a shocking condition at times we had to climb across stretches of it. We took tonnes and tonnes of pictures but as with yesterday nothing will capture the amazing sight we seen. It really is one of those bits of scenery that’s just breathtaking. So to get back we had to walk (oh joy of joys), on the way we passed by Mongu’s main hotel which my guidebook absolutely slates even calling it “shit”. We finally got back to town and secured a scrappy along the ground taxi home. The evening was spent writing bits and drawing other bits until we had the amazing Hungarian sausages for tea. After tea we sat down to watch the film as I mentioned above. Before we did though, we had bought a small chocolate log cake for Jamie’s birthday. We had no candles so we stuck some party buggles (from home) in it instead (once we took them out you had to “suck hard to get the cream out and then blow hard to make it make a sound”, only school kids, and us, would laugh at such immature jokes). So we sang the obligatory song and sat down and watched the film without an ending. The day that was, was the day that I described. Dream well!
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