Relaxed Day in Victoria Falls
05/20/10
Victoria Falls was a quaint little town with small streets packed with restaurants and tourism companies. We each step in this community - regardless if we were down a gravel path, in a trail or along main roads - we were either being followed or watched by salesmen. My friend, my friend!…How much you pay…I give you good price…
A couple steps further and we were offered wooden animal carvings, helicopter flights and trillion dollar Zimbabwean bills worth less than the paper they were printed on. In Zimbabwe, under Mugabe’s regime, their own money had become useless and instead sales were completed in U.S., Botswana or South African money.
Imagine that for a minute, dear reader, imagine all your life savings, maybe your retirement fund or college tuition cookie jar, had suddenly become worthless. Imagine saving half of all your money earned to save up for a property downpayment for years, then learn the clothing on yor back was worth more than your bank account.
This was the reality for many Zimbabwean people, defining a living nightmare, spending a life working hard and saving diligently to become extremely impoverished, slumdog poor. Instead of buying property or going to college abroad, they take their savings and attempt to sell their hard earned cash to tourists as souvenirs - a 10 trillion dollar bill for a U.S. dollar.
I could not help but feel sorry for these people, who now re-start their savings in U.S. currency. Meanwhile, HIV/AIDS has dropped the life expectancy in Zimbabwe to 37 years. The more I travel, the more blessed I feel to be Canadian, to come from a western country full of opportunity, free healthcare and many resources.
However, the tourist attraction of Victoria Falls did result in the town being hard on the budget with over-inflated tourist prices. For example, a bungee jump cost $110, a 20-minute helicopter ride cost $240 per person, elephant ride for $110 per person, $115 to walk with a lion in a group, etc. - all costs above and beyond what I could afford on a six-month-long around the world trip.
Our residence at Victoria Falls Restcamp did have a reasonably priced laundry service at $3 a kilogram, which meant the three of us had all our clothes cleaned for $18. For me, it was refreshling. Boxie-boo’s happiness was fake-wrestling animated. She looked excited enough to wear her fresh panties as elbow pads and attack the laundry basket.
I wanted to bungee jump, but did not for a few reasons: Mine and Boxie-boo’s budget was $100 Canadian a day, Bob said the strap put weight on the ankles and mine was broken recently, I didn’t really want to, but admittedly, although I have no fear of heights, the jump did intimidate me. Ben, the other jumper, had the reason to jump that tempted me to splurge beyond our budget - just to do it because he did not want to. The bottomline was I could not justify spending more than a day’s budget on something that lasted a few seconds, a reality that I might regret one day.
Standing on the bridge over the Zambezi River between Zambia and Zimbabwe, our two jumpers Bob and Ben had the look of conerned animals. While Ben seemed unable to move, Bob could not stand still. They waited. And waited.
Ben’s stillness before the jump was so unnatural I felt his muscles strain. His face was ghost white. Meanwhile, Bob had a spent-looking smile, exhausted from the anxiety. With his hands twitching together, Bob looked like he was skipping an invisible rope, unable to stop himself from moving.
“Just focus on your breathing and you’ll be fine,” I said to Ben, who was staring down at his feet sitting.
“Yeah right. Thanks,” he muttered between still smiling teeth, rubbing his clammy hands on his thighs. His face was distant and abstract, the look of a hypnotized child.
The cruelty of the Victoria Falls Bungee Jump was the waiting - strapped in a harness and ready to be attached to the bungee, the boys waited for 45 minutes. Silence fell between Bob and Ben, who only communicated by breathing exaggeratedly in each other’s directions. Then they jumped, driving the tension of their bodies away in an andrenaline released free fall over turbulent waters. I envied them both.
At lunch on the Zambia side, Ben slowly regained his complexion, while Bob shivered with the heebie-jeebies looking at the bridge they jumped off. They had both paid for the Big Air Package that included three high flying tasks. Bob completed two. Ben one. Then they threw in the towel. It was understanding after such rushes. For the rest of the day, a chilly excitement seemed to brush across their skin, the goose bumps swelling and visible, relieved that no longer had to jump. As they both put it, “Never again.”
Back at our campsite, I was less motivated than a baby who just pooped himself. After so many days on the road, I had the energy of a male rabbit after a week with crazed females in heat. I was so lazy, I put off procrastinating and did nothing, only breathed enough to make sure my nostril hairs maintained their silky smooth figures.
I then thought of you, dear reader, my just so attractive stalkers following me around the world; some of you slacking off at work to read this, others now examining the beauty of their own nose hairs, and I began to write, picturing you all naked to avoid getting nervous.
That’s all for now.
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