Monday, 3 February 2020 - Botswana to Zimbabwe
After lunch we walked about a km along the pathways around the falls. What can I say. It was just beautiful. Got wet from the mist as if the falls were showering me with its fresh water. There is a statue of Dr. David Livingstone (1813-1973). He was a Scottish missionary who visited the falls on 16 November 1855 and widely publicised its existence to the outside world. He spent over 25 years in Africa traversing over 45,000 km of uncharted territory. He dedicated the last 5 years of his life to shutting down the slave trade in East Africa.
This was where his famous meeting with Henry Morton Stanley took place, on the shores of Lake Tanganyika, where Stanley greeted him with the famous quote, “Dr. Livingstone, I presume?” It is a line dripping with sarcasm because he was the only white man there. Upon his death in 1873 in Chitambo Village, Ilala, Northern Zambia, his companions Sussi and Chuma buried his heart there. The rest of his remains were laid to rest in “Explorers’ Corner” in Westminster Abbey but symbolically his heart has always remained in Africa 😢❤️.
Then back to the truck where we met a guy who could custom-make t-shirts. I ordered 4 (including 1 for myself) which had the map of my journey from Cape Town to Victoria Falls at the back. I think it’s pretty cool that I did this on my own (albeit with a tour) and why shouldn’t I advertise the fact.
In the afternoon Jette and I walked around town. It is really a very small town with one main street, and very, very touristic which also means that everything is expensive and people trying to sell us things everywhere we went. It’s actually quite tiring telling them “no thank you” over and over again so we just spent a short time at the craft market which sold local made stuff (I bought some souveniers here) and then we went back.
Our last dinner together at 7 p.m. There was a group of singers/dancers from the Zulu/Ndebele tribe performing some numbers and dances which was quite fun to watch. It is Clever’s birthday tomorrow and earlier I had arranged with the restaurant that this group sing him a birthday song and bring him a birthday cake. I would have paid for it but they very kindly told me that it was all complimentary. I could see that Clever and Taro were pleasantly surprised and touched by this gesture as they really didn’t expect anything like this. They didn’t know I planned the whole thing and I didn’t tell them.
Then the t-shirt guy came with out custom made t-shirts (so fast)! and I gave him all my last remaining poolas.
And then it was finally time to say goodbye to everyone. I am sad. I will miss them, especially Clever and Taro. Clever is still jealous about Emanuel, and I keep teasing him about how intelligent Emanuel is and Clever gets so agitated 😂😂😂! I am also nervous because I had gotten so used to someone telling me what time to meet, where to go, what to do, and now I have to figure everything out on my own all over again. And this incident about losing money has shaken my confidence a bit.
But I have no choice. I am all alone in this world and I chart my own path in life.
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