The following day I head out to Iringa to take a one week intensive course in Swahili. A colourful Sumry High Class bus, this is the top notch bus company which besides taking you in neon-colourful surroundings gives you soda and sweeties at the start of the nine hour trip. In exchange for this you put up with a screen showing violent soap operas and MTV amplifying Celine Dion and rap all the way. This time I’m not as lucky with my side companion. Besides leaning on me to the point of crushing me onto the window, he unapologetically uses half my lap to spread out his papers and begin marking. I think he wants to make it obvious he is a teacher and speaks English, as he soon starts conversing non-stop. Unfortunately this time I sense he is keener to talk than I am, as I have been told that the bus will be crossing a national park and I’ll get the chance to see wild animals. Philip jabs away and despite hardly saying a word myself he stresses how happy he is to meet me and asks for my contact details so that “we can keep in touch for ever”. At this point, I give him my email address, close my eyes and plug in my MP3 player. After a while I wake up to the sight of ELEPHANTS! But it’s too late to take a photo... Then I see a herd of zebras, eating lazily a bit further away from the road. I keep looking with my camera on hold and only after the best part of an hour do I see a herd of gazelles. Wow. What a sight! Had we been there at a darker time of day or the weather been less hot, other marvels like giraffes and hyenas might have crossed our way. Maybe next time...
I’m woken up suddenly by Philip who assures me we’ve reached the point on the motorway where I should get off. I was instructed to get off before reaching Iringa where there was a big sign for Riverside Campsite, and I have asked the driver and Philip also to point it out. I see there’s a big sign, so I get off and get my luggage from the boot. The bus drives away and I feel in the middle of nowhere: a semi-deserted area with few bushes and one long road cutting through it. I take out my camera to take pictures of such isolation. I follow Amy’s instructions to walk about one kilometre into the bush, where the sign is pointing. I notice the sign does say “riverside” but in smaller font than I’d been told. I feel lucky to have been woken up in time, “good old Philip” I think to myself.
Now, I had been warned that this is low season and there would only be a handful of students at most. But as I reach the resort-looking open banda with sofas, a few tables and an open bar I soon realize there is nobody to be seen. I try calling Steve, the camp manager who I’m meant to introduce myself to, but there is no phone signal. I sit on a sofa and then see a boy mowing a tiny bit of lawn nearby. I greet him and ask for Steve. He smiles, nods and says he’ll call Martin. He returns after a while and asks me to wait. A yellow jeep then arrives and an English middle-aged man gets off. I hurry towards him. “Steve?” I ask. He nods with a blank look on his face and says “Hi”. I tell him I’m Sophia. After trying to explain who I am and getting no welcoming response, he says, “I don’t think I’m your Steve. I’m just passing by with my family; we’re on our way to Kigali”. I apologize and go back to the sofa where I doze off for a while.
I wake to the sound of English conversation. An Aussie trio are chatting to Steve and his wife, while two little blonde boys play around me and ask me if I want to see a trick. I nod and listen up to what the adults are saying. The Aussies then ask me what I’m doing here. When I tell them I ‘m here to study Swahili they look perplexed. “I thought that was something you can only do at Riverside...”. So I say, “Is this not Riverside?!!!”. Apparently not. Riverside is still 145 km away. Oh sugar. They all laugh and offer me a beer. Fortunately Steve and Helena are driving via Iringa and say they can give me a lift. I can’t believe my luck. There’s no seatbelt on the front passenger seat so Helena was going to sit at the back with Toby and Oli anyway. We chat about different development projects in the region, they even offer me my first “Tuskers” beer and I learn lots about their life in Arusha and Tanzania in general. Steve has lived here for thirteen years and was born in Kenya before being sent to boarding school in England, so he is bilingual and dexterous in handling the road, including talking his way out of corrupt police fines.
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