The Adventures of Viv in Swaziland

I guess I had this idea that all of Africa is more or less like Moz, with the exception of a few countries. Boy, was I wrong

My friend Drew and I crossed the Namaacha border into the Kingdom of Swaziland, marveling when the Swazi lady who stamped our passports wished us a lovely day. (In Moz, customer service is non-existent. After two years, I'm pretty used to waiters rolling their eyes at me, shop owners and market ladies acting like they're doing me a favor by selling me something, oftentimes just being plain rude.)

Drew and I then found ourselves on a lovely paved road, in a cushy spacious mini-bus not crammed to the max with sweaty bodies. Even more amazing, was the driver following through on his promise that the chapa would leave right at 4pm, even though the car wasn't full. As we sped along on the wonderfully smooth road, surrounded by beautifully manicured fields of sugar cane, it felt like we were in a whole different world.

Night fell, and we arrived at our destination Ezulwini Valley, a city of glittering lights. Our backpackers lodge was 5k from a shopping mall replete with fancy stores, and even a movie theatre! (Wait, did we somehow teleport ourselves back to America?) We went to see The Dark Knight Rises, my first time at a movie theatre in two years. Drew gorged himself on popcorn and blue raspberry slushies, bought a velcro Avatar wallet and chocolate Rand coins, and otherwise used his credit card with reckless abandon. (You can just call me the babysitter.) We wandered the magical aisles of a Pick N Pay grocery store, and ate a lot of awesome food at the mall restaurants: pizza, chicken fingers, a smoked salmon sandwich. With all the amenities and choices, it really was like being home. We also toured a craft market and I stocked up on cool jewelry made out of beads, straw, and spun paper beads.

We realized we'd been in Moz too long when one night, after taking a cab ride to eat dinner at the mall, we asked the taxi driver to come back and pick us up at 9pm. He agreed, telling us to just borrow a security guard's phone to call him, and he'd be right there. As 9pm approached, Drew and I opted for dessert, absolutely convinced that the taxi driver would not even leave for the mall until he had received our call Around 9:45, we dialed his number from our waitress's phone. "I'm already here," he told us. Oops. We rush out and sure enough, he's been waiting for us promptly since 9. "I drove all over the mall looking for you guys!" He exclaimed. "Some other people wanted to hire me, but I said that I was waiting for some other mulungus" (Apparently, some words are universal in African languages- the one for "white person," for example.) Drew and I felt great shame for our taxi faux pas. Apparently, not all of Africa runs on Mozambican time. We made up for it, however, by leaving a generous American tip.

The next day, we went white water rafting, tubing, and rappelling- all of which were pretty fun. Although Kevin was convinced I would get eaten by a crocodile, we did not see a single one on the calm, shallow river. Drew and I got stuck on the sand bars plenty a time (it's dry season in Africa), and somehow ended up backwards on almost every rapid. Drew fell out of the raft once, but I didn't notice until the guide told me to look behind me (which might say wonders about our friendship... Just kidding.)

On our last day, Drew suggested we head back to Moz a day early, to get a head start on our full traveling day, but I wasn't ready to leave the luxuries of Swaz. We ended up compromising by staying in the city of Manzini, which is closer to the Moz border. The hotel we stayed at was called Moçambique Hotel (coincidence?), although you get an idea of how classy a place is when they have rates for "special room– 2 hours." We left bright and early in the morning, saying our goodbyes to Swaziland and returning to the disarray that is our Mozambique.

Throughout the trip, I thought a lot about Moz (a country I love despite its shortcomings, and feel lucky to have served in) in comparison to neighboring countries like Swaziland and South Africa. From a initial perspective, Mozambique is just way behind in terms of progress and development, despite the fact that there is so much outside money being poured in. Factors such as the protracted civil war that ended in 1992 and the flooding of Southern Moz in February 2000 play a significant part, but cannot account completely for the slow progress of the nation as a whole.

In Swaziland, there were so many positive billboards everywhere about corruption: "YOU can make a difference in stopping corruption!," "Corruption hurts all of us," etc., with whistle-blower hotline numbers. Corruption is so ubiquitous in Mozambique, but you see very little being done about it. One of my Mozambican friends has been looking for a job for some time. He heard of a job opening, interviewed, and when he went back to follow up this week, was told that he had to pay 2000 mets if he wanted his application approved. But there's a huge job shortage in Moz, what can he do?

The tourism industry in Moz has a lot of potential but the cost of development is so high that for example, the price of a hotel room in Maputo is phenomenal in comparison to what you can get in other big cities in neighboring countries like Capetown. Not to mention, the condition of the roads throughout Moz is... in need of improvement, to say the least.

But, of course, these observations and comparisons should be taken with a grain of salt. I don't claim to know much about the economic systems or political structures of Swaziland. I do know that the Kingdom of Swaziland is one of the worst affected by HIV/AIDS, and that the economic margin is pretty wide. The nice areas are really nice, but the rural areas can get very primitive. At least with Mozambique, what you see is what you get. Every 20 km or so, there's a Mozambican village next to the National Highway. In Swazi, I noticed a distinct lack of villages or traditional housing visible from the paved roads we were driving on, which is not to say that they don't exist... but just that they are hidden away from view.

I was a mere tourist in Swaziland, passing from big city to big city, soaking up comforts unavailable in Mozambique. In the end, though, I wouldn't trade my experiences in Moz for anything.