As was expected, yesterday was rather unexpected (ironically). Dudley the crocodile man never showed up (what a surprise) but Ryan, one of the South African guys who we'd been talking to the night before and who said he would have liked to come and see the lions, did turn up. We waited a bit for Dudley but when it became evident that we were waiting in vain, Ryan said he'd take us instead.
So we set off for the farm which has the lions living on it, but after a few minutes we realised this might not be advisable - the lion farm was just outside Lusaka, and sometimes immigration control to enter the city is strict, and we didn't have our passports with us. So instead we decided to drop into the zoo. It was fairly small, and was certainly missing some animals you might find in a UK zoo (penguins, for example...) but we saw some pretty interesting creatures including two lions, monkeys and ostriches (which I have concluded are the most freakish animals ever).
After wandering around for a while watching animals in the sun, we joined Ryan and a couple of his neighbours for a barbecue dinner, which was absolute bliss! There was not a chicken in sight for once: instead we had beef and lamb and sausages, with salad and potatoes (vegetables have been a forgotten luxury). We also caught the end of the tennis (hurray Murray!) which caused some controversy in a house full of South Africans: I was all for Murray, being mildly patriotic when it comes to sport, but Guy (one of the dinner guests) was rather put off by his personality. Ah well.
We got back to our room fairly late in the evening, and this morning it was an early start to get to the immigration office and renew our visa. We were expecting the process to take forever, what with the usual state of organisation here, but it actually happened extremely fast: the woman obviously knew exactly what we had come for and just whipped our passports off us, stamped them, and that was that. We had a bit of a wander around the city as we returned back to the backpackers by foot, and now we're all ready to spend a lazy afternoon by the pool. The hope is to find an Italian tonight and go to the cinema - life is good.
We hope everyone's enjoying the sun back home - long may it last! Lots of love, and it's not long til we're back now.
Really pleased to hear 'life is good'!!!
ReplyDeleteJust wondered after reading your blog if you both feel intimidated by the attention from the men?
Heather x
Hi Heather.
DeleteThe answer to that is definitely yes! All our colleagues we've worked with are lovely, and generally the people we've met in our accommodation (either who work there or are just socialising) are really great too. But the people we meet in the street can be really intimidating, although one thing I have to say is that, unlike when you meet a creepy person in England perhaps, they will leave you alone if you tell them very firmly.
We've had some awkward experiences just because people take such an interest, and although it can be rather unpleasant we haven't actually had any really bad moments as such. It's mostly just people trying to get money from you.
Hope you're well x