Chapter 9
I adjust the chain tightness.
Working feels good.
I re-discover that you can indeed do a chain tighten, as in Cameroon, without having to get the rear brake metal push rod thingy out of the way, which is a fiddly bitch of a thing. The last time I tightened the chain - I'm not sure where - I remember that this baffled me, and I ended up removing the rod completely.
The problem is the exhaust pipe. When it's warped over to the left against the brake lever it cramps you for space, and there’s just no room in there to fit a spanner. But if you kick the shit out of the exhaust pipe to make some space, you can fit the spanner in underneath the nut, and it's a piece of cake from there; loosen that “castle nut” which acts as a locknut, loosen the big nut under that one, which makes the whole lot “slideable”, slide the wheel backwards along the guides till the chain is under tension, and tighten it all back up again.
Voilà.
I notice that the swingarm, which the back wheel is attached to, wiggles ever so slightly from side to side if you give the wheel a push or a pull. It should be rock solid. It's disconcerting. Something to take care of at the next service.
As I work, I think.
It seems that after all of the uncertainties and all of the things that scare me have been swept away, new ones have come in to replace them; the Congo's are over, and I’ve reached a permanent state of good tarmac, and there are no more embassies. Forever. So the attention turns to whether the Enfield is going to make it or not.
And I'm not sure about that.
There's still a very long way to ride...
The “pensão” – the place I’m staying – has a weigh ‘n’ pay smorgasbord dinner. That’ll do me.
I’m serving a big fat plateful of whatever that is in the steaming metal box. I’ve earned it.
My mind turns to tomorrow. It’s a short day with a border crossing, but I don’t know how the visa situation’s going to go; whether or not that "declaração" I picked up a couple of days back is good enough to get me out of the shit, or what Customs are going to think of that Congo passavant that the guy at the other end of the country just wrote over, signed and stamped.
Flakey.
I wonder how easy it’s going to be to get into Namibia without any paperwork for the bike or visa for me; I'm assuming I'll be let in just because I’ve got a British passport.
And then there’s not having a Carnet for the bike... Namibia and then South Africa are, I imagine, much more rigid with the rule book than proper Africa. I don’t know what I’ll do if they just flat-out tell me no...
I'm expecting the most interesting stories to come from Angola Immigration. Second place goes to Namibia Customs.
So many places where it could all go balls up.
Walking to the weighing counter with my dinner tray full of food and I swoon. Out of nowhere.
I lose my head off my shoulders. I lose my body. I lose control.
I nearly black out and ditch dinner.
My brain pumps in the fizzing adrenaline to keep me conscious, keep me from swan-diving on my face. I feel it drip down my head and spread. It does the job; I keep my feet.
I’m at the end of my tether.
I stumble to the counter. I weigh, I pay.
I’ve overdone it at 1,200 kwanza. I can’t do that math, but I know it’s a lot. I don’t care.
I get back to my seat and try to figure it out.
What’s going on.
I can’t. It’s all the same questions with the same no-answers.
I’ve eaten well today. Well, maybe not well. But I’ve eaten something. So it's not that...
What’s happening to me?
Morning.
Border day.
It's freezing, again. Even under the good blanket I've spent the night feeling the chill.
I'm up at dawn, which is becoming something of a habit.
I quaff the free breakfast of an omelette and coffee.
I’m barely a step out of the restaurant door before it all turns south. Puddle in a hurry.
Surprise!
I sprint.
As fast as I dare.
What was in that omelette??
Not gonna make it...
I shoulder charge the door into my hotel room, nearly taking it off at the hinges. I make a lunge for the throne in the nick of time.
A photo finish.
I’m not entirely sure I got “nothing but net”.
Out it comes like a bat out of hell. Evil fucking thing.
All that “seagulled” mystery meat from yesterday’s lunch, the massive pile of weigh n pay, the omelette, well, that didn’t even touch the sides...
I wish I chewed more.
Besides almost making an unholy mess, it’s not a big deal.
I dare not move any further than spitting distance from the toilet, but after an hour’s worth of trips to and from the throne, it’s a done thing. Over with.
What used to knock my guts out for days and days at a time is now gone in sixty minutes.
This iron gut I’ve cultured - hard earned and hard worn - it’s handling food poisoning like a champ.
I’ve finally got myself - over the course of months of dodgy food - to being street food invincible. Nothing can touch me.
And all for what?
Today’s probably my last day of rough food. I might never see another plate of grisly African mystery meat and dodgy as fuck sauce for the rest of my life.
I'm retiring at the top of my game.
I load up the Shrike.
All talk of iron gut aside, this could be a little touch and go...
If I haven’t fully cleared the decks like I’m assuming, well, this could be disgusting.
Apparently I’m not the only one who’s crook today; the Shrike sounds like dog shit. Under brakes she’s backfiring, badly - The exhaust letting off deafening bangs like a gun going off.
Bad bad not good.
Where last night forty kilometres felt like an eternity, this morning it feels like a blink. We’ve hardly begun before we’re at the frontier.
It’s all relative, I guess...
The border is massive.
There’s a huge building off to the side, like a giant sort of warehouse. I’ll be buggered if I know what it’s there for. Everything looks tidy and modern, well organised and efficient.
Given the situation, I was hoping for a bit of a disorganised shambles that would be easy to slip; organised and efficient might means thorough, and thorough means I’m thoroughly in the shit.
I’m going to get my pants pulled down here.
I looked it up and apparently it’s one hundred and fifty clams a day for time overstayed on the visa. Clams being dollars, not kwanza...
One hundred and fifty multiplied by four days overstayed.
It’s going to hurt...
I'm ready to fight the good fight with my "declaração".
I’m gee’d up, I’m ready to go to war.
I wind-down The Shrike. All the backfiring ensures we get everyone's attention, and quickly draw a crowd.
I’m beset upon by the normal fixers and money changes and folks selling bananas or whatever.
As I unstraddle the Shrike, the hour of vibration has left me feeling a little, well, loose.
I can’t see any obvious toilets anywhere...
I leave the mob to ogle the Shrike and I head over into a small, neat demountable building which is labelled "imigração".
There's one well-dressed uniformed bloke sitting behind a well organised, clean desk.
I introduce myself with a big smile and apologise in Portuguese for my awful Portuguese. He asks me to take a seat.
I sit down and hand him my closed passport; I’ll be fucked if I’m going to hold his hand and show him where to fuck me, if he wants to get me, he’ll have to sleuth out the Angola entry stamp like Sherlock.
While he’s fingering through my passport I scan over the room. On the desk in front of me, next to the computer (yes! A computer!!) is one of those fancy passport scanners that you see at Immigration in normal airports.
I’m so fucked.
Maybe I could distract him by shitting my pants?
I could totally do it. Right now.
Spray on demand.
He starts typing into his fancy computer who knows what.
He asks me for my motorbikes rego number.
Not sure how that’s relevant to Immigration, but whatever.
He back and fourths for a bit, then grabs a big fat “chonk-chonk” stamp and smacks it onto one of the passport pages with a beautiful, glorious thwack!
Surprise!
Job done.
Not a word said about the visa or the overstay. Never even mentioned it. It’s anyone’s guess whether he noticed it or not...
Jackpot.
You fucking beauty.
Back out with the mob again, who are still ga-ga over the Shrike, and I try to follow up one win with another, bargaining hard to get my money changed to Namibian dollars for a decent rate.
Nope. They won’t budge on their exchange rate. Not an inch. And I get reamed on the exchange.
Whatever. I'm happy to have it done, and the fact I’m not nearly a grand down the drain already is a massive win. Not having to even fight for it is another enormous win. Getting a good exchange on the clams would have been gravy.
Onto the bike again. It sounds fucking crook as a dog. It’s a wonder it’s running at all.
Customs are up ahead at an open gate that I can definitely buzz. If I don’t have to explain that dodgy Congo/Angola passavant, the more the good.
The officials don’t seem to be paying attention, so buzz it we shall.
But The Shrike won’t do subtle, backfiring like an old western gunfight, enough to wake the dead, and enough to wake the officials from their stupor.
They come running to stop me.
God damn it.
Two blokes who look way too badass to be Customs pull me up. They look more like a SWAT team than boring border officials... Big bastards too.
They ask me for my Carnet. Straight up. I'm fucked.
I don’t bother to explain that I don’t, and never have, had one - that can only make things more complicated. Instead I shake hands, apologise in Portuguese for my terrible Portuguese, and cough up the dodgy passavant.
They want to know what I’ve been up to on the bike. More interested than interrogatory... so we chat about that for a while. They hand me back the passavant, tell me to watch out for those thieving bastard Namibians, and, surprise! wish me good luck.
Fuck yeah!
Angola: Done.
Fucking done.
Adios, mofos!
I’m going to go buy a lotto ticket. This has been too good.
We backfire our way over to the Namibian side of the post.
Immigration is a piece of cake: fill out a simple form, get a stamp, no visa, no questions.
And they speak English. Hallelujah.
Welcome to Namibia.
I head to Customs - the last piece of the puzzle.
I have to dodge past another group of officials on the way, who look a lot like Customs, but aren’t Customs...
They wanted me to pay a road tax, which ain’t gonna happen... I tell them that the lady at Immigration told me that I had to see Customs first and they swallow that.
At the legit Customs there’s no one behind the perspex sheet, so I busy myself with reading the papers tacked onto it while I wait. Knowledge is power.
The first bit of paper says “TIP: Temporary Import Permit”. I’m in the right place...
Behind the Perspex it all looks pretty legit. Very formal, very organised. Not looking good for me then.
Once I’ve read all the papers, and run out of patience, I start “hallooooo”-ing through the hole in the bottom of the window.
Finally, someone comes to attend to me, she gives me papers to fill out while she goes and finds the boss.
Papers are pretty straightforward; the usual guff: Name, passport details, addresses...
A man who looks like a businessman shows up and slides the Perspex back a smidge.
“Carnet”
Fuck.
I can go sycophantic or assertive...
Assertive.
“I don’t have one” I nearly spit it at him.
“No Carnet?”
“Nope, I don’t need one. Here, look at my passport, I’ve been to all these places with no carnet. Look. See? I don’t need one”
He says he needs to go and speak with his boss.
It’s gonna go tits up.
After five he comes back to the window with an older version of himself.
“Where is your carnet??” The boss this time, accusing.
“I don’t have one. I don’t need one.”
“How did you make it to Namibia without a Carnet?”
I sound off on my fingers, “England, Scotland, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania, Senegal, The Gambia, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Nigeria, Cameroon, Gabon, Congo, The other Congo, Angola, and, voila, Namibia. All without a carnet.”
It’s a hell of a list. All twenty seven of them.
It's overkill, and takes some saying, but it’s evidence enough, and it works a charm.
The boss gives it the nod, they whack a stamp on the papers I’ve just written on, which is a little weird. They tell me that that’s my permit, and I can go.
Handshakes all round.
I’m in.
It’s over.
And I didn’t crap my pants. Not once.
Welcome to the southern chunk of Africa.