Here’s a short of lists of things that, if you have the opportunity to do, you should avoid.
If you have the opportunity to spend two nights in a row on an airplane, don’t. If you have the opportunity to be stuck on a plane when the ground power unit keeps failing, don’t. If you have the opportunity to do the above in the middle of the heat, you definitely should not.
If you have the opportunity to do that and meet the British Karen … actually do that, it is quite funny. And, look, British Karen isn’t going to get that plane flying any faster. You know that. I know that. I suspect she might know that. British Conspiracy Theory Karen might not know that. But what she can do is make the flight crew hand out extra snacks to mollify the human cargo. So thanks for that, I suppose, British Conspiracy Theory Karen. But, mostly, thanks for going quietly back to your seat when you scored the extra biscoff.
All of that is what we did last night. British Airways out of London and to points beyond. But to where? You’ve got just a little bit more time to guess, because the answer will become apparent below.
We got a bleary-eyed ride to our hotel. Honestly, I don’t remember much about it. I’ve not slept a lot on two successive airplanes and I didn’t sleep much the night before in anticipation of exhausting myself for two successive airplanes. On the way we heard a local newscast. People in the country illegally was the top story. The third story was the Senate primary in Texas. (We are in neither Texas, nor the U.S., obviously.)
We are staying just around the corner from the local stock exchange. There’s an American-style steakhouse out front. The hotel is gated. There is a private security guard. It all feels safe. Plenty of happy pedestrians are walking alongside a busy two-lane street. The hotel is nice. It is a sprawling affair. (We got turned around once, because who needs to pay attention to the desk attendant’s directions, anyway?) The hotel does not have amenities. It has experiences. The first experience was politely declining every bellhop’s offer to help. We’ve only just arrived, and we don’t yet have the local currency. We walked by two pools on the way to our room. They were small, and also cold, because winter is coming along. By this time I was the combination of tired and restless that put me close to tipping with every American dollar I had in my pocket. Just get me to a room, any room will do, so things stop spinning around me.
This evening we were picked up by a local driver who told us he spoke nine of the official languages. No idea if that was the truth, or, if so, why he’s a driver. He said there are 12 all told — they’ve recently added sign language to the list, but he hasn’t yet found a way to learn it yet, I thought about teaching him how to finger spell, but he was working, and I decided against telling him about the many dirty word tutorials on YouTube, because surely they are there. He said some of the languages were very similar. I assume this was easy for him to say, perhaps in several languages.
He delivered us to his colleague who took us on a walking tour of four nations cuisines. After the fact, I can say this: for years now I’ve had this idea of learning about food and eating the food and it is a bit like art, I am not exactly sure what I mean by that, but I’ll know it when I see it. This evening, we had food and culture and a lesson or two out of that and it is pretty close to what I’ve always been looking for. I suppose we’ll have to go on more food tours.
Tonight, we had Ghanaian, which was good. It was earth, rich, flavorful, and I will remember that as being a funny, spicy experience. (I am a spice wimp.) We tried Ethiopian, which was perhaps the best. The base of it is injera, or taita, a fermented, spongy flatbread made of teff flour. You eat it with your hands, tearing a bite of this off and using that to pick up the other parts of the food, family-style. I probably did it wrong, but the tour guide had to know that’s an occupational hazard.
I’m not a food photographer, but I would like you to know that everything on this tray was incredibly fresh and delicious. I don’t even like lentils, but those lentils were amazing. The other vegetables were freshly cut. The beef had incredible flavor. The spaghetti is there, I think, as an homage to the time that Italy tried to colonize Ethiopia and failed. The pickled beets I could do without, but it was all delicious.
We also had Nigerian, which was a bit similar to the Ghanaian, but not quite to that same level of satisfying, though I did enjoy our spicy stew sample. (This could have also just been the place we were.) It was also a bit on the spicy side. Lastly we had meat from a South African braai. The only problem is that we were full by then and we, thus, probably laid insult to the restaurant. South Africa is big on red meats. They barbecue in all seasons, and the braai has deep cultural routes in their cuisine. Also it is incredibly delicious. By the time we found this out, we’d eaten our way through three countries.
I’m going to want more of that. Fortunately, we are in South Africa for the next two weeks. I’m sure we’ll have the opportunity.
