Amageza to Dakar 2015: Day 3 You know that cartoon where the character starts to cry, just before crying there is this buildup of tears, until gravity takes over and tears go in every direction? Well that was just about what my face looked like. My biggest fear after fearing that the sky might fall on my head, was to miss breakfast. No matter where I find myself on planet earth, eggs, bacon, toast. And in that order please. Hard, crispy, brown. Not today. I was faced with some cereal and midget portions of fruit, a croissant with some melted cheese and cheese cake. Cheese Cake? WTF! How do you ask for bacon and egg in Spanish? ‘Tocino y huevos por favor?’ The way I pronounced it it might have sounded a bit like I was looking for a tortilla humvee, because I was met with a blank expression. Could also be because as I came into the dining area I attacked the coffee jug with a religious zest, making funny noises and sounding like a television evangelist. See the order of operation when waking up goes like this: Start a fire, stove, kettle, anything that produces heat and boil water. While the water is heating, dash for the toilet, long-drop, bush, side of the road, for a morning relieve, ensuring not to take 1 second longer than absolutely necessary so I have enough time to add coffee to a mug before the water boils. This way I get caffeine in my system in the shortest possible time. But not this morning. After waking up I immediately looked for the stand with the kettle and cup. Small and round with a assortment of Nescafe sachets and Red Roses tea. You know that little tray you find even in a guesthouse in Hotazhel, normally accompanied by a kettle of various sizes and age? Nothing on the first sweep. I must have missed it. I sat up straighter in bed and scanned the four by six meter room like a wife looking for a new pair of boots with her husbands credit card in a shoe store. Nothing. I looked in the cupboard. Nothing. In the fridge under the box television. Nothing. Bathroom? Nothing…….. F@#$!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was four AM. Resigned, I started up my laptop to be confronted with a email from a dude who owed so many people money I thought he had left planet earth. WTF? His race would be on TV. Why tell me? Oh well. Whatever. So now you know why the steward in the dining area was eyeing me with a bit of nervous suspicion. Regaining my composure after two coffee’s and my epic failure in ordering bacon and eggs, I approached the tables hosting the meager food offering. To the left of the assortment of croissants, was a toaster machine. The one with the conveyor. So I chucked in two slices of toast while scoping out how to make the best out of the food on offer. Out slid the first slice of toast. I waited for the second slice, nothing. I looked inside the machine. Nothing. I looked at the back, and saw that my second slice of bread had escaped the heat and dove onto the floor. I bent over and picked it up, brushing off whatever may be stuck there. As I straightened up, the dude from the kitchen was looking at me with a look of horror on his face. In a flurry of Spanish and hand speed that would have fooled David Blaine, my toast was gone, and a fresh slice was subjected to the oven. The last time I saw such hand speed was while doing basic training the OC came in and the dude in the bunk next to mine hid his um ‘female anatomy’ magazine! Three bowls of serial, two croissants, four slices of bread (none escaped after the failed first attempt), and two cups of coffee later, I had stocked up on enough carbs to survive the day. It was time to go check out the city. My objectives were simple. Find where A.S.O was staying. Find the best places to hide around the hotel to be able to make a surprise visit on a unsuspecting Mr Etienne Lavigne, and try and sell him the idea to make the Amageza rally part of the Dakar Series. Find public transport to the Techno-thing where scrutineering will be. Find bacon and eggs. Armed with my Runbo phone that is so heavy I do curls while walking, I started out in the general direction of the Sheraton Hotel. Apparently they have a bit more money than the Amageza organization and stay in nice hotels. Yip, only 200 metres from my hotel. Striking distance. A left and a right later and I was in a 2km long street lined with shops. Every 10 metres was a guy shouting ‘cambio, cambio’. Money exchangers. Well, if I had any money to change, sure I would follow you in the alley for a exchange. Tjop. I’m from Africa. Oldest trick in the book. There was a big-ass mall called the Galarias Pacifico. And there was a Dakar stand. Nice. Pity I can’t afford it. And so started a day of wandering the streets armed with Google Maps. I wanted to talk to my wife. No matter where I am, I always try to talk to her at least once a day, even at home. Haha. Only joking. But I had no local sim card, and she was at her parents and no stable internet for Skype, so I had to find a open space where I could make a call with the satellite phone. On google maps I saw what could be a park, and made my way there. I can say this for this city. It is quite clean. There is plenty of free wifi around town. The traffic is quite orderly, the people very friendly and the dogs speak Afrikaans. Yip. The park I went to was a dog park. Dogs sounded the same as back home. To get a signal for the GPS to get the position before I can make a call, (yes, the phone needs to know it may call. Seems some countries don’t allow sat phones. Wonder why...lol), I need a open space with at least 45 degree clear upwards in a 100m radius for the initial acquisition. So I stood in the middle of the park, in the 32 degree sun sweating like a gringo while the Inmarsat Pro did its thing. After about 10 minutes, I could call. Now speaking on a sat phone is like speaking on a two-way radio. You talk, the other person listens, then he speaks, and you listen. Don’t try and speak at the same time, else the whole thing goes psycho and you hear alien talk. After 4 years of Amageza, my wife knows the drill, and we had a great 2 minutes. All good. It was great hearing her voice after three days. I found a Mcdonalds. On the Big Mac index they were a bit overpriced. A Big Mac upsize with Coke and fries will set you back 80 pesos, about R90. Now ordering that Big Mac was something of a new adventure. See, they have only the highlights on the big backlit boards.Then there are little automated machines with pictures. So after figuring out which picture looked the most like a Bic Mac, I joined the queue armed with Google translate and repeating the sentence in my head, ‘Un Big Mac grande por favor’. It was my turn. ‘Ola’, ‘Ola. Un Big Mac grande por favor’, I said. ‘Si’ she said swiftly followed by a lot of words. I assumed it meant cold drink, and so I said ‘Coke’ and then more words and then more words and a finger at the till readout. 80.00. Out came the Nedbank card. Yip, all good. I stand back. What now? I see the other people have formed another queue. I fall in line. When I get to the front, there is my order. Sweet. The day was drawing to a close. Returning to the hotel I decided I had had enough of Spanish and trawled the internet for a full movie to watch. Found Lethal Weapon 1. Nice to watch it. Funny to see the mobile phones they used in the movie. Looks like a car portable jumper battery pack with an aerial and a handset. Ten minutes before the end I could not keep my eyes open anymore. Time to nap. I had not achieved much more than finding the Sheraton Hotel and ordering a Big Mac, but hey, I have to start somewhere. Tomorrow I will find the bus to the Techopolis. Maybe tomorrow some other rally-nut’s will start arriving, and I could speak English to someone. Yip, tomorrow was going to be a big day. Wonder if somewhere on a flight over the ocean a competitor was worried that he might have forgotten his cold gear at home. The next day I would meet such a competitor.
Posted on: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 11:01:13 +0000
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