It’s late. Our convent dormitory in Harare is dark and hushed. Sister Avila and the prefects have stopped prowling the passages, stopped listening for naughty giggles and homesick weeping.
But four of us have shoved our beds closer together and are lying on our tummies munching Tennis biscuits. Our plan of escape is clear. We’ll save up and buy a London bus (red, of course) and kit it out with everything needed for a long trip to the north. Daringly, we decide there’ll even be room for boyfriends!
We’ll drive far away from school rules and routine, meet handsome Arab sheiks and ride camels across the desert. We’ll float in warm seas and collect shells the size of lampshades. We’ll smoke cigarettes and say “bugger”. And our best-selling diaries will be become setworks for Mrs Moffatt’s English class. Above all, we’ll never compromise. Our lives will be adventurous and scandalous – propelled by our bright red bus.
Well, it was not to be. Two of us got pregnant, one of us got married, and I got varsity. We all got trapped, I guess.
But a singleton’s shackles are easier to break because they’re not forged by vows made to others, and our adolescent promises to ourselves are quickly forgotten. So I smoked cigarettes and said “bugger” without my fellow conspirators. There were no affairs with Arabs. (My naïve image of romantic Arabs was defined by the movie Lawrence of Arabia. I thought everyone looked like Peter O’Toole – searing blue eyes gazing into the distance.) And sadly, there was no red London bus.
But, later, I did own a bush-green Discovery, named Disco Divine. And, despite Land Rover’s poor reputation, she didn’t break down in Zambia’s Bengweulu swamps, nor in Zimbabwe’s Mana Pools, but was considerate enough to go on sabbatical in Sandton. She seemed to enjoy this so much she took unauthorized sabbaticals time and again. So it was off to the chop-shop for Divine.
My next ticket to ride the backroads was Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. A sand-coloured Toyota Hilux that I pimped-up and kitted-out to the max. She had everything a suburban girl (with dogs, always with dogs) might need in the bush – but doesn’t really. There were even two large deep freezes. Mind you, those came in handy when I was in the Kalahari doing heritage preservation work with the Khomani San. Their desire for meat was prodigious – but was not matched by their desire to hunt. Why hunt when Patricia and Priscilla would provide? Never underestimate efficient refrigeration as a driver of cultural evolution!
Play-time in Priscilla came to an end when she was stolen while parked in one of Joburg’s burbs with everything on board: cameras, recorders, tents, tables, tanks, stores, the lot. Even the bloody freezers.
I took that as a sign. Time to upgrade to something that wasn’t high on the wish-list of car thieves and hijackers. And I was tired of sleeping on the ground, tired of being vulnerable to everything from claws to a knife. I wanted a bed.
Enter Alexandra, Queen of Everything! My dream home-on-the-move – stylish but comfortable, safe but unconfined, and capable of taking on terrible terrain without handling like a Sherman tank.
I’ve written about her in the “Meet my Truck” section on my website – but I haven’t shared the disappointment I felt once I’d done 20 000ks in her.
Why was I not hungry for more? I was living the dream. So why did I have that ‘so what’ feeling about it all? “So, I’ve seen the Augrabies Falls”, I thought. “So what”?
It took me a while to understand what I was not getting from my touring experience (although I can have fun with my dogs in a supermarket carpark!) Yes, I was going to places, but I was not meeting the people of those places. I wasn’t being touched by their hearts, I wasn’t hearing their precious memories of our country and its extraordinary inhabitants.
That is how Storycatcher came about – a project that would enhance both your and my sense of humanity and belonging. And, I figure, if I’m getting personal introductions, if I’m handed from storyteller to storyteller, told which roads to take and which to avoid, told where to camp and who to trust, I would never need to feel unsafe or purposeless again. The local people and I would share the important things, the things that really matter, laugh together and howl and learn from our shared stories.
And I want to share what I hear and experience. I don’t see the point of it all otherwise. Which is why I offer you my podcasts, videos and blogs. Treasures brought back from my travels.
Oh, and one last thing: I don’t smoke any more, but I do still say ‘bugger’!