Victoria Falls

How could I be so close to Victoria Falls and not visit. Seven of us decided to go and see Vic Falls. Mike, another LTOV has been living in Livingstone for almost 2 years, and will be headed back to Canada. This was his last chance to see the falls, and he wanted to see the falls from a different perspective. Now Mike has already seen the falls by foot, by white water rafting, but for his last time with his 3 close friends and 3 tag-a-longs (me included) he wanted something different. Bungee jumping! Personally I have never been much of a thrill seeker, so I was not interested in jumping. Mike, Paul and Dave decided that they were going to jump. They paid the fees, signed the release form, got their harnesses on, and stepped up to the platform. One by one they jumped, not fell, off the platform. They were free falling over Victoria Falls plummeting to their death until the bungee cord was stretched to its limits and then they were tossed around like a rag doll back up the direction they just fell from. Those of us who were not jumping, cheered on our friends from the bridge as we watched in anticipation and envy of the courage (or stupidity) it must have taken to jump off Victoria Falls. One by one they were finished, and while they were being hoisted back to the top, you could tell that they were high on adrenalin. Afterwards we walked over to the falls.

If you are a tourits you have to pay around $30 to view the falls, if you are a local or have a Zambian work permit, you only have to pay $2. Luckily most of the LTOVs speak the local dialect and were able to get all of us in for $2. We started to walk down the path towards the falls and you could hear the water pouring over the edge of the falls and then the noise of the water pounding hard against the rocks below. It was so loud and intense. We kept walking down a path and came across someone selling raingear. None of us wanted to waste our money on raincoats, so we decided to take our chances getting a little wet. Now I have been near some intense waterfalls in my day, but I had never gotten that wet from mist in all of my life. I was completely soaked from head to toe. It looked like we had walked underneath the falls instead of beside them. We walked along all sorts of paths taking us around the gorge and the falls. It was quite beautiful, and yet I was a little sad. Being there at the falls reminded me of my trip to Brazil with my family, when we took 1000 pictures and spent 2 days walking around Foz de Iguacu. Then I started to get homesick. I had only been out of Canada for 2 weeks but I hadn’t really seen my family for a month previous to that. I took a little moment to think of my family back home and the fun times that we had in Brazil, and then I smiled and moved on knowing that they wouldn’t want me to feel homesick.

We hopped in 2 cabs and headed back to town. The cab started to slow down and then the driver said, “What’s going on up there?” I was sitting in the front seat and I was trying to see why the traffic had slowed down, then to my amazement I saw the hold up. I screamed, “ELEPHANT!” I don’t even know if the cab had came to a halt but I jumped out and started running towards the elephant that was just casually crossing the road. I tried to get my camera out of my purse while running at the same time. I got my camera out and started to take a picture, than I realized I was all alone. I had run past all the cars and buses. I probably would have kept running, but then I figured there was a reason why everyone else was staying back. Their reason could be safety reasons, or for the simple fact that it is Zambia and it is very common to see an elephant crossing the road in this part if the country. Despite all of my efforts I still wasn’t that close to the elephant and my pictures are not that good. Mike and Dave, who I believe have seen plenty of elephants while living in Zambia, came up behind me. We took our pictures and watched the elephant saunter away, then we headed back to our cabs.

Our next adventure was a sunset cruise. It was a double-decker barge, with a BBQ, open bar, and lots of munchies. We got on the boat at for a two hour sunset cruise down the Zambezi River. We saw hippo’s, birds, and at one point a head of a giraffe. I tried to take a picture but we were so far away that it just looks like trees, and not a giraffe. We didn’t see any crocodiles, but we did see the imprints that they left from sunbathing all day in the sand. I met a bunch of Australians on the boat, and some how we managed to have a singing competition which resulted in the Aussies whipping our butts. The Aussies were gracious winners and we were good losers which made for an interesting sing song session afterwards. With our bellies full of spirits and food, our voices full of new songs, and our head full of wonderful memories we headed back to Livingstone and partied the night away.

Mike was leaving for Canada in 2 days, so everyone wanted to get in as much adventure and fun as possible. The next item on the agenda…killing a goat for dinner!

DUNN! DUNN! DUNN!

Paul, Mike and Dave ventured out to purchase a goat. A few hours later they returned with a small young goat. We arrived at Mikes host families house, only to hear the sounds of blades being sharpened. Being a vegetarian Jenn was a little quizzy at the fact that the goat was going to be slaughtered in front of her. All the girls including myself went in the house to get as far away from the butchery as possible. At one point I heard the goat screaming like a child so I went out to see what was happening and the goat was hogtied on the ground and Paul was stroking the goats neck trying to calm him down. Eventually the goat started to calm down and just laid there, silent. There were about 8 men surrounding the goat, mostly all Canadians and a few Zambians. “How do we kill it?” “Where should we kill it?” “I heard that if you don’t move quickly the meat won’t be as tender.” “How many knives do we have?” These and many more questions were being discussed right in front of the poor goat. I am not sure but I don’t think anyone in the group actually knew what they were doing, other than one Zambian, but even he had some hesitations. The killing was about to start so I quickly went back inside the house. After about 10 minutes my curiosity got the better of me and I went outside only to see the goat was hanging upside down with his throat slit. Now it was time to skin the goat. Almost all the men had a hand in skinning the goat. When they asked me if I wanted to try, I was tempted, but I didn’t think that I would be able to eat the goat afterwards, and I was really hungry, so I declined. After the skinning and the gutting of the goat was done, the BBQ was fired up, and the ladies that were hiding inside made themselves useful by preparing all of the side dishes. Everyone had a part in helping with the good bye dinner and making the night a very memorable one.

*FYI - I have not included any photo’s of the goat killing.