From Namibia to Botswana

It's Tues, 26 Nov, and we're about to spend our second night in Botswana, having crossed from the Namibian border after a one-night stop in its capital, Windhoek on Sunday night. Windhoek itself seemed an unremarkable city (though the first African city where we've seen a full-sized cricket pitch - right outside the Office of the Prime Minister). Maybe Windhoek is more interesting than it seemed to us, as it was a Sunday and everything was closed up and deserted as we drove through. The greatest excitement was a long cavalcade of pick-up trucks, each crammed full of people flying huge national and political party flags, and shouting/chanting at the top of their voices. As they went by, we could clearly see that it was a political rally for SWAPO, the governing party in Namibia which fought for, and has been in power, initially as part of a coalition, since Nambia won independence in 1989.

Then, as we were having a brief stop just before the Namibia/Botwana border posts, I got into conversation with a Namibian man about to get into another pick-up truck, this time bearing the emblem of the Namibian Electoral Commission. He told me that the next General Election is a year away yet, but there is a big drive on to ensure that voters get registered (just as there had been in South Africa a few weeks ago, for their General Election next year*). Interestingly, this man's project is to oversee the installation of an electronic voting system in every region of Namibia (including the most remote rural areas) in time for next November's voting. The Namibian government, stung by past criticism from overseas observers about voter irregularities, has bought a voting system devised and used in India, and now also successfully implemented in Nepal and a number of other far-eastern countries. With so little infrastructure in Namibia, this seems a huge challenge, especially given that electricity is an as-yet unheard-of miracle for many parts of the country, thus necessitating the installation of huge generators in many places. It's not clear whether these generators will remain in those areas permanently - with all the other possibilities they may bring - or whether they'll be disinstalled immediately following the election

[* Incidentally, talking of South Africa, we learned a few days ago that just a couple of days after we left Cape Town, they had some torrential rains which flooded some parts of the city (including Camps Bay (where you grew up, Arnie), Kalks Bay, and Chapman's Peak - all places we'd just visited ) causing 8 deaths in all.]

Our first night in Botswana (after the luxury of travelling on flat, tarred roads for a change!) was at Ghanzi. Almost immediately upon arrival at our lodgings, we were taken on another bush walk with some San people , who, through an interpreter (especially needed, given the variety of clicks, tuts and kissing noises in their particular dialect) explained something of the healing powers of various plants and plant roots which they sought out and dug up from the sandy/grassy/hummocky soil as we walked around. That evening, these same San people treated us to a performance of some of their tribal singing and dancing, around two camp-fires in the sandy/grassybush which borders our lodge, under the most beautifuly starry starry night we've ever seen. Magic! Amongst the group of San people there was a tiny toddler - a rather beautiful but slightly naughty two-year-old girl, whose antics in trying alternately to copy or sabotage the actions of the San people, kept us all enthralled. I later learned from the interpreter that this little girl's uncle has just recently taken up post as the Botswanan Ambassador in London. Maybe we'll drop by and show him our photos of her some time!

Today, we're in Satatunga, at an unprepossing lodging on the edge of Maun (pronounced Ma-Un), the gateway to the Okavanaga Delta, the world's largest inland delta. Small planes will transport us across the delta to a tented camp - which looks absolutely gorgeous in the brochure, so fingers crossed!