Monday, March 13, 2006
Delays and Adaptations
Angola was cruelest to our brake system and suspension. One of our brake disks broke completely from its housing and fused itself to the pads; the other is worn thin past usefulness. With minimal assistance from a mechanic at the only shop in white Windhoek who was willing-after emotional blackmail about hospitality and the reputation of white Namibians-to allow our car to be so much as parked on the premises, we completely dismantled and removed our rear braking system, which involved cutting and stopping lines for brake fluid, laboring for seven hours under the car and duct taping the dangling cables to the undercarriage. With new front brake pads-a much easier fix-we set out with the intention of soaking up some of Namibia's famous natural beauty.
The roads are interminable; Namibia is huge. At the end of our travels we found more ghost towns cringing away from lively but somewhat menacing townships. We found a fish tank called the National Aquarium, some average beaches and busloads of elderly tourists. The natural beauty deserves all of this attention; but the scramble for photographs and the hustling of list checking visitors diminishes the atmosphere.
On our way back from the largest sand dune in Africa, which plunges down towards a muddy salt lake in the midst of dunes that look significantly larger, our car made an unfriendly noise and began reeking of burnt rubber. We had demolished a shock-the same shock that we replaced in Douala, which, as it turns out, had already been much welded and much abused. Without the shock, the car simply rests on its rear tire, chewing the tread away with the rough degraded metal of the wheel well. Removing the shock was difficult. There was only space for one eighth of a wrench revolution where the shock's rusty, dusty, bending screws attached themselves to the narrow space beneath the rear windshield.
Some kindly local truck drivers (white guys who pushed around their San-bushman-employee in a way that did not leave him much of the dignity he deserved for being twenty years older than them) gave Sean and Tuuli a ride back to the tiny outpost of Solitaire where they were supposed to present our wounded component to a skillful welder. This man drew our attention to the degraded quality of our shock and reluctantly performed a quick fix that he intended us to use only for returning to Solitaire (wrong direction) where we were expected to wait and send for help.
After installing his handiwork, Sean and I drove cautiously back to town, escorted by a friend whose acquaintance we initially made in Windhoek. On the way we tagged a rabbit and threw it in a plastic bag-having badly missed the taste of bush meat and having failed in our illegal attempts to hunt ostriches with the bow and arrows given us by Mike from Angola. The following morning, full of confidence in the dodgy shock and empty of desire to wait in a town that consisted of a petrol station and a truck stop, Sean and I dumped Mike and Tuuli with much of our baggage and set out, gingerly, with the car-hoping that Mike and Tuuli would be able to hitch a ride a few hours later and see whether or not we were stranded on the road.
One third of the way across the scarcely populated and mountainous desert, the shock gave way on the first slanted hill that pushed the weight of our car onto the weakness of the shock. It was 11am and extremely hot. We constructed a shade shelter out of a fraying blue tarp, fuel bidons and bungee cords. Then we set about removing the shock for a second time. Since the metal housing of the shock had almost ripped itself completely free from the solid body of the car, it was considerably easier. We twisted and turned the casing until the whole piece fell out—no need to unscrew the miserable bolts.
We expected to give Tuuli and Mike the dozen or so pieces of scrap metal that previously constituted our rear suspension with instructions to have bars bolted all around the severed frame and to return with a new shock, a few new spanners and the power tool necessary to bolt the thing back together. At 3pm Mike called to announce that he and Tuuli had already arrived in Windhoek, by way of a road that was previously unknown to us. Sean and I had seen at most four or five cars-one of which, piloted by a German couple, was kind enough to offer us two frosty cans of beer, bless them-and were not optimistic about our options for getting the wreckage safely into their hands. However, an employee of a private telecommunications company agreed to deliver our package to our friends on the following morning.
Sean and I waited. We threw stones into a cup as a drinking game of sorts, we played machete beer can baseball, we speculated about leopards and fried our road kill rabbit, eating the whole creature over the course of the late afternoon. We thought about trying to fix our miserable stereo system but were overwhelmed by heat and the unwelcome thought that since the following day was Friday it would be difficult to organize our rescue and we would probably be camped beside the Stingray for several days with an unexciting selection of canned goods to consume.
The following day news of our options began to arrive. Sean and I were adamantly opposed to tow-trucks and fairly convinced that we could do the work ourselves-now that we have special workman's outfits, a spattering of experience and a dawning awareness of how easy the work was that we paid to have done to our cars in the past, we are attracted to the underside of the vehicle and are becoming territorial. However, our idea of bolting with power tools was roundly denounced by every professional with whom Mike and Tuuli spoke and it became apparent that it would be necessary to send for a welder. While Sean and I read Knut Hamsun, Nietzsche and The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, occasionally passing out in the obnoxious dry heat of the Namib desert and taking turns asking passing vehicles for water, Tuuli made the acquaintance of our deliverers.
She arrived, intending to surprise us, with a cackling German who is a welder and car mechanic by profession. He and some rented welding tanks were driven three dusty hours to our breakdown by Eddie, "Man of Action" who spoke ceaselessly about the opinions that he formed while fighting for the independence of Namibia over the course of many, many years. Eddie was confrontational about our nationality and informed us that, with his tactics, he could easily kill us (us as individuals and representatives of the American military machine, for which he prophesied many dooms). He also told us that Americans do not smile from the bottom of their hearts and that they are liars; he let Sean and I know that he would never confide to us any information about his country and though we had shared our water and food with him upon arrival, he would not share what he pushily extracted from the few cars that passed us while his companion yelled "attack!" at our car and nearly ignited our gas tank. Eddie did not listen to anything that I said to him and continued his aggressive and smirky behavior; to avoid ruining the atmosphere I ignored him and attempted to help the German by holding glowing metal plates beneath his torch or fetching water when he lit something on fire. I made sure that I would be in the company of the welder for the drive back, which Sean and Tuuli, whose patience was greater than mine, were wonderful enough to accept the interminable self-important rant of our expensive chauffeur. (Incidentally, I have no problem with Eddie's politics, especially considering that the C.I.A. deliberately destabilized fledgling countries to which Eddie felt allied during the nonsense of the cold war and American armed and trained troops routinely tried to kill him and succeeded in killing many of his brothers in arms. I simply resent his inability to draw distinctions between the Americans that fill with pride at the notion of ruining Angola or "beating the communists" and those of us who fill with shame.)
I provided the welder with a pint of pastis to satisfy his thirst-after he demolished a quart of rum-and he drank the bottle dry while shouting over the gravelly road about how he "comes from Rommel." At the height of his gaiety he told me of the time that he and two German friends had netted the alpha male baboon of a troop in South Africa for the sole purpose of spray painting it red. He said the others would not recognize its scent and it would be compelled to fight its way back to the top. He did not have photographs of the fighting but he said there was one shot of the beautiful savanna a troop of baboons and one shining red monkey. He was laughing so hard that I scarcely understood him when he shouted, "It is the best picture evAH!" I will try to get my hands on this work of art and post it to our gallery.
Holger told a long string of stories about fugitives from the law, spying and nuclear technology, dodgy work permits, a Bordello in Windhoek, the impossibility of marriage for a man of his character, the impending collapse of South Africa, the popular joke about having sex with Robert Mugabe's wife and how to escape from Communist East Germany. I also learned how to talk about killing rabbits in German-a language that I have mostly forgotten.
The drive back opened new cracks in the welding job-I was being urged to "attack!" the winding mountain pass as darkness fell. These fissures were fixed up the following morning along with the parallel damage to the other side of the car. The welder is opening a technical school in Windhoek-along with Eddie "man of action", who is happy to use his government connections to advance this particular business (and to enlarge his collection of vehicles, domiciles and showy clothing)-and was glad for the opportunity to help. His generosity and thorough work are the only reason that Sean and I are not currently eating baked beans and begging for water in the abandoned desert dust beside our damaged car.
To improve the patchwork nature of our repairs it will be necessary to spend still more time in Windhoek, about which none of us are disappointed. If this random sickness that woke me up at 5am this morning does not decommission me for the beginning of the work week, I should have the opportunity to meet with an unusual organization that will round out our treatment of Namibia's situation with regards to the AIDS epidemic-it is delightful to conduct research in our native tongue with skillful speakers.
Also, because I was in the middle of the desert with no credit on my cell phone, I was unable to wish my sister her quarter century birthday in a warm and timely fashion. Happy Birthday Annaliese~! I hope it was memorable. Thankfully, I will be seeing her and the rest of my nuclear family during the first week of April in South Africa-thanks to the generosity of family friends who fly frequently, to whom I extend my own heartfelt thanks.
That means, incidentally, that if any of my indie rock acquaintances wish to send audio cassettes (yes, tapes) of music to freshen up the soundtrack of our traveling, they need only to ask me for my parent's address. I am fiending for Possum Dixon, the Violent Femmes, Lou Reed, early Silkworm, Slick Rick, the new Strokes and Franz Ferdinand albums, Arrested Development, Frank Zappa, DJ Shadow, early Flaming Lips, Mos Def's first album, Helium, Dirty Three, Joe Tex, Good Blues Music and did Kriss Kristofferson only cut one album? Just a wish list. More credit to Ben Morgan, Alex Marchute and Will Schofield, who have kept me in the music that I love.
Angola was cruelest to our brake system and suspension. One of our brake disks broke completely from its housing and fused itself to the pads; the other is worn thin past usefulness. With minimal assistance from a mechanic at the only shop in white Windhoek who was willing-after emotional blackmail about hospitality and the reputation of white Namibians-to allow our car to be so much as parked on the premises, we completely dismantled and removed our rear braking system, which involved cutting and stopping lines for brake fluid, laboring for seven hours under the car and duct taping the dangling cables to the undercarriage. With new front brake pads-a much easier fix-we set out with the intention of soaking up some of Namibia's famous natural beauty.
The roads are interminable; Namibia is huge. At the end of our travels we found more ghost towns cringing away from lively but somewhat menacing townships. We found a fish tank called the National Aquarium, some average beaches and busloads of elderly tourists. The natural beauty deserves all of this attention; but the scramble for photographs and the hustling of list checking visitors diminishes the atmosphere.
On our way back from the largest sand dune in Africa, which plunges down towards a muddy salt lake in the midst of dunes that look significantly larger, our car made an unfriendly noise and began reeking of burnt rubber. We had demolished a shock-the same shock that we replaced in Douala, which, as it turns out, had already been much welded and much abused. Without the shock, the car simply rests on its rear tire, chewing the tread away with the rough degraded metal of the wheel well. Removing the shock was difficult. There was only space for one eighth of a wrench revolution where the shock's rusty, dusty, bending screws attached themselves to the narrow space beneath the rear windshield.
Some kindly local truck drivers (white guys who pushed around their San-bushman-employee in a way that did not leave him much of the dignity he deserved for being twenty years older than them) gave Sean and Tuuli a ride back to the tiny outpost of Solitaire where they were supposed to present our wounded component to a skillful welder. This man drew our attention to the degraded quality of our shock and reluctantly performed a quick fix that he intended us to use only for returning to Solitaire (wrong direction) where we were expected to wait and send for help.
After installing his handiwork, Sean and I drove cautiously back to town, escorted by a friend whose acquaintance we initially made in Windhoek. On the way we tagged a rabbit and threw it in a plastic bag-having badly missed the taste of bush meat and having failed in our illegal attempts to hunt ostriches with the bow and arrows given us by Mike from Angola. The following morning, full of confidence in the dodgy shock and empty of desire to wait in a town that consisted of a petrol station and a truck stop, Sean and I dumped Mike and Tuuli with much of our baggage and set out, gingerly, with the car-hoping that Mike and Tuuli would be able to hitch a ride a few hours later and see whether or not we were stranded on the road.
One third of the way across the scarcely populated and mountainous desert, the shock gave way on the first slanted hill that pushed the weight of our car onto the weakness of the shock. It was 11am and extremely hot. We constructed a shade shelter out of a fraying blue tarp, fuel bidons and bungee cords. Then we set about removing the shock for a second time. Since the metal housing of the shock had almost ripped itself completely free from the solid body of the car, it was considerably easier. We twisted and turned the casing until the whole piece fell out—no need to unscrew the miserable bolts.
We expected to give Tuuli and Mike the dozen or so pieces of scrap metal that previously constituted our rear suspension with instructions to have bars bolted all around the severed frame and to return with a new shock, a few new spanners and the power tool necessary to bolt the thing back together. At 3pm Mike called to announce that he and Tuuli had already arrived in Windhoek, by way of a road that was previously unknown to us. Sean and I had seen at most four or five cars-one of which, piloted by a German couple, was kind enough to offer us two frosty cans of beer, bless them-and were not optimistic about our options for getting the wreckage safely into their hands. However, an employee of a private telecommunications company agreed to deliver our package to our friends on the following morning.
Sean and I waited. We threw stones into a cup as a drinking game of sorts, we played machete beer can baseball, we speculated about leopards and fried our road kill rabbit, eating the whole creature over the course of the late afternoon. We thought about trying to fix our miserable stereo system but were overwhelmed by heat and the unwelcome thought that since the following day was Friday it would be difficult to organize our rescue and we would probably be camped beside the Stingray for several days with an unexciting selection of canned goods to consume.
The following day news of our options began to arrive. Sean and I were adamantly opposed to tow-trucks and fairly convinced that we could do the work ourselves-now that we have special workman's outfits, a spattering of experience and a dawning awareness of how easy the work was that we paid to have done to our cars in the past, we are attracted to the underside of the vehicle and are becoming territorial. However, our idea of bolting with power tools was roundly denounced by every professional with whom Mike and Tuuli spoke and it became apparent that it would be necessary to send for a welder. While Sean and I read Knut Hamsun, Nietzsche and The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, occasionally passing out in the obnoxious dry heat of the Namib desert and taking turns asking passing vehicles for water, Tuuli made the acquaintance of our deliverers.
She arrived, intending to surprise us, with a cackling German who is a welder and car mechanic by profession. He and some rented welding tanks were driven three dusty hours to our breakdown by Eddie, "Man of Action" who spoke ceaselessly about the opinions that he formed while fighting for the independence of Namibia over the course of many, many years. Eddie was confrontational about our nationality and informed us that, with his tactics, he could easily kill us (us as individuals and representatives of the American military machine, for which he prophesied many dooms). He also told us that Americans do not smile from the bottom of their hearts and that they are liars; he let Sean and I know that he would never confide to us any information about his country and though we had shared our water and food with him upon arrival, he would not share what he pushily extracted from the few cars that passed us while his companion yelled "attack!" at our car and nearly ignited our gas tank. Eddie did not listen to anything that I said to him and continued his aggressive and smirky behavior; to avoid ruining the atmosphere I ignored him and attempted to help the German by holding glowing metal plates beneath his torch or fetching water when he lit something on fire. I made sure that I would be in the company of the welder for the drive back, which Sean and Tuuli, whose patience was greater than mine, were wonderful enough to accept the interminable self-important rant of our expensive chauffeur. (Incidentally, I have no problem with Eddie's politics, especially considering that the C.I.A. deliberately destabilized fledgling countries to which Eddie felt allied during the nonsense of the cold war and American armed and trained troops routinely tried to kill him and succeeded in killing many of his brothers in arms. I simply resent his inability to draw distinctions between the Americans that fill with pride at the notion of ruining Angola or "beating the communists" and those of us who fill with shame.)
I provided the welder with a pint of pastis to satisfy his thirst-after he demolished a quart of rum-and he drank the bottle dry while shouting over the gravelly road about how he "comes from Rommel." At the height of his gaiety he told me of the time that he and two German friends had netted the alpha male baboon of a troop in South Africa for the sole purpose of spray painting it red. He said the others would not recognize its scent and it would be compelled to fight its way back to the top. He did not have photographs of the fighting but he said there was one shot of the beautiful savanna a troop of baboons and one shining red monkey. He was laughing so hard that I scarcely understood him when he shouted, "It is the best picture evAH!" I will try to get my hands on this work of art and post it to our gallery.
Holger told a long string of stories about fugitives from the law, spying and nuclear technology, dodgy work permits, a Bordello in Windhoek, the impossibility of marriage for a man of his character, the impending collapse of South Africa, the popular joke about having sex with Robert Mugabe's wife and how to escape from Communist East Germany. I also learned how to talk about killing rabbits in German-a language that I have mostly forgotten.
The drive back opened new cracks in the welding job-I was being urged to "attack!" the winding mountain pass as darkness fell. These fissures were fixed up the following morning along with the parallel damage to the other side of the car. The welder is opening a technical school in Windhoek-along with Eddie "man of action", who is happy to use his government connections to advance this particular business (and to enlarge his collection of vehicles, domiciles and showy clothing)-and was glad for the opportunity to help. His generosity and thorough work are the only reason that Sean and I are not currently eating baked beans and begging for water in the abandoned desert dust beside our damaged car.
To improve the patchwork nature of our repairs it will be necessary to spend still more time in Windhoek, about which none of us are disappointed. If this random sickness that woke me up at 5am this morning does not decommission me for the beginning of the work week, I should have the opportunity to meet with an unusual organization that will round out our treatment of Namibia's situation with regards to the AIDS epidemic-it is delightful to conduct research in our native tongue with skillful speakers.
Also, because I was in the middle of the desert with no credit on my cell phone, I was unable to wish my sister her quarter century birthday in a warm and timely fashion. Happy Birthday Annaliese~! I hope it was memorable. Thankfully, I will be seeing her and the rest of my nuclear family during the first week of April in South Africa-thanks to the generosity of family friends who fly frequently, to whom I extend my own heartfelt thanks.
That means, incidentally, that if any of my indie rock acquaintances wish to send audio cassettes (yes, tapes) of music to freshen up the soundtrack of our traveling, they need only to ask me for my parent's address. I am fiending for Possum Dixon, the Violent Femmes, Lou Reed, early Silkworm, Slick Rick, the new Strokes and Franz Ferdinand albums, Arrested Development, Frank Zappa, DJ Shadow, early Flaming Lips, Mos Def's first album, Helium, Dirty Three, Joe Tex, Good Blues Music and did Kriss Kristofferson only cut one album? Just a wish list. More credit to Ben Morgan, Alex Marchute and Will Schofield, who have kept me in the music that I love.
1 Comments:
Nate- please send your parents address to me at my new fancy gmail account-
marchut@gmail.com
I will see what I can do.
--Alex
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marchut@gmail.com
I will see what I can do.
--Alex
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