Sunday, 17 August 1986: A Looooong Trip to Botswana to Start My New Job

 9:45AM, Mafekeng, Bophuthatswana (South Africa) train station

After arriving back in Johannesburg on August 1, I spent the next two weeks at the Hillcrest Community Farm near the town of Halfway House.  

I am spending my Sunday morning enduring an 8½ hour layover in a nothing town about 15 miles from the Botswana border in one of South Africa’s quasi-independent homelands.  Were I up for Las Vegas-style gambling, floor shows, and probably hookers, I could take a cab over to the Mmbatho Sun Hotel, but I’ll forgo vice for the solitude of this train station platform bench. 

Tonight I get to Gaborone.  In the morning, I sign my contract with the university and apply for my work permit.  The department chairman informed me yesterday by telephone that I am to be paid the “outlandish sum” of 14,076 pula for my nine months of academic labors.  Although this translates into only US$7000, a pula goes about as far in Botswana as a dollar does in the USA.  So it’s not all that bad for a developing country since they’ve promised me housing.  I should be able to afford some decent wheels, especially if the bank cooperates with a loan.  I’ve got to do something, as this public transportation situation is absurd at times.  True, this trip is only costing me US$12 (as opposed to US$70 to fly) but it’s taking 23 hours whereas it takes only 4 hours to drive from Jo’burg to “Gabs”.  Thank god, the 2^nd class compartments are very comfortable.  By the way, I’m not sure what the significance is of the extra 76 pula in addition to the 14K.  Could be a little bonus for being an American (“the spirit of ‘76” maybe?)

3:40PM

Shit.  The train I’m supposed to take is four hours late getting here.  It was supposed to have left at 2:00PM.  I wonder if they are really harassing people at the border.  I knew it.  I knew it.  Just when I start typing, it finally gets here.  By the way, if Bophuthatswana is supposed to be an independent country, howscome there are South African Railway Police all over this station?

 

4:30PM

Talking to two Brits who just got off the train.  They said it was delayed by work on the track just on the other side of the border.  The conductor can’t find the seat assignment list, so I just found a compartment myself.  If he wants to move me he can be my guest. 

 

5:15PM

The train finally pulls out of Mafeking.  Looks like it’s going to be a long evening.  The conductor and another train crewman just came by to admire my typewriter.  This sort of thing isn’t available in Zimbabwe where this train originates.

 

6:45PM

We got through the South Africa/Botswana border in record time.  Only 50 minutes – only 50 passengers.  I’m the only honky on the train.  Had to help Edith, a 41-year-old Zimbabwe housewife, fill out her South African exit forms as the light was bad and she didn’t have her glasses.  The Botswana border guy thought I should have a letter from my prospective employer, but he gave me two days to get to immigration.  Whew.  So far, so good.

 

8/18/86, 9:20PM

The train arrived 2½ hours late last night.  I was supposed to have been booked into this hotel, but when I got here, the fucking desk was closed.  The only other hotels were at least US$40/night so I called the department chairman and said, “Help”.  He decided I should stay at his place.  While I was sitting outside the station waiting to be picked up, a truckload of heavily armed Botswana Defense Force guys pulled up and one of them said, “Please come over here.”  I moved into my best “be friendly, cooperative, and confident with the Africans” mode and insisted that a man from the university was coming to pick me up shortly.  That was good enough.  When smiling, white haired, mustached Professor Cooke arrived ten minutes later, he explained that the defense force was quite nervous about potential South African commando-types these days.

A building at the University of Botswana.  The groundskeepers had a tough time growing grass at the campus given the dry climate and sandy soil.

Today has consisted of filling out reams of forms for immigration.  They needed a statement of character form a minister, banker, lawyer, or former employer.  I thought of phoning my mail-order minister friend back in Denver to ask for a reference but Cooke found a reference letter from one of my grad school professors that made me sound like a potential Nobel Peace Prize candidate.  In the morning, I have to see a psychologist to get certified that I am not an idiot, imbecile, feeble-minded person, epileptic, suffering from attacks of insanity, psychopathic inferiority, or chronic alcoholism.  Were my M.D. friend, Jim Bachman, back in Frisco, Colorado to fill out this form, he would likely question my sanity for coming to southern Africa in the first place.  The only category that concerns me is the one about chronic alcoholism.  If I am unable to find a steady girlfriend fairly soon, I may drown myself in a large vat of Castle Lager Ale, my favorite local poison.  If so, you can blame it on the bar of the President Hotel and my drinking buddies, Gordon and David from the Botswana Development Corporation who seem to have a permanent lease on one of the tables there.

Speaking of bars, there is a very active one outside my room at this crummy hotel, and the Batswana [a Botswana citizen is called a "Motswana"; two or more are called "Batswana"] sound as if they’re having so much fun that they’re about ready to tear the place apart.  Hope the university can find me some housing quick.  In the meantime, I’ll stick in the ear plugs and try to get some winks.  Must be ready for the sanity test in the morning.