drive home

Of course the truck drives fine to town, through town and to the party. But as soon as I get the keys…no luck. The engine will turn but won’t catch unless you continue to rev it. ok we’re headed downhill the only problem is that is the wrong direction. So we go and then I try to turn around. Three point turns don’t work when you can’t stop to go into reverse without stalling out. But I get the reverse part of the turn…now we have to get going uphill without rolling backward at all because of the large ditch behind us. that doesn’t work quite as well. Gun the engine and switch my foot of the brake to the clutch and go. Finally get up to a flat part and have to stop to get everyone back into the truck (yes they got out to hold the truck just out of the ditch—not sure if that was quite necessary but now we’ll never know). And at this point everyone is leaving the party (our headstart didn’t work—didn’t really know it needed to when we left) so we have to wait for the road to clear some as once we get started I’m not going to want to stop. Flat starts and downhills are not a problem as I can rev or pop it into gear no problem but even slowing down for round-abouts or stop signs the truck would die without fail. Made it through town but of course there is that police block on the road out to Nkhoma…and of course there is another story.

We get stopped and the truck dies but we stop and roll the windows down. the officer talks to us through the passenger window (which is fine with me). Passports. (what they never ask for passports?! and I refuse to give mine to him, I mean, really I usually don’t have it and he doesn’t know that I’ve just been to the embassy.) “we don’t have them” what you should always have your passport. “no, carrying it around makes it much easier to be lost or stolen, they are locked up in Nkhoma” well you should carry a copy. “hmm. Hadn’t thought about that” at which point chris leans over to my purse (I’m carrying his) saying I think mine is here so I hand him his which he gives to the officer. The rest of you don’t have yours? “no” well then I guess he can go and the 3 of you will have to stay until he comes back with them. “oh you have a place for us to stay? That’s great because I’m going to be homeless at the end of the month.” Yes we have a place you can stay. It’s a cell. “well, it has a roof right?” yes it’s a cell. Dorothy is all the time trying to play the agogo (grandmother) card and point out her white hair which usually gets respect and less hassling but doesn’t seem to be working tonight. He does finally let us go (chris has taken his passport back from the officer) though of course it takes some doing to get the truck going again…