Living for Disco

And finally, I am back from my trip, and the internet is working at a pace that enables me to actually upload photos, and do stuff with them.

As a result, I can now show photos both of pink hair, and of our halloween party, which was a roaring success, by the way.  So I’m told.

We carved a pumpkin, drank many bloody marys, ate ghost shaped crisps, made our guests sick on additive-packed chewy skull shaped sweets, cut our feet on metal confetti shaped like pumpkins, and made everyone who turned up without a costume paint their faces.  Most people’s initial reaction to this was “get away from me, crazy bitches”.  However, as you can see, this soon changed to “Paint me more! I want a spider too!”.  It’s amazing what booze can do for your inner child.

And by the way, I made the red witch’s hat myself, out of facing and red satin, with my own two hands (and my sewing machine).  I am thinking of buying it its own stand.

It’s the annual ‘do’ at the British High Commissioner’s residence this evening; an occasion for British people to gather on a fragrant lawn, drink gin and natter about the old days of the Empire.  As you might imagine, last year the lawn was strewn with old ladies in Laura Ashley making small talk about their dogs, besuited British businessmen, and slightly pissed VSO volunteers.  At least, they were slightly pissed when I left.  I hear that they soon moved on to very pissed, which may account for the curtailment of this year’s festivities to two hours instead of four and a half.

This time last year, I had just fallen headlong into a love affair with my ex-bloke, who, although a Kiwi, was invited along to the function.  Because I am clearly a disgraceful unwashed plebian, as the country director of a British NGO he felt that admitting that the two of us were an item would damage his reputation as a fine upstanding member of the commonwealth, thereby rendering him incapable of doing his job.  He arrived without acknowledging me, spent the afternoon flitting about being important, and then tried to sidle up to me unnoticed to whisper in my ear that he was about to leave, and could I leave it five minutes before following him out.  God knows why I put up with such ridiculous behaviour in hindsight.  Ah, love is blind.

This year no-one will be able to sidle up to me unnoticed.  I have made sure of this by dying my hair pink in a fit of barefaced stupidity at the weekend.  I don’t know what came over me – I think I just needed to do something I’ve always wanted to do at a time when it wouldn’t much matter.

I think I like it; most people I know like it (including, rather surprisingly, my boss) but the effect is rather startling.  I hope they let me in.  My identity crisis could do with a G&T right now.

“It’s not a dog”, I said, stating the obvious as I indicated the pile of deformed and twisted canines on the table.  “Those are dogs.  That’s a giraffe.  This is a mouse.  Look at its long tail!”  I was particularly keen to draw attention to the tail.  It took me a few tries to get the calculations right – too much air and it looked like it had suffered a prolapse, too little and it would be a mouse devoid of back legs.

I put the mouse on the table with the rest of the animals, took a swig of wine and began a series of dispiriting attempts at fashioning swans.  My triumph with dogs, giraffes and mice made me convinced that this was not outside the limit of my balloon modeling capability.  How wrong I was.  Half an hour later, traumatized by balloons repeatedly exploding in my face at critical moments, I just decided to drink more and forget the swans.

The orphans are going to be so disappointed when they rock up at the fun day demanding swans, or parrots, or bicycles, and I can only bring forth armies of rodents.  All is not lost though - lots of other people at the balloon workshop/Sunday afternoon excuse for a piss-up were much better than me, producing complex masterpieces that wouldn’t look out of place in the local art gallery, so I may just stick to face painting, like last year.

Chez Ntemba. I’ve heard so many bad things about it. It’s where you should only go in a big crowd. The music is good, but it’s where you will be hassled, where people fight. It’s overcrowded. It’s where Juanita went the night she lost her head.

We arrive at 2am, desperate to dance, a mixture of wine, margaritas and beer and making us feverish and excited. Within ten seconds of leaving the car I feel alien fingers shamelessly exploring my coat pocket. I look round in amazement at the blatant thief, who shrugs as if to say ‘worth a try, mate’ and moves away.

It is dark inside, the beat insistent. On our way to the bar we attract brief, uninterested stares. We are the only three white faces in the room – a blonde, a brunette and a redhead, psyched up and needing to party. The music is pulling me to the dance floor, but I look up. Arranged around the balcony are the watching men, perched, looking for prey.

A tap on my shoulder.

“Do you have any cigarettes?” Slurring, swaying, in my face.

“No”

“The one you are smoking would be nice”. His face too close, his eyes red. I back off and he takes it from my fingers.

“Fucking talk to me like a normal person, bitch”, he spits as he walks away. I raise my eyebrows.

“Arsehole.” He can’t hear me, my words lost in the crowd.

The music is perfect. Hip-hop, Madonna, bollywood, Namibian pop, the tunes that have made their way into my brain over the last ten months seeping out through my feet and my hips, lips forming familiar words I don’t understand. Local songs come on and everyone goes crazy, waving arms, spilling beer, jumping, grinding, everyone having the time of their lives. Time slips by with each song, each one better than the last.

We leave at 5am, exhausted, drunk and happy, confetti email addresses spilling from pockets, scattering unbroken hearts across the pre-dawn city.

For the last month, there has been a furore going on at the Parliament buildings. Roads have been closed off, protesters have marched, waved placards and made demands, and the Namibian newspaper has featured the issue on its front page almost daily. The problem? At the beginning of June, the government ordered the closure of all shebeens that do not have liquor licenses.

Shebeens are endemic here. Usually small, one room structures with outlandish names, they crop up like mushrooms across urban and rural landscapes. My friend in Opuwo says that there are two sorts of building that are constructed on an almost weekly basis there – churches and shebeens, and there never seem to be too many of either for the general population.

There are two sides of the shebeen story. They are the major form of small business, and believe me, there isn’t much else in the way of enterprise going on. The unemployment rate is extremely high, and for the owners, shebeens pay to feed their families, and to send their children to school.

However, they do contribute considerably, of course, to Namibia’s alcohol problem. They are also considered to be a major factor in the spread of HIV – people go out, they get drunk, they meet someone, they have sex, too drunk and reckless to think about protection. There was a recent outcry in Walvis Bay because children were running to the Mayor’s office to complain about the noise from the shebeens. The question was raised – where are their parents? Well, where do you think?

So in the name of tackling the problem of alcohol abuse, the government has decided to crack down. As the Namibian has pointed out, however, what is the difference between the alcohol consumed at legal shebeens, and that knocked back at illegal ones? It’s widely held that the matter of liquor licenses is simply a revenue-generator for the government.

I don’t know why the shebeen owners who are facing closure can’t go and get themselves a license. They’ve had since 2002 to do it – four years’ notice doesn’t seem unreasonable. Also, it seems to me that this would solve the problem, pretty much. However, they seem to have taken the whole thing very badly, and have made the pilgrimage to Windhoek to protest, spending the money they could have spent on a license on the travel costs. I’m all for the right to protest. No problem there. I just don’t think they have a case.

They have now been camping outside the parliament building for two weeks, during which time, presumably, their businesses are bringing in no money, the local alcoholics are undergoing cold turkey, and their children are going shoeless to school. I drove past them the other day, and they seem to be having lots of fun, shouting, doing laundry, and sitting about in the sun, drinking beer.

Things are getting a bit fraught now, though, because the shebeen owners appear to be treating the parliament buildings with ‘disrespect’, and this is not going down well with the population in general. Bear in mind, this country is relatively newly independent, and its institutions of power are held in high esteem, even if those wielding the power are not.

So, in the opinion of many, Thursday’s slaughtering, dismembering and braaing of a cow on the lawn outside the chamber of representatives was a meal too far.