The wedding went great! I'll post some pictures as soon as I get them neatly organized and trimmed for exposure on the web...
It was great to have our friends there. Guys, you know who you are and where you are...
Once we started our journey (me and Ana), we both had the same feeling: "there's something wrong..." It coincided with a funny smell inside the car. Was a fish? A bird or a cat hidden in the engine? Apparently, it turned out to be our car battery that was evaporating under the hood!!! The windshield whippers went crazy, the car turned off and we pulled over to the side. Smoke started to come from the dashboard. It smelled like distilled water. The car couldn't start (wouldn't?) and we were looking at the engine as if it could talk to us and say something like: "hey, it hurts right here. So tight my bolts and let's go!" It's not a child. It's a sophisticated high-tech electrically dependant piece of machinery... The solution you ask? Get out of the car and wave someone to stop and give you some assistance. But before you expose yourself to the wilderness and the muggers, try and call someone just in case. Assess the damage and find a solution, even if it's a temporary one. So we called some friends and said "the honeymoon went kaput. The car died on us". They rushed to the scene, just a brief hour and a half away from Maputo, roughly some 100km, but me and Ana decided that it would be better to meet them halfway in a town called Manhiça to pick up time because it was getting darker by the minute... With leftover beer from the wedding, still chilled, we lifted our spirits
To try and fix the car, we waved. And we waved. And we waved. And we waved. And we waved. And we waved. And we waved. And we waved... and our arms couldn't stand much any longer. "Hey, let's get in the middle of the road and attract someones attention." A truck stopped. Driver and co-pilot came down from the gazillion-tonned monster of a truck. I popped the hood, they looked in and breathed a truth and sparked a solution: "Wrong battery. Change for new. Can't haul you because we don't have a rope. Good luck". Our arms were rested by then and the waving started all over again. Cars went by, trucks went by, and finally a small truck stopped. "Can you haul us back to Manhiça?" we said. "Sure!" they said. After some handy work with the knots, we experienced what many mozambicans go through with most of their cars: getting hauled. The free riding was cool. At least you don't spend any gasoline... Just some cans of beer.
As we got to Manhiça, we said thanks and gave our benefactors some of the leftover drinks we had. Beer! We still had a lot. meeting up with our friends, we just took some time to eat something and drink something less mind-altering than beer: Coca-Cola. Did I tell you that Coca-Cola here only costs you 50cents, anywhere?
Getting back to our car, our friends had brought what they could find to try and haul us this time. They only had a mesh of ropes tied together. Luckily, and slowly, the second ride begun. The rope held on!
Since it was already dark, the emergency lights from our friends were blinding me and I was unable to see the road. A sharp turn and it could turn deadly. Little did I know that without the key in the ignition, the steering wheel could block itself at some 45 degrees. In a small curve, it did! When I finally slipped the key to unblock it so that we wouldn't crash, the car was already in heading to the sides, our friends along with us, and my girlfriend pulling on the handbrake. In 2/3 seconds we headed one way, got pulled the other way, effectively standing in the middle of the road pointing our headlights the wrong way. Luckily, the cars stood just a few centimeters apart. Even more luckily, the loaded truck coming behind us stopped within meters from us. First things first, signalling triangle in place, car pushed to the side of the road and rope tied all over again, this time with only a meter distancing from our friends. We quickly realised that we couldn't enter the city of Maputo like that, so we decided to leave the car in a police station near Maputo. In a few seconds we where back on the road, this time, with the key in the ignition!
Since we left the car in the police station of Marracuene, me and Ana thought only of a bath and bed scheme as soon as we got home. Little did we know, our house was robbed, but that's another story... See ya in my next post!
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