Our trip to Lubumbashi had 3 segments: Seattle–Amsterdam, Amsterdam–Nairobi, and Nairobi–Lubumbashi. As we descended into Nairobi at 6:30am last Friday, we could see the sun rising orange over the flat landscape, but we didn’t see much of the city, just a few lights. The next flight, to Lubumbashi on Kenyan Airways, was on a smaller plane, but it was still a jet. We flew out of the airport and away from the city, so we looked down over a flat, scrubby landscape that was marked with animal tracks we could see from the air. Much of the flight was over clouds, but when the ground was visible it was uniformly brown, scrubby, and flat.
Approaching Lubumbashi around 10 AM, we flew directly over the city and could see the dusty, reddish dirt roads, the single story houses, and the spaciousness. Although there are over a million people in the area, Lubumbashi is not a tightly packed, dense city. New houses were being built, the unroofed walls of the brick houses appearing like small mazes from the air.
At the Lubumbashi airport we had no problems with passport control or baggage claim, although the driver we were expecting was not in the terminal—it turned out that the arrival of some Nigerian pop stars made the terminal more restricted than usual, but we easily found the driver waiting outside. Our first home is the Bougain Villa, an small hotel and a restaurant that is owned by South Africans (note: that’s Bougain, NOT Bargain, Villa) They had a “black and white” party on Friday night, and we didn’t realize until we got there that it wasn’t formal—those were the rugby team’s colors. Good thing I didn’t bring a tuxedo. They played a lot of rugby on the television over the weekend. Much of the staff is South African and don’t speak French. The clientele is almost exclusively middle-aged, white South Africans mining managers and engineers.
After checking in and getting lunch we got a car to bring us to downtown. We started at the tourist office, hoping to find a map of L’shi, but found a nondescript handful of rooms containing desks and agents. For the map, we were directed to a bookstore and headed out. The bookstore was a religious one doing a brisk business selling school books for the coming year. They did have a map, but didn’t take dollars (many places take US bills, as long as they are in excellent condition. Large purchases are often done using new $100 bills. We haven’t used a credit card yet.) We headed back out to find a money changer. There are money changers everywhere, usually sitting on a chair with stacks of bills displayed on their laps or a small table. These are stacks of 500 Congolese Franc bills (each worth about $0.55). So, when we changed a $100 bill, we received about 905,000 FC, around 100–150 bills, which is an unpocketably large stack. We bought 2 identical maps for 1,500 FC each.
On Saturday, we spent most of the day walking: we walked to the zoo, then paid to go into the zoo. The lions and tigers were taking a siesta, but they did have nice enclosures. There was also a variety of monkeys and we could get quite close to them—close enough for one to grab the map from Karen’s hand and try to pull it into the cage. A zookeeper quickly grabbed it back, and the 4 monkeys in that cage were pretty upset to lose their map! I liked seeing the monkeys up close because you could really see their coloring, the details of their hands and feet, their eyes, fur, etc. The zoo was partnered with a zoo in Germany and also has a termite museum because the area is known for the very large termite mounds. I guess you can buy them by weight at the market, but we haven’t seen that yet. The display of dogs was a little disconcerting—they were barking and sounded very dog-like.
After the zoo, we continued walking to downtown, where we discovered the Institut Français where a dramatic monologue based on Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man was about to start. We stayed and watched the performance and the audience commentary afterwards. The audience was mostly actors and so the comments were not about the play, but about the performance: pronunciation, body language, dialect, etc. I was curious to hear a more socio-political response, but that didn’t happen despite Karen’s direct question about that.
We took Sunday off and hung around the outdoor pool at the posh Hotel Karavia, where we watched people and read. There was a large contingent of Middle Easterners there—mostly clean-shaven young men and some children.
We are staying at the Bougain Villa for about a week, and also looking for a place to rent. The way it works here is that if someone helps you find a property to rent, you pay them one month’s rent as a finder’s fee. This is an incentive for everyone you meet to want to help you find a place to live, since furnished places start around $1500/month for something that would be considered pretty (c)rudimentary in the States. We have had the most luck with a real estate agency (ImmoKatanga), but that doesn’t stop everyone we talk to from wanting to show us the property some friend of theirs has available. There are many complications involved in renting an unfurnished house: the generator for when the power goes out, the water tank, the guard, the deposit (sometimes 3 months’ rent), the finder’s fee, taxes, furnishings, etc. After looking at a nice unfurnished place ($2500/month, 3-BR, swimming pool out back), we decided to restrict our search to fully furnished places where all the “complications” are included in the price. We have looked at a few newer apartments, but have our eye on a 2-bedroom house with high ceilings, a yard, and character that should be available in about 10 days.
It is getting warmer, with highs of 97 degrees predicted for the next week. Rainy season should start in a couple weeks, which will be just as hot, but wet. It is currently hot and dry. Fortunately, it was somewhat cooler when we spent our first full day walking.
Tonight (Friday) there is lightning but no rain yet—the next post may describe what it is like in the rainy season!
Approaching Lubumbashi around 10 AM, we flew directly over the city and could see the dusty, reddish dirt roads, the single story houses, and the spaciousness. Although there are over a million people in the area, Lubumbashi is not a tightly packed, dense city. New houses were being built, the unroofed walls of the brick houses appearing like small mazes from the air.
At the Lubumbashi airport we had no problems with passport control or baggage claim, although the driver we were expecting was not in the terminal—it turned out that the arrival of some Nigerian pop stars made the terminal more restricted than usual, but we easily found the driver waiting outside. Our first home is the Bougain Villa, an small hotel and a restaurant that is owned by South Africans (note: that’s Bougain, NOT Bargain, Villa) They had a “black and white” party on Friday night, and we didn’t realize until we got there that it wasn’t formal—those were the rugby team’s colors. Good thing I didn’t bring a tuxedo. They played a lot of rugby on the television over the weekend. Much of the staff is South African and don’t speak French. The clientele is almost exclusively middle-aged, white South Africans mining managers and engineers.
After checking in and getting lunch we got a car to bring us to downtown. We started at the tourist office, hoping to find a map of L’shi, but found a nondescript handful of rooms containing desks and agents. For the map, we were directed to a bookstore and headed out. The bookstore was a religious one doing a brisk business selling school books for the coming year. They did have a map, but didn’t take dollars (many places take US bills, as long as they are in excellent condition. Large purchases are often done using new $100 bills. We haven’t used a credit card yet.) We headed back out to find a money changer. There are money changers everywhere, usually sitting on a chair with stacks of bills displayed on their laps or a small table. These are stacks of 500 Congolese Franc bills (each worth about $0.55). So, when we changed a $100 bill, we received about 905,000 FC, around 100–150 bills, which is an unpocketably large stack. We bought 2 identical maps for 1,500 FC each.
On Saturday, we spent most of the day walking: we walked to the zoo, then paid to go into the zoo. The lions and tigers were taking a siesta, but they did have nice enclosures. There was also a variety of monkeys and we could get quite close to them—close enough for one to grab the map from Karen’s hand and try to pull it into the cage. A zookeeper quickly grabbed it back, and the 4 monkeys in that cage were pretty upset to lose their map! I liked seeing the monkeys up close because you could really see their coloring, the details of their hands and feet, their eyes, fur, etc. The zoo was partnered with a zoo in Germany and also has a termite museum because the area is known for the very large termite mounds. I guess you can buy them by weight at the market, but we haven’t seen that yet. The display of dogs was a little disconcerting—they were barking and sounded very dog-like.
After the zoo, we continued walking to downtown, where we discovered the Institut Français where a dramatic monologue based on Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man was about to start. We stayed and watched the performance and the audience commentary afterwards. The audience was mostly actors and so the comments were not about the play, but about the performance: pronunciation, body language, dialect, etc. I was curious to hear a more socio-political response, but that didn’t happen despite Karen’s direct question about that.
We took Sunday off and hung around the outdoor pool at the posh Hotel Karavia, where we watched people and read. There was a large contingent of Middle Easterners there—mostly clean-shaven young men and some children.
We are staying at the Bougain Villa for about a week, and also looking for a place to rent. The way it works here is that if someone helps you find a property to rent, you pay them one month’s rent as a finder’s fee. This is an incentive for everyone you meet to want to help you find a place to live, since furnished places start around $1500/month for something that would be considered pretty (c)rudimentary in the States. We have had the most luck with a real estate agency (ImmoKatanga), but that doesn’t stop everyone we talk to from wanting to show us the property some friend of theirs has available. There are many complications involved in renting an unfurnished house: the generator for when the power goes out, the water tank, the guard, the deposit (sometimes 3 months’ rent), the finder’s fee, taxes, furnishings, etc. After looking at a nice unfurnished place ($2500/month, 3-BR, swimming pool out back), we decided to restrict our search to fully furnished places where all the “complications” are included in the price. We have looked at a few newer apartments, but have our eye on a 2-bedroom house with high ceilings, a yard, and character that should be available in about 10 days.
It is getting warmer, with highs of 97 degrees predicted for the next week. Rainy season should start in a couple weeks, which will be just as hot, but wet. It is currently hot and dry. Fortunately, it was somewhat cooler when we spent our first full day walking.
Tonight (Friday) there is lightning but no rain yet—the next post may describe what it is like in the rainy season!
Housing sounds complicated...I would have gone the furnished route as well. Good luck with your search, looking forward to pictures of the new place :)
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