From a hotel room

I have spent an inordinate amount of bed hours at the Southern Sun in Maputo. That’s because general manager Bruce Chapman - surely one of the continent’s finest hoteliers - was kind enough to host me once upon a time while I researched and wrote a guide book to Maputo and beyond. 

Low tide walker 

It led me to witness extraordinary spectacles across that delicious city, but also some extraordinary spectacles just from my window. An urban beach, a palm tree, a window frame -  what a fabulous composition aid for the framing of the clam pickers, the lone wanderers, the capoeira dancers, the lovers and very late at night, the traditional healers who bring their clients to the seafront to cleanse them or heal them or put them in touch with their ancestors. Which involves a great deal of loud prayer, sometimes weeping and wailing, unnerving at 3am for those who are not familiar with Africa’s religious customs. You hear it better, or worse, from the right hand wing of the Southern Sun. Often this was the time myself and my fearless street guide Phil Baker would be arriving back at the hotel after many satisfactory evenings of er, research. 

Sunrise

In the old days, before the $30 million dollar refurbishment, sigh, Bruce used to routinely book me into the Presidential Suite. It was his idea of a joke and I loved it and found it most funny, especially when one of the waiters started calling me Mrs President. Oh those were the days. Since then, Maputo has had an Economic Miracle - although it’s increasingly shaky and dubious - and I have been bumped from my perch by more important people such as those building bridges, importing cars, setting up banks and exploring coal and gas deposits.

Dear Bruce made sure it was been a very gentle transition down to the Superior Executive Princess Suite Extraordinaire on the floor below, although I do miss the big lounge of the old Presidential Suite, its two flat screens TVs and two bathrooms, vast lounge with leather couches. There was more space to shoot pictures while lying on the floor too, although my new suite has a stricter frame for composing pictures and perhaps it has made my eye more disciplined. 

The new refurbishment of course has made the Southern Sun even bigger and better and Bruce is still ever generous with his champagne and hospitality and friendship and I now have this fabulous collection of photos from the window of my hotel room. 

*  Check out www.tsogosunhotels.com/hotels/maputo

Reserved for the Ministry of Fabulousness 

Escape to Mother Fuckers Bar!

You'll find Mother Fuckers bar in Catembe

My journey from Phuket in Thailand to Maputo in Mozambique is hell. There is no business class blingy-blingy, sweetie dahling this time, just two days of non-stop awfulness travel - on minibuses, planes, trains and taxis and trains, planes and minibuses and somehow at the end of it all I eventually wake up on the other side of the world at dusk, listening to the sighing of the same Indian Ocean I just left in Thailand. I have travelled some 8000km and lost five hours and large parts of my sanity.

Now I am in Maputo on business, alongside Sawubona - official magazine of our national carrier SAA - to find out about the building of the biggest suspension bridge in Africa that will link Maputo mainland with Catembe spit, and link Ponta d'Oura with Kozi Bay in northern KZN. It’s big news, big bucks, the figure of US$ 700 million is bandied about. The Chinese, the Germans, the South Africans, former Mozambican president Gubuezza - everyone is involved and the circus is in town.

Maputo skyline from Catembe

The bridge building has already begun with the dropping of 90m concrete shafts into the bay and Catembe is already pimping its ride. even though the country's economic miracle is somewhat less miraculous than last year due to coal price drops, political violence and a complete bottom out in the leisure tourism market.

Nonetheless the talk on the cocktail circuit is tough, the whiskeys are big, the wine is flowing. Construction okes, financiers, the banks, the developers, the key players, they're all there talking MICE market and global finance and positive outcomes. The Chinese-funded Golden Peacock is being built up the road with rooms for hundreds, the Radisson is building twin towers for offices and top end rentals (the most expensive in Africa) next door to the Southern Sun where I am staying (always do, always will) and the deals are going down, the alcohol levels are going up, there are even rumours hat King Mswati of Swaziland also wants a deep sea harbour....  

Thank heavens for Mother Fuckers Bar.

We spill off the passenger ferry from Maputo to Catembe 

Phil and I escape – he’s my Man in Maputo –jump on the passenger ferry and head out of Maputo across the bay to Catembe, whose entire landscape is soon to be rearranged due to The Bridge, which in some ways is a pity really, since it's quiet and charmingly dilapidated. We spill off the ferry and head to the eastern end of Catembe and up a lone sand dune at the top of a sparse village, where it’s almost impossible to reach even in the butchest 4x4 (naturally Phil pulls it off). And here we are at Mother Fucker’s Bar where no one can find me and the beers are ice cold and the views are fine. I can hear the sounds of chicken and children, and Muddafak himself is there, giant bodybuilder that he is, holding a baby of all things. It’s all so blissfully surreal and far away from airports and air-conditioning and the rich world’s portly and pompous. Phew. Bring me a Laurentina por favore. Make it a quart.

Maddafak and his bebe 

Mudda grew up on the streets on Maputo and now has a wife, two children, a chapas (minibus) and his bar. I danced with him once in one of the Rua Bagamoya clubs. All you could see was blonde fluff, my hair,sticking out of his arms. Through Phil, I have known Mudda for years, and he proved to be an invaluable connection when I was researching my guidebook on Maputo. Everyone on the streets knows Mudda. Mention his name in the right places and people treat you with much reverence, especially in the less salubrious places our research took us. He lost the mobility of his knee in a scooter accident  years ago but continues to pump iron and just recently appeared on local television talking about the importance of gym. But he’s happiest up here at Mother Fuckers Bar and we chat about his confidence in the future because of The Bridge and the prospects of expansion although God alone knows how anyone will actually get here.

Right now that’s why I love it so… 

Maddafak and his fabulous bar 

Mozambique and back again via Thailand, with love

Ok so it’s been one of those entirely crazy years in which absolutely nothing has worked out the way I planned but the net result has been alarmingly global and somewhat astonishing. For example, I went to Malawi via Hawaii earlier this year – and snowy New York - and now I‘ve just been to Mozambique and back again via Thailand, with a bit of Jozi thrown in. There’s also been a heady back story involving love and a musician from my youth, my Darling, who is on his way to Frankfort now, from LA.

En route Ilha de Mocambique 

Sawudika I said to the doorman at the Southern Sun in Maputo a few days ago. I was back from Thailand and in Mozambique again, nine aeroplanes later, three yachts, a ferry and a whole lot of air-con minibuses. It’s a lovely Thai greeting - you hold our palms together in front of you and bow slightly, or curtsy, eyes cast down. The Mozambican doorman arched a wary eyebrow. “No lovey, said my friend Phil gently, “you’re in Maputo now, it’s bom dia (good day). 

Sawudika Bom Dia Hello

Sawudica, bom dia, ola, sawubona, hello, pingaling, kiss kiss. What a sexy mad scramble these past five weeks have been. It went like this: Darling landed in Jozi from Manchester, coming from Hawaii via Reykjavik and Wales. Then we disappeared into the heart of the Limpopo bush and saw leopards and heard lions roar and watched the full moon rise into the African skies. Then we hit Jozi, got on a plane and half a day and about eight beers later we were barrelling along past colourful mercados and dramatic inselbergs and at sunset we crossed the bridge onto the 3km-long Ilha de Moҫambique, some 2 000km from Maputo, nuzzling up to Tanzania. The whole island is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, its buildings hewn from coral rock and dating back to the 8^th century. 

Ilha de Mocambique 

Vasco da Gama landed here in 1648 and we landed in Nampula quite some time after that and spent a week exploring this incredible island with its powerful history, ancient forts and brave churches, slave houses, squalid shantytown and amazing spirit and architecture. A strong sense of the past even if you don’t understand it, a trading post of people and history, happy-sad, despairing and delicious all at the same time. We met people from Spain and Sweden, Italy, Denmark, Australia, Portugal, Manchester; imbibed an amazing mix of African and Arab, Portuguese and Indian. Sea and salt and love, the sound of trumpets in high-ceilinged rooms; the thrum of the Indian Ocean. 

Indian Ocean prrrrrrrr

And then all of a sardine and a langoustine – we were outta paradise on a small yacht and then some walking plus a very long taxi back to Nampula and then onto a plane which then bumped us down on the Jozi tarmac. Then Darling got on a plane to Amsterdam and onto LA and I got on a plane and went to Hong Kong and onto Phuket, jolled around southern Thailand swimming in the very same Indian Ocean across the other side of the world with a whole lot of fabulous women. Then I got back on a plane to Phuket, onto Hong Kong and landed back in Jozi with a head full of rainforests, tropically dressed mountains, jungly islands, erotic beaches, emerald waters and and ohjafuckit a cheap tequila hangover. Godamn. 

Khao Sok National Park, Thailand

Darling in the meantime got a bit of travel in his troubadour and went unexpectedly back to Honolulu via San Francisco and Portland and Seattle, and is now tired – haha who would have thought? – and back in LA and flies off today, his time, on a three week desert rock tour across Europe -  check out 3^rd Ear Experience. I got onto another plane to Maputo, did some work stuff then got onto another plane back to Jozi and now I am in deep rural Limpopo nine hours ahead of LA trying to figure out what the hell just happened and if I’ll ever get laid again. He tells we shall meet again on Guy Fawkes Day in Jozi. He promises fireworks and I love the predictably sexy metaphor even though I am in a startled condition back on the Harare/ Pretoria time zone two hours ahead of G&T, I mean GMT. Good god, Darling.