a typical african experience

On Wednesday Jacquee & I tried to fix my computer. We spent most of the morning looking at the Apple help page on her computer. When it became apparent that I would need either a copy of my OS (on a disc in ATL) or something more drastic, we went off in search of a computer store. We heard from a Zimbabwean Jacquee knows through a friend that there was some guy downtown who fixed Macs. Armed with the knowledge that his place was on Independence Rd. (ironically, right next to Saddam Hussein Blvd.) & in the old Ministry of Finance building, we set off.

We caught a taxi on Great North Road & I'm pretty sure the driver was slightly inebriated. His car definitely smelled like alcohol & he didn't really seem to understand us. On our trip into the city he stopped to get gas & told us we needed to pay for the ride then so he could pay for the gas. Although I wondered why he was driving around with no money & no gas, the gas light was on so we gave him half the fare then. He drove right by the Ministry of Finance & on toward the Cabinet Buildings. We didn't really know where we were going, but eventually he dropped us off behind the Ministry of Finance.

We wandered around on the back street for a few minutes & decided to ask the guard at the gate if he knew where the "old" building was. He buzzed us through the gate & I know the only reason he even talked to us was b/c we are white. Sometimes being different has it perks. The guard didn't really understand us, but figured out we wanted to fix a computer. So he very helpfully wrote down the name of the man who is in charge of Data Centre for the government offices who fixed all their computers. He tried to give us directions, even leaving the compound to point us down the street. Even though we realized he had no idea what we were actually looking for, he was so helpful that we thought maybe if we found this Data Centre the people there could help us. So we wandered down the road for about 40 minutes. We passed every government office imaginable, but never saw a Data Centre.

By this point our only goal was to find someone who spoke decent English. We saw a sign for a bookstore & walked into the compound. We quickly realized that we were on some campus b/c all we saw were classrooms with teenagers starting out them at us. No bookstore. We continued up the road b/c we decided by this point it would be faster than going back the other way. We were up near UTH, which is the main hospital in Lusaka. There was a little building called the "UTH Lounge" claiming to have internet access. We figured they might know something about computer fixing men & would speak English. I went inside to ask, but found only a dusky bar filled with Zambians. I asked the bartender, knowing he wouldn't understand anything I said so I just said "Thanks" to his response & left.

We decided to head back toward the Ministry of Finance and look around the front bit. As we walked down the road we stopped and asked yet another person working in the Ministry of Geology if he knew about a computer store. Although he was reading an English newspaper & obviously spoke decent English, we still only got one word answers from him. It occurred to me that perhaps people were scared of us.

As we walked on I saw some signs that said "ZamSafety" on them. One of my quests is to take pictures of all the Zam- signs I see so of course I wanted a picture. These signs were in front of the Department of Defense, but I decided to risk it anyway. I took that picture & then one of a hilarious sculpture across the street. Immediately a guard came over & told me I couldn't take pictures. I pretended like I was some clueless girl & showed him that I was only taking a picture of the sculpture across the street. So he made me delete it (but I successfully saved the ZamSafety one!). I understand not taking pictures of the DOD itself, I really do. But the other side of the street? Really?

We moved on down Independence & just past the front of the Ministry of Finance we saw a tall (for Lusaka - 6 stories) building. We decided to try it. The guard didn't seem to know what we were talking about when we told him we were looking for a computer guy, but he consulted with his fellow guards & gave us a pass. He told us to go to the 5th floor & talk to the receptionist there. The guard inside told us to go to the 4th so we started there. The 4th floor was the French Embassy so we head up one more. We came out into the lobby & saw there were 3 businesses on that floor: an investment group, an agricultural consulting firm, & an insurance group. Someone from the investment group came out & directed us to the agricultural firm. This seemed a bit odd, but we went in & saw a British lady with using a Mac. I've never been so happy to see someone whose first language was English.

We told her we were looking for a guy who fixed Macs. Much to our surprise she looked a locked side office & said, "Oh, I think he just stepped out. Let me call him". A few minutes later, a South African came through the door & we met Malcolm, my computer savior (kinda - he couldn’t fix it, but he could tell me I needed a new hard drive). Only 2 hours after we’d began our search!