"Welcome to Angola!"I landed in Angola an hour before schedule - 4:00am - on Saturday, December 27. What an amazing experience it was to land at such an odd hour of the day... to step off the plane onto the fresh tarmac with a sudden blast of humid 25+ Celsius temperature. The wind wasn't blowing and the airport's surroundings were nowhere to be seen. Lack of proper vision in a foreign country is quite the experience, especially when you start to become really curious as to your surroundings. I could only wait until the morning to really see what Luanda was all about!
The true greeting and morning wake-up call in Luanda is the sound of honking horns, revving motorcycle engines, opening and closing gates, and chirping birds. The sun beats down pretty hard as well, and to top it off, as early as 6:30am!
Watching out my bedroom window was quite the sight. Houseworkers walked up and down the streets. Local children about eight to twelve years of age (some without shoes) walked in groups of 2-4 around the neighbourhood. At first I wondered why the children walked in a fashion that seemed rather relaxed and aimless But then I noticed one child bent down to pick up an empty container lying on the ground, adding it to his collection of several bottles in his left hand. While I have quickly gotten used to the revving of engines, although not necessarily in the middle of the night, one sight really caught my attention - quite the adrenaline rush I'm sure. A teenager I'd say would be no more than 16 or 17 years of age glided up the road on a motorcycle, made a quick U-turn, and accelerated down the road only on the back wheel of his bike, reaching about 75 degrees off the ground with his front wheel! One part of me was really excited to watch someone do this with relatively no difficulty, but the greater part of me was panicking as his front wheel moved higher off the ground. Luckily nobody got hurt and he seemed to have had a great time.
Garbage and Pollution
Garbage is thrown everywhere! No matter where you drive, there is always garbage - sometimes even in piles - on the streets. As we drove around today, I saw clothes, empty boxes and food waste strewn all over the roads and sidewalks. Just minutes before we pulled into the driveyway, I watched a teenager (about 18 years of age) toss an empty cardboard box and some garbage into a pile on the side of the road. As shocked as I was to see this, I had to think twice about where I was staying. Trash on the streets of Angola seems to be common. There is absolutely no challenge to find piles of garbage on the road. However, in Toronto, the streets are littered with scattered garbage and countless cigarette butts. On the other hand, Singapore has made it a law that citizens or tourists can not litter. However, my visit in early December to Singapore, and my conversation with a local taxi driver only proved the change in mentality there as well - the law is only a law when the police are around. It seems all over the place there is garbage and pollution, but this is far worse than anything I have seen in Toronto.
So my first impressions are definitely positive. Some people say that first impressions are everything. If that is the case, which I am sure it is, then I am sure to have a great time with lots of stories to tell.
