Nuclear strength for anyplace near the Sahara, which includes the countries in the Sahel.
I was there in 2002. One of my favorite things to do is get Chinese food in countries way far away from China. I’m wondering what Chinese African food tastes like now that there’s a ton of Chinese people developing/exploiting natural resources in Africa.
I’ve got a t-shirt that says mizungu, which I was told meant tourist in Swahili. Could mean pigfucker for all I know.
I would give the trip to my cousin’s husband. He’s black, so I think the trip would mean a lot more to him than it would to me.
I would be checking out what vaccines/preventive medications/treatments he would need to survive, and what he would have to know about who/when/how to bribe to make sure he stayed safe.
Also, if he wanted, I would get him a DNA test so he would know which part of Africa his ancestors may have come from and concentrate on that area if he wished.
Basically, it means a person of European descent, but also can be taken to mean foreigner, white person or stranger. I don’t know about Chinese food, but the best Indian food I’ve ever had was in Uganda.
Beyond general health / safety / what to pack questions, which I think everyone else has covered:
– Once I have picked out some places to go, what do I need to know about customs / etiquette / how to avoid offending people in these regions?
– What are communications like? Will there be Internet cafes / wifi access? Is getting a local, prepaid cell phone a good idea?
– What do I need to know about visas and border crossings?
– What is the best way to carry money? Will there be ATMs? Are credit cards useful in the places I plan to visit? Is it a good idea to take cash, and if so, what currency?
Do they get Game of Thrones?
I know a fair amount about the ancient Egyptian culture and about North Africa in general. I know almost nothing about sub-Saharan Africa since 1960 outside of the atrocities one hears about on the news. I’m certain an area that vast must have a great deal of history and culture. I’d be happy to learn about any of it.
As to doing the research prior to the trip? Absolutely. I’d be reading everything I could find. But there is no substitute for just being somewhere new and taking it all in - the smells, the sounds, the rhythm of life.
Given what I know about Africa as a whole, I’d guess that for someone who already speaks English, the best languages to study would be French and Arabic. French is spoken widely in many African countries that were former colonies of France or Belgium, and is a major second or third language of the world anyway. Arabic is likely to help when traveling in predominantly Muslim areas of North Africa and around the Horn. If you have the time and talent to take on another language beyond those, Swahili could be nice as it is spoken somewhat widely as a lingua franca in the east. Sure, studying Zulu, Touareg, or Amharic might be interesting, but overall it would probably be less useful.
My brother had an awesome hunting safari trip to Tanzania. He said the dark skies at night with the sounds of the African plains are incredible.
Really. Dark skies alone are worth the visit.
Oh, he said take along some little trinkets to pass out as a kind of tip. My brother said multitools are popular.
How long ago were you there? Didn’t Idi Amin throw out most people of Indian descent?
Ke itumetse, Mma. Will we be in countries where gay people are being harmed?
Not to dp, but this resource may be helpful: “My hovercraft is full of eels” in 51 languages.
Yes, at the same time as the US even. As long as you can find someone with a satellite TV subscription.
Yes. We get it the same time as the US. On satellite TV, which has pervasive coverage in Africa.
Portuguese is also useful.
I think this highlights one of the fundamental absurdities of this project-- one that I frankly don’t have a good plan to address. “Africa” is a geographic designation, not a cultural or other designation, and encompasses an enormously diverse place, such that giving general advice becomes a pretty silly thing to do.
But there is a reality that people (well, Americans)-- even people going out that way-- think of the place as just plain “Africa” and won’t really make sense of the diversity until they have been there for a while.
My goal in this project would be to make travel in the region more accessible and attractive to a broad range of people-- travelers, armchair travelers and even nervous parents freaking out because their kid decided to study abroad in Ghana. It’d focus on really showcasing the continent while providing lots of practical information on HOW to travel (advice which is probably broadly applicable.) It would address things like what to pack, how to stay safe, what to expect from accommodations, how deal with transport, etc. I would also want there to be some broad historical and cultural context, as well as some good stories from real travelers.
It wouldn’t take the place of a full guidebook, but rather would go deeper into all the stuff that gets shoved in the back of the guidebook. I would want it to be equally relevant to vacationers, people planning to live and work in Africa for the first time, study abroad kids, and people just wanting to learn about a place they may not know much about.
Hows the Arts scene in the various countries? I really want to avoid the (IME elsewhere) extremely hackneyed “traditional” dances and paintings/crafts, which are often touristy flavored.
What are the painters/sculptors which are the toast of Nairobi? Which singers are taking Luanda by storm? Is there a show on TV which can empty the streets of Yaounde, when its broadcast?
Angola and much of the Congo basin has a wet season that is called cacimbo. It runs between November and March. If you like to surf this would be the time to go.
Has he considered starting a project to advise people on the ins and outs of traveling in Africa?