Do you ever wish you could just stay in one place for a very long time without needing anything, just so you could see the world unfold? I feel this way when I walk through Gaborone’s streets. Winter is starting to loosen its grip and now there are so many street scenes that I just want to stop and watch, like the people walking in the dirt field as they emerge from the bright twilight sun and pass you by with more people leaving their footprint’s trace. You know there is a story on every face, you just have to stop, watch and listen, ask them to tell you a story, like how you asked for one as a child. This is what I crave, stories to listen to, stories from another land. I feel lucky to be here and experience a bit of a foreign adventure. When I talk to people from here, I can’t help but ask them about what it was like growing up in Africa. I hear lovely simple stories. Stories about walking 20 kms to school and back and having to bring their own firewood to cook their lunch with. Stories about going to the cattle post to be with their father or brother on the weekends. Stories of growing up in Gaborone when the city was still young, that it was more likely to pass by a donkey or goat than a neighbour. Stories that are stories that pull you away and place a dream in you.
The combination of my experiences and the stories I’ve heard remind me of a descriptive English folk song “Dirty old town”
“I found my love by the gas works croft.
Dreamed a dream by the old canal.
Kissed my girl by the factory wall.
Dirty old town, dirty old town.
I heard a siren from the dock.
Saw a train set the night on fire.
Smell the spring on the sulphured wind.
Dirty old town, dirty old town.”
Though I am still not too sure why this song makes me think of Gaborone. Gaborone is far from the sea, and the only thing that I have seen that is canal like are all the deep ditches that are along the streets to collect the water during rainy season and to keep the streets from flooding. So I guess I too am dreaming by the old canal and smelling spring on the wind.
