EASTER

A long weekend in Lubango seemed a bit too long and boring to me, so I had booked myself into the Flamingo Lodge over Easter. The lodge is situated along the coast of the Angolan province Namibe, in the Namib Desert. From Lubango it takes about three hours by bus to Namibe ’city‘ and there the people from the lodge pick you up. That last bit proved a little bit tricky because the bus company had not paid road tax on the particular bus I was travelling with and therfore, the police took the bus, with all the passengers still aboard, to the police station. I had to phone the people from the lodge and ask them to pick me up at the police station rather than the bus station.

After that, all went smoothly and I arrived at the Flamingo Lodge just before lunch, which I considered excellent timing. After lunch I wandered through the desert. The landscape is desolate, but very impressive. The desert is mostly rocky, but it is a very soft sandstone full of fossils. It appears that a muddy bottom with lots of shells in it was pushed up not too long ago. The fossils seem so young that I am not sure they actually deserve the name fossil.

The next morning I travelled further into the desert and saw some jackals and a springbok. In the afternoon I visited a canyon. Very impressiove and somewhat scary. Those sheer cliffs are made of the same soft crumbly sandstone as the stuff i saw the day before.

On the last day I went fishing for a few huors and I even caught a cod-like fish (the South Africans call it kob) of about three kilos. The freezer of the lodge was already full and I did not fancy fish for dinner, so we released the little beast.

Soccer

The African Cup of Nations will be held from 10 to 31 January 2010, in Angola. And the city where I live, Lubango, is one of the four cities hosting the tournament. The Angolans are, of course proud to host the championship. Almost everyday the news states how many days are left until the tournament starts and that the building of the stadiums is on schedule. I can personally assure you that this is correct, because I can just about see the new stadium from my flat.

And, more imortant, one of the training fields is just opposite my flat and is also being renovated. I look forward to seeing the training sessions of at least one team. And to having inside information about the tactics of that team.

However, since last week the Angolan pride is mixed with some trepidation. You see, the national team is not performing very well at the moment. Yes, they made it to the world cup in 2006, and the Angolans were probably more surprised by this than anybody else, but no, they have not scored another win since. Last week Angola played Cape Verde and Marocco. Losing to Marocco is probably nothing to be ashamed of, but losing 1-0 to Cape Verde is not a good sign.

The qualifying games last until November 2009, and double as qualifying games for the world cup. The first three of each og teh five groups qualify for the African Cup of Nations and the winners qualify for the World Cup. So We do not yet know who will play, but I assume we will have at least one good team playing in Lubango, and hopefully Lubango will also host a quarter- or semi final.