Amsterdam Capetown Overland

With no good city map and no idea of where to stay in what is known as one of the most expensive cities in Africa we decided to hit the centre of town. Approaching the centre the buildings became larger and more developed, contrasted with the slums jammed in between.

A sign on the busy street indicated a left to the centre, Patrick signalled and turned. Suddenly a hefty traffic police woman dressed in a blue suit and orange vest jumped in front of us looking very unhappy and blowing her whistle, her cheeks puffing out like a trumpeters. She motioned for us to pull to the side and took several minutes to saunter over to us. "She looks like a bitch," I said to Patrick, "but don't worry, we didn't do anything wrong."

road in luanda

"Documents!" she barked. Patrick used the age-old trick of not understanding what she said but instead of giving in she became more and more agitated, huffing and sweating in her heavy uniform. He handed her the car papers and she began to ramble in quick, loud Portuguese. "Problemos trafficos muchos!!". When she saw that we did not understand what she was saying she took the papers and went back to directing traffic.

Two bystanders spoke French and went with me to talk to the officer. She yelled and screamed and explained that we had made an illegal left turn. "What? We did not make an illegal turn! We were just following the signs!" I said through the French speakers. At that point I was starting to get angry as there had definitely been a sign that had indicated a left turn.

"There is no sign like that. Show me which sign you mean," said the bystander to me. We walked through the small shanty town that was in the street meridian and towards the sign.

In my head I was formulating how the complex scam must have worked: the officer's brother put up a left-turn sign, waited for unsuspecting tourists to come and when they fell for it, the sign was taken down. Quite a complex scheme for one or two tourists a year but it really just showed how devious and corrupt the Angolans were.

My blood was boiling as we looked for the sign and, a bit to my dismay, it was exactly where it had been, a white sign showing a clear 'Left to City Centre' with an arrow. The Great Angolan Road Sign Scheme was not quite as clever as I had originally imagined. "See!" I said. "That's the sign. Left to centre!"

"Oh, that sign," they said to me, chuckling, "that is a transit sign, not a road sign. You cannot turn left there. See the blue sign? You can turn with that sign. And the red sign? You can turn with that sign. But the white sign, you can not turn with." The board displayed several signs, all of varying colours and all pointing in different directions.

"In Canada, and everywhere else in the world, if a sign says 'Left to City Centre' it means you can turn left!" I was angry and beginning to yell.

chaos on luanda streets

"This is not Canada, this is Angola. Here you cannot turn on a white sign."

"I understand. Please explain to the officer that we are tourists, we did not know about the sign and that we will not do it again."

We walked back to the officer, busy blowing her whistle and screaming at random cars on the road. The translator spoke very quickly to her in Portuguese. When finished she took off her police hat and produced a paper with various violations on it, the charges ranging from € 5 to € 30. With a quick glance she yelled back at me, "The fine for that offence is ?0."

"€ 70 That's a lot of money!"

"It is not a lot of money," the translator said back to me.

"It is a lot of money for me. I will not pay!" I was now yelling at him.

"Fine, then she will keep your documents. I am here to help you and you are getting angry so I must go." He began to walk away.

"I am sorry," I chased after him, trying to play the role of 'friendly traveller'. "Thank you very much for your help. I do not have that money," I said in a calmer voice.

He translated, "How much do you have?" Now it was coming to a bribe. She had tried to give the impression that it was an official fine but in the end it was simply a gift for her.

I glanced back at the Land Rover and envisaged the four thousand euros we had stashed in various nooks and crannies. We definitely had the money but were not going to part with it for this woman. After sitting on the hot street corner for almost an hour it was soon to be getting dark. Luanda was not the place to be stuck after the sun went down so Rob, Patrick and I discussed that € 12 would be a reasonable cost.

petrol station in northern angola

When told of our compromise the police women scoffed and replaced the documents in her sweaty bosom. I thanked the translator through gritted teeth and he left. We decided to play the waiting game.

Several minutes later the police woman appeared at the car door and demanded the equivalent of € 4 for the documents. We knew we had her where we wanted her; the last thing that she wanted was a group of tourists causing problems on her street corner. "No!" Patrick said to her and sent her back to her post. A few minutes later we had the documents in our hands after paying nothing. Her greed had cost her € 12!

During the whole argument I had been shaking with excitement, fear and anger. To me that is what African travel is all about: arguing in French with a Portuguese-speaking woman about a traffic violation in one of the most war-torn countries in the world and then winning!