It's early morning at St Paul's Catholic church in Dolisie, a town in the Republic of Congo. "Would you like me to make you a cup of tea?" asks Roger. We're sharing a spartan room at the church guest house, and Roger's already up and about.
"Tea," I reply, my eyes still closed. "That would be great."
I wonder why he's not more anxious to get moving, for we have a full day of travel ahead of us, with three borders to cross. "Might get some breakfast and bring it back," he adds. "And while I'm out, check on the transportation situation."
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• More from Scott's travels Around Africa
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It's hard to discern a sarcastic tone when you're half asleep. He should have kicked me.
According to the map, we're within a few hundred kilometres of the Pool region, which merits its own box in Lonely Planet because of a band of rebels-turned-bandits calling themselves ninjas, mentioned in a previous column. We arrived in Dolisie last night down a 230km mud track from the Gabon border in part to avoid these guys.
But this surely gives a wrong impression. It's not like we've ventured into a war zone. Congolese travellers met on the road assured us the ninjas are no longer a menace and, in any case, my biggest problem so far in Congo was last night's rude waiter. Mogadishu this is not.
Our plan: head west to the Atlantic coast at Pointe Noire via a shared car, then to the nearby border of Cabinda, an exclave of Angola; find transport through Cabinda from north to south, a distance of about 100km to the border of the Democratic Republic of Congo, then cross a tiny coastal strip of DRC to the mouth of the Congo River. From there, take a ferry from a place called Banana to the northern Angola oil city of Soyo, where buses (hopefully) make the long journey to the capital, Luanda.
Borders crossings are unpredictable, especially so in Africa, and although our paperwork is technically in order, we don't actually know how far we can get in a single day. I'm inclined to just go until we can go no further - a mistake, in hindsight.
In the car to Pointe Noire, I exchange waves with the Chinese foremen of a massive road reconstruction project that blasts deep canyons into the jungle-covered hillsides. The main route between the Congolese capital and the country's largest port, the road is a wide, empty asphalt highway in some places, still a rutted field of mud in others. Torrential rains greet us in Pointe Noire, but we cross into Cabinda with only moderate hassle. Via a translator, the Portuguese-speaking Angolan immigration officer insists on our writing out the itinerary of our entire trip, which is difficult if you've been living out of a suitcase for 18 months.
Cabinda's roads come as a shock - perfect asphalt, complete with guardrails in places, a product of Angola's oil boom. A driver promises to take us straight across the exclave but instead gives us an unwanted tour of the unpaved slums of Cabinda City. The southern border post is nearly deserted by the time we reach it at 5.30pm. "Closed," the guard says. "Come back tomorrow."
We're not happy. "There's only one thing to do," I tell Roger. Based on nothing more than a hunch, we proceed to a nearby drinks stand, where we find the station chief himself, nursing a beverage. We strike up a conversation and soon the guards are following his instructions to stamp us through.
Problem solved - almost. On the DRC side, the station chief has left for the day so a lengthy discussion ensues. "You'll have to go back to Cabinda, sleep in a hotel and come back tomorrow," one of the guards finally says.
"That's impossible," we say. "We've already been stamped out of Cabinda."
"Then you'll have to sleep here."
"Here? On the floor?"
"Yes."
"No problem. We'll sleep here." I assume we're just calling their bluff but, as it turns out, when we talk about sleeping on the floor of the border post, we're actually talking about sleeping on the floor of the border post. After dinner with the guards, they bring a mattress out of the closet. We set up our mosquito nets in front of the passport collection windows. It's remarkably comfortable.
"Can I just say one thing?" Roger says. "This wouldn't have happened if we'd gotten an earlier start."
True. And these sleeping conditions - perfectly adequate, it turns out - are actually the least of our concerns, for there's another problem hanging over us. We only have a five-day transit visa for Angola, a country so large that overland passage in such time lies at the frontier of the impossible. As we pass the night in no-man's-land, the clock is ticking.
Scott MacMillan is blogging about his journey on his website, www.wanderingsavage.com
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Day 5, Abu Dhabi Test: At a glance
Moment of the day When Dilruwan Perera dismissed Yasir Shah to end Pakistan’s limp resistance, the Sri Lankans charged around the field with the fevered delirium of a side not used to winning. Trouble was, they had not. The delivery was deemed a no ball. Sri Lanka had a nervy wait, but it was merely a stay of execution for the beleaguered hosts.
Stat of the day – 5 Pakistan have lost all 10 wickets on the fifth day of a Test five times since the start of 2016. It is an alarming departure for a side who had apparently erased regular collapses from their resume. “The only thing I can say, it’s not a mitigating excuse at all, but that’s a young batting line up, obviously trying to find their way,” said Mickey Arthur, Pakistan’s coach.
The verdict Test matches in the UAE are known for speeding up on the last two days, but this was extreme. The first two innings of this Test took 11 sessions to complete. The remaining two were done in less than four. The nature of Pakistan’s capitulation at the end showed just how difficult the transition is going to be in the post Misbah-ul-Haq era.
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
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Director: Hwang Dong-hyuk
Stars: Lee Jung-jae, Wi Ha-joon and Lee Byung-hun
Rating: 4.5/5
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Coming soon
Torno Subito by Massimo Bottura
When the W Dubai – The Palm hotel opens at the end of this year, one of the highlights will be Massimo Bottura’s new restaurant, Torno Subito, which promises “to take guests on a journey back to 1960s Italy”. It is the three Michelinstarred chef’s first venture in Dubai and should be every bit as ambitious as you would expect from the man whose restaurant in Italy, Osteria Francescana, was crowned number one in this year’s list of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants.
Akira Back Dubai
Another exciting opening at the W Dubai – The Palm hotel is South Korean chef Akira Back’s new restaurant, which will continue to showcase some of the finest Asian food in the world. Back, whose Seoul restaurant, Dosa, won a Michelin star last year, describes his menu as, “an innovative Japanese cuisine prepared with a Korean accent”.
Dinner by Heston Blumenthal
The highly experimental chef, whose dishes are as much about spectacle as taste, opens his first restaurant in Dubai next year. Housed at The Royal Atlantis Resort & Residences, Dinner by Heston Blumenthal will feature contemporary twists on recipes that date back to the 1300s, including goats’ milk cheesecake. Always remember with a Blumenthal dish: nothing is quite as it seems.
Tips for taking the metro
- set out well ahead of time
- make sure you have at least Dh15 on you Nol card, as there could be big queues for top-up machines
- enter the right cabin. The train may be too busy to move between carriages once you're on
- don't carry too much luggage and tuck it under a seat to make room for fellow passengers
What is the FNC?
The Federal National Council is one of five federal authorities established by the UAE constitution. It held its first session on December 2, 1972, a year to the day after Federation.
It has 40 members, eight of whom are women. The members represent the UAE population through each of the emirates. Abu Dhabi and Dubai have eight members each, Sharjah and Ras al Khaimah six, and Ajman, Fujairah and Umm Al Quwain have four.
They bring Emirati issues to the council for debate and put those concerns to ministers summoned for questioning.
The FNC’s main functions include passing, amending or rejecting federal draft laws, discussing international treaties and agreements, and offering recommendations on general subjects raised during sessions.
Federal draft laws must first pass through the FNC for recommendations when members can amend the laws to suit the needs of citizens. The draft laws are then forwarded to the Cabinet for consideration and approval.
Since 2006, half of the members have been elected by UAE citizens to serve four-year terms and the other half are appointed by the Ruler’s Courts of the seven emirates.
In the 2015 elections, 78 of the 252 candidates were women. Women also represented 48 per cent of all voters and 67 per cent of the voters were under the age of 40.
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Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
Our legal consultant
Name: Dr Hassan Mohsen Elhais
Position: legal consultant with Al Rowaad Advocates and Legal Consultants.
COMPANY PROFILE
Initial investment: Undisclosed
Investment stage: Series A
Investors: Core42
Current number of staff: 47
