A Walk Down Main Street, Opuwo

Opuwo is a strange town, as I have mentioned. Taken in context (that is to say, being surrounded by straight up bush) it is a booming metropolis of adventure. Taken out of context, it looks like a small, dusty African town that simultaneously embraces the past and oozes itself into the cracks of the 21^st century.  Among the rusty signs, dingy little pop-up shops, and network of street vendors, you will find fragments of modern life outside of Kunene. These “fragments” are usually being peed on by stray dogs or overrun by a pig family, but they are there nonetheless.

Allow me to take you on a hypothetical journey down the main drag of Opuwo. It’s not that long, but it certainly is an assault on the senses. At least the first five times. So pardon me if this entry is long, but bare with me.

You arrive in Opuwo in the back of a random person’s pick-up truck (or bakkie as they are called). After detaching yourself from the corral of goats, bags of everything you can imagine, tanks of oil, babies, Himbas, Hereros, and folks whose hair does not look nearly as mangy as yours, you exit the bakkie and find yourself in downtown Opuwo. Here you will find several banks, a supermarket, a pharmacy, a café, and several other typical shops you would find in a larger town.

Now you will be attacked by people trying to sell you bracelets and necklaces and handing you their babies.

Why do they hand you their babies?

No really. That is a legitimate question.

Regardless, it took me two months of living here for this tradition to stop.

You begin walking towards the opposite end of town. You pass a soccer field, being occupied by regional leagues, and then you hit what appears to be the most random assortment of people, buildings, shops, and items being sold that you have ever encountered in your humble life. It’s a mass of confusion that will begin to unravel itself after say…several months.

I’m getting there.

The smell of grilled meat, onions, and fried dough hits you. Followed by the smell of the sewer system. Followed by the smell of your own disgustingness because you are a sweaty dirtball and you’ve only been there for 10 minutes. Get used to looking like that, Sweet Pea.

The sandy ground is littered with phone minute cards, rocks, candy wrappers, and broken bottles.

On the right, you pass a cell phone shop/barber/car wash. On the left, you pass a bakery/not-really-a-bakery-they-only-sell-chicken. China shops line the sidewalk, selling as much crap quality items as you can imagine. Clothes? You got it. Pots and pans, check. Kitschy plastic things you can’t identify, tiaras, and umbrellas? Please.

As amazed as you are of the number of take-aways that sell soggy french fries, fried chicken, and russians (a fat hot dog sans bun), you are more amazed by the overwhelming number of bars, many of them with a variation of the name Arsenal, the others with names like Facebook Bar and The Place To Be.

On the road are cars that honk and slow down as you are walking so the strangers inside can have a chat about how your day is going. A proposal and/or offer to run away together often follows. Smile, laugh, decline, and keep your cool. No harm is meant. On the street are people who do the same. Often yelling across more space than you thought a voice could cover. All this noise and friendly banter is complicated by several raucous Namibian songs playing simultaneously from different bars and shops, competing for first place in the What The Shit awards.

As you are passing the second, and less stocked, market, you are bombarded by a dust storm. Choking and tearing up, you continue on your way. Soon, the shops start clearing out and the streets are less densely packed. You pass the road where you would turn to climb up a mountain where you will find the elegant and ridiculously expensive Opuwo Country Hotel, gem to all tourists and the furthest thing you can get from Africa in this town. You pass a group of Himba ladies milling about on the street. To your left, children are cramming their faces through a chain link fence like little mush children and demanding that you give them “sweeties.” Still trying to blink away the dust and convince the kids that you don’t carry candy on your person like a creepy pedophile, you trip over a goat lying in the sand. People laugh. The cows look on in apathy.

Now you are in what is mainly the residential area, although there are still enough bars to get the whole of Cape May County drunk. Keep walking a bit further and you will encounter my and Ashley’s flat, almost outside of town. But you don’t keep walking because you are dehydrated, sunburned, and there is glass in your foot, and it is time to go to Arsenal VIP for shade, a drink, and a game of pool.

You go into the bar and order a drink over a counter constructed for giants and sit down only to remember that you forgot to get out money at the bank, and you now must walk back to the other end of town to go to the ATM. Such is life in Opuwo.

It’s a marvel to behold.