Go to sleep, with Gunfire in The Streets...

Angola, 2007

I made it back from Angola alive. Admittedly, the writing of this account constitutes something of a spoiler, but in the best traditions of 24-Hour news, I will re-cap the abundantly obvious: I’m still alive, and by quite some way, which, given the dire warnings posted on the British Embassy website, came as a surprise …even to me.

“Do not go out, ever”, “Draw the curtains”,  and “Beware ye stranger, the night o’ the blood-moon” were the general traveller’s recommendations given. Utter drivel. The most lethal things in Angola are the bloody pot-holes, some of which are deeper than the District Line - and if those buggers don’t get you, you might die of shock; at the price of cheese. Yes, cheese. A small lump of manipulated cow-fat that might set you back 93p in the UK, costs a whopping £17.00 in Luanda - and don’t even think of buying powdered milk. I got asked for some cash in a local supermarket by a kid with a 1 litre can of milk power in his hand. He limped badly and had an open-wound on his foot; the likes of which hasn’t been seen since Trafalgar. I felt sorry for him, and offered him a few dollars, only for him to point to the price tag on the tin: $30!  Not knowing the Portuguese for: “Hey fella, go easy on the Muesli”, I left him to gather the remaining monies from the other shoppers, but the experience did serve to illustrate the basic economics of a former failed state.

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