existentia

Why do I only post in this blog when I’m in Angola! Probably because it’s one of the few times when I have the time to do so. So yes, here I am, a New Year and back working in Luanda and where I’ll probably be working on/off until at least June now.

It has been interesting to look at the changes taking place in Luanda over the last five months or so. The pace of construction taking place in the city center is really quite frightening. Office blocks and luxury apartments are going up seemingly everywhere and the company I’m currently working for hope to be moving into their new flashy offices later this year.

The infrastructure outside of the city also seems to be improving with new roads and bridges being built, thus finally helping to undo a lot of the damage dealt by the long civil war Angola suffered up until 2002. This reconstruction work is in part to help pave the way for people to travel, register and vote in the first elections in Angola since 1992 that are due to take place in September of this year. I for hope everyone’s sake those elections don’t trigger the same problems we are currently seeing in Kenya.

It’s not all positive though. There is still more people in Luanda than there are homes (flying over the expanse of shanty towns on the approach to the airport is a sobering experience) and affordable housing just doesn’t seem to exist here. I’ve been told rent for a one bedroom apartment here costs around $1200 US which put the cost of living here almost on a par with London. A quite ridiculous state of affairs when you consider that Angola is still effectively a third-world country.

But I guess any progress is better than no progress, and when there is so much conflict and doubt in the world just now (is it just me or has everyone written off 2008 already?) it is encouraging to think that at least Angola should manage to end 2008 in better shape than it ended 2007. Here’s hoping.

Kissama National Park

Looks like I’ve been rather negligent of this blog in recent months, but I can assure you all I’ve been rather busy. On Monday I will be departing to Luanda once more for my last 3 weeks in Angola for the year. Will there be more trips to Angola next year? The jury is still out on that one for now.

I’m looking forward to it once again. I’m developing a rather strange affinity with Luanda and the people I work with over there (a mix of Angolans, British, Americans and South Africans!) so it will be good to catch up with them. At the same time though I’m starting to feel a little detached from my life back in Scotland and I think once I return home at the end of this month I’ll have to make an effort to correct this. Either that or move to West Africa for good!

Luanda doesn’t do good roads!

In addition to the many photos I also tried to capture a couple of short films of the whales and shark we encountered while fishing off the coast of Luanda, Angola. They can be watched below. Viewer discretion is advised for the shark catch video as it was caught and killed accidentally (we were just expecting to catch fish!) and was in some distress.

Shark Catch

Whales