I'd never been to Africa. I traveled the world from Australia to Hawaii, but never set foot on African soil. Subsahara, the Islamic countries in the North, the islands... it doesn't matter, I didn't even come close to those places in the first 23 years of my life. Not that I didn't want to visit Africa. The problem was financial in nature, as well as not knowing anyone who was willing to visit the virtually uncharted territories of southern Africa. That all changed when my parents decided to book a tour through Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa and encouraged me to do the same. So a few weeks after my 23rd birthday, I finally got to visit the continent I'd wanted to see for so long - and discovered another reason why my parents steered clear of Africa when I was a kid: The sheer distance between my doorstep and Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, took over 24 hours to bridge and shortened my life by at least 5 years.

It all started in the Rotterdam area, where a major malfunction of railroad systems on the Sunday of our departure threw our entire schedule off. The trains to Schiphol Airport were canceled, as well as most other trains going in the direction of Amsterdam. So while I was still in the middle of sending a few important e-mails, my parents made the decision to leave. Now. Jump on the very next bus.
I rushed out of the house, forgot to take my watch with me and almost left my bus pass behind as well. We then missed our connecting subway train. Trains were still being canceled left and right. I was seconds away from calling my granddad to beg him to drop us off at the airport, when I noticed that there was one train going to Schiphol Airport just minutes after we would arrive at Rotterdam Central Station. So we made a run for it. Somehow we managed to get on one of the very few northbound trains leaving Rotterdam that day. That was only the very beginning.


It usually takes 30 minutes to travel from Rotterdam to Schiphol if you travel by Intercity Direct. Our train was a regular Intercity, meaning we stopped in a million different places. Just as I was about to die of boredom, an elderly lady from Surinam got on the train. She told stories about her family, her grandchildren and her life as a black woman in the Netherlands. She was amazing. Before I knew it, we were at Schiphol and I sadly had to say goodbye to her.

Once we'd left the train station, I realized that we were now about four hours early for our flight to Frankfurt. Four hours of still not feeling like I was on my way to the last permanently inhabited continent that I hadn't visited yet. I killed those four hours with repeated book store visits and bathroom breaks, because I'm terrified of airplane toilets. Lucky for me and my airplane toilet phobia, the flight to Frankfurt took less than an hour. Yet by the time I got off that plane, I felt like I hadn't eaten in years. It was 7 pm and I had no idea if I'd get dinner on my red-eye flight to Johannesburg. So I did what everyone should do in Germany: get myself some good German food.


With dinner out of the way, it was finally time to get ready for the main leg of our journey: a ten-hour flight transporting me from good old Europe to exciting and unknown Africa. I made sure to claim a window seat and had to keep myself from bouncing up and down in my seat with excitement as the plane took off. Black Panther was playing on my private screen to get me even more hyped up about the continent I was about to get to know. Night fell, and I closed the window knowing I'd finally see Africa when I'd open it again.

My daydreams about lions and Bantu languages and Table Mountain were rudely interrupted by a tremendous shock. Left, right, left again, free fall. We were experiencing some turbulence, nothing I hadn't experienced before. Or so I thought.
The cabin crew sat down. The captain made his announcements. And then I started praying. Although we were told that the turbulence wouldn't last long, we didn't seem to get out of the angry bubble of air. We were thrown from left to right for minutes at a time, often making short free falls. The plane started creaking. A sound I'd never heard a plane make suddenly came from the wing right outside of my window. I'd never been so scared on a flight before, but didn't want anyone to know that I was almost shitting myself. So I continued to watch my movie, eat my snacks and smile while the minutes of extreme turbulence turned into hours.

I managed to fall asleep in between two pockets of rogue air, although "asleep" might be a big word for the half-conscious state in which I found myself. Every time I came close to that nice deep sleep I needed, I was shaken by the turbulence to the point where I believed I had no internal organs left, just reddish goop. As the hours dragged on, I became more and more sure that I was going to die. The plane would crash, I just knew it, but at least I wouldn't be alone in my dying moments, I thought as I put my head on my mom's shoulder and closed my eyes.


Four agonizing hours later, I woke up high in the air somewhere above what I guessed to be Congo. The plane had stopped shaking. I sighed with relief. My neck was unbelievably painful and I needed the restroom asap, but at least I was alive. Better yet: We'd finally left the turbulence behind us! I quickly went to the dreaded airplane toilet and found out I'd spoken too soon. Before I could even flush the toilet, the plane went bobbing around like a mad balloon again.

Another three hours went by. They felt as endless as this blog post, but with more opportunities to get bruises all over my body. I couldn't sit in my seat anymore. My first looks of Africa had been a disappointment, as the air above the continent was hazy and almost solid-looking. I was very grumpy by the time we finally landed in Johannesburg. Oh, and I got my period right then and there as the cherry on top. It didn't help either that all logic left us once we left the plane. Knackered, I didn't feel ready to claim my luggage and check it in again for the flight to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. I dragged my feet and came close to hysteria when I discovered that getting my luggage on the right plane meant going through customs, getting a South African visa that would only be used for 30 minutes, finding my luggage, finding the British Airways counter hidden away in a corner, checking my luggage in again and going through customs yet again. It was illogical and exhausting. I could only laugh about it as I dropped my tired body like a sack of potatoes in my window seat on the plane to Zimbabwe.


The plane ended up departing with a delay of almost an hour. But when we took off, the view was much better than it had been a few hours earlier. No turbulence, which was great too. I tried to see as much of the landscape as I could, but my eyes were burning; I'd been on the go for almost 24 hours and just wanted to sleep in a real bed. Time lost all its meaning. When I spotted the Victoria Falls airport from afar, I almost couldn't believe that I'd reached my destination. The plane landed, skidded and bumped towards the terminal. Dead on my feet, I struggled through immigration and got on the truck that would be my home for the next three weeks. Everything around me was new and unknown. Every tree was interesting, every bush fascinating. As I sat back in my chair, exhaustion and happiness washed over me. It had taken me 24 hours. I'd woken up in my Dutch hometown and one bus, two subway trains, a train and three planes later I was finally here in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. My African adventure could begin.