This being Tanzania, I hear, and wonder how she knows — about the drug deals and buying a taxi from a drug addict and this being Tanzania. She looks so Midwestern. She is here to save the world. But why here? And why? And how? I now appreciate that my appearance in Magulu was not just odd but unsettling. Whatever questions I have about Gloria she will surely have about me.
The electric windows don’t work. The passenger side is halfway up. ‘Kind of a pain in the rainy season,’ Gloria says. ‘The rain gets in and the foam in the seat gets damp and it smells like a boy’s bathroom.’
Outside, people flow past. I think how much better dressed they are here than in Magulu, but then I realize it is just after five and I am seeing people with jobs, people who can buy clothes and shoes. If I dared walk down the poorer streets, the tracks that drift off into bean fields and palm groves, I’d see the ubiquitous, tatty, patchwork poor. I hear Martin snicker: There are always more of them.
The sea, to my left, appears and disappears through thick stands of fig and mango trees and the shabby remnants of colonial houses. A red-brick hospital built by the Germans a century ago has long been humbled by ivy and the roosting swifts. In the foreground, the new hospital is already decaying, molding. Gloria has a strong opinion about the healthcare offered there and it’s not a good one.
Several hotels follow with their overgrown lawns and dark windows. Once, during the pre-Independence sisal boom of the forties and fifties, things were different; visitors came and there were buffets and bands. Tanga was a thriving colonial town.
Gloria talks on, her little history lesson, and I nod, yes, yes, how interesting, but I’m imagining the colonial housewives — acolytes to their husbands’ careers — trying so hard to keep busy with teas and luncheons, the sweat ruining their frocks; and, how, at the end of the day, when their husbands were passed out in bed and the servants had gone home, they could sit on the sofa, crumpled, stained, their hairdos limp. In the quiet unelectrified dark, they could undo the hooks of their sensible bras, take off their stockings, let the fat roll and the sweat drip and press the last cold drink to their cheeks, and think: Thank God it’s over.
I recall how I’d take off my clothes after an evening with our Addis associates, our Lagos associates. I’d shed the little black dress like a skin and feel the very edge of unease, like a shift in barometric pressure. I pushed it away with such discipline: that inkling of my boredom. Thank God it’s over, I would think, then tamp down that thought. Be careful what you think, thoughts become words, words become conversations and conversations become traps. Therefore: think less to say less. Then Tom would reach for me, Tom would touch me, and I was reassured that all I needed to be was Tom’s lovely wife.
‘This is it,’ Gloria says, juddering to a stop in a sandy layby. I refocus now on the wrought-iron gateway encompassed by bougainvillea, through which I can see the bright blue of the bay. We walk down a long flight of steps, under a flame tree. The clubhouse is a surprise: a new building, well-made, with a large open veranda. Below us, there is a small beach, two pale brown children with a bucket and spade. About half a mile along, on the public beach, hundreds of Tangans thrash about in the water, their raucous laughter punching holes in the quiet of the Yacht Club.
As we sit at the bar, Gloria tells me why she’s here — an orphanage for children with AIDS. I lean forward, attentive. ‘I put my life savings into the project. I mean, what the hell was I saving it for if not life?’
But it has been difficult.
‘The Tanzanians don’t want to admit there’s a problem. It embarrasses them. So rather than take my help, they refuse me permits — not all of them. Just a couple of the really crucial ones. It’s a crock. But I also kinda accept that it’s a test. If I stick around long enough and pay enough chai they’ll trust me. I see their point. If I’m going to take care of sick and orphaned children, I’d better be walking the talk.’
Despite first impressions and near-chain-smoking, Gloria isn’t a drinker. She sips her G&T carefully, eyes me purposefully. ‘So, Tanga.’
There’s no hint of a question mark in her voice, but very clearly she thinks it’s my turn.
‘Divorce,’ I say. Rehearse. See how it sounds. See if it’s big enough to hide in.
‘Men,’ she sniffs. Again the unquestioning question.
‘Men,’ I lob back.
‘Mine was a first-class prick. Best day of my life when Milton left.’
Down the bar from us a group of men are drinking. They’ve had too much sun, their old skin blotched and peeling, bits of it actually missing. One of them catches my eye and winks. Sure enough, he calls out, ‘Hey, Gloria, who’s your friend?’
She doesn’t even turn around, just gives him the finger. ‘No one who wants to know you, Harry.’ Then she leans in, stage-whispers, ‘What every girl dreams of, right? An insolvent drunk with Kaposi’s sarcoma.’
I laugh. It’s an odd sound, and I think how I’ve held myself back these months, laughter forbidden. I feel something in that moment, maybe spiked by the gin, a possibility, as Strebel said, of life’s persistence.
As if reading my mind, Gloria says, ‘Hey, if you’re thinking of sticking around, I got this cute guesthouse I’m caretaking. The owner had to go back to Holland. Dying mother. He’s asked me to rent it or sell it, whichever comes first. It’s right on the sea.’ She glances at her watch. ‘It’s still light enough. Just up the road. I could show you now if you like.’
The tarmac — such as it is: a fickle strip of tar connecting potholes — segues into a narrow sandy lane. There are houses between me and the sea, hidden by high walls and security gates: a rare show of prosperity. But the walls are intermittent, punctuated by more abandoned mansions and grass lots with mud huts: those who have lost, those who never had.
We pass a boy grazing a cow on the verge. He’s wearing a white shirt about ten sizes too big, and for a brief hallucinogenic moment I think it’s the boy from Butiama. But we pass this boy so quickly and the idea that they are the same child is absurd. Gloria waves and he smiles and waves back.
Then she says to me: ‘The key is not to have anything they can steal and sell. No computer, no TV. Then they won’t bother you.’
‘I just have a small bag.’ I don’t mention the box.
‘Traveling light.’ She says this casually, but she’s still seeking a revelation. Why do I only have a small bag? Did I leave in a hurry? Did I leave in secret?
‘My husband and I traveled a lot. I’m good at packing.’ We shed our material lives, posting after posting, all those boxes, and we just left them behind, so by the time we arrived in Arnau, we had only the essentials.
‘Ex-husband,’ she corrects.
‘It’s recent. I’m still getting used to it.’
‘Ah, poor doll.’ She pats my thigh.
This, then, is who I can be for Gloria: the wounded divorcee.
Easing the Toyota around potholes, Gloria says, ‘The electricity is totally unpredictable, so gadgetry of any kind is pointless. Hairdryer, TV, computer, and such. Though you don’t have those, traveling light.’ She stops at a low metal gate and beeps the horn. A security guard in blue uniform runs out to open it. He salutes.
‘Habari, Jamhuri.’