Around Africa with Riaan and thoughts of Japan

I've been reading Riaan Manser's book, 'Around Africa on my Bike' for some time. Over the last two months or so I've interspersed 'biking' through a few countries with Riaan and reading other books. Last night I finished Riaan's 700-page adventure.

What an adventure! Two years two months and 15 days of biking and traveling through 33 countries. The sights that Riaan has seen!

But, I'll tell you straight that I would definitely not be up for putting up with what Riaan dealt with. It's one thing to get on your bike and ride (I'm fine with this, no matter the terrain) but it's a completely different issue to put up with roadblocks (official and not), border officials and police/military types who make you unpack every pocket of your pannier or lock you up for a couple of hours while they decide what to do with you.

And then there were the visa issues and the unbelievable amount of backtracking and catching lifts to major centres to sort out issues and then catching lifts back to where you left your bike to continue the journey. I do not have this type of constitution.

There were, of course, the dozens of really kind and generous people who assisted Riaan on his expedition. Right near the end of the book Riaan makes a comment about a South African chap who assisted him. You can certainly substitute the word 'South African' for 'person' in the following sentence as it applies to the other people he met on his travels and of which he made similar comments.

Riaan says, "He was just another South African who wanted to reach out and change our country for the better".

I disagree.

He was a guy who was able to and gladly did assist Riaan, not because he wanted to change the country but because he just really liked what Riaan was doing and by assisting he was contributing to the success of Riaan's adventure. I would gladly have a passing through adventurer stay over any day because I like what they're doing, I'd like to assist in making their adventure successful and I'd probably like to be doing what they're doing too. It has absolutely no bearing on the country but on personal interactions.

I may not believe in deities but I do believe in people and I do believe that people are inherently good and kind and helpful. I wasn't counting but there were certainly more people who were kind to Riaan than those who were not. And all of those nasty people he encountered? They're environmentally nasty - from the environment in which they've been brought up, how they live (defensive, territorial, brandishing firearms) and what they've been taught.

And this last point brings me full circle (or triangle) to the tsunami disaster in Japan. An interesting article on CNN mentions how 'calm' the Japanese affected by this disaster have been. There has not been any looting, people stand patiently in queues for a bottle of water and shoppers limited to 10 items only adhere to this restriction without compaint or cheating.

The article also mentions a shelter at a school in Shendai. "In a third-floor classroom, families have self-organized themselves on cardboard boxes and blankets. No one family has a larger space than the other, just as you see at any average family festival. Shoes are not allowed on the blankets in order to maintain sanitary conditions. Food is shared as equally as possible, even if one person eats or drinks a little less in order for everyone to have some sustenance."

A guy interviewed, Jeffery Kingston who is a scholar of Japan and has lived there since 1987 explains how this is possible: "The Japanese, from a young age, are socialized to put group interest ahead of individual interest. Many criticize them for deference to authority, abundant rules and conformity, but this is the fabric of social cohesion that keeps Japan together".


This would so not happen in South Africa, I'm mortified to say.

In adventure racing our team is a micro-community where everything we do within this team is for team benefit, not for personal interest.