Note to readers: We do not have photos to enhance the blog for the next few entries (May 21 and 22, particularly), because in cities such as Maun, and even in some villages, taking photos in public, especially of shops and public buildings, can have negative consequences.

Sunday, May 21: Last night the Botswana national football (soccer for our U.S. friends) team defeated the team from Madagascar in a match that was seen on television by probably the majority of the country's population. The match took place in Gabarone, the Botswana capital and largest city. It seems that the football team has had limited success with international matches until recently, when a coach from Croatia was hired and the team improved dramatically. This afternoon the team will play the national team from the Republic of South Africa, which has historically enjoyed more resources, support and success than Botswana's side. Our reason for mentioning football will become clear in a few more paragraphs.

We reached Maun in the early afternoon. Maun is one of the larger cities in Botswana, so it has several large well-stocked grocery stores, several banks with ATMS (Shakawe, where we will live, has no banks or ATMS), and other businesses and services which are not available in rural areas and villages. We already had been told by some of Jeff's future colleagues in the TOCaDI office that if we want items such as cheese, yogurt, bacon, ham, ice cream, certain types of fresh vegetables, etc. we should bring a cooler and stock up in Maun.

We took a room in the very nice Maun Lodge, located on the outskirts of the city, then did some exploring. Jeff visited Maun during his residence in Botswana a number of years ago, but it has grown considerably since 1994 when he returned to the U.S. A friend of Jeff's from his days in Nata, Isaiah, now lives in Maun. We tracked him down as he was watching the Botswana-RSA football match in a crowded bar, and agreed to return to pick him up for dinner at about 6 p.m.

We drove to our hotel room to unpack, and watched the final half hour of the football match on satellite television. At the end of regulation the match was tied, so the teams had to proceed to a shootout to determine a winner. With the room door open we could hear the reactions of people throughout the city as each team took its turn alternating shots. Botswana was ahead by one goal as South Africa took the final shot--and missed. The city exploded in cheering and "hooting" (drivers using their vehicle horns).

We left immediately to pick up Isaiah, and were able to drive through the center of downtown on the main street to get back to the bar, but each minute the number of pedestrians and vehicles in the street increased as people flocked to the area to celebrate. By the time we retrieved Isaiah and tried to drive to the restaurant, the celebration was so raucous and so many people were dancing in the street that all traffic came to a standstill. Young men (and a few young women) who had been drinking all afternoon began to climb onto any stationary vehicle, including ours. There was a heavy and visible police presence on the street, but they seemed not to have anticipated the action, and began a bit too late to try to gain control. Jeff was able to maneuver our vehicle through a parking lot, shake off our uninvited riders, and get clear of the crowd. We decided to return to the Lodge restaurant for dinner, instead of trying to eat downtown as originally planned, because it appeared that a full-scale riot might break out. (It didn't.)

The streets were full of revelers until the early morning hours on Monday, but apparently no damage was done to businesses and buildings. There probably were some arrests, but we didn't hear of any serious injuries related to the street "party."

We have now driven about five thousand miles since leaving Johannesburg on April 30.