All I know about Swaziland is that the country is ruled by a king who marries a new wife every year. Or something like that. There must be a dedicated automated phone service in Swaziland just for his divorces:
"Welcome to the Divorce Express Service.
Please select service.
Press 1 if you are seeking a divorce for the first time.
Press 2 if this is not your first divorce.
Press 3 if you are the king. Your divorce is granted. No explanation necessary.
However, please select service for your most recent ex-wife.
Press 1 to throw her in prison.
Press 2 to exile her to another country.
Press 3 to exchange her for her younger sister.
The King's you-must-marry-me-and-be-my-number-(insert number here)-bride face, via BBC.
Just kidding.
Anyway... Swaziland is tiny so a road trip around the country will probably take 30 minutes. Which leaves a lot of time to catch up on some reading.
Books I'm taking with me:
The Almost Moon by Alice Sebold
Skinner's Drift by Lisa Fugard
Amazing Disgrace by James Hamilton-Paterson
Not sure which one I'll start with, but so far I'm feeling the pull of the ghost of Manila, James Hamilton-Patterson. Amazing Disgrace sounds hilariously absurd. My friend Trish, a newspaper editor and book reviewer who recommended the book, was telling me about a scene where the main character is visiting this famous conductor whose memoirs he wants to ghostwrite. At one point, apparently, he excuses himself from the dinner table and mistakes a cupboard for the toilet... It reminded me of that scene in William Boyd's Stars and Bars, where the guy from the auction house makes faces at the daughter of a prospective client, thinking she's blind because she's always wearing dark glasses, but it turns out she's not.
I love absurd. I'm from flipland, as Ninfa calls it. It's the original Absurdistan.
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