How to Barter for Paradise by Michael Wigge

Author:Michael Wigge
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781628738797
Publisher: Skyhorse
Published: 2013-12-24T00:00:00+00:00

A Pipe in Honor

Back in Arusha, I go through several days of doubt in my venture along with five days of sore leg muscles. I’ve been walking on a treadmill for weeks: I haven’t made one trade and I’m still in Tanzania, which is not good for bartering. A solution occurs to me: the mothership! The state always jumps in when one of its citizens needs help somewhere in the world. Luckily, I’m not in physical, mental, or financial crisis, but I am stuck in a real bartering emergency. I sit at the computer and research the German embassy in Tanzania. I find the honorary consul’s email address and relay my concerns in an email. Shortly after, he replies with an invitation to meet. We become friendly quickly, and Ulf empathizes with my bartering crisis; it’s obvious that he truly considers himself to be responsible for me.

When I ask where in Tanzania I could put my bartering idea into practice, he first directs me to the past and the German-African exchange in colonial times. Colonialism is never a true exchange; it’s certainly not a platform for equal rights, since it always serves the interests of the colonial power. Even if a railroad comes out of it, that part doesn’t change.

Then he tells me that the more recent history of the country is marked by many crises. The Tanzanian government traded the entire coffee harvest for oil to keep Tanzania’s industry running. According to him, it is a matter of a huge amount of bartered goods that dwarfs any personal exchange. I and my few gold pieces probably couldn’t keep up.

A true bartering culture in the private realm really only exists among the countless tribes in the country, as they often live far from big cities and have no real infrastructure as we know it. Additionally, bartering often has an important role in their traditions. That sounds very interesting. Maybe I could pick up my bartering blitz again among the tribes in Tanzania, I think. I ask Ulf what he thinks. As we talk, we are standing in front of an official gold seal with the inscription “Federal Republic of Germany.” Ulf leads me through his piece of land, which is official sovereign territory of my country. Then he shows me his coffee plantation, because when Ulf is not busy being the honorary consul, he deals in coffee.

“I could help you,” he says suddenly. To my great surprise, he offers me two things: coffee for my labor and a loan of his jeep for a bartering trip to the tribes of Tanzania.

I immediately accept and am beyond happy that my bartering blitz is back on track.

A day later, I stand before a hundred sacks of coffee that each weigh about 130 pounds and each need to be carried by me to the truck standing about eighty feet away. This is my side of the “sack of coffee for labor” trade. My mood is immediately dampened. I’ve been dealing with acute back pain since the beginning of my trip, and it’s finally just begun to go away.

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