Tonight we’re almost at the end of our journey. We’ve reached Zambia, our penultimate destination. I can’t believe we’re almost there!
Zambia is a landlocked country spanning central and Southern Africa bordering eight other countries, including our final destination, Zimbabwe. Zambia is home to 73 ethnic groups, and one of only two only places in the world where the currency is named the “kwacha”. (The other country is Malawi. Thanks Norma for pointing this out!) Kwacha translates to "dawn”, and the name was picked following Zambia’s independence from Britain in 1964.
From 1972 to 1991 Zambia was a one-party state, but has now transitioned peacefully to a multiparty democracy. Last week Zambia saw successful elections and a new Zambian president, Hakainde Hichilema was elected on the back of policies promising to expand copper production.
Why expand copper production? Well, Zambia is one of the world’s largest exporters of copper making up at least 75% of Zambia’s exports. Even though this is a gigantic amount of copper, Zambia’s copper production has stagnated over the past few decades. This is not ideal in a world addicted to electronics.
The Victoria Falls Bridge spanning the Zambezi in Zambia
Other than a uniquely named currency and copper mines, Zambia is known for its namesake river, the River Zambezi. The Zambezi provides water, power and food for Zambia. The Zambezi is dammed to form Lake Kariba, the world’s largest man-made lake by volume. It’s 223 km long.
The Zambezi is also massively popular with tourists in Zambia, most notably for the world-famous Victoria Falls on the border with Zimbabwe. The Victoria Falls are the largest single sheet falling waterfall in the world. Other Zambezi river highlights include a sedate cruise or, if you’re completely insane and want to join the likes of Will Smith and Ewan McGregor, you can bungee jumping from the Victoria Falls bridge. At 111 metres high, let’s hope the rope is well maintained.
Zambia is one of the few places in the world where you’ll find termite hills the size of houses and is also, unrelatedly the birthplace of Zamrock. Zamrock, often described as the combined sound of Jimi Hendrix and James Brown is a genre of psychedelic rock that emerged from Zambia in the 1970s. It’s really rather good.
See you tomorrow, for our trip over the border into Zimbabwe.
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