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1/10/1958 - Bukavu by Smith Hempstone Jr.

NOT FOR PUBLICATION INSTITUTE OF CURRENT VrORLD AFFAIRS SH January Bukavu Gomorrah Sea Bukavu Belgian Congo Walter S Rogers Institute Current World Affairs Fifth Avenue New York N Y Dear Rogers Bukavu shares Nairobi reputation being naughtiest Africa European cities Not blatant Chamber Commerce drumbeater course would maintain either match historic jewels Afro Arab seaports Djibouti ogadiscio But comes apartheid Bukavu supposed quite shucks Lake Kivu whose waters reflect Bukavu ro6fs began quite recently being discovered Count Ad01f Goetzen officer service Kaiser European settlement began seven years later Lieutenant Tondeur He killed eaten later fifteen years before local tribes uncle accepted Belgian administration Th slowly there white residents It known Costermansville memory government inspector proved mouthful local Africans government officially changed native designation Bukavu everything beautiful bilharzia crocedile g0odclimate dramatic backdrop smouldering volcanees wreathed mountain peaks statuesque Watusi riors pygmies gorillas All needed money And World War II brought Copper consuls ranium earls diamond directors began flinging strikingly modern villas peninsulas which Lake Kivu around Bukavu theaters hotels restaurants florists lingerie shops mushro0med overnight By European population BUKAVU S CATHEDRA reached preSent estimate native villages housing Undr pleasure people sprang On theflanks European But European apartheld continues dominate shores There isn0ne feeling impermanent white colony rising bubble smells sounds ancient SH African Bukavu white native quarters grown relation purpose serving white As approach north following twist through mountains along Bukavu looks satisfactory enough pleasure The first thing modernistic cathedral dominating small Then drops pastel residences hidden groves trees The smooths tarmac flowered landscaping replaces You climb small faced symbol sophistication traffic light After negotiating obstacle yourself Avenue Royale This lined street perhaps terminates golden flame onument other bronze jumble labelled onument Aviateurs In between either Avenue Royale Bukavu And composed Taverne Royale restaurant Sitoconil travel agency Hotel etropole Garage Dodge Dumoulin travel agency Iusee Geologie Place Royale government offices Hotel Leopold Postes office Congo Tours inerva Hotel Cine Hotel Royal Residence Banque Congo Belge Garage Chevrolet Banque Belge Afrique AI travel agency Your first impression everyone Bukavu American enjoys careening avenue miles The second impression after safely navigated parking place going holding money Bukav Hotel prices least higher East Africa The hotels Kenya instance charge about double board At Bukavu pride storey Hotel Royal Residence finally obtained basement without small hotels night And expensive The continental breakfast cents person The standard lunch without recourse carte costs cents Dinner basis about Here prices commodities offered Bukavu windows restaurants caseless record player frankfurters electric Kraft cheese cents Pops LP record tomato cents Rolleicord camera Heinz baked beans cents Gaevert cents tinned dozen oysters bottle scotch strawberries cents chocolate snails anhattan shirt tournedos Rossellini quart cents SH large carafe leather cased ashtray Ford sedan truck 10olO local cigarettes cents Old Gold cigarettes cents drink cents lipstick cents movie ticket gallon cents So cheap living Bukavu basement strawberries scotch whisky local cigarettes AndI suppose there worse fates world As starter I called manager Sabena office going This Bukavu second annual Christmas festival The festival aimed attracting local rather international tourists The schedule which showed included exhibit water skiing tournament native dancing ouple formal balls parade Sabena would happy shown round their expense He picked phone travel agencies A minutes later fashionably dressed young arrived shoved Ford despite protestS fractured French I skulking about nearby shops propelled breakneck speed Avenue Royale This briskly efficient personage quietly gurgling coughing fumes burned rubber front gentl obviously proprietor travel agency Festival sneered festival With copper coffee prices Congo money spend festivals We Christmas festival nothing Go dancing exhibit That Don They there bilharzia Iknow better These He returned Presse Africaine I assuming completed dodged through traffic safety basement The entirely European exhib itors uncrowded undistin guished Several artists showed KABARE DANCERS could paint acceptably style their mentors The shoes showed origia talent The dancing bette Belgian penchant organization SH bloom The dancing which Kabare above Bukavu consisted representative groups seven tribes Kivu district A display gymnastics followed singing quartet Then seven greups shuffled around accempanimnt drummers As memory barbaric splendor impact because Belgian efficials dutifully ejected dancers obviously nipping bottle drummers tried cadge cigarettes crowd dancers shees socks There about Europeans resent perhaps natives Belgian ladies upholstered accompanied broods young The looked tired Nobody looked We grand We dinner hotel where being solitary splendor Finally seine started sawing fiddle black typem peared began manuevering their ladies about This illusion abandoned gaity somewhat dissipated which arrived Sabena Since Sabena sponsor appeared likely attendance datory those wouldbe their looked posters outside movie Treasure Island precarious shaft The thing Christmas Eve apparently reveil This women cosmetic state which Belgians Cengo night swilling bubbly stuff paying their inner otherwise indulging William Tecumseh Sherman called spicuous consumption By intensive reconnaisance place where although reveillon reigned possible dinner relatively modest After poked heads several doors reveilloning going Not Each restaurant seemed selling about three dinners idnight crowded while tavern keepers sobbed their chablis And minute seemed directed stores lingerie duccas In Bukavu reputation naughtiness tarnished seemed about bourgeoise might expect projection Belgium Sincerely Smith Hemstoe Jr Received New York