Friday night
Iain Harris
Cira had been insistent. Be ready at eight, looking great and prepared for the best of Luanda’s nightlife. Eight? That’s ridiculously early for a Saturday night out, I object, forgetting that when the party queen of Luanda speaks, you just say yes. So 8pm, and I’m looking flash in porn green and pinstripes, chilling out on the couch, listening to local grooves and discovering the joys of Cuca beer and Marlboro.
The queen and her entourage are inevitably and royally late. They breeze in at 10.30 and wake me from the dozy comfort of the sofa I’d relented to a couple of hours earlier. We’re going to bingo, they tell me. Not exactly what I had in mind for my first club night in Angola’s capital city, a city with a reputation for extravagant parties. And I cannot imagine this lavishly outfitted crew standing around a table getting excited about a bunch of numbers. But I remember not to question the queen.
Soon we’re pulling up outside the city’s first and newly opened Wimpy. I’m told that it is the mandatory hors d’oeuvre to the clubs. And while Cira orders burgers all round with some deft finger snapping and authoritative gesticulation, I ruminate over the fact that it’s a Saturday night and I’m about to eat a $20 grease patty before heading off to play bingo!
It’s around midnight when we arrive at a very swank spot with beautiful big wooden doors and a queue just gunning to get at those bingo boards. The place is even called Bingo.
Bingo, it turns out, is one of Luanda’s best nightclubs, and far, far from a blue-rinse- brigade bingo bazaar. It’s spacious with plush decor, wine stewards, a big sound system blasting kizomba music, and loads of beautiful people. But the dance floor is empty. It reminds me of a junior school disco, with everybody hanging out just off the dance floor, waiting for everyone else to start dancing.
After a while a couple of honky foreigners take to the floor and do some kizomba moves very poorly. Soon the floor fills up with locals intent on salvaging the national dance from this uncoordinated although daring couple. Cira drags me on to the floor for a whirl. It’s full enough for me to almost blend in, but I still succeed in failing abysmally.
Next up is Miami Beach on the Ilha de Luanda, the peninsula that is home to the beaches and a host of restaurants and clubs. Open air with an international vibe and pop chart music, this at least is something I can comfortably throw my body into. An array of local beers gives my body suitably fluid motion and I look much cooler than the other honkies, mostly American, whose lack of co- ordination skills must rank as a wonder of the world.
Meanwhile, the queen and her partner, Marco, have escaped to an old deserted nightclub called Aphrodisiac, just a couple hundred metres up the beach. And just as a bit of R&R is about to get serious, an AK-47 is cocked behind them and a policeman demands to know why they are here in this out-of-bounds spot. No explaining is going to rescue them from the inevitable fine, so they just whip out $50 and two minutes later they’re back at Miami hankering to go home.
It’s around five when I get home. I put on some kizomba and spend an hour practicing in front of the mirror. I’ve got to get this right if I want to get anywhere in this town. Best start now!
Iain Harris is a freelance journalist who writes about jazz and travel