Here are a few of my experiences:
1. On short finals the ATC requests that we confirm safe on the ground as he can no longer see us or the runway over the tall elephant grass from his elevated position in the tower!
2. Setting up for the ILS at 5000' in the clag atc reports Cloud overcast 4000' and scattered at 1000', we execute the missed approach at 250' agl still in solid clag, request "confirm scattered cloud at 1000'" (thinking to myself in a bemused fashion what the
?)??!!! Affirm comes the response, set up second approach and on the brink of commencing the second go around we get the runway visual. Confirming we have the runway visual ATC response: "rojjer, cled to lend" (roger, cleared to land). Taxiing to park, another aircraft joins overhead with the same weather report!!! Go figure.
3. File a flight plan over the phone, get to the field, request start only to be told they have no flight plan and I have to come to the tower and file a flight plan. I try objecting on the radio only to be met with the dreaded African silence treatment (you know the kind where you call ATC for hours as you pass through their FIR's only to get a "confirm crew, pax, a/c type?" question from atc just as you are about to exit there airspace so they can bill you for overflight clearances). Back to the story, I eventually give up, tell the pax to take it easy for 20 minutes and go file the flight plan....again! I must say, I never made that mistake again. Always only file at the field with the relevant personnel.
4. This one happened to crew I worked with and not me so perhaps allow a little poetic license:
ATC instructs them to execute one orbit to the left for traffic avoidance. Being the good crew that they are, they happily oblige and shortly thereafter they are cleared for the approach to land only to be met by a multitude of army and police personnel demanding why they flew over the kings/presidents palace, prohibited airspace, transgression of which is punishable by undefined jail sentence until it can be established if you were attempting some sort of coup. Anyway, the crew profess innocence and argue a lot saying they were instructed to orbit due to possible conflict with other traffic thereby trying to avoid a mid air collision and all end up in a smouldering head over the local market. The captain by now, bless him, has a complete sense of humour failure about this 'harrassment", throws all his toys out the cot and promptly gets arrested. In jail he is instructed to write a letter of apology to the King for disturbing his peaceful afternoon. He refuses, spends one night in an African jail and suffice to say by 6am next morning his letter of apology was forthcoming. African jails are not for the faint hearted.
5. I was once fined $300 for having a passenger board the aircraft without his pasport being stamped. Try as I might, I could not convince the chaps that customs and immigration are not my responsibility but there's and that I just drive the airplane. I paid the fine. The boss was a little miffed to say the least.
Lessons learnt
In Africa you always smile, be polite, be humble, wish everyone a wonderful day and pay your "fees" without making a fuss or cross examining their calculations. Generally they respond in kind and call you Captain or Commander even with two bars on your shoulders.Any other approach gets you nowhere fast. That is a fact as far as I am concerned.