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What can you say about Botswana? It's kind of hard to believe how great it is.
Sometimes it's said that Botswana doesn't have the problems of other African countries because it's 98% the same ethnic group (the Tswana). But that misunderstands Botswana's history. It used to be divided into 10 or so "tribes" that were often at war with each other, but in the mid 1800s, when they saw the Afrikaners taking over South Africa, they kind of artificially decided that they were all one ethnic group. In fact, the word "tswana" means "the same" and the ethnic term "BaTswana" means, "they are the same," and BoTswana (often written that way in Africa) means country of the Tswana.
Botswana is a very large, mostly empty country with perhaps the most beautiful game reserves and nature preserves in Africa. The populated part is basically along a road that runs from Mafikeng in South Africa to Bulawayo in Zimbabwe, just a few miles in from South Africa, and in the early 1800s, Botswana was essentially a string of merchant princes' cities who controlled the trade between South Africa and what would become Zimbabwe. Many Tswana towns were bigger than Cape Town up until the mid 1800s.
Oh, yeah, the Tswana were historically obsessed with law and their legal system. If you went to the Zulu kingdom in 1800, you would have found people preparing for war constantly. If you went to BoTswana in 1800, you would have found much of the town sitting around in court arguing cases, day after day, after day.
Very unusual country and people.
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