Culture is the part of a journey that rewards reading beforehand. Below, country by country, what is expected of a guest and what the year is built around.

Dancers in colored wraps move barefoot on grass wearing rows of seed pod ankle bells.
Culture

Rwanda Culture and Etiquette Guide

Language, greetings, the words used for what happened here, and several rules that carry a legal penalty rather than a raised eyebrow.
Aug 18, 2026 · 3 min read
A craftsman shapes a length of pale timber with a chisel at an open air workbench.
Culture

Namibia Culture and Etiquette Guide

Namibia chose English as its official language in 1990, and almost nobody grew up speaking it, which shapes every conversation you will have.
Aug 18, 2026 · 2 min read
People sit on benches under a thatched shelter while a woman reads from a paper.
Culture

Botswana Culture and Etiquette Guide

Get the words for the country, the people and the language right, and Botswana will notice; get them wrong and it will notice that too.
Aug 18, 2026 · 3 min read
A small plastered hut with a corrugated roof and a wooden door stands among trees.
Culture

Zambia Culture and Etiquette Guide

Zambia runs on greeting people properly, and a visitor who learns that one habit will be treated differently for the rest of the trip.
Aug 18, 2026 · 3 min read
Two men in conversation beneath the colonnade of the Al-Azhar courtyard in Cairo.
Culture

Egypt Culture and Etiquette Guide

A conservative, hospitable and very sociable country where dress, photography and the word for tipping are the three things visitors most often get wrong.
Aug 16, 2026 · 2 min read
Five women in beaded headdresses and orange and blue Xhosa dress stand in a row.
Culture

South Africa Culture and Etiquette Guide

Twelve official languages, a country that talks openly about its own history, and a set of courtesies that are easy to learn and matter more than usual.
Aug 16, 2026 · 2 min read
Men in embroidered caps sit talking on the stone bench under the tree at Mkunguni Square in Lamu.
Culture

Kenya Culture and Etiquette Guide

Greetings are not optional in Kenya, and the coast has its own rules. What to say, what to wear, and when not to take the photograph.
Aug 14, 2026 · 3 min read
Three four-wheel-drive vehicles on a wide salt plain, the low sun reflected in the wet crust.
Culture

Afar: Human Origins, Salt and Fire in Ethiopia's Rift

The Afar Depression in northeastern Ethiopia holds one of the deepest records of human origins anywhere, alongside a working salt trade, an acid hydrothermal field and a persistent lava lake. It is also a region the US, UK and Canadian governments currently advise against.

Aug 8, 2026 · 10 min read