Of course I had forgotten about Angola’s farewell sting. At the airport, once safely past immigration, security and the shops, the “Financial Police” gather at enclosed cubicles for the final shakedown.

“How much dollars you have?”

“Not much…”  I said, fanning the notes in my wallet.

The policeman nodded intensely, eyes fixed on my wallet, “And Angolan currency?”

That was when it all came back to me. Damn. “Just this,” I flourished the 500 Kwanza note.

He relaxed and smiled, “It is not allowed, I have to take it.” He pointed out the eight point letters taped to the wall of the cubicle, as another passenger was searched for currency alongside me.

Harrumph, I was annoyed at being caught in such a sorry scam. “Pity you don’t have any signs outside the airport,” I passed the note to him with the best grace I could muster.

He beamed, gently tugging the grubby note from my fingers, “I am sorry.”

Luanda was its usual charming, mad self. But the vast amounts of oil, etc, money seem to be finally showing in the streets of the capital. Roads and hotels are being upgraded everywhere. Money seems to be flowing so freely, I expected to see handfuls of it in the still hugely deficit sewer system.

Without chancing my luck at a real restaurant, I went to a simple eatery where I had a prego roll, salad and handful of prawns. It is Luanda’s equivalent of a fast food joint – plastic chairs bolted to the floor, but that meal still set me back $56. Oh, and I also had two beers.

I have been coming to Angola since 1991, and it never fails to shock, horrify and fascinate. This time, it was the unprecedented spread of banking to all corners. I went to Angola to do a corporate assignment – to photograph progress at the massive gas plant being built at Soyo, where the great Congo River flows into the Atlantic. There seemed to be a modernist single storey bank building on every corner.

Angolans were being trained and employed by the multinationals as artisans. One can imagine this previously forgotten corner of Africa one day being an oasis of growth and prosperity.  If, that is, the lovely culture of sanctioned graft  - and the much larger nemesis of top-level corruption – can be defeated.

The images here are from one breakfast at the company canteen where I dined for some days.

1 of 3. Breakfast, very large corporate canteen, Soyo, Angola

2 of 3. Breakfast, very large corporate canteen, Soyo, Angola

3 of 3. Breakfast, very large corporate canteen, Soyo, Angola