Okavango II

This is a bit of a cop-out, because I'm still not done... In fact, I've barely begun. But I'm about to leave on a trip and I'm not sure when I'll be able to write more, so I thought I'd post what I've got.

My trip began with the 6:00 a.m. bus to Maun. When you wait on the edge of the road in the dark, cold, early morning, you could be anywhere at all. Any train platform, any bus stop, on any road in all the world. Headlights illuminate the bush in an alien monochrome, but other than that it is just dark, an anonymous temperature that rules out only the most equatorial of locations, the only distinguishing features the dry subtle smell, the sounds of the birds. The bus pulled up – one of the small ones, rickety and wheezing with drafts through a thousand gaps, barely able to push 90km/hr, the front piled high with checker-print plastic bags and tattered duffels. I slept, having seen the pale sunrise over the Kalahari enough times already.

In Maun, a stop at the internet cafe to send off some last-minute emails for work, and then off to the airport to meet my relatives. Their plane was late, and I sat around waiting and chatting with R, our guide. In true closely-linked-small-town fashion, R is both a friend of the Princeton alumnus that set up my position here, and the brother-in-law of C, a prominent Ghanzi landowner that has been helping out with Huiku. R is also friends with many of my other Maun acquaintances... What can I say, it's a small community. He's originally from Kenya, which I would say is the archetypal country for Rugged Safari Guides, and he fills the position to a tee: sun-baked, cigarette-smoking, swearing constantly with the words “bloody” and “damn,” white-streaked wavy grey hair, a compact energetic form, and – incongruously – a pair of Crocs on his feet. I could have suggested someone a bit younger, a bit more modern, but what's a safari without a colourful guide? He's full of casual stories about near-death-in-the-bush; he is disdainful of tourists, researchers, and the modern world; he spouts out politically incorrect opinions about everything under the sun, most definitely including Africa; and he is a bit of a nutter. He also has an encyclopedic knowledge of the bush, gained through experience and conversation rather than hours bent over a book. I myself have learned almost everything I know from books, and it was interesting to me how he knew everything there was to know about the animals we encountered, yet nothing about phenomena which are textbook standards for Bio 101. Different sets of knowledge, gained in different ways, but with significant overlap... I think he was also a bit surprised by what I knew, since I obviously haven't spent years as a guide in the bush.

Sitting in the airport, however, we talked mostly about my work at Kuru, until the plane landed and interrupted all conversation. My relatives (aunt, uncle, 2 cousins) arrived laden with bags to donate to a local street kids' center,* and ready for their African experience. Faster than I could have imagined possible, we piled into R's Land Cruiser and started barrelling down the highway – canvas flapping, raised safari seats bouncing, no seatbelts, dodging donkeys. Straight from the tarmac to the bush. I imagine they felt a bit shell-shocked.

Soon we left the paved road for the slightly calmer gravel road into Moremi, and within an hour or two we were seeing giraffes and elephants on the side of the road. It's always exciting to see the first one; the crossover point where you leave the drive and enter the adventure. My relatives, needless to say, were very excited.

We drove for 4-5 hours through Moremi, the bush gradually changing from the low, dry bush of Maun to the taller trees along the gravel road – the sunlight low and golden, dust filtering slowly through the branches and autumn-tinted leaves. It's not quite the raging fire of “The Foliage” in Vermont, but there's a definite sunset tinge to the leaves at this time of year. Further into Moremi, the trees get larger and more twisted, the acacias all but disappear, patches of reeds interrupt the grass. As we drove through a large open field dotted with weirdly misshapen dead trees, boughs scattered across the ground like bones, R (the guide) explained that once, decades ago, there was a very high flood and this field was actually a lagoon for several years. The trees drowned and now their bleached shapes stand alone on the plain, used as elephant scratching-posts or roosts for tawny eagles. The area can still flood seasonally, but it was dry when we went through.

*Bana Ba Letsatsi (Children of the Sun)