You Can Do Better

Tonight I am sitting on my bed, watching the wall for a while. It’s starting to get late, nearly one, and most of my neighbors are sleeping and silent by this early hour of morning. Across the courtyard I can hear a large group of guys, chattering and intermittently breaking into whooping and chanting. At home, this is the kind of noise that might accompany some frat boy downing an unusually large portion of beer in a single go – tonight though I am nervous, because I am worried that they are beating up a friend of mine, who has misbehaved and earned himself a number of enemies. The enemies said that tonight would be the night. The rest of the exchange students that know him have gone to bed, leaving him to his own devices, but I can’t get the imagined image of him out of my head, walking slowly across the courtyard to see what’s up, tall, chin upheld, his face as always glowing like a little boy surprised by delight.

Shortly after our arrival in this country, we were ushered into the barricaded rooms that are the American Embassy. In an average conference room, with nondescript jokings and many helpful tips, it was mentioned to us that for as long as we remain in this country, we are the faces and breath of America. We are more than ambassadors, dipping our toes in and out of a foreign pool with decorated parties and handshakes – we are America incarnate.

Most of us brushed this off; at any rate it has not guided our behavior. We have pitter-patted about, making our own decisions. After all, we are not America. We are not responsible for the things that presidents do.

This afternoon I was kneeling for several hours on the tile next to the bathtub, my arms propped on the edge, filling and refilling it with water and kneading and grinding the clothes around in the suds. It was thunderstorming outside and the street was a river; the speed bumps were rapids. Each time I rung a shirt I had to stand up slowly, unwinding and smoothing it as I patter-pattered across the empty common room, and arrange it to hang on the thick metal poles that cross the windows. I had calices developing below my fingers and the good, hardworking feeling that pioneer-work in movies always exudes. Sometimes below the water I would find a resistant dirt strain and beat it out. Sometimes I would pause and lean on the tub, watching bubbles popping and listening to people shuffling around the building. That is being in Botswana.

I have a hard time with people who say they hate America, hate being American. I feel towards the US like I do towards some of my friends who, momentarily dingy with the unkind things they’ve said or irresponsible things they’ve done, I nevertheless believe to be of good stock. They go through phases of mal-action, but these are transient.

And what about Botswana? Today, a range of cases – an attentive waiter at dinner, a hostess who wouldn’t help us. A man who loves visiting Portland, a man who never calls back. A helpful waiter at drinks, a jolly taxi driver who tried to beguile and jostle us out of our fair price. Men noisy in the courtyard. Girls peacefully around me sleeping in every room. A friend earlier, stopping by because he was worried about a potential fight, frightened; leaving, defiant, dismissive. Never back down, never surrender. I can agree with the sentiment, but at the same time, I feel we are responsible for not adding more suffering to the world when we can. It’s a mixed bag. I can’t say that Botswana enraptured me automatically; in honesty I probably wouldn’t choose to be friends with it if we didn’t already have mutual companions. With this obligated friendship, then, I feel tender but peeved towards Botswana. Even being slightly incompatible, I want to get along. But it’s a little difficult. Despite being friendly, I've often suspected that she doesn’t ultimately care about me. But give it a little time: she may sometimes be in the wrong, but she's starting to do the small things - saving me a seat, asking after my family.

Pictures of Friends from Emilie's Bday Party

Emilie and Kelly (L to R)
Emilie and Sam aka "Some Cash"
"Scud," Emilie, and Jon
KT, our next door neighbor, and Emilie

Where is "SA & Safari Photos 1"?

Well I'll tell you where "SA & Safari Photos 1" is: it is at the end. I don't know why it's down there - I did it the right way to be in order, it just ignored me. You should go in numerical order through the photo groups, if you want to follow the chronological trail.

SA & Safari Photos 2

One of the prison guards' bars on Robben's Island
Cape Town, South Africa
Nelson Mandela's prison cell
Robben's Island, Cape Town, South Africa
View along the waterfront
Cape Town, South Africa
View from my playground sun-tanning windbreak
Cape Town, South Africa

SA & Safari Photos 3

Late afternoon mountains from the bus window
South Africa
Grain
Malealea, Lesotho
Valley view
Malealea, Lesotho
Jeans drying
Malealea, Lesotho

SA & Safari Photos 4

Someone's little place - Malealea, Lesotho
A boys board game
Malealea, Lesotho
Our guide shows us the rock paintings
Malealea, Lesotho
Rock paintings
Malealea, Lesotho

SA & Safari Photos 5

Butterfly friend during a lunch break - Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Botswana
The crew with their safari faces on
Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Botswana
A cheetah at 30 feet
Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Botswana
Maribu Stork?
Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Botswana

SA & Safari Photos 6

Antelopes in Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Botswana
A turtle!
Central Kalahari Game Reserve, Botswana
Zebras in a muddy sunset
Nxai Pan, Botswana
A baobab tree
Nxai Pan, Botswana

SA & Safari Photos 1 - START HERE

Sunset from my dorm room balcony:



Tasting the local brew in Soweto, Johannesburg
Birds flying past Robben Island, Cape Town, SA
View towards Cape Town from Robben Island

Safari

After a locally raucous weekend, some discussion about whether our safari hats should be worn on the plane, and one day of malaria pills, we took off in a rattling hired minibus to the airport. This same minibus would have its engine removed and sitting in the footspace of the first passenger row when we returned, only to be quickly dropped back into the floor before it drove us home.

The plane ride was very short, and we arrived in Maun in the evening with the slowly baking desert air to greet us. It felt much like the inner West except without cacti. Our camp housed us in tents, with a permanent bathroom with real hot showers, my first since Lesotho, which were open to the air and visiting birds. At night, these facilities turned quickly into a horror show - we realized that the pitched straw ceiling was completely covered with spiders, that bullfrogs lurked like gangstas in the toilet stalls, leaning over their ominous shadows, that huge hissing unknown creatures the size of birds divebombed your head, and that the trash cans in each toilet stall rattled and rustled mysteriously as you gingerly and jumpily tried to go about your business.

The next day a beast of a Land Rover pulled up to drive us out. We were going to the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, then to Nxai Pan (N-tsk-i), for safari. We loaded in. Five million hours of driving later we stopped for lunch, five further million and we reached the gate of the reserve. Ruster, our guide, had the voice of Louis Armstrong and a huge scar across his face from when a leopard tried to eat him. "From here," he announced, "the roads get really bad." We considered lying prone on the roof. It started thunderstorming. Eventually we reached our camp.

That night, as we sat around the fire waiting for dinner, a lion roared nearby. 3 kilometers, said Ruster. We reapplied mosquito repellent and chilled. Roar. 1 kilometer, Ruster said. They are heading right towards us, the cook said. Probably on the road, Ruster said. They like the road at night because it's easier to walk on. Let's go find them.

We leaped aboard the Land Rover and it roared into action. We drove down the road a bit, around and then - LIONS! Two huge males, young still, one with a stunningly beautiful black mane, like the embodiment of night omnipotent. They weaved a direct line off and on the winding road, then short-cutted through our camp before we could reach it. Off into the dark.
When you wake up to go to the bathroom tonight, Ruster said, shine the flashlight around for eyes. If you see any go back in the tent.

The next few days were game drives, in Central Kalahari and then over to Nxai Pan. We saw a cheetah at thirty feet, unhappy but unfazed, our first morning; loads of antelope, jackals playing amongst the antelope. Giraffes. A puff adder (from the car hallelujah). Meercats which are significantly less cute once you've seen their tv show. Lots of huge storks and prehistoric birds. Some zebra and elephants in Nxai Pan. Then back to Maun.

Trip two was the one that my travelling compatriots have been freaking out about since a few two many runs through Google. Mokoros are low wooden (now plastic) canoes which are powered and maneuvered by pole, like Venicean gondolas. The passenger lies propped up on little cushions, face perhaps a foot above the water, watching reeds go by as the poler navigates down clear channels. The fear, of course, was that hippos can chomp your boat in half with a single bite, and crocs can flip it over with a tail whack. However, we stayed in narrow, shallow channels where neither of these creatures have friends to visit, so we were fine. We camped back from the water and grassy marsh a bit, hiked a little, goofed with the teenage polers, and got drenched entirely by rain. Luckily my safari wear was quickdry (holla, REI). Saw some elephants on the way back to land.

Our transport vehicle back to Maun was an open air safari Jeep, and from the back of it fell my program director's wallet, which he had unfortunately placed in a back pocket. This happened perhaps a minute into the drive but was realized 45 minutes later, requiring a painful backtracking. Nearly at the water's edge we found the wallets protective plastic bag, neatly placed atop a bush, with no wallet. Evidently someone had snatched it. Our drivers recalled polers from their village a minute away, and they were accompanied by every other available man (rra - sir, borra in aggregate), some of the women bringing five-gallon jugs of water back on their heads, and some older children. Borra CSI set in - footprints were analyzed, everyone's treads were compared. Darkness came and we began to get hungry. We snuck back to the cooler looking for Tennis Cookies but only found an empty apple bag listlessly floating - foiled! The tread analysis continued. An elder rra got extremely agitated, rightly fearing the impact this would have on their tourist flow, and lectured the lesser borra. None of their treads matched the supposed culprits. Footprints from no where near the crime scene were added to the mix. Our driver had his "goodness gracious" face on. Finally, we gave up, a bad taste left in our mouth after a pleasant outing.

We spent two more days in Maun, then headed home to Gaborone.