Friendships and camping

Victoria Falls - from the air, photo taken August 2004

    We have booked our reservations for the July 2012 trip - at least the Zimbabwe part of the trip.  Deposits for the safari camps will have to be paid by September and we will confirm our plane tickets at the same time.  The plan for our South African travel hasn't been worked out yet but it looks like we will fly from Victoria Falls to Johannesburg on July 25, and spend the next ten days along the southern coast from Port Elizabeth to Cape Town.

Friends and camping.

    In 1957, soon after entering Std. VI (8^th grade), my brother and I were approached by David Hayes and asked if we would like to go camping on his grandparents' farm. David and I would soon begin a friendship that has lasted 54 years. David's grandparents owned a farm about 20 miles west of Uitenhage, along the Elands River. It was, at the time, and certainly remains today, one of the most beautiful and picturesque places I have ever known. Without intending to go into a long and complicated story at this point, I still need to provide some back ground to the events that would follow in subsequent years after becoming friends with David and his older brother Charles. 
 
    My dad was an avid hunter. He learned to hunt from his father and from an early age my dad and my grandfather would hunt to put food on the table. The backwoods of Alabama would provide rabbit, turkeys and deer to supplement their often meager provisions. My twin brother and I had learned to shoot and to safely handle firearms at an early age. For our 10^th birthday we were given single-shot, bolt action, .22 caliber rifles and taught basic shooting skills. 

    One of the managers at the Uitenhage Goodyear plant was George Whitehead, who learned of my dad's interest in hunting. It wasn't long before my dad was invited to a weekend hunt at Mountain View Farm, the home of George's parents. It was a successful hunt for my dad who became friends with the Whitehead family. In the next few years he established himself as a competent hunter and an excellent marksman; ultimately providing him with an ever-widening circle of farmers and hunting enthusiasts in the region who would give him opportunities to hunt. His knowledge of and interest in the amazing variety of wildlife in the area grew over the years; as did his circle of friends.
    
    David and Charles Hayes were George Whitehead's nephews. They were the two sons of his sister Hilda Hayes who, along with their older brother Stan, were born and raised on the farm Mountain View. The family had generously suggested to my dad that my brother and I might like to spend a few days on the farm camping and this led to the first of many adventures for the four of us. David was a year younger than we were, and Charles was a year older. David and I became partners in many excursions into the beautiful valley at Mountain View and Charles and John teamed up to try our patience at times, but to always ensure there were no dull moments.

Mountain View Farm - photographed in January 1964.

    It is difficult to adequately describe the farm. It was, in those days, a nine mile (15km) drive on a paved road southwest out of Uitenhage across the Swartkops River to a right turn at Rocklands. A few rural houses and a chicken farm were the most notable features. In the 1950s, Rocklands also featured a wildlife sanctuary of sorts, called Wide Horizons. It displayed a variety of animals in relatively confined fenced areas and cages. By today’s standards Wide Horizons would not have been permitted to operate. Fortunately for its inhabitants, it closed down in the 1960s. Most interesting to me, on the one or two occasions that I stopped there, were the variety of birds we could see, such as peacocks, turkeys and many species of colorful South African birds such as Knysna Louries. 
 
    Much of the gravel road from Rocklands heading in a northwesterly direction is paved now but back then it was a dusty, often badly corrugated, road. About 12 miles (20km) from Rocklands, a short distance after passing the Sand River Dam on the left, we would take an unmarked turn right onto the farm road in the middle of a stand of Eucalyptus (or Blue gum) trees. Through several gates and over cattle grids (guards) the narrow three mile (5km) dirt road from there passed by rounded hills covered with wild proteas (suikerbos) and thick shoulder high shrub vegetation. On the right was ploughed, dry-land cropland, planted with winter wheat, lucerne, maize (corn) and other grains depending on the season. The last mile of the road descended down a steep mountain side with several switchbacks into the Elands River valley. In the distance, about a mile away you could see the small, old traditional Cape Dutch style farmhouse, built here fifty years earlier by George Whitehead. Behind the house, the mountains rise steeply to what is now designated the Groendal Wilderness. It is a wild and remote mountainous area, frequented now mostly by backpackers. There are no roads and only limited 4-wheel drive access.

    After the steep descent into the valley you came to the Elands River and a rocky crossing. When the river was high, as occurred generally once or twice a year, crossing was only done by horseback or by a tractor pulled trailer. The wide valley floor in front of the farmhouse and further south along the valley was dotted with citrus orchards and some deciduous fruits such as apricots. Grandpa Whitehead, we were told, could sample a tangerine or orange from one of his orchards and tell you almost exactly where it was picked. I vividly remember his stories of the troops of baboons that would come into the valley each year and eat his oranges.
    He told us that baboons could count to three but no higher than that. He would build a hide in the orchard and four armed men would go into the hide. One by one three hunters would come out, making their movements obvious to the distant baboon troop. The fourth man would remain in the hide and the baboons would, in due course, venture into the orchard and begin to eat the fruit. They were very destructive because they would pluck one fruit from the tree, take one bite and throw the remainder on the ground. A family of baboons could cause a great deal of damage in a very short period of time. When the apes came within range the fourth armed man could open fire and kill a few of the unsuspecting marauders. This plan would not work if only three men went into the hide and two came out. The monkeys always knew there was one human remaining and they would stay away until he left.

    The presence of baboons was a sure indicator that there were leopards in the area. Over the years, the Whiteheads had shot a number of leopards that would become too attracted to their livestock, but for the most part, leopards sightings in the valley were rare. I can only recall seeing leopard tracks once in the years that we would camp at Mountain View.

   John and I and David and Charles would camp in this valley many times over the next four or five years. Whenever we would ask my father if we could go camping he would insist that we could only go if personally invited by the elder Whiteheads. It wasn't okay that David or Charles would ask us. So we soon developed a “protocol” to conform to my dad's requirement. The four of us boys would decide on dates to go camping and begin making plans; then David would ask his mother to ask his grandparents if it was alright. Within a day or two my dad would get a call from one of the Whiteheads asking if we could come out for a long weekend.

    The Elands River valley is a perfect place for four young boys to camp, and fish and hunt. It is, when not too high from seasonal rain, a crystal clear river with many rocky pools (read swimming holes), ideal for fishing for large-mouth bass. We would often look into the deep pools in the early morning and see bass lurking in the shadows. Consequently a rod and reel was always part of our essential equipment, as was a roll of aluminium (aluminum) foil. We would return to camp with two or three, one to two pound bass, cut the heads and tails off, and fillet them. The two sides, still with scales on them, were put together and the whole was wrapped in foil with a few dabs of butter. The sealed foiled package would be buried in the coals of the camp fire and allowed to bake for 10 to 15 minutes. When done, we would remove it and open the foil package. The flesh would fall away from the skin and the tender meat was easy to pare away from the bone. I can still taste this delicacy as I think about it.

    We usually carried a shotgun with us and from time to time would bag a few pheasant or quail to cook. David or his brother would sometimes borrow a .22 caliber rifle from their grandfather in case we would see a bushbuck or duiker on our wanderings. Both are small African antelope that make good eating. We even had a few exciting night hunts for rabbits and springhares, those rabbit-sized hopping rodents that look like midget kangaroos in the distance in the glare of a powerful flashlight (or “torch”). Springhare hunts would have to attempted on moonless nights. I remember one night when we came across a porcupine and followed it for a while, its sharp white-tipped quills bristling with annoyance at our intrusion.

    Our camping spots along the river were always chosen with care. Although we always took a tent or large canvas or plastic fly-sheet with us for shelter, we rarely used it. On winter (July) nights it was too cold to sleep in a tent. Our sleeping bags, in those days, weren't particularly warm, so we would lay on the ground as close to the fire as we could and sleep there. The first person to get cold enough would reach over and put more logs on the fire to keep the heat “turned on.” On those nights the temperatures would sometimes get down to just above freezing and heavy frosts would cover the grass and fields. 

The only photo I have of Granny Whitehead, (1973) holding my son Graham.

 
    After a cold night on the ground we would often put on our heavy coats and walk to the house where Granny Whitehead would have hot coffee or tea prepared on the wood-fueled cast iron stove in the kitchen. She was the most wonderful, generous and hospitable person you could imagine. I don't believe I ever saw her sitting still. She always seemed to be cooking or sewing, knitting or arranging something. Grandpa George would always greet us with his loud booming voice and you could never meet him in the morning without a shake of his powerful hand. He was in his seventies when we first knew him. He was broad-shouldered and powerfully built and would often saddle up a horse and ride along the river to check on his orchards or his cattle. Together they had settled in this valley, built this farmhouse and raised three children. For most of their years here there had been no electricity. Water was collected from a small mountain stream about half a mile away and was piped by gravity into tanks adjacent to the house. A small staff of dedicated, friendly employees, many of whom had been born here, helped them run the farm. Most were descended from bushmen and had the small stature and fair complexions of that race.

    We would have many adventures on this farm. The Whiteheads were substitutes for the grandparents that my brother and I had left behind in Alabama. I know that my dad, despite his insistence that we always go there by “invitation only” must have been delighted that we had the opportunity to experience the adventures that we had, especially as my mother's alcoholism would continue to grow more difficult to deal with. He would always listen to our stories and laugh when we described some of the things we would get up to.

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    I will tell a few more stories from the farm in my next blog including our run-in with a skunk, and the night we had to leave our camp in a torrential rain as the river began to rise.

Mountain View Farm in 1999. Groendal Wilderness is in the background.

Learning to spell - and other distractions

Visiting Wankie Game Reserve in 1975

My first visit to Hwange Game Reserve was in 1967. I was an entomologist in the Tsetse Control division of the Department of Tsetse and Trypanosomiasis Control, which was part of the Department of Veterinary Services of the Rhodesian (now Zimbabwean) Government. Formerly called "Wankie," this game reserve was established in1928 under the supervision of a 22 year old conservation-minded young man named Ted Davison.  It was to become one of the finest Game Reserves in Africa. Davison's classic book "Wankie:The Story of a Great Game Reserve" was, for many decades, the definitive read for anyone interested in development of Africa's wildlife resources. 


The 14,600 sq.km. (5,637 sq. mile) park is the largest reserve in Zimbabwe.  It has been, perhaps, most noted for it's large population of elephant; drawn here by a series of watering holes established by Davison in the 1930s and 1940s. The western edge of the park is the border of Botswana and the vegetation transitions into the Kalahari desert there. 

Main Camp, Hwange Game Reserve, 1985

The prospect of returning to this unique wildlife preserve is causing me some excitement and that will build over the next 18 months.

Hwange elephant - August 1996

After spending three nights at Imbabala Camp, the African Bush Camps trip outline reads as follows:

 After an early morning activity and brunch, you will depart at 1100hrs to Victoria Falls Airport.
You will be driven east back to Victoria Falls airport, where you will meet your Sefofane Air pilot for your flight to Little Makalolo Camp, Hwange. The flight takes 1 hour, and you land at Makalolo Airstrip situated deep within the park on a private concession.



Little Makalolo, situated in a remote and private concession within the vast Hwange National Park, is one of the few camps built within the Park. Hwange is legendary for its wonderful array of wildlife, particularly the massive herds of elephant and buffalo, and summer sees the large antelope herds migrate onto the plains, closely followed by large predators.

The camp is built on the ground, providing panoramic unique views over the Little Somavundlha Pan with its excellent concentrations of wildlife. Accommodation consists of 6, comfortable tented rooms with en-suite facilities as well as an outdoor shower for those who enjoy showering under the stars. The lighting in the rooms is battery-powered so there is peace and quiet in camp, allowing one to listen to the sounds of the bushveld instead.

The main area has a lounge, pub, plunge pool and dining area where delicious meals are served. While the emphasis is on game drives, night drives and guided walks, well-situated hides or raised viewing platforms provide the ideal manner to while away the lazy midday hours, watching wildlife come down to the waterholes to drink.

There are a number of shallow pans spread throughout the Park, around which wildlife congregates, making for excellent and reliable game viewing. During summer plains game migrate onto the plains, closely followed by their predators. Elephant, Cape buffalo, sable, roan, southern giraffe, blue wildebeest, impala and sometimes even gemsbok (oryx) can be seen here.


This Park is one of the best for predators - lion, leopard, wild dog and cheetah are regularly sighted, along with the smaller African wildcat, serval, honey badger, civet and spotted hyena.

Bird life in the area is prolific, with more than 400 species found, and varied as species frequent teak woodlands as well as those more typical of the drier Kalahari being present.

3 nights at Little Makalolo Camp in a twin bedded tent, with en suite facilities, on an all inclusive basis.

 

Learning to spell - and other distractions

Muir College School Crest

 

My brother John and I had completed 6^th grade at C.A. Donehoo Elementary school in Gadsden, Alabama before traveling to South Africa.  Now, suitably outfitted in our new school uniforms we were to enter Standard 5 at Muir College Boys High School.  In South Africa schooling begins as Kindergarten I (KG 1), followed by KG II, then Standard 1, Std. 2 and so on.  So the seventh year of one’s schooling is Standard V (5). Eventually, in theory, we would finish High School by successfully completing the academic requirements of Standard X (10).  We would then have “matriculated” and moved on to higher education at a University.  In effect, because the U.S. school year ends in June each year and the South African school system ends in December, we would skip half a year, going from Grade 6 to a half year into Grade 7. 

Academic standards between the two school systems were not all that different.  I mostly remember having to catch up with a new history curriculum.  The settlement of the Cape Colony by the Dutch in the 1600s had not been a part of our history lessons in the 6^th grade in Alabama. The names Bartholomew Diaz, Simon Van Der Stel and Jan Van Riebeeck were unfamiliar to us.  A higher standard was demanded in English a stronger emphasis on written essays and reports.  Correct grammar, spelling and punctuation were required, without compromise.  Many words were spelled differently.  Neighbor, labor and just about all words ending in “or” were now to be spelled the old English way; Neighbour, labour, favour, vigour, etc. The transition in Math was not difficult.  In Social Studies we lost a little in the geography of Africa and the United Kingdom but had the upper hand on North American topics.  Generally speaking we were able to fall into the new system pretty easily and it didn’t take long to begin to catch up.

In 1956 South Africa there were two official languages taught in schools; English and Afrikaans.  In English schools Afrikaans was taught as a second language and vice versa in Afrikaans schools.  Afrikaans was derived from the old language spoken by the early Dutch settlers and farmers (“boers”).  A requirement for graduating (or Matriculation) was competence in two languages.  As our parents did not anticipate being in South Africa for more than my dad’s three year contract period we were advised to take Latin classes, knowing that Afrikaans wouldn’t transfer very well to any other country, if and when we were to move again.  So Latin was our second language and we would begin taking Latin in Standard VI.

Looking back, I found the transition to an all boys school system to be pretty easy.  We made friends easily.  Our southern accents were obviously a conversation starter but within about six months we had just about lost any outward evidence of our American origins.  (At home our diet still consisted of fried chicken, black eyed- peas and other traditional southern delicacies.)  The Muir uniforms in winter consisted of grey slacks, black leather shoes, white shirts with school tie and a blazer with dark blue vertical stripes with thin white and lighter blue stripes.  It was distinctive and a much better colour combination than many of the other school uniforms in the area.  In summer, we would wear cooler dark blue shorts with knee high socks that required elastic garters to hold them up.  There was also a “beany” cap required for younger students when walking to and from school or when wearing school attire in public.

Dr. Thomas Muir - 1914

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I mentioned the history of Muir College in an earlier blog.  There was a very strong feeling of history and tradition here, which was evident from the old buildings and many historic plaques on the walls of the main assembly hall.  The school had, after all, been established in Uitenhage 134 years before, in 1822, as the “English Free School.” 1822 to 1830 was a period of widespread chaos and destruction in the eastern and central parts of southern Africa, brought about by the expansion of the Zulu State under their powerful ruler, Shaka.  Putting this into even sharper historical context, it was only in1831 that Charles Darwin began his voyage on HMS Beagle to South America and the Galapagos Islands.  Slavery would be abolished in the British Empire in 1833.

My next blog will discuss school activities, competition and maintenance of one’s self-esteem in the decade of the 1950s.

 

Leaving civilization

Dreaming On

We've received a proposal from Chris Worden of African Bush Camps.  It describes in mouth-watering detail an eight-night safari experience in the Victoria Falls, Upper Zambezi and Hwange National Park.  If we could afford it today, we would be leaving almost immediately.  The following extract describes only the first two days.  

Jan at the falls - March 2001

Tuesday 17^th July, 2011:  After breakfast Safari Club will transfer you to Johannesburg Airport, where you will check in and connect to your British Airways/Comair flight 6285, to Victoria Falls, departing Johannesburg at 1125hrs, arriving Victoria Falls at 1310hrs. 

Here you will be met by Wild Horizons Safaris and transferred to The Elephant Camp, situated only 15 minutes from Victoria Falls Airport and 10 minutes from Victoria Falls village and the Victoria Falls themselves.

Riding an Elephant in August - the dry season

March 2001 - in the rainy season

The tented suites are all equipped with indoor and outdoor showers, huge baths, private lounges, mini bar and tea/coffee stations, overhead fans plus air conditioning and are all mosquito proofed.

The Elephant Camp overlooks a waterhole that is fed by natural streams in the rainy season that rush down to meet the Masuwe River, and the Zambezi gorges below the Victoria Falls.

Bush walks and birding for guests supply boundless photographic opportunities in addition to the variety of activities that are available in Victoria Falls.

Interaction with the resident Elephants and Elephant back safaris are a unique attraction of this camp.

Managing the Elephant Camp is Jonathan Elway, who has 21 years experience in the tourism industry. 

The views from the elephant camp towards the spray of the Victoria Falls are breathtaking!

2 nights at The Elephant Camp, in a twin bedded room, with en suite facilities, on a fully inclusive basis.

These photos from our previous visits to Victoria Falls and Elephant Camp may put this whole mouth-watering reference above into better perspective.

Leaving Civilization

Let me recap my historical origins prior to stepping on African soil in Port Elizabeth in July 1956.

Indigenous peoples inhabited the Gadsden, Alabama, area for thousands of years and the agrarian Mississippian culture lived here from 1000 to 1600 AD.  The French first settled in the Mobile region in 1702 and knew the local tribe as the Alibamon. The Spanish Hernando DeSoto expedition of 1540 described the Alibamo tribe of the area.

I had been born and raised in the city of Gadsden. In 1956 it was not considered a big city having a population, as I recall, of about 70,000.  The first white settlement in the area was reputedly a house built in about 1825.  After 1840 the first survey of land was made and the first steamboat arrived on the Coosa River from Mobile, on the Gulf of Mexico, in 1845.  The new “town” was named Gadsden in honor of Colonel James Gadsden of South Carolina who, a few years later, would gain notoriety for his part, as American Ambassador to Mexico, in the Gadsden Purchase.  The Gadsden Purchase was the final acquisition of territory from Mexico by the United States in 1854 and comprised an area about the size of Scotland across southern Arizona and southwestern New Mexico.

It should be noted that Col. Gadsden was an extremely vocal supporter of the practice and continuation of slavery.  The State of Alabama was to gain statehood in 1819 although it seceded from the union in 1861 at the start of the American Civil War.  Also noteworthy is that Alabama created a public school system only during the years of reconstruction which followed the end of the war in 1865.  It was during those post Civil War years that the Ku Klux Klan would gain enormous influence.

“After the Civil War, the state was still chiefly agricultural, with an economy tied to cotton.  Planters resisted working with free labor during Reconstruction and sought to re-establish controls over freedmen.  In the early years the Ku Klux Klan had numerous independent chapters in Alabama that attacked freedmen and other Republicans.  After it was suppressed, insurgent whites organized paramilitary groups, such as the Red Shirts and White League, which acted more openly to suppress black voting.  After regaining power by the late 1870s, in the last decade of the nineteenth century, white Democrats passed electoral laws and constitutional amendments to disfranchise most blacks and many poor whites.  Having regained power in the state legislature, Democrats passed Jim Crow laws, including racial segregation in public facilities, to restore white supremacy.” (Source:  Wikipedia)

I mention these historical facts to put my new home region and school system into perspective.  We were thought to be going back in time, to settle in a third world country, which would almost certainly be backward in technology and education.  My parents clearly did not think this way, but many of our family back home certainly did.   From the moment we set sail to cross the Atlantic, they were counting the days until we would return and reestablish ourselves in civilization once more.  That my father would take his young wife and three small children into such an uncertain and unsafe environment was disgraceful.

My brother and I would be attending an all boys High School, Muir College Boys High School, which was first established in 1822 as the “English Free School,” in the town of Uitenhage; established 18 years earlier on April 25, 1804 (41 Years before naming of the new town of Gadsden).  It was in the town of Uitenhage (pronounced U-tin-hāge) that the Goodyear Tire Company had built a manufacturing plant in 1948, and where my dad would become the Production Director for the company.  

More on these topics in my next post.   

  

Africa is a very big place! 6,812 miles from Cape Town to Cairo.

 

Once upon a time . .

My Home in the African "bush" - 1967

Joan, Alan and Graham at Victoria Falls - August,1975

I immigrated to Africa as a 12 year old boy. It wasn't a decision I made consciously but the journey from Gadsden, Alabama to Uitenhage, South Africa would have a profound influence on my life ever after.  I was destined to live in South Africa (12 years) and then Rhodesia for another 13 years before returning to the US and settling in Littleton, Colorado with my wife, Joan, and three children Alan, Graham and Carol in 1980.  

The children grew and in 1984 Joan, who was born in Rhodesia, passed away when Alan was 13, Graham was 12 and Carol was 10.  The following year, I took the three kids to Zimbabwe for four weeks.  We stayed with their grandfather Hank Blowers, visited many old friends and had a memorable week-long camping trip on the shores of Lake Kariba. The trip had a major influence on the 14, 13 and 11 year olds.  Apart from the experience of the wilderness and wildlife, the kids were  able to cement memories of their earlier years (they were all born in Rhodesia -  now Zimbabwe) and see people and cultures that few Americans get to see firsthand.


Several years later, Jan and I were married and we brought together her two children, Kevin and Kristin and my three.  This Brady Bunch amalgam allowed us to experience five High School graduations over a five year period.  


Later we organized our first tour group and went on a 17-day tour of Zimbabwe.  That was the beginning of quite a few trips to the southern end of Africa.  In 2000 we attended a course in Denver and acquired credentials as Certified International Tour Managers (CITM) with the intention of leading small tour groups.
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Now it is January 2011 and Jan and I have begun to fulfill a long-held desire to go back to southern Africa with some of our children and grandchildren. This is a blog about that trip, begun a year and a half early.  We wanted to wait until our grandchildren were old enough to appreciate the wonders of the dark continent and Avery will be 11 when we go back in July 2012. 

On New Years day 2011, Kevin, Michelle and nine year Avery came over for lunch and we began to discuss Africa 2012.  I sent an email to our daughter Carol, to Alan and Lauren and their three daughters Keely (9), Sydney (8) and Abby (4), and to Graham and Candace and their two boys, Cameron (10) and Chase (6).  The word was out.  The time is now.  Start taking notes and making plans.  Above all, begin saving money.  

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This blog is a diary of sorts; but not just a diary.  I will add stories from long ago and write about some of my experiences living and traveling in Africa.  Jan and I have kept travel journals and self-published books of each of our six trips to southern Africa (some of which we will throw in here to add some flavor) and I had the good fortune to be able to visit several remote, but remarkable, National Parks in Tanzania in 2005 and published a book of photos and notes from that journey as well -  which I will share.

The final part of this lengthy introduction is about books.  We operate a small home-based business which we call BookCrafters.  Through our experience (since 2007) of designing and publishing books using BookSmart software from the online publisher Blurb.com, we began to help others create and publish their own customize books.  It has been a rewarding endeavor and we have been kept very busy, helping interesting customers and making friends across this wonderful country.  This blog and the travel journal that it will eventually give rise to will be published as a book.  

I wrote the following blog about Africa in 2007.  Seems like it might make a decent introduction.

A blog about Africa  17 February, 2007

One can only go so long without thinking about Africa. I think, therefore I blog. Ask many people what their "once in a lifetime, dream vacation" would be, and the reply is often, "a trip to Africa." What they don't really foresee, of course, is that once you visit, the urge to return is planted firmly in your mind. Before you leave that vast continent, you almost invariably begin to plan the next trip. 






When it is discovered that I lived in Africa for 25 years, from the age of 12 until my 37th year, I find I have to answer certain questions over and over. A few examples:
1. "Some friends from our church run a mission near Lake Victoria. Do you happen to know them?" When I ask in what country the mission is located, there is often confusion. Africa is a very big place you see, with over 50 countries, five time zones, seven or more climatic regions, 900 million people and, evidently, as many as 14 million proverbs. Then I have to explain that Nairobi is a mere 1,800 miles from where I use to live in Harare and no, the despotic regime of Idi Amin did not threaten me or my wife and children.
2. "Is the political situation in Africa stable now?" or "has the rioting in South Africa subsided?" It's difficult to answer these questions.
3. Someone once asked me, "Where IS South Africa?" I calmly explained that it is at the southern tip of Africa. This seemed to make a lot of sense to my inquisitor. Perhaps he was just testing me.
4. "What is your biggest fear when you go to Africa?" The answer to that one is easy, "That we'll eat too much."
5. "If you could go to one place in Africa, where would it be?"

Aside from familiarizing ourselves with basic geography, it is a good idea to read about Africa. Watching Animal Planet or National Geographic documentaries about wildlife, is entertaining and interesting, but it seldom reveals much about the people, cultures and political circumstances of the continent. One of the most insightful articles I have ever read (and I have read a lot) about Africa was published in January 2006, in Granta 92: "The View from Africa." It was authored by Binyavanya Wainaina, who lives in Nairobi, Kenya. Mr. Wainaina is the founding editor of a literary magazine called Kwani? and was recently nominated by the World Economic Forum as a "Young Global Leader." 




His brilliant essay is titled "How to Write About Africa," - 'some tips: sunsets and starvation are good.'  It is included in a compendium of new African literature, along with the writings of 14 other writers, from disparate backgrounds. Wainaina's observations are cruel, sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek, funny and truthful. A few excerpts will give you an idea:
"Never have a picture of a well-adjusted African on the cover of your book, or in it, unless that African has won the Nobel Peace Prize. An AK-47, prominent ribs, naked breasts: use these. If you must include an African, make sure you get one in Masai or Zulu or Dogon dress."
"In your text, treat Africa as if it were one country. It is hot and dusty with rolling grasslands and huge herds of animals and tall, thin people, who are starving. Or it is hot and steamy with very short people who eat primates. Don't get bogged down with precise descriptions. Africa is big: fifty-four countries, 900 million people who are too busy starving and dying and warring and emigrating to read your book. The continent is full of deserts, jungles, highlands, savannahs and many other things, but your reader doesn't care about all that, so keep your descriptions romantic and evocative and unparticular." 




"Taboo subjects: ordinary domestic scenes, love between Africans (unless a death is involved), references to African writers or intellectuals, mention of school-going children who are not suffering from yaws or Ebola fever or female genital mutilation." 



"Remember, any work you submit in which people look filthy and miserable will be referred to as the 'real Africa', and you want that on your dust jacket. Do not feel queasy about this; you are trying to help them to get aid from the West. The biggest taboo in writing about Africa is to describe or show dead or suffering white people." 

"Animals, on the other hand, must be treated as well rounded, complex characters. They speak (or grunt while tossing their manes proudly) and have names, ambitions and desires. They also have family values: see how lions teach their children? Elephants are caring, and are good feminists or dignified patriarchs. So are gorillas. Never say anything negative about an elephant or a gorilla. Elephants may attack people's property, destroy their crops, and even kill them. Always take the side of the elephant." 


"Readers will be put off if you don't mention the light in Africa. And sunsets, the African sunset is a must. It is always big and red." 

"Always end your book with Nelson Mandela saying something about rainbows or renaissances. Because you care." 


This author has his finger firmly on the pulse of western literary attitudes. If you are interested in reading the entire text of Mr. Wainaina's article, do a Google search for Binyavanga Wainaina or go to www.granta.com/extracts/2615.

Jan and I have planned a tour to Namibia and Botswana for next year (2008) and when we do that, the questions begin again. The fears and doubts are revealed. We always go to see the wildlife and the scenery, old friends and, yes, the sunsets! It is hard to describe the thrill of sitting in an open vehicle within a few feet of an elephant, or a cape buffalo or a pride of lions. There's that question,"Isn't it dangerous to be so close to those big cats?"

My formative years in Africa and our travels over the last decade have always been immeasurably enriched by the friendly people we meet along the way. We have seen local people being treated rudely by tourists, Americans among them, who are ignorant, arrogant and paternalistic and who seem convinced that every African is in need of charity. - an attitude so skillfully described in "How to Write about Africa."

We, as visitors, have always been afforded the greatest courtesy and respect by the people of Africa. It is the warmth and sincerity of Africans that, more than anything, draw us back, whether in a hotel in Johannesburg, a National Park in Tanzania, a beach front café or a rural village.
The late Simon Combes, that brilliant painter who was raised in, educated and who lived in Kenya, and who was tragically killed by a Cape Buffalo two years ago, talked about his experiences as a Game Guide with 'first time visitors to Africa' who came under an "unsettling effect of African hypnosis." They become "hooked", he said, and are drawn to return.
And, oh, our favorite destination in Africa? - the Okavango Delta of Botswana.