DINNER WITH MEL GIBSON AND JULIUS CEASAR

Never thought you would hear that combination eh? Yes, in fact we did have dinner with Julius Caesar and his brother (cousin maybe) Mel Gibson. Apparently it is quite the fashion here to acquire a change of names and go with something, well, something…not sure if they really know what they have chosen as their statement name but they had quite a range. In the past four days I have met – Donald Duck, Dodgy Geeser, Sweet Talker, Fabulous Thief, Giraffe, Superman, Puff Daddy and many many more – not forgetting Julius and Mel. We did in fact have dinner at Mel’s house…not sure if Julius was there or not as we were eating by gas ship lantern type things out under the stars. It was a very basic meal of beans, rice, spinach/kale stuff, sweet potato soup and some sort of meat thing, which I passed off to one of the men on the truck, who was very happy to have it an obviously not as picky as I was. I couldn’t quite figure out what it was and it was sort of all attached together with other stuff that was also unidentifiable. Guess I reverted to my old ways for a moment – where is mom to cut my meat when I need her!

The night before that – Oh, we are at Lake Malawi in Malawi – we had a pig roast with one of the other trucks AND a bad taste dress party. My friend Jules decided it would be fun to dress me in a fairly godmother type outfit. It was a lovely shade of pint with gold lace sleeves and a gold cape to match. Can’t beat that now can you? In fact, it was in quite good taste for a Halloween costume but incredibly hot for a lakeside beach resort. The one bonus was that it kept all the midges (very small incredibly pesky flies) off of my arms. Didn’t help much with the face and hair but it was a small reprieve. Pig was a little bland but still fun as it was fresh slaughtered that morning and we (well not me) put it on the spits and spent the day turning it. Neeta and I conjured up some apple sauce to go with it so that was fun and it even turned out really tasty.

Lake Malawi is absolutely gorgeous. It is hard to believe you are sitting on a lake with its wide beaches and lapping waves. The color is a deep blue greed and just beautiful. One draw back is that it has bilharzia, a tiny worm that lives in snails in the reeds that digests itself into your skin and ultimately can do some un-repairable damage to your internal organs. It supposedly wasn’t in the area we were in but I wasn’t going to risk it. A few others did and we will have to see. Regardless it was a lovely place. Got some walks down the beach in to the local fishing village and us Mzungu challenged the locals to a soccer match on the beach for one of the evening’s activities. The match was great and I am happy to say that I can still play soccer. At first the guys on the other team were apologizing to me but then they realized us four girls that were playing were actually quite tough and did not need apologizing too – thus, out came the grabbing. We held our own though and actually won the game two to one. Go Mzungu!

So basically, as you can see, I have been sitting on beached and doing lots of relaxing the past week or so. We are now heading into Zambia to another game park where we will get in a couple of night drives…can’t wait!

All my love, Steph

ZANZILAND

After a hard days drive, a couple hours in the less than exciting and horribly dingy town of Dar, we jumped on the ferry out to Zanzibar, the Spice Island, where we settled in for a few days of complete R&R on the beautiful white sand beaches. Of course we did do a bit of an educational piece and went for a tour of the spice plantations as well as a quick stop at the old slave market. The fruit on the island is absolutely amazing and for lunch we devoured fresh picked and cut pineapple, jackfruit, oranges and coconut. Amazing the way they cut it with HUGE knives and barely miss their wrists. We were all nervous for them until they handed us the fruit and then we couldn’t stop asking them for more.

Beaches are absolutely gorgeous here and the Curio (tourist) Shop sales guys weren’t too overbearing either. Broke down and got a Henna done just for fun and well, cause I was sitting on the beach just having a cocktail anyway so, hell, why not! Spent one day just walking on the beach, playing in the water, reading and relaxing and the other day about 10 of us went out diving. We went out to a little island on the North East side of Zanzibar (the name fails me at the moment). Water was lovely, coral amazing and the fishies weren’t all that bad either J Saw a green turtle, loads of massive starfish, grouper etc. etc. etc. My favorite was the thing that looked like bad pale pink and off green parlor paper. Think it was a piece of coral. The third day was more of the same – relaxing and completely enjoying ourselves and then it was time to head back to reality and two days of driving to reach the shores of Lake Malawi.

WHAT IS FOR LUNCH?

Well, if I were a lion, I’d be having gazelle, wildebeast or buffalo, as a hyena, whatever I could find but buffalo seems to be the main option, and as the Leopard, I think I’d just climb up a tree with my tasty treat – preferably the gazelle. I think that pretty much describes the lunch menu I have seen in the past few days.

We just left the Serengeti where we had some great wildlife viewing. The Leopard was probably the most spectacular. We got lucky enough to arrive when he had come down the tree to take a pee or get some water or something so followed him along the side of the road and down to his tree. It is anazing how beautiful and graceful (and undisturbed by all the jeeps) that animal is. He sauntered slowly across the road, glanced about just for good show, then leapt up the side of the tree, hopped about up to the highest branch and then began munching on his latest feast. It was phenomenal, disgusting, fascinating and beautiful all at once. The sound effects were quite spectacular as well. Jules and I were sitting on the roof seats watching through our binoculars and constantly exclaiming “ugh, did you hear that? Oh, what was that?” then back up with the binocs, then “I think that might be the back bone, hmmm, maybe the skull?” then back up with the binocs. It sounds quite morbid and sick to admit having sat there and watched it all but so amazing and fascinating.

The lion we saw was equally impressive, although the brush was quite thick and we all thought poor Mr. Lion had a limp and was not doing too well. He had no lady friends around to help him hunt and just seemed to be wandering aimlessly. Well, so much for that, after a minute or so of wandering, he pounced and up he came with a gazelle. I think it was a fake out on his part…the poor sick lion trick, you know the one. Either that or the gazelle hadn’t quite woken up yet and was happily sitting there thinking, “no one can see me, I am hidden in the tall grass and completely invisible”. Oops, not quite! Out came the lion with breakfast in his mouth and then he proceeded to walk proudly across the road showing off his kill to us.

On the happier note, we have seen tons of fat hippos lazing about (and rolling over - quite a feat!) in big pools of water, elephants galore roaming huge vast open plains with amazing blue skies behind them (perfectly offset by the golden grass of the Serengeti), zebras happily dancing about and, my personal favorite, giraffes, blinking in confusion at our truck as we pass by and then placidly returning to their munching of acacia leaves. All beautiful in their own right (even the hyenas, which seem to be getting more and more prevalent as we move to the different parks).

Bathrooms continue to be, hmm, interesting shall I say? Surprisingly enough, when we bush camped in the Serengeti, we had semi-flush toilets (had to bring your own water for the flushing) but did not have showers. Maybe that explains the Hyenas that continued to come into the camp each night and sniff around out tents. Two of them were even so bold as to walk up while a couple people were still up and sitting around the fire. That’ll get you to the truck right quick. Figure we were so minging (British term for nasty, smelly, yucky) that they thought we were a nice ripe kill. Can’t tell you how fantastic the show this morning felt after three days without one…when we got back to a camp with showers it was mass chaos on who could get there first. We ended up with settling for putting our toiletries in line for the shower and going off to do other things like put up the tents, help get dinner going, have a beer and chat, the usual evening activities.

We did get a nice break in the bush though with some sundowners at the closest lodge. Beatiful sunsets over the plains with a nice crisp, cold bottle of S.African wine in hand. Does the soul good to feel civilized for a brief moment. That is not to say that it is bad being in the bush, but a sink and a western style toilet, along with running water in general is a really nice thing!

Now in Arusha – just left the Ngorongoro Crater (also beautiful and saw another attempted kill by the lions)– heading past Kilimanjaro, visit to a Maasai village and then on to Zanzibar. Then, four days of R&R and hopefully some great scuba diving.

SANDPAPER KISSES and WARRIOR ESCORTS

Arrived in Nairobi today and really learned what Africa time was all about…there is a saying here that things move according to Africa time, which they do, and which means that people are never where they say they will be and that nothing at all happens on time. Thus far it has been a standard 10-15 minutes tardy but today, well, it seemed to get stretched a little bit more. Our taxi driver, who was to be back in 20 minutes, showed up about an hour later and when we called to inquire where he might be, he informed us that he had ‘stopped quickly in the store’ and was just 300 meters away - as if that was quite normal. I think it was the longest 300 meters ever as it still took him another ½ hour to arrive. We spent the day playing around going to the elephant orphanage, the giraffe sanctuary and the market. The baby elephants in the orphanage were absolutely adorable. The ran right out up to their bottles, downed three of them each, chased the keepers around begging and screaming for more then proceeded to roll in and dump each other in the mud, slip, slide and fall and execute head stands in the muddy pools as they learned how their feet worked and how to stand up. Just like little children playing in the sand box. After that, we went over to the giraffe sanctuary where we fed, petted and kissed the giraffes. They have the most amazingly long, disgusting black tongues that they stick out as they try to grab the little food pellet out of your mouth. It feels like someone has taken a wet piece of sandpaper and run it across your lips. Oh boy, how nice would a giraffe French kiss be? Think I have come as close to that as I want to. In addition, and for good measure, they leave behind a bit of gooey antiseptic saliva on your face. It is actually so that they can get by eating off the nasty thorn infested Acacia tree but apparently they feel the need to share the wealth elsewhere..

On our way to Nairobi we went through the Maasai Mara National Park. Amazing! The Maasai tribe is still very much around and available to sell you whatever trinket you might like as you enter the park. They are drenched with beads and bracelets and blankets and are ready to strip off any of it to make a buck. Our truck was swarmed. They are known for being quite the savvy business people as well though and take us foreigners with the deep pockets for everything we have got. There are still many of them our herding their cattle though, and they can be recognized by the bright red plaid or striped blankets wrapped around their chests and their spears. It is a beautiful site to see them dotting the land as you drive by, their long legs stretching out as they run after, or stroll in many a case, their cattle. Several of them guarded our camp at night ‘just in case’, which made us feel oh so comfortable (hah! Hmmm, guess that means lions are around) and, of course, inspired the need in the middle of the night to go for a pee. This meant leaning out of the tent with the torch, flagging down one of the warriors, who promptly appeared torch in one hand and spear in the other to escort you to the bathroom. He then patiently waited a discreet distance away and walked you back. Very odd feeling at 3:00 in the morning to be walking next to a man whose body melted into the night sky wearing a red robe and carrying a lion spear. Did make me wonder that if in fact a lion did appear, would he actually be able to use the spear and kill it or would he use those nice strong, long legs to leave me for kitty food.

The park was great and we saw almost everything we wanted to – still missing the leopard, cheetah and rhino but think I will probably have a pretty good shot at the leopard and rhino in the next couple of weeks. We will see. We had numerous lion sightings with them in various activities. Saw them stalking and attempting to catch a wildebeest, playing in a little oasis next to a stream, sleeping all over and anywhere and guarding their most recent kill. Also saw plenty of giraffe, elephants, zebra, wildebeest, topi, and impala - the usual suspects. The highlight for me though was the balloon sunrise ride over the Mara. It was incredible to see the animals from above and watch the wildebeest stream across the plains in their migration. Watched a pack of hyenas finish their kill and then go on the hunt again and finished off our ‘float’ with a pack of lions. It didn’t hurt that we had a beautiful sunrise, incredibly clear day, a full hour and 20 minutes in the balloon and a delicious champagne breakfast at the end. The party was almost crashed by a stray wildebeest, who apparently was quite excited about the yummy smells. However, he was quickly headed off by a much larger beast, a Land Rover. So, after that, we headed to Nairobi, which is where I am now. Tomorrow morning it is off to Lake Naivasha (sp) where we will apparently be surrounded by hippos and other animals (in the camp that is). In a previous trip to this camp, a hippo tripped over one of the tent pegs and fell onto a girl in the tent. She was OK but quite heavily bruised. Hope one of those guys doesn’t feel the need to come share my tent!