Slouched in comfy recliners in New Orleans, after watching the movie “The Bucket List” about two men with a terminal disease who live life to the fullest until they die, I asked my friend, “Well, what do you have to
Slouched in comfy recliners in New Orleans, after watching the movie “The Bucket List” about two men with a terminal disease who live life to the fullest until they die, I asked my friend, “Well, what do you have to do before you die?”
She replied, “Republish your book about dying at home.” I said, “Me too and I have to see the animals in Africa. Two weeks later she telephoned and said, “Let’s go to Africa this summer.”
First, we had to decide where — Tanzania? Kenya? Botswana? We decided on Zambia and Zanzibar, an exotic “Z” summer.
The first lap of the journey was to Chongwe River Camp, a safari camp situated at the confluence of the Zambezi and Chongwe rivers where the famous English explorer, Dr. Livingston, once camped.
After flying some 20 hours from New Orleans, through Johannesburg, we landed in a plush guest house in Lusaka, capital of Zambia. Zambia, previously Southern Rhodesia, is now a sufficiently stable country and the U.S. is building a huge embassy complex there.
After recovering from jet lag and late luggage, we drove four hours to a site on the Zambezi River where we met a Chongwe staff member to take us by boat up-river to the camp.
The Zambezi River, the boundary between Zambia and Zimbabwe, is as wide, or wider, than the Mississippi River. As we passed by, solemn elephant families on the shore ignored our intrusion on their bathing grounds. We raised our eyebrows in understated fear as 12- to 18-foot crocodiles slithered into the water and hippos’ heads popped up close to us as we passed.
As the skiff rounded a promontory at the corner of the Chongwe River, we saw the first sight of camp — a green lawn, canopy of towering acacia trees, and khaki tent roofs with adobe walls that blended into the landscape.
We were met with wide, glowing Zambian smiles. One helped me out of the boat; another handed me a hot wet washcloth to wash away the dust and wind of the journey. That was the beginning of being spoiled all day, every day.
On a typical safari day, we awoke to laughing sounds made by hippos, or to a vervet monkey peeing on the tent roof. At sunrise, after tea and porridge by an open fire, we loaded into a Toyota Land Cruiser, outfitted with a snorkel for river crossings, and headed out to the bush (African for “countryside”).
Over the course of our stay, we were up close to elephants, lions, baboons, leopards, Cape buffalo, zebra, impala, water bucks and hippos, but not too close to the crocs.
We learned to recognize some of their ways of communicating. If an elephant, for example, is irritated because you get between it and its baby, first, it flaps its enormous ears. Then, if you continue not to listen, it paws the ground. If you continue not getting the message, it will charge.
Returning to camp, we ate a “simple” breakfast — like fresh-baked mango scones, bangers (English sausage), curried eggs and fresh passion fruit juice, prepared by our butler. Then it was hang-out and gourmet lunch time. Fresh food, trucked in six hours over dirt road, was prepared by five chefs. Even the New Orleans food connoisseurs thought the food was excellent.
After nap/reading time, tea time! Fresh baked chocolate or pineapple upside down-cake. Satiated, we’d stagger to the Land Cruiser, skiff or canoe, for more animal watching. At sunset we usually stopped by a giant Baobab tree for “sundowners” — drink of choice served in metal goblets and appetizers. Then dinner with fun talk, candles and wine.
The journey’s soul food was not only seeing the animals in their own environment, but also quiet solitude in nature, totally relaxed times with old friends and making new ones. It was visiting a village of mostly mud-thatched roofed huts and seeing what life was really like for the Chongwe Camp staff who’d come to feel like family.
As a teacher, I couldn’t resist loading my suitcase up with school and art supplies. With the village elder’s permission, I carried them to the principal of a bush school with eight teachers and 400-plus students, 114 of whom are AIDS orphans and 15 with active HIV infections. Some walk 80 kilometers round trip to get their meds.
My Spanish students at Chiefess Kamakahelei Middle School had made nearly a hundred brightly colored cards with messages like “We care about you” for me to deliver to children in Africa. From their smiling faces, I think they were pleased! And I wished I could have given much more.
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