Here are links to more information about some of the amazing people we met in Africa:
Enfants Oubliés du Bénin (Forgottten Children of Benin)
"Center for the Promotion of Arts, Crafts and Culture of Zou" - providing homes and schooling for orphaned children in Benin. Set up and managed by Janvier Houlonon, our fantastic tour leader in West Africa.
Jaynii Culture and Charity
Supporting orphans and street kids, and cleaning up the beach in front of the Jamestown lighthouse in Accra, Ghana - which is where we met this crew and learned about their work.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Africa. Dark, mysterious, dangerous. Dont believe a word of it. Its crap! Its bright, beautiful and it rocks. People do it hard here for sure but life is lived fully and with fervour. We visited just six of the forty two nation siblings of this massive and diverse continent but we've seen the family resemblance which ties it together and we like it! Progress rolls on, political passion is unbridled and people believe that not only can they make a difference it is their responsibility to do so. Thanks to each and every person we met on our journey. You are great ambassadors for your homelands. You love your countries and your continent and now we do too!
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Cats in the Cradle
They call Tanzania the cradle of humanity. A million or more years ago early man was living it up close to what we now call the Serengeti National Park.
Our ancestors’ bones lie buried in the wrongly named Olduvai Gorge (the Maasi were actually saying oldupai), named not for its prehistoric pies, but for the oldupai plants which grow like massive, spiky aloe vera across the dry valley.
The elements have exposed a vertical time line in the rock; dry brown layers like a Schwarzwaldenkirschtorte. And for 50 odd years modern man has been digging up evidence of life in the layers. Australopithicus afarensis (the same species as the famous Lucy from Ethiopia), Homo habilis and finally our predecessor Homo erectus all lived there. They even left footprints that fossilised in the mud… it was erectus who, appropriately, first walked out of Africa.
Animals were living at Oldupai too, fantastic prehistoric versions of the ones we know today - weird looking horses, giraffes, giant pigs and of course big cats. So humans and lions have coexisted in the Serengeti for thousands if not millions of years.
It was and still is a strange and somewhat tense existence. No doubt those cats were hunting early man until man worked out how to sharpen rocks and thus a method of hunting lions. Later poachers, collectors and colonialists killed for trophies and cash rather than self defence. Maasi tradition still dictates that a man must kill a lion in order to get married; our tour leader Julius killed one, along with a group of other young men, so that he could marry his first wife.
Now lions are protected, instead hunted by tourists shooting with cameras not spears. For me those cats were the highlight of our safari - the lioness, standing on a rocky outcrop with her cubs, looking over the Serengeti (possibly eyeing off dinner: wildebeest on the horizon). And the bold cubs playing - just like Simba - in the Ngorongoro crater (on which the Lion King was based). Majestic cats. Little fluffy ones that could probably bite your hand off. Nice puddy!
Now if I could only get a new song in my head because ‘The Circle of Life’ is really getting tiresome…
Our ancestors’ bones lie buried in the wrongly named Olduvai Gorge (the Maasi were actually saying oldupai), named not for its prehistoric pies, but for the oldupai plants which grow like massive, spiky aloe vera across the dry valley.
The elements have exposed a vertical time line in the rock; dry brown layers like a Schwarzwaldenkirschtorte. And for 50 odd years modern man has been digging up evidence of life in the layers. Australopithicus afarensis (the same species as the famous Lucy from Ethiopia), Homo habilis and finally our predecessor Homo erectus all lived there. They even left footprints that fossilised in the mud… it was erectus who, appropriately, first walked out of Africa.
Animals were living at Oldupai too, fantastic prehistoric versions of the ones we know today - weird looking horses, giraffes, giant pigs and of course big cats. So humans and lions have coexisted in the Serengeti for thousands if not millions of years.
It was and still is a strange and somewhat tense existence. No doubt those cats were hunting early man until man worked out how to sharpen rocks and thus a method of hunting lions. Later poachers, collectors and colonialists killed for trophies and cash rather than self defence. Maasi tradition still dictates that a man must kill a lion in order to get married; our tour leader Julius killed one, along with a group of other young men, so that he could marry his first wife.
Now lions are protected, instead hunted by tourists shooting with cameras not spears. For me those cats were the highlight of our safari - the lioness, standing on a rocky outcrop with her cubs, looking over the Serengeti (possibly eyeing off dinner: wildebeest on the horizon). And the bold cubs playing - just like Simba - in the Ngorongoro crater (on which the Lion King was based). Majestic cats. Little fluffy ones that could probably bite your hand off. Nice puddy!
Now if I could only get a new song in my head because ‘The Circle of Life’ is really getting tiresome…
Top 5 songs to have stuck in your head on safari
1. ‘Africa’ – Toto
2. ‘The Circle of Life’ – Lion King soundtrack
3. ‘Atomic’ – Blondie
4. ‘Rapture’ – Blondie
5. ‘I Just Cant Wait to be King’ – Lion King soundtrack
2. ‘The Circle of Life’ – Lion King soundtrack
3. ‘Atomic’ – Blondie
4. ‘Rapture’ – Blondie
5. ‘I Just Cant Wait to be King’ – Lion King soundtrack
Serengeti pics
1 - View from our balloon ride across the Serengeti
2 - A lioness on the move
3 - An elephant, also moving
2 - A lioness on the move
3 - An elephant, also moving
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Monday, December 1, 2008
Waftings and wanderings
They say in the good old days of Zanzibar that the sailors used to be able to smell the island’s famous spices from miles offshore. I’d put that one into the bullshit file pretty early on but after a couple of days in Stonetown, I may yet be convinced.
In this little melting pot of the Indian Ocean where African, Arabic, Indian and Asian culture have mixed seasonally from the better part of 1000 years to produce a unique blend all of its own, perhaps the smells of acres of clove plantations could have wafted up into the breeze and out to the odour-deprived sailing around on dhows in the ocean.
Smell, sight, and sound travel in strange ways here in Stonetown. Everything seems to be carried upwards rather than along the mazy lanes that mark this little part of the world. From our privileged position four floors up, the street sounds like a cacophony of conversation and laughter but at ground level you have to lean to hear the words. In early morning when the ringing of the Hindu temple and the call to prayer from the nearby mosque compete up above the street it sounds like a battle for sectarian bragging rights. In the laneways they are softer and they act as gentle reminders of religious observances.
The smell of the local food takes a similar journey upwards rather than along the streets. As for sight, from the balcony we can see that this labyrinth is much smaller than it would seem. The streets may be confusing but rarely overwhelming as you know that if you keep heading in the right direction, you will find your way. A bit like those sailors. Pick your star, follow it and let your nose do the rest.
Things in Stonetown have context from four floors up, but context is not as valuable as it would seem in a culture that lives lane to lane, tide to tide, monsoon wind to monsoon wind, and these days tourist to tourist.
In this little melting pot of the Indian Ocean where African, Arabic, Indian and Asian culture have mixed seasonally from the better part of 1000 years to produce a unique blend all of its own, perhaps the smells of acres of clove plantations could have wafted up into the breeze and out to the odour-deprived sailing around on dhows in the ocean.
Smell, sight, and sound travel in strange ways here in Stonetown. Everything seems to be carried upwards rather than along the mazy lanes that mark this little part of the world. From our privileged position four floors up, the street sounds like a cacophony of conversation and laughter but at ground level you have to lean to hear the words. In early morning when the ringing of the Hindu temple and the call to prayer from the nearby mosque compete up above the street it sounds like a battle for sectarian bragging rights. In the laneways they are softer and they act as gentle reminders of religious observances.
The smell of the local food takes a similar journey upwards rather than along the streets. As for sight, from the balcony we can see that this labyrinth is much smaller than it would seem. The streets may be confusing but rarely overwhelming as you know that if you keep heading in the right direction, you will find your way. A bit like those sailors. Pick your star, follow it and let your nose do the rest.
Things in Stonetown have context from four floors up, but context is not as valuable as it would seem in a culture that lives lane to lane, tide to tide, monsoon wind to monsoon wind, and these days tourist to tourist.
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