Fishing and Kayaking in Swakopmund

Went fishing again while here in Swakopmund with Terrence Clark our favorite guide. Caught a number of sharks from three different species: Bronzee, Spotted Gully Shark, a muscle Shark. Caught so many cob that we’ve been eating it for the past three days. Delicious stuff. Forgot to put sun screen on our feet—this is surf fishing so of course one is on the beach with his toes exposed----and even though it was overcast most of the day, the top of Reid’s feet got so burnt they’re blistering. Annie had a blast chasing waves again and examining each catch with the eye of a scientist. I even gave it a go for a while, but didn’t have the stamina to stay with the 2.24 m, 75 kg Bronzee that was on the other end of the line.

Today we did the Kayak Tour of Walvis Bay. It was a bit disappointing because we didn’t get to see any dolphins nor whales. We did see loads of flamingos and those stinky cape fur seals again. It was a bit chilly and we had an early start of it so the girls complained about being cold. Augustus manned his kayak alone and did manage to get the hang of it by the end. Annie and I were paired and we just kind of took it slow. We did have fun paddling about in the bay and saw tons and tons of jelly fish—apparently a by-product of global warming and over fishing.

Our guide was a young fellow named François duToit. The duToit family name can be found throughout South Africa and Namibia. The first duToit to arrive back in the mid-1600’s were fleeing religious persecution as they were Huguenots (Protestants) seeking a better life outside of war ravaged Catholic France. It was a bit strange chatting with him since there are virtually no vestiges of French culture left among the family who’ve been so totally assimilated into the lifestyle of Southern Africa. We in Louisiana are rather proud of our French heritage and work hard at trying to preserve it………

Tommy's Living Desert Tours

Went out into the Namib with Tommy Collard of Tommy’s Living Desert Tours. It was truly like being on NatGeo Wild or Animal Planet. Tommy drove this souped up LandRover through the dunes that end at the edge of the city of Swakopmund. He reads the “Bushman Newspaper” i.e. the faint tracks in the sand to locate all of these fascinating creatures that inhabit the seemingly desolate Namib Desert, the world’s oldest. When he spots something, he jumps out of the Rover and starts digging like a rabid dog and pulls up such interesting beasties as a Fitzsimmons Burrowing Skink, or a sand-diving Lizard or the Palmato Gecko. The Namaqua Chameleon was the most appealing of the bunch and sat in everyone’s hands very obediently. He even ate mealie worms right out of Tommy’s lips. I did get a bit frightened when Tommy fished a Peringuey’s Adder (sidewinder, yes exceedingly venemous) out of one of the desert bushes and started handling it very close to the girls. The girls were un-fazed and of course Emma volunteered to hold everything—not in the least bit squeamish. Tommy said she was one tough little girl. She sure enjoyed the “adulation.” We had a terrific time, learned loads about the Namib and flat out enjoyed going over the dunes. It’s definitely an excursion everyone who visits Swakopmund should undertake.

Cape Cross

We are spending our last weeks in Namibia in Swakopmund. We thought that would be an appropriate Grand Finale to our Namibian Adventure. We arrived on Saturday to stay in our favorite beach house in Vineta. Vineta is a nice neighborhood located at the northern part of the city. On our way, Karin, the woman who keeps an eye on the place texted us to tell us, “the geyser has given up the ghost!” The geyser, by the way is the hot water tank, so when we arrived, the repair people were on their way to install a new tank, I mean geyser. I’m always tickled when I hear such expressions. Not to worry, they didn’t bother us as we made our way to the supermarket and most importantly, THE BEACH. Love being able to say we’re spending a week at the beach in the middle of December.
Swakopmund, although situated at the edge of the Namib desert is usually always cool. This is why people vacate Windhoek in droves to come here during the summer stickiness. The Benguela current is responsible for the cool westerly breeze that characterizes the area and the chilly, chilly water. The Benguela rises up from Antarctica. Frequently, the rising cool air off of the ocean colliding with the desert warmth will produce a heavy fog that shrouds everything in greyness and it was indeed one of those grey days when we arrived. Sunday also presented itself in the same manner, so we headed up the coast to Cape Cross to see the seal colony. By afternoon though, the fog had burned off and it turned out to be quite marvelous.
Cape Cross is noted as being one of the first places that Europeans ever set foot in Southern Africa. Diogo Cao, a famous Portuguese seaman, erected a cross here in honor of John I of Portugal. The cross was later “appropriated” by the Germans who recognized its historical value and now it sits in some German museum back in Europe. The cross that currently resides there is a replica. We took pictures of it anyway since we’ll probably never make it to Germany to see the real thing.
What makes Cape Cross interesting , though, is that it is home to the largest population of Cape Fur Seals in the world: 80,000-100,000 at any given time. Cape Fur Seals are actually a type of sea lion according to scientists. The way they can tell is that they have visible ears, whereas true seals do not. The females give birth in late November and early December, so we got to see the pups: thousands upon thousands of seal pups. The stench emitted by all of these clustered mammals is indescribable. The combination of ammonia smell from the excrement along with rotting carcasses of pups which have perished due to abandonment, sickness or trampling cannot be conveyed by mere words. This combined with the awful bellowing of mothers who have misplaced their pups or pups who’ve misplaced their mothers or big bulls trying to make themselves seen and heard is truly something that can only be appreciated if experienced firsthand. We managed to withstand it for about a half hour.
There is a picnic area within the reserve, but we were too grossed out to try and partake of any lunch. Additionally, we’d made the mistake of leaving our windows slightly open and Ole Bess was filled with flies—the big green, bottle flies that usually alight on feces. We drove many kilometers with the windows down to blow them out and headed for Henties Bay and the Fishy Corner, family owned restaurant which had been recommended by the Powells. We weren’t disappointed. The food was quite good. It took a bit of time though and we didn’t make it back to Swakop until mid afternoon. By this time, the fog had burned off and we had a nice walk on the beach. Tomorrow, Tommy’s Living Desert Tours!

Emma has a summer birthday!

Emma got to celebrate her birthday early this year since school lets out the first week of December for the holidays and most people at WIS return to their home country for the month long holiday. Emma wanted to be able to share her birthday with her friends before they went off on holiday and we repatriated to the States. She was especially delighted that it’s summer here and she could plan a summer activity for her party. She chose a slip n’ slide kind of thingy that the kids really enjoyed. She also had a shark theme for the décor which matched perfectly with the warm weather. There was a great turn out of her friends and everyone seemed to have a good time. We, her parents, were especially thrilled that no one broke anything given that her good friend Sofia had just recently broken her cheek on a similar apparatus!
It’s off to the coast on Saturday for us where we’ll conclude the grand finale of our Namibian Adventure. We scheduled to head home on Dec. 17th!

Ole Bess declared Roadworthy

Soooooo, Reid returned the next day to NaTIS, after first spending the morning at Minz Garage. Minz, by the way, found nothing out of the ordinary with Ole Bess, but cleaned her up well and wrote out a ticket indicating he had traced the leak. This satisfied the “inspectors” and Ole Bess was declared Roadworthy. Reid was issued the proper documentation and tried to hurriedly make it back to our last session of baseball at WIS. Because he was in such a hurry, he didn’t notice that the one piece of computerized documentation in this whole process was replete with errors. The woman has the thing listed as using petrol/gas when it clearly does not (she's a diesel)---- among other mistakes. Ah Africa! The photo above is of the number of official stamps of the kingdom that we had to collect. We’ll then hand all of this over to the buyer and he’ll have to go about collecting the stamps, signatures and documents that he needs and of course pay the all important fees at each step in turn.

NaTIS, by the way has its own website where one purportedly can download the correct forms and access all the info one needs to know when embarking on this grand adventure. Of course, when one clicks on the links, nothing comes up because it’s still all under construction!
http://www.ra.org.na/VehicleRegistrationAndLicensing.html

How to sell a car in Namibia in three easy steps—yeah right!

Selling our vehicle has been an interesting exercise into the inner workings of African bureaucracy. Of course no part of this process is computerized and so one must advance through the steps collecting the all important “official stamp” of the kingdom without which one had better not present himself at the next level. I'd never thought I would come to view American bureaucratic systems as being efficient (at least some of them especially regarding car sales), but this experience has permanently altered my perceptions.

We knew a bit about the process prior to embarking upon this adventure from having purchased the vehicle from an individual in the first place. We knew that a police clearance of the vehicle was the first hoop through which we had to jump. We didn’t know though that the clearance in and of itself consisted of several steps very little of which is explained or indicated by signage or handout or verbal cue. We located the correct building down on Banhof and Independence, parked our vehicle and presented ourselves at several windows to determine what needed to be done. It was basically those who were waiting in line, essentially the customers, who explained the process to us. No one person of course could explain all of the details, so we put it together piecemeal from each of the individuals we encountered along the way. At PHASE ONE, we waited in the vehicle until we could pull into the parking bay. Once parked, we propped the hood like everyone else, we were told we needed to complete a form. The guy with the forms, however was nowhere to be found. Once he did show, and once the form was completed, no one even bothered to look under the hood. The papers were then submitted to some women who sat behind what looked to be end tables in the alcove of the stairwell leading up to the second floor. They stamped the registration form with great enthusiasm. They then indicated that we should wait a few days before proceeding to PHASE TWO of the process.
The following Monday, we presented ourselves at the entrance marked PHASE TWO. Here there were at least posted notices telling the clientele to first go to Office One. Of course, the woman who inhabits Office One was not present. So, we took a seat and waited and waited. Several customers asked if someone would be coming to assist us and were told, “She is coming just now.” Finally, a woman arrived with a liter bottle of a name brand soft drink in tow and entered the office. Reid went in armed with copies of the registration, copies of his passport, his international driver’s license, etc. Our little stack of paperwork had become quite thick. She matched up the names and numbers with the documents, wrote a few things into a notebook and stamped, stamped, stamped.

It was on to Office Two which fortunately was adjacent. Several women inhabited this office and gave us essentially the evil eye when we arrived with our stack of documents. There was not one single object of technology in sight. They too were recording everything by hand in their little notebooks filled with forms and carbon paper. We received a couple of stamps from Dame #1 and a few more stamps from Dame#2 after paying the appropriate fee. When they deduced we were foreigners from the “duh” nature of all of questions, they did drop their air of being put upon and projected a somewhat more friendly attitude, but only somewhat and we ascertained that we needed to go up to the NaTiS (Roads Authority) Bureau in a different section of town to complete the Road Worthiness portion of the process.

Armed with all of our documentation replete with the appropriate stamps, we headed for NaTiS in the Northern Industrial sector of Windhoek. NaTiS is billed as your one-stop transit authority where you can meet all of your transit needs. We now needed to complete the Roadworthiness test to make sure the vehicle is fit for the road. We arrived about 8:10 in the morning, but that was actually a bit late. We should have gotten in line in the wee hours, sort of like waiting for rock concert tickets to go on sale, so that we’d have been up there in the queue. As it was, we were clueless as to which queue we needed to line up in. The guides directing us spoke little to no English, they grabbed one of the clients who translated. We were in the wrong queue. Additionally, another form needed to be procured and completed. We headed for the right queue behind a retaining wall. To our surprise, the wall was hiding a mass of cars equivalent to a 50 meter section of Los Angeles freeway traffic during the rush hour standstill. It was already 35 degrees Celsius and no cars were advancing.

Reid went to retrieve the correct form. He returned to our car to fill it out and then headed back to the “office” to pay the fee. He returned yet again, but without the form, just the receipt for payment. Everyone around us though seemed to have the form in hand. What to do? Absolutely no signage even hinting at the process. A couple of guys wearing uniform shirts with the logo of some local car dealerships stood ahead of us in line, surely they’d know what to do. Indeed, one kind young gentleman named Vernon took us in hand and ran our document down for us. He then proceeded to explain the process in intricate detail. It appears he does this everyday for a living for the car dealership where he works. Bless him! He even filled out some of the missing info on the form for us.

The inspection process, and that’s all the Road Worthiness test essentially is, took place in three steps. After several hours of waiting and advancing in tiny increments, we finally encountered the first “inspector” who checked out that the signals, lights, wheels, engine and doors were in order. This took maybe 45 seconds in total. The freeway of cars then narrowed down to one lane so that they could straddle the pit and have the undercarriage looked at, step two. It was a mad jostling to position the cars (if cars can jostle each other) in the one queue. Once the cars had been run through the pit, they were parked in the area to await someone to drive them round to their waiting owners at the gate, hence the completion of step three. Just as we approached the pit, we were stopped to wait for the inspectors to clear out the waiting cars. That took another 45 minutes or so as the hot, hot Namibian sun climbed higher in the sky.

When we did get our car over the pit, the inspector indicated that we had a bit of an oil leak that needed repair. We then had to park the car and wait yet again until the lot was cleared. The young lady who drove our car around tore off the bottom of the form and handed it back to us so that when we returned, they’d be able to locate the original form to which the stub had been attached and we’d not have to go through the entire process again. She put the form in a drawer of one of those plastic stacker organizers. Nothing was entered into a computer, so we hope that they will still have the documentation when we return. We won’t be holding our breath on that one.

Soooooooooo, Reid’s going to the mechanic today who will hopefully be able to correct the leak in a timely enough fashion for Reid to report back to NaTiS to complete the retest. Retests are only performed from 8-9 a.m. and 1-2 p.m. Ahhh Africa!

We’re trying to maintain a sense of humor about all of this, but sometimes it’s just not funny. My neighbor who is of Afrikaaner origin says one day, she’s going to get tired of laughing and have to move out of Africa. It’s really a good thing we got started early in this endeavor because it’s taking weeks and weeks just to make a simple car sale! When we bought it, it took weeks and weeks so we knew it wouldn’t be easy, but it does make me wonder about the people who really have to live here and try to function with that type of bureaucracy for things that should be so simple. I don’t even want to imagine what one has to do to buy a house around here! Well at the current 11.75% interest rate, most people don’t have to worry about that one…….

Visiting the Newspaper

Went to visit the newspaper printing plant. Our neighbor, Esther, who is an events photographer has lots of connections in the paper business. One of the reporters for the daily newspapers, The Republikien, took us around the plant and explained the process from gathering and collecting information and writing the articles to the actual printing. There are many newspapers in Windhoek, published in various languages: Afrikaans, German and English. Each caters to its particular language speaking clientele. However, most are published at the same plant we visited. This is quite refreshing given that in the States most local papers are being gobbled up by the likes of the USA Today crowd. Because so many papers are published at this one plant, the place never shuts down—it’s 24 hours of non-stop printing.
Ruan (the political reporter for the Republikien and Esther’s friend) showed us the presses, the prep area, the ad department, the writer’s pit, and the archives. It’s a full color operation and the newspapers produced are quite sophisticated in their layout, color and design. We also got to see the storage area where the huge rolls of paper are kept. It was a most interesting tour and worked out well with the unit of inquiry for Annie’s class—Get A Job. Who knows as much as Annie likes to peruse the paper, maybe she’ll be the next Nellie Bly.

Thanks LSU's Coach Mainieri

One of the former Fulbrighters to Namibia, Steve Grey, had the idea to start a baseball team during his stint here. Steve’s kids also attended Windhoek International and so naturally that is where he chose to base the team. He went through considerable effort to get equipment shipped over here since Cricket and not Baseball is what is practiced in these here parts. He was in contact with a little league team back home in his native Michigan. They sent uniforms, balls, bats and gloves among other things. When his tour was up he needed someone to whom he could hand over the reins. Naturally this then fell to Reid and his Fulbright colleague, Larkin Powell.

“The team” is an extension of WIS’s after school activities program, so it consists of just about anybody and his brother from year 4 on up. There’s also a number of boys who participate from a nearby orphanage associated with the school, Orlindi. Kelly usually runs over there and fetches the boys, typically about 6 or 7 in number, who then pile up in the back of the Polytechnic’s Toyota Corolla. They pile back in after practice to return.

The practice field may see 20 to 25 kids at any given time. The numbers vary depending on what else is going on that day. There hasn’t been a day when someone new hasn’t shown up and asked to play. Play, for us, has been the main objective of this all so international of exercises. We’ve tried to give the kids some basic skills and a general background concerning the rules, but we’ve also just approached this with the idea that it should be fun. Given that we’ve got kids from Israel, the US, the Netherlands, Iceland, and Namibia (just to name a few places) and from all income levels—the sons and daughters of ambassadors to orphans—it’s been an amazing lesson in the power of sport to unite all participants in a common sense of purpose and in the spirit of having a little fun together no matter how diverse their backgrounds might be.

We, of course, immediately thought about a role for LSU’s Baseball Program, National Collegiate Champs, in all of this. Reid wrote to Coach Mainieri and requested any kind of leftovers from the camps LSU runs for aspiring young athletes. Coach Mainieri’s reply was prompt and he put his assistant, Will Davis, right on it. Will had a bunch of t-shirts and caps all emblazoned with the LSU logo sent over FedEX for our rag-tag group of budding baseball aficionados. We held somewhat of a lottery among the kids in order to distribute them since there were an unequal number of shirts vs. caps. My brother also sent over a couple dozen baseballs and it felt like Mardi Gras handing these out. I was completely mobbed by the little munchkins. Although the shirts tended to run to the extra-large sizes, the kids were tickled pink with their acquisitions. They were especially pleased after Reid explained to them just who the LSU Tigers were and what kind of a baseball legacy they have. Who knows, maybe one of these days one of these kids will end up in Louisiana batting for the Tigers. There are a few of them that can really whack the ball.

Unfortunately, we’ve yet to find someone to whom we can now hand the reins and time is running short on us. We’ve harassed everyone we know, but we’re not yet ready to give up on it!

Namibian National Elections

The Namibian Parliamentary and Presidential Elections are scheduled for Nov. 27 & 28th. The ruling Party, SWAPO (Southwest Africa People’s Organization) which worked and fought to gain Namibian independence back in the 80’s & 90’s is predicted to win without too much of a show from the opposition. Although there’s been a few incidents of some wild talk, most of which has been directed at the former colonizers, Britain and Germany, there hasn’t been any violence per se accompanying these speeches. In fact, we’ve heard so little in regard to campaign speech as compared to American elections, where the presidential candidates begin advertising two years in advance, that we’ve hardly noticed there’s an election on. This week however, Reid and I have begun to get a little antsy in regard to what might accompany the voting when we read the pictured advertisement hawking riot insurance! This is Africa after all and no one ever really can predict what’s going to happen come election time. All one has to do is look at Kenya or Zimbabwe for examples of things gone wrong. I guess that’s the fear this particular insurance company is trying to capitalize on. We'll keep everyone posted on the progress of the elections.

Halloween in Namibia

Although Namibia’s population has a large component of British heritage, Halloween is not a widely celebrated custom here. There weren’t a whole lot of costumes available for purchase in the stores and most businesses are already focused on Christmas and their displays and product lines reflect this accordingly. The kids’ school, WIS, did allow the students to dress in costume on the Friday before and did hold an afterschool activity in the spirit of the tradition.

One of the mothers, incidentally of Brazilian origin but who has spent time in the States, organized a ‘Trick or Treat’ event in her “neighborhood” on the Friday evening and invited the kids from school as well as the neighborhood to participate. It must be noted that neighborhoods here don’t exist in the same way as they do in the States. In much of the city of Windhoek, houses are surrounded by high walls topped with electric or concertina wire. Every house is equipped with an electric gate. This makes it a bit difficult for people to get to know each other and house to house Trick or Treating virtually impossible. Eloisa’s neighborhood on the other hand is attached to the Country Club and is gated, so there are fewer walls and bars and the kids were able to walk down the street and knock on neighbors’ doors. Fewer bars do not equate to no bars and a couple of residents did hand out sweets between those that surround their porches it must be said (see photo above).

Despite the fact that Eloisa had sent out a notice, many of the residents weren’t exactly sure what to do when the gang of disguised munchkins appeared at their doorstep. One fellow was apparently caught unawares and so he invited the entire group into his house, opened his fridge and allowed them to take a soda of their choosing. By the time the last kid reached the fridge, he was down to one can of Tab (some of us are old enough to remember the first diet soda that’s still marketed here). I’m sure his wife wasn’t real happy with him when she got back from work! At another house, when the lady ran out of treats, she began distributing packages of yogurt.

All in all, a fun time was had by kids and adults alike. The kids especially enjoyed stuffing their mouths with treats and running from house to house with complete abandon. It was a bit strange though engaging in Halloween fun in the middle of Summer. I came home sporting a sun burn and guzzled down at least a liter of water to try and quench my thirst after running to keep up with Annie who was literally crazed from the unaccustomed sugar rush.

The following day, the Embassy community also engaged in its own version of Halloween. No one distributed soda, but we did have to jump in our cars and drive around town to the various embassy houses that were distributing treats. It did put an interesting twist on the custom as a convoy of American vehicles snaked its way from house to house and the masked kids jumped out to collect their treats.

I’m not sure that the custom of Halloween has a future in this country—it demands too much trust among residents and requires people to open their gates and let strangers in, strangers in search of free treats nonetheless! Perhaps if they did do so every now and again, they could finally rid themselves of the architecture of apartheid that continues to characterize this place. What a concept!

Camping at Hochland Nest

Went camping this weekend with another American family from the embassy community. They also have three kids roughly the same age as our own. So, six kids out in the African bush....wow! We camped at a place called Hochland Nest. It’s got a lodge, but its camp site is located a bit of a ways away from the lodge on a lake called Friedenhau Dam. The lakes and rivers typically dry up outside of the rainy season, so the water authority, NamWater, will dam up the rivers and create lakes so that there’s some standing water in the dry season. Some of the lakes serve as a water supply to different communities and/or also have a recreational function. This particular place apparently attracts fishermen from neighboring Windhoek. They host bass tournaments and so the camp sites are well frequented by the locals.

We weren’t sure what we were getting into. The website info on these places tends to be sparse and talking to people on the phone is an experience in and of itself—they’ve got an accent, we’ve got an accent, there’s an echo, yada, yada, yada—so communication is often sketchy at best. We did know beforehand that there wouldn’t be water at the pitching site itself. We knew there were ablution facilities (toilet & shower, such a medieval term), so our family had assumed that there would be drinking water available somewhere on the premises. Wrong! The water used in the showers was pumped up directly from the lake. Not sure whether or not it was then treated in some manner, but from the looks of it when we filled up our supply bottles, not likely. Never, never, make assumptions in Africa. Things turned out all right nevertheless and no one went thirsty since I had frozen a couple dozen juice boxes to use in the cooler in lieu of ice and the kids drank so much of that, that they were actually begging for water by the trip’s end.

The kids fished (didn’t actually land any though), played badminton, swam (until they discovered the leeches) and generally cavorted to their hearts’ content. The adults worked like dogs on the other hand getting tents and meals prepared. We took the first night’s shift on dinner and braaiied lamb chops, steak and sausage over a barrel that didn’t have a grill. Luckily we had brought our little grill, but had the devil of a time getting it so that it actually supported the meat over the fire in the barrel and didn’t collapse right into it. My friend Stephanie experimented the second night and made a ‘potjie’ which in Afrikaans means pioneer’s stew. We used hartebeest and other game meat just like they would have in the olden days. It turned out pretty good even though Steph had forgotten the red wine. We substituted Savanah Light Hard Apple Cider, so it gave the stew a rather unique flavor that we all enjoyed.

We didn’t see a whole lot of wildlife on this trip with the exception of baboons. We noticed their scat all around the campsite and I could have sworn that I heard them digging through the garbage one night. We saw a fine specimen on our way out of the campsite as he was foraging for breakfast. Baboons can be very aggressive, so being prepared for an encounter with one is the best advice. Just an added note, it was Emma's weekend to bring home the class pet, Jerry (a dwarf hamster). So, Jerry came along on the camping trip with us and spent the night in the tent. It's probably the biggest adventure he's ever been on! He did make it back to school in one piece. Thank goodness!

This will probably be our last camping outing here in Namibia and we sure enjoyed being out in the wilds of the African bush.

Photos: Kids from the two families in the splash pool at Hochland Nest Lodge. Jerry, the class pet, on his wild African Adventure.

Louisiana Makes The Namibian

The Namibian, Namibia’s foremost English language daily is one of many published here, however, it’s one of the most provocative and thought provoking in our opinion. In the run up to the presidential election in November, it and its editor, Gwen Lister, have been the subject of much controversy. It seems to invite the ire especially of the ruling party, SWAPO because the paper has a tell-it-like-it-is stance that seems to bother the powers that be. This is particularly sad given the fact that the editor worked tirelessly in the run up to independence in the 70’s and 80’s to help point out the injustices of the apartheid system. It is in large part due to her efforts that the ruling party is now the ruling party. It seems that lately though, many in the party leadership have conveniently forgotten this fact.
On the other hand, there are often some really strange things that make the publication cut. The following story entitled “Naked burglar breaks into home, cooks and showers” appeared in the Friday, Oct. 9, 2009 issue of the paper. Interestingly enough, the naked burglar performed his mischief in a house in SLIDELL, LOUISIANA. It’s thought that the naked man was possibly drunk or on drugs. Police Chief Freddy Drennan is appealing to the public to help identify the man and photos captured on surveillance video of his escapades have been published in the Times-Picayune according to the article. Once again, Louisiana makes the news for the wrong reasons and this time it’s not just the national news; it’s the INTERNATIONAL news!

More Photos of WABI & Waterberg Plateau

Photos: Baboon imitating art? Le Penseur en nature? This guy is sitting atop a skyscraper of a termite mound.

The family hiking in Waterburg Resort

Kids hiking with our guide Morné at WABI (who is living the dream of being a tour guide in the bush)

Female nyala just below the porch railing of our chalet.

Waterberg Plateau Visit

Just returned from visiting the Waterburg Plateau. The Plateau is located 150 km or so north of Windhoek. It is a most strange geologic formation that resembles many of the mesas of the Arizona/New Mexico region. It began to form over 300 million years ago and is an interesting mixture of sedimentary rock that has also seen volcanic activity. The sheer rocky face of the Plateau contains every shade of orange and brown and is dotted with psychedelic lichens of neon yellow, green or even blue. We hiked all the way to the top on one of the days of our visit. Annie did the best job, especially since we were moving almost vertically towards the top of this thing. I think her lower center of gravity helped her maintain her balance better than the older members of our family. The view was spectacular from the top.
We were pretty pooped when we descended the trail, but we still had a little left in us to visit the German cemetery on the grounds. Waterburg is the site where the Germans and the Herrero people clashed during the height of German colonization of the area. The Herrero, needless to say, lost. And the infamous ‘annihilation order’ was subsequently issued. It was rescinded sometime later by the Kaiser himself, but not before the death of many an indigenous man, woman or child. Most of the Germans buried there, however, did not die as a result of battle. They died mostly from disease or from the lack of appropriate medical attention after the battle.
In more modern times, the place has recently been turned into a resort complete with “chalets”, a restaurant and a humungous pool (which of course Annie fell into with all of her clothes on). There’s also camping for the more modest budget. Game drives are offered as well and guided hikes. Since we were staying up the road a bit which offered its own game drives, we just availed ourselves of the well marked hiking paths. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to spot the black rhino that inhabits the top of the plateau.
The lodge we stayed in was called WABI and it is a most interesting place indeed. Its décor is a bit of a throwback to the early eighties. It's also filled with hunting trophies from its earlier days when it was a hunting lodge. Its owner, Christine, is the ultimate hostess. She is the type of person that seems to anticipate one’s needs before one can even verbalize them. Our kids ate up her three course dinners with gusto, which is saying quite a lot. Because WABI is located so far in the bush, much of what is needed for the lodge is produced on site. There are ducks and chickens whose eggs are eaten at breakfast. So the experience was also much like being on the farm. The meat course is usually of some sort of game variety so we were offered kudu steaks, kudu stroganoff and springbok in a nutmeg sauce. Yum!
There were other animals just for the viewing—giraffes, sable, oryx, white rhinos, hippos, wildebeest, kudu, lechwe and black-faced impala—just to name a few. The lechwe are bred there for live sale to other lodges. It is normally an animal that inhabits Northern Namibia in the Okavango Region. Additionally, there was a flock of magnificent peafowl; the alpha peacock of the bunch being the most beautiful and well kept we’ve ever seen. They tended to roost on our doorstep, the roof, the exterior window sills or just about anywhere they darn well please. A small herd of nyala roamed free among the ‘chalets’ and the kids were able to get some really up-close and personal shots of them. Lastly, a pair of injured and / or elderly cheetahs were kept in a huge enclosure where they could be fed and kept safe from predators. On our last morning there, Christine took a group of tourists into the enclosure and one of the cheetahs began to express his discontent over the situation and it looked like it might be curtains for the tourists, but one of the bigger women in the group averted disaster by shooing him away like one would a troublesome dog. Emma said her knees were shaking after witnessing that little scene. What an interesting departing gift!

More on Driving in Namibia

Well, you all know how I feel about driving here since it was the topic of one of my first blog entries. It’s not just the fact that driving is done on the “wrong” side here that makes it difficult to adjust to; it’s all the various and sundry other crazy things that occur as well that contribute to my being a nervous wreck behind the wheel.
First anything goes here. Like the photo above demonstrates, four-wheelers are allowed to be driven on city streets. As you can see from the picture, they’re even licensed! We’ve seen dune buggies, three-wheelers, elderly chair scooters, etc. If it’s got wheels and a motor, we’ve probably seen it on the streets of Windhoek.
Additionally, there seems to be a high tolerance for risk taking behavior here. Safety appears to be a non-issue for Namibians. Parents think nothing of driving with kids in their lap, in the front seat unrestrained or packed to the gills in an open-bed bakkie (pick-up truck). I cringe every time I come up behind one of these vehicles because I can envision a kid falling out right in front of my on-coming vehicle and me running over him/her with my kids in the car.
Taxi drivers are the absolute worst, however. They will make two lanes where there was only one originally. They’ll turn right in front of you even if you’ve got the right of way. They typically jump the light before it turns green and run the red ones. They’ll pass you in town, in neighborhoods or any time they feel like it even if the road signs indicate against such. An acquaintance from school is currently driving around with a huge dent in her driver’s side door where she “was kissed” by a taxi! Because there are zillions of taxis, they can't be avoided either.
Perhaps it’s the German influence, but excessive speed is a major factor in road accidents here in Namibia, so many of which end in a fatality. Drivers treat these little two lane shoulder-less roads as if it were the Autobahn. Posted speed for the “highway” is 120 km. That’s 75 miles per hour on a road that’s not even close to being in interstate condition. Mind you, that’s the posted speed; people are typically flying by us and so we figure they’re up to 150 or 160 Km. Encountering a wart hog or an oryx at that speed would spell sheer disaster, but it’s as if most drivers don’t even give it a second thought.
She may be slow and lumbering, but she’s built solid like a rock. With her bull bar in the front, Ole Bess can out intimidate most other vehicles, so we’re hoping that we can stay safe and sound for the remainder of our 3 month stay here in Namibia. We’ll be sad to part with her when the time comes. She’s been such a good girl.

Gus Wins Silver at the 27th Annual Namibian National Science Fair

Held September 8-10, 2009, Gus’s Birds in My Backyard project earned a score that qualified him for the silver medal in the category of Biology. Hundreds of kids from around the country descended on the exam basement of the Polytechnic, Namibia’s premier university for the three day event. WIS had only two entries to advance to this high level, Augustus’ and his classmate Sharifa’s. The competition was pretty stiff especially from St. Paul’s and St. George’s, well noted for their strong programs in both academics and athletics (somewhat like Catholic of Baton Rouge and Episcopal), but his research held its own in the end. Incidentally, Sharifa also received a silver (they are pictured together above). Both may qualify to attend the next level in South Africa—we’ll keep everyone posted. We, his parents, are extremely proud of him, needless to say!

The “Eisheiligen”—Being Cold in Africa

When Reid was finally awarded the Fulbright and we had to make decisions about what to bring with us to Namibia, we did a bit of research into the climate. We knew that Namibia, being a desert country, was prone to some pretty low temps especially at nighttime. The statistics indicated that during the Winter (June-August here) nighttime temps typically fell around the freezing mark (0 degrees Celsius). Daytime temps however were quite mild according to the literature—hovering in the upper teens and low twenties Celsius (50’s & 60’s F). We thus packed a few sweaters and light jackets. We did not even consider heavy duty pjs or coats. What with Reid being the packing Nazi that he was, we were lucky to make it here with enough underwear in tow. Upon arrival in December, mid-summer, we were glad we had brought our Louisiana cottons and clothing of other light weight fabrics. With the approach of winter, many of our Namibian acquaintances kept telling us to brace ourselves. We tended to down play it, after all being from the Northern Hemisphere and Reid a native Iowan to boot, it would take snow and ice to scare us, a most unusual sight in Namibia to say the least. Little did we understand, however, the ways of Namibian construction. Most of the houses here are built with the heat in mind. Walls are made of thick brick that are designed to keep the interior cool. The exterior is usually painted a light color so as to reflect the sunlight. Windows are just basically panes of glass and don’t do much to resist either the cold or heat. Insulation as we know it is virtually non-existent here. The term furnace as a household item does not exist in the Namibian vocabulary. So when the Namibians experience freezing temperatures; it is not only freezing outside, it’s literally freezing inside as well! Literally!

To try and keep warm during this time, we’d turn the oven on and open the door to let the heat warm the living space of our tiny flat. We baked a good bit (needless to say, I’ve put on a few pounds as a result) but we finally had to succumb and purchase blankets and an electric space heater even though we’ve been trying hard not to spend money on things that we’ll just be leaving behind in a few months time. Finally the first of September drew nigh and we thought we were home free, this date being the first day of Spring in the Southern Hemisphere.

As if by magic, plants and trees that looked utterly spent have begun to sprout leaves and the most exquisite and exotic blossoms. We’ve had to really rethink our understanding of the workings of the natural world during this time. For us in the Northern Hemisphere who understand that April showers bring May flowers, we are taken aback with the complete lack of rain prior to the onslaught of Spring. It hasn’t rained in months and won’t do so we’re told until November and yet trees have begun to green up and the flowers are popping out everywhere. Nights had begun to get warmer too. We had even broken a sweat at the first session of baseball practice we’d conducted at WIS. But lo and behold today we are experiencing what older Namibians refer to as the Eisheiligen. I’m not sure the origin of the word, whether German or Africaaner, but it roughly translates as the Ice Saints. Suddenly, the wind has begun to blow up from the South (yes, it’s the South wind that brings the cold here) and we’ve had to break out the sweaters again. I’m on my third warm beverage this morning and I can’t feel my toes in my shoes at the moment. We’ve got baseball practice again this afternoon and I hope the wind mellows before we get out on the field to toss the ball around. The Eisheiligen, we’re told won’t last long and the lovely spring weather should return shortly but a true Louisianian, I like my weather warm!

Please take note, with the Spring came the return to Daylight Saving Time here, so we are now 7 hours ahead of Central Time/ Louisiana & Iowa time. That is until you guys go back to standard time in October when the differential will again change!

Photo above: Annie celebrates her 6th birthday on a lovely Namibian Spring Day. We'd have been sweltering back in Louisiana.

Gus Goes to the Namibian National Science Fair

The National Science Fair of Namibia begins tomorrow, September 8, and Gus will be there. His bird project has taken him far and he’ll present his findings to the judges on Wednesday. Being held once again in the exam basement at the Polytechnique, Augustus is beginning to feel like an old pro at this business. What a wonderful experience for him as students from around the country will be there mingling and sharing their findings as well as their culture. We wish him the best of luck!
The pictures above are of the Long-Tailed Paradise-Whydah and the Southern Red Bishop.

Hippo Talk

Ndhovu Lodge, Rundu, Otjiwarongo & Ole Bess

While at Ndhovu we went on two game drives, one with Horst in the Bwabwata National Park, the other on our own in the Mahango Game Park. We saw a wide variety of wildlife in both: hippos, crocodiles, kudu, roan and sable antelope, water monitor, vervet monkeys, elephants, water buffalo galore and even a python. Although not in evidence in the same numbers as in Etosha, we did feel like we had seen more types of birds and animals than in our previous experience. In Mahango, we even had an elephant just about charge into us as he was wanting to cross over to the other side of the road just at the spot we had stopped the vehicle. We managed to get Ole Bess cranked up and out of his way just in the nick of time. The kids found that to be very exciting and Augustus was able to get a number up close and personal shots of him as he nearly grazed the Rover. He didn’t appear too angry though, so Reid was thinking that maybe we could have waited him out another click or two….I for one am glad that we made our escape when we did. Saw huge Baobab trees along the drive and were treated to dancing and singing by the lodge staff at Ndhovu after dinner that evening. Speaking of Ole Bess, well what kind of adventure would it be without some sort of input on her part? After our game drive in Mahango, Reid noticed that the steering was getting a bit tight. He got under her and discovered that the power steering line was leaking rather badly. Reid made mention of our circumstances to one of the staff, who in turn radioed Horst, in town to pick up provisions, who picked up some power steering fluid for the old girl. What was to be done about the leak, however? Horst indicated that we could get the line repaired in Divundu. Divundu, readers, is about the size of Morganza and then again I might be exaggerating. Next door to the Engen combined petrol station and supermarket is the 435 Garage. This place looks more like a car graveyard than a repair shop. It consists basically of a shack with a few tables containing tools with derelict cars and car parts strewn willy-nilly about the yard. Reid stood around for about 5 minutes before anyone appeared. When the guys did so, they were fairly efficient but had to send the line off to someone else to have it brazed---ah, the weak link in the repair process. Needless to say, the repair did not remain repaired for very long and we found ourselves in the same circumstances of having a leaking power steering line when we arrived in Rundu some hours later after picnicking briefly at Poppa Falls. Rundu, a hodge podge sort of town with its people spilling out into its streets everywhere hasn’t got a whole lot to offer to its tourists, but we did find a competent mechanic there who got Ole Bess back in her running shoes. Rundu sits on the South side of the Kavango River across from Angola. We took a boat ride with the lodge where we were staying and got a good deal of insight into the everyday life of the people on the Angola side. There were loads of fishing boats made from what looked to be dug out tree trunks, some being used to ferry passengers to Namibia, others for their intended purpose. Since it was nearly sundown, many of the villagers were bathing, brushing teeth and washing clothes in the shallows and on the river bank--the children splashing happily, oblivious to their poverty. The Kavango is also the source of their drinking water so it’s a good thing that it flows rather rapidly at this point given the heavy usage it gets by the local inhabitants. Rundu offered a glimpse to our kids of the Africa with which Reid and I had been acquainted through our Peace Corps experience. It’s a place that has largely escaped the influences that Windhoek and environs were subjected to and as a result retains its “disorganized” qualities that lend a certain charm to the town. Stopped in Tsumeb on the next leg of our journey. Tsumeb is a pretty little old mining town that is well kept and one can still find lots of interesting stones and minerals in the vicinity. Of course, Augustus obtained several new acquisitions to his rock collection. Visited the museum there and had lunch at a “biergarten.” Stayed the night in Otjiwarongo and toured the Crocodile Farm in the morning. Would have had lunch there, where what else but crocodile is featured heavily on the menu, but Annie got sick so we headed back to Windhoek. Were glad to get back to our temporary home sweet home and a functioning washing machine after so many days on the road!

Sleeping with the Hippos

After our interlude at Roy's, we headed up to the Caprivi Strip, a little narrow thumb-like projection on the Northeastern corner of Namibia that touches Angola, Zambia and Botswana. The area is noted for its diversity of wildlife, open-flowing rivers and angling appeal. Our fellow Fulbrighter family, the Powells, had recently been through the area on their way to Victoria Falls and had stayed at a very cool lodge called Ndhovu where the guests are housed in Lobatse military style tents with a detached bath. The tents aren’t in the least bit Spartan, however. They are well appointed with embroidered linens, thick wool floor rugs and sparkling white mosquito netting. We seized the opportunity and capitalized on the Powell’s tip and scheduled 4 days and 3 nights there. We weren’t disappointed.
The main attraction of the lodge is that it sits right on the banks of the Okavango River. There just so happens to be a grassy island right in front of the lodge where a herd of hippos hang out for out 7 months of the year. Our tent was located just opposite the island and we were able to almost literally sleep with the 15 or so hippos that make it their home. Most were mothers with nursing calves. What a treat! The great part is that they’re nocturnal and so as we drifted off to sleep each night, we could hear them milling about in the river and on the bank right in front of our tent. They’ve got the strangest call that resembles the laugh of Jabba the Hut on StarWars.
Additionally, the owner of the lodge, Horst Koch, is very hands-on. He sits and has meals with the guests, takes them out on game drives and will even fetch supplies for one’s broken-down vehicle when necessary. (More about the Adventures of Ole Bess later). Horst is a wealth of knowledge and information and just a downright nice fella. He still owns a farm near Windhoek, but his heart is with the lodge in Divundu and that’s where he spends most of his time. His children live in different places around the world, so he’s got some work to do to get them to come back and take over the farm and free himself up entirely for life in the “unorganized sector” of Namibia.
Indeed, this area of Namibia is vastly different from the Central and Southern districts. The population is much denser up here. Many still live in traditional homesteads that can easily be seen from the road. Non-existent are the huge 20,000 hectare farms like in the South and life appears to be much more hard scrabble for people who engage in subsistence farming. The people must battle malaria here as well. No easy task when there is little money for prophylactic medication. Things aren’t as clean here as in the Windhoek area either and there is often trash on the roadsides especially near the larger towns. It is nonetheless a most interesting place to visit and we enjoyed it thoroughly.

Bushmen Village

The following day we drove about 65 km to an historic living village of the /Xoa-o Ju/Hoansi gaon, a branch of the San people whom we typically refer to as the Bushmen. Most live in very dire circumstances since many of their traditional activities have been severely restricted. Although they have given up their traditional housing, they've replaced it with tin shacks and basic construction that isn't much of a step up. To try and support the village, they have turned to putting on demonstrations for tourist groups. They will even walk one out into the bush and show how they track and hunt animals. We didn't think our little ones would be able to keep up with such a demanding pace, so we elected their crafts program wherein some of the tribespeople showed how they make jewelry, bows, arrows and fire. Most of them spoke their native tongue; complete with all of the clicking sounds just like in the movie, The Gods Must Be Crazy and very little English. So, one of the younger members of the tribe did the translating. He's pictured with Augustus above. Not much bigger than Augustus, he indicated that he was 19 years old. They were all attired in their traditional clothing which is to say very little clothing at all--loincloths, and the women wore something similar looking in the front but with a much longer back piece to cover the nether parts. Many of the women had their babies tied to their backs while they used natural materials to create all sorts of marvelous jewelry confections of seeds, ostrich egg shells, and wooden beads. They did so with the most primitive of hand tools. One man made a bow, set of arrows and quiver in the time we observed him. He used giraffe bone to make the arrows as well as some more modern iron tips. Making fire seemed to be a fine art. The translator, Elias, didn't appear to be as skilled as the older man and seemed to endure some good-natured ribbing from the ladies as a result. Augustus gave it a try and remarked on how difficult it was to keep up the speed on the rubbing stick.

When the older Bushman finished creating his hunting weapons, he showed us how game is tracked in the bush. He had a target set up and shot three arrows. He narrowly missed it each time. When we gave it a try, we realized how difficult it was to secure one's dinner. All of us with the exception of Annie gave it a try and we'd have all gone hungry that day had we to rely on our own prowess because most of us didn't even come close.

The tribe had a "craft shop" set up under the trees, somewhat of a roofless, wall-less, stick kraal with the crafts the tribespeople make hanging from sticks embedded in the earth. Emma bought a quiver and bow that included giraffe bone tipped arrows and the fire starter equipment. Augustus bought a bush knife. Annie's quiver was miniature size that she intends to hunt rats with. I got a multi-strand necklace made out of some sort of indigenous seeds. Our interpreter wrote everything down in his class notebook and calculted the total purchase prices on a scrap of paper while the little ones looked on from a neighboring tree.

It was a wonderful experience to see firsthand how the Bushmen have lived and existed for millennia. It was also somewhat sad to view a culture in the midst of disappearing. Because the San/ Bushmen are a nomadic people, their very way of life has been inalterably changed by virtue of the government confining them to a limited territory where they can no longer hunt the type of animals they were long accustomed to. It would be interesting to return in 20 or 30 years to see what has become of them and how they manage to adapt in this ever changing world of the 21st century.

Roy's Camp

Began our big tour of the North of Namibia yesterday, 15 August. Ended the day at Roy's Camp, a funky little lodge/campground between Grootfontein and Rundu. The place is decorated with an eclectic collection of junk including such things as a huge wind chime/mobile made of among other things, a whitened giraffe skull. The remains of a 1930's Ford greet the guests upon arrival at the reception. The pool water is circulated through an old claw foot bathtub. We were housed in a two stroy A-frame thatched cottage called Lappa in Namibia. The staircase, made of rough hewn trunks of old trees sits at the exterior leading up to a small exterior veranda where the kids gladly made themselves at home. Since our bedroom was on the first floor and theirs was only accessible via the exterior stairs, they felt like they had their own private tree house club. We partook of the lodge's dinner and were quite surprised by its tastiness. The cook had prepared a very interesting combination of items--kudu steak, chichen wings, macaroni and a variety of salads. The kids actually ate everything on their plates and remarked that it was good. That in and of itself is a remarkable thing.