Whaattssap! I’ve been in Botswana for 11 days now and just wanted to share my experiences in the rawest form where spelling and grammar are non-issues. This is a “thought to words” type blog and so my apologies if my writing isn’t lyrical and eloquent (Head over to the QPID Botswana blog for that. Lots of food for thought there).

The epic journey to Botswana was as smooth as it could possibly be. I left Kingston on June 7th at about 12:30 PM, reached Francistown Botswana at around 3:30PM on Thursday June 9th and everything went exactly as planned. There was no lost luggage, no flight delays, and no real turbulence. The Etihad flight from Abu Dhabi to Johannesburg was probably the emptiest long haul flight I have ever been on and so I ended up having the entire middle row to myself. Best sleep on a plane EVER. The overall journey would have been pretty boring if it weren’t for the excitement that accompanies travelling to new places.

Francistown Airport reminded me a lot of Kilimanjaro Airport in Tanzania though this one was even smaller; the immigration office and baggage claim were merged into a bedroom size area.

For the first few days in Francistown aka “the Ghetto”, a friend of a friend took it upon himself to show us around the city and teach us survival techniques and without him, we would have seriously flopped. We spent one full day in Francistown (June 10th) and then the QPID team left for Kasane to get Chloe and Lyndsay settled in. The bus trip there on the CHOBE EXPRESS was possibly one of the most uncomfortable because the van that would hold 12 mayybee 15 people in Canada was holding 27+conductor who was one fattass rude guy. Along the way, we ended up seeing our first elephants chillin in some bush along the highway as well as a group of female ostriches, a young giraffe, and kudu.

In Kasane, we were greeted by Ludo aka Mama who is the elder sister of our friend Kenosi. Just for a little background, Kenosi is a Batswana friend of ours from Queen’s who helped us with language and cultural training and travelled with us to Francistown before heading to his own town. Mama turned out to be one hell of a character. She’s 25, works as an automechanic, and acts like a total child (in the best of ways). But she was incredibly generous to allow us to stay at her home which was a tale in itself consisting of freezing cold showers, massive spiders, and leopard attack scares. Mama’s place was actually in Kazungula which is roughly 6km from Kasane and while most people would just think of jogging that distance every morning, the threat of animal attacks from leopards, elephants, cape buffalo, and hippos was so great that hitchhiking became our preferred mode of transport. That may seem sketchy but that is part of the norm here and it is the recommended way of getting around.

A pile of hippos in Chobe National Park

Kasane is a very touristy town and so food was a lot more expensive but the place itself is just incredible. Its located on the banks of the Chobe River which we were told is one of the world’s only rivers that flows in 2 directions (at different times of the year). The area itself is teeming with wildlife because of its vicinity to the Chobe National Park and so we regularly saw elephants, pumbas, cape buffalo, and chacma baboons on the outskirts of the town.

Male Chacma baboon contemplating

A herd of elephants stopped to eat mineral rich dirt

Dumbo

We had a bit of downtime during our trip to Kasane and so on one day, we went for a boat cruise along the Chobe River and saw elephants swimming across the river into Namibian territory. A site to behold. The next day we went for a game drive and saw the most spectacular sunset I have EVER seen as well as 2 female lionesses (a rarity for a 3 hour game drive in the early evening) as well as the “usual” fauna. The day after, our game drive guide contacted us to let us know that he had witnessed 15 lions feast on an elephant. Buzz kill.

Our first lion on the prowl

A young giraffe crossing the Chobe River

Male Kudu silhouette

We left Kasane on Tuesday morning at 6AM and even that was adventurous. The day earlier, Mama had told us about a leopard attack and so we were really sketched on the Tuesday morning when we had to walk out to the main road in the dark lugging all our bags. As we were standing on the main road desperately waiting for any car to roll by, we heard a growling type noise. Thomas and I maintain that it was some sort or wild animal whereas Iz thinks it was a truck idling. It was an animal. Trust me.

Back in Francistown, we all met with our host families and parted ways. My hosts the Tshabos are quite the accomplished couple and I really look forward to the next few months. Mr Tshabo is an elderly man who, before retiring, was involved in the wildlife and game department of the government and even held the post of coordinator of Chobe National Park at one point. He currently lives by the Okavango Delta and is a cattle farmer at the tender age of 66. Mrs. Tshabo is a lecturer of English and in stark comparison to Mr. Tshabo, she is very soft spoken and a devout Christian. By devout I mean realllyyy devout. Like church 4 times a week. Im sure I will talk more of these guys as the days go by.

Now a little about the culture. For one, there is no rush to do anything. Things will get done when they get done. It’s a major change from North American living where when someone tells you to meet them at 9AM, its imperative that you meet them at 9AM or else you’re a slacker, have commitment issues or are just plain useless. Here, that pressure of having to fit perfectly into other people’s time tables is absent and so life is just 10 times easier. This is a culture that teaches you that patience is everything. People even walk slower when going from A to B. Another great thing about this chilled way of living is that as a foreigner, people don’t give a damn that you’re here. In Cambodia, Thailand, or anywhere else that I have ever been, street vendors yell from every angle to get your attention but here you can walk through a market and go completely unnoticed. The Batswana culture is also very communal as compared to North America where people are generally individualistic. There is an immense amount of trust between strangers and thus when someone helps you out, you never get the feeling that there are ulterior motives involved.

Now a little about the work. Thomas, Iz, and I are interning at a local NGO by the name of True Men Center and basically its goal is to increase the involvement of men in the fight against HIV/AIDS and ultimately stop the spread of the virus. Basically there are three main projects being run right now and they target commercial sex workers and the truck drivers they cater to, the issue of multiple concurrent partners (MCP), and prevention of mother to child transmission (PMTCT). We’re based in the headquarters but as we learned today, there is a large network of peer educators, about 50 in total, that are responsible for all the “field work”, who only come to the office once a week and for the rest of the time are out engaging the community. Our first main project as interns (6 of us) is to hold a workshop for new hires to the post of peer educators and give them all the information necessary to conduct their jobs. I will personally be responsible for a presentation on mental preparation as well as putting the overall presentation together. Right now we’re just trying to figure out the structure of the organization but soon enough we’ll be doing some real work and heading out with peer educators.

This message has gotten wayyyy too long but I just wanted to include as much as I could in the first post. I promise to keep them short from now on and post frequently. Pleaasseee don’t hesitate to comment on anything.

“If you reject the food, ignore the customs, fear the religion and avoid the people, you might better stay at home.” - James Michener

Sala Sentle
Faisal