Sights at Etosha!

So I am incredibly behind on my blogging. This weekend we went to the Zebra River Lodge and the sand dunes, and last weekend was the first week we were in the schools. I need to finish up with our week up North, which ended with Etosha National Park.

This is a hornbill, the type of bird Zazoo is in the Lion King.

We almost witnessed the mating of giraffes, but I guess us watching killed the mood. 

In Namibia, Zebra are pronounced Zeb-ra. 

So I know jackals are supposed to be vicious, but I thought they were really cute. Except when they were running all around our hotel. Cinnamon and I were coming back from the watering hole and one was coming towards us and so we ran into the alcove where Cinnamon's room was. We fumbled with the keys and barely made it in the room before it was upon us. Linnea said she ran into one and made funny faces at it and it went away.

Ostrich, plus babies. 

Baby wildebeest

We saw several lions all together, but they were sleepy and did not do a whole lot. This one at least got up enough for a couple of pictures. 

The watering hole at our hotel at night. We heard many animal noises and saw an owl up in the tree above us. It looked like a barn animal to me. We also saw a ferret/cat like animal. 

Chameleon at our hotel. We saw it change colors before our eyes. 

Photo courtesy of Rayna McMullen. Seeing a leopard is supposedly very rare, a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence!

Look back tomorrow for a post on my time this weekend at Zebra River Lodge and the sand dunes!

More Postcards from Up North

I will post Etosha pictures hopefully tomorrow. 

Postcards from Up North

More coming soon . . .

Cheetara, go Find Lion-O

As of today, I have been in Namibia for one week. I have loved every minute of it and have enjoyed seeing the sites and making new friends. I am so thankful that I have seven more weeks to explore this beautiful country.  Probably my favorite thing I have done thus far is visiting the Cheetah Conservation Fund, which is north of Windhoek.

When we got there, we split up into two groups. My groups went on a ride to see the cheetahs first. The Cheetah Conservation takes in orphan cheetahs that farmers find and if possible puts them back into their natural habitat. Therefore, the cheetahs we saw were in an enclosed space and they were not afraid to come up to our truck. Our guide, Charles, said that one cheetah in particular was not afraid of humans and would get impatient and take the meat out of his hand if he did not give it to her quickly. Now I am not usually a cat person, but the cheetahs were so beautiful and in a lot of ways they just acted like a big house cat. I took about 200 pictures while I was at the conservation, but here are some of my favorites plus a video.

I thought that we had gotten pretty close to the cheetah, but following the tour they brought four, 17  week-old, orphaned cheetah siblings on leashes. They immediately plopped on the ground like any normal house cat would and bathed in the sun. The director of the CCF talked about how they raised puppies on the Conservation to give to farmers as guard dogs for their cattle as an alternative to shooting at the cheetahs who might attack their cattle. As a part of their efforts, the CCF will also track down, trap, and take in problem cheetahs who are attacking cattle. To identify that they have caught the correct cheetah, they will collect their scat and put it in a sock. Then they will take it back to their lab, put it in the laundry machine so all that is left is hair. From the hair they can identify what animals the cheetah has been eating and if it has been eating cattle and is the problem cheetah. Here are some more pictures of the cheetahs and animals around the Conservation. 

Shout-out to all of my Mayo Clinic friends. I got to see a lab at the CCF. It was pretty simple though, they had fridges for pre-PCR and post-PCR and of course a PCR machine. What they do in the lab is that they get dogs to track down cheetah scat and then they use the cheetah scat to get a census of how many cheetahs are in Namibia. They say that choose dogs who are very playful or food-oriented. Maybe Izzy needs a day job? They do take volunteers and interns, which I just might consider doing at some point. 

Here are some things I learned about cheetahs: 

• They have a horrible sense of smell. Our guide threw a piece of meat by them and it took them quite awhile to find it. 
• They are the fastest land animal, but they can only run that fast for a short distance. Otherwise they walk very slowly. We learned this when we were stuck behind an ambling cheetah in our truck for about five minutes. 
• They don't have a collarbone, so they can run fast. 
• You can tell a cheetah and a jaguar apart because cheetahs have teardrops under their eyes and jaguars do not. Cheetahs also have spots and jaguars have rosettes. 

We got to see them feed the cheetahs. They are eating horse with a protein powder on it. They have to cut out all the bones, because cheetahs have very small teeth. Therefore, they only eat the organs and leave the rest for scavengers.

This is a hornbill. 

White-necked vultures. 

As you can see I learned a lot when I went there and I loved it, even though it took us three hours to drive back to Windhoek. It was perfect though because on our way back we saw a full double rainbow and lots of other animals including baboons, which had eluded us on our hike. Who knows, maybe I will visit again soon as an intern? 

The Market

On Thursday night we went to a favorite local restaurant called Joe's Beerhouse. It is known primarily for its game and its atmosphere. The inside of the restaurant did not disappoint, it had a pond with lots of wood features that sort of reminded me of an African version of the Rainforest Cafe. I was also brave and tried various  game meats. I split the "Bushman Sosatie," which included ostrich, crocodile, zebra, kudo, and chicken. My favorite was probably the crocodile. It was very light tasting, like fish but it was chewier. The ostrich, zebra, and kudo had the same texture as steak. I was surprised though because the ostrich was the toughest of the three.

The following day we left to go up north, just for an overnight trip. We stopped at a town called Okahandja, where the best markets. The markets were little shacks that were open on both sides with many different kinds of African handicrafts in them. The stalls went on for about a soccer field's length. I got off the bus with two shirts draped over my arms. One was a PLU yellow soccer jersey and the other was a warm-up top from the Santa Clara soccer team. I was hoping to be able to use them to barter. I had only ever witnessed bartering once and that was in Mexico, when I was in elementary school.

Therefore I was kind of nervous to barter, because 1) I felt like I was causing them to lose money and 2) I had no idea what was a reasonable price for their goods. I started just walking and the man in the first stall pointed at the black Santa Clara warm-up and said, "I like this one. I will trade you." I told him I was just looking for now, but every time I picked something up all of the store clerks would say "It's a nice one!" It was rather overwhelming looking at what all was in the market, even though they mostly sold the same things. The market had a lot of African animals carved out of wood, wooden and painted bowls, carved wood salad tongs, masks, and boutiques (like tapestries). It was rather overwhelming. I was not quite sure what I even wanted.

Our professor was a self-proclaimed pro at bartering. She asked how much a bowl was from one of the vendors. The vendor gave the price of $200 and Paula just rolled her eyes and said, "I'll give you fifty." After some himming and hamming the store clerk finally gave in and Paula was just like, "Does anybody want this bowl?" Rayna took her up on the offer.

At the next stall I asked Paula for her expertise, hoping that she could give me a price range of the items I was  thinking of buying. I asked her about giraffe bookends and  a wood wall hanging that has animals carved into it. Instead, she started bartering for me. I asked her about the boutique too. I picked out one that had giraffes on it and she was like, "no, you don't want that one." She ended up settling on a price of $275 plus the Santa Clara warm-up, for the three items. Paula said it was a steal. I was pretty happy with my purchases.

Katie and I were walking back and I still had the yellow PLU jersey draped over my arm. The store owners kept coming up to me and telling me that they would take it. One man said he would trade me an elephant for it and I fell for it and went into his stall. I didn't want the elephant, but I found a wooden hippo I liked. He took a tusk from a wood elephant and scratched his price of $200 on his wrist. I told him it was too much and I told him I would give him $50 plus the jersey. We ended up settling on $70, which I am not sure if that was a good price or not. I probably could have gotten lower, but the bus was about to leave. As I looked out the window of the bus, I saw that the man had immediately put the jersey on. So I ended up paying $345 Namibian dollars for four items, which is less than $50. I think I did pretty well.

We are going back to the market when we come back from Etosha, so now is the time to tell me if anybody wants anything.

We drove another of couple of hours until we got where we were staying, which was called Out of Africa. :) We had dinner at the lodge and listened to a presentation from an American named Betsy. She is originally from Virginia and a veterinarian. She came to Africa to try and help conserve the elephants and rhinos in Africa. Betsy has now been working in Namibia for this for twenty years. It was pretty interesting. She showed us slides and talked about how they try to educate farmers to understand that elephants are not threats.

I was also going to write about going to the Cheetah Conservation Fund, but this post is getting rather long so I think I will leave it until tomorrow. It will also give me time to go through the 200 some pictures of cheetahs that I took. Until then.

Staff Meeting

This morning was the first time that we got to go visit the school that we will be student teaching in for six weeks. To be honest, I was not very excited about it, because our professors told us that we mostly would just be doing a lot of waiting and sitting around. They also told us to go in with no expectations, but that we might be ignored because people would not know what to do with us. They said the other teachers would probably not be very welcoming or friendly. We all drove in a taxi to get to our school. First, our taxi driver dropped off some people at the other school first. They exited the car and just kind of stood outside in a line, not quite sure what to do because the gates to the school were locked. As we drove away our taxi driver started giggling. We asked him what he was giggling about and he said it was because we just let them there.

The girls and I at my school were very excited when our school was open, but also there were lots of people milling around. My school is called A.I. Steenkamp. We went into the staff room and one of the teachers took us to see our principal. The principal of the school is awesome. She introduced herself and asked us to write down our names and specialties so she could place us in a classroom. She seemed very grateful that we were there.

We then went back into the teacher's lounge, we were greeted by several teachers. They were very welcoming and friendly. For one teacher that we met, Liz put out her hand and the teacher said, "No, no, we do this the Namibian way" and she reached out for a hug. We got a lot of hugs. The teachers seemed incredibly excited that we were there. They asked us where we were from. There was a Pacific Lutheran pennet hanging on the bulletin board so we pointed to it and told them that we were from the United States. They asked us what we taught, because they wanted to know if we would be placed with them.

It was interesting to see how the teachers greeted each other. When they would hug us, they would hug on both sides like some cultures do with a kiss greeting. There were also some teachers who greeted each other by doing the hug, but then ended with kiss on the lips. A greeting with the men was a  special handshake. They would do a normal handshake, but then tilt their hands up and entwine their thumbs and then go back into a normal handshake.

Overall, there was a great energy and enthusiasm in the room and everybody seemed ready to start another school year. After about 45 minutes of just greeting each other, the meeting started. During that 45 minutes we got to hear many languages including ones that included clicking. The meeting began with religious songs. I thought about doing "ice cream, watermelon" but some of the songs repeated a lot so I caught on and was able to sing parts. When we were singing, one of the teachers said that she thought people's hearts were not in the school and that she could sense that someone was not well in the room. She told everybody that if their heart was not there, they needed to leave. She then invited everyone to sing again and then we all went in a circle and she danced on the inside. She said that she was going to go around and tap people who she thought were unwell and that she was going to pray over them. I was really thankful that she did not tap Alicia, Jenn, Allison, Liz, or me. She then read some bible verses and the principal gave an inspirational opening.

The principal's opening was very good. She talked about how even though we were a diverse group of people, we still had the same mission. The common mission we have is to provide a quality education. She talked about and celebrated the successes of last year, but also said that we have some things to work on in 2012. She handed out a paper that talked about how we need to sit in the driver's seat and take responsibility  and to accept external factors. But ultimately we are responsible for seeing that our learners succeed and pass. She asked several of the teachers what their goals were for 2012. One male teacher said that he had the resolution of growing in his teaching and also to be a good father. She also called upon Allison, who gave a good response about how thankful we were to be there and that she wanted to grow through teaching in Namibia and also be able to get a job after graduation. Rudolfine, the principal, said it was her resolution to see that all the teachers met their resolutions.

Continuing the theme of providing a quality education and taking responsibility, the grades from the last school year. It was interesting because there were very few A's. The idea grades were that there were more than 10 A's and very few E's or failing. We would clap whenever anybody reached this goal. I was surprised that there could still be over 50 D's and yet it was still considered successful. We also heard about how many students would be staying in the same grade as the previous year.

After the grades were read, it was a little awkward because they invited us to leave. I told them though that we would be staying until 1:30, because that was when our taxi was coming back. They seemed to accept this and then gave out what committees everyone was on and what grade they would be teaching. It was crazy to me that school starts on Tuesday and they do not yet know what grade they will be teaching.

The other school we drove with ended up being done early, so we did not get to stay for the whole meeting. I think it was okay though. Although I was not originally very excited about going today, my expectations were blown in concerns with how welcoming everyone was and how we did more than just sit around. I am even more excited now to start school and meet my learners, as they are called here.

P.S. I heard from my classroom in the United States today and it made me happy. I had sent them an e-mail and some pictures of my trip so far. They said I was very brave to eat the caterpillar. :)

A Better Version of the Lion King

Yesterday we went on our first game drive at the Okapuka Ranch. Sometimes on our trip it does not even seem like we are in Africa. For example, on our hike the scenery could have been in the United States. However, when we pulled into the park and saw giraffes out the window. I knew I was in Africa. We drove around the 20,000 acre park in a windowless and roofless vehicle. So we all scrambled from side to side getting pictures of the animals.

First we drove up to a watering hole and saw two crocodiles just bathing in the sun.

Warthogs or Pumbas then also came to the watering hole and there were baby ones that were just two weeks old. They ate the grass that was around us, but it was kind of funny because they go down on their "knees" to eat the grass.

During the drive I found myself unconsciously humming the theme to Jurassic Park, because I felt like I was getting to see something spectacular. There were fields where all of the animals were together and living. They didn't seem to pay very much attention to us. One of my favorite animals was the giraffes. We got pretty close to them and they stared at us as much as we stared at them.

After the giraffes we went into a field where there were rhinos up ahead. Our guide got out and threw food all around our truck. Then the rhinos came towards us. We were within arms reach of a rhino. Our guide told us it was okay to touch, so I touched its horn. It was very cool. Seeing and touching the rhinos was probably my favorite part of the game drive.

Unfortunately at this point my camera died, so I will have to get pictures from others later. But after the rhinos we saw a herd of elan, which are kind of like antelope. We also ran into the other tour group, who told us that   they had seen a wildebeest that had just been born and its mom had left it. Jackals had been approaching and they had to chase them off with the land rover. We got to where the wildebeest was and it was still wet and the umbilical cord was still attached. It was walking though, which was amazing considering it had been born minutes before. It called out, what sounded like "Mom." It was very sad. Our guide assured us that someone was on the way and they would give it milk and  then return it to the group. When we got back we heard that the baby wildebeest's mother had come back for it. 

We ate at the game range and I had the game lasagna. I asked what kind of game meat it had in it and our waitress told us, "It is what you call minced?" She said it was probably springbok (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Springbok) and orek (the national animal of Namibia). It was actually really delicious though. It had a little sweeter and lighter taste to it. I also had some ice cream, which was delicious. It tasted more like frosting, I think because they use real sugar. 

It was a great day. I am so excited to have seen all of those animals and I look forward to seeing more when we go up north. 

Cinnamon has just provided me with the following pictures. She took the picture of me with the giraffe pooping because she said it matched my personality.