Living in Botswana

So what is it, that is making living here so fun? To be honest, I can't place my finger on it -- it's nothing tangible but more just this effect being in this continent has on me.

Masome a Mabedi le Bobedi kwa Botswana (22 in Botswana)

Some people know I have developed a thing for the number 11 or sequences of '1's. I therefore determined, for no reason other than just 'because', that 22 (as 2 x 11)  is going to be an epic year of my life. (And I’m sure I’ll find a reason for 23 to be as well).

So how did I start my 22nd year of life? Reunited with my sister in Maun and on Safari in the captivating heart of the Okavango delta. Yup, a pretty good start.
My sister is currently a Safari consultant up in Maun - a gateway town to the Okavango that is inhabited by extremely friendly, relaxed locals and a minority of eccentric expats, to which I'm sure she fits in perfectly. With her 'connections' she wangled a trip for us to a somewhat exclusive camp, infamous for its tracking capabilities of wild animals. And it didn't disappoint. We got nice and close to wild cheetahs, lions (including those feasting on a baby Giraffe whilst the mother watched from afar with a heart-wrenching blankness), elephants, hippo's (well, they're everywhere..), various species of antelope including some rather rare ones, crocodiles, buffalo and the usual zebra, monkeys, warthogs etc. Naturally we took a Mokoro trip, a small 'bushmans walk' where we learnt some basics of bushmen subsistence, went on game drives and ate alot of food. 

Our 'tents' were a joke and by that I mean I don't know how they were ever defined as 'tents'. It was definitely one of the more luxurious things I have ever stayed in in my life. But I particularly liked the way it was designed in harmony with the bush -- aesthetically and otherwise. Solar panels were used for power, eco-friendly, locally made bathroom products were supplied for use and they emphasized filtered water rather than bottled. Each tent had its own raised 'balcony' from which you could see impala strolling around in the morning, a rock monitor (a giant reptile) and baboons, whilst at night you could hear the distant sounds of a lions roar as you went to sleep.

The camp was also a 'fly in/ fly out camp' from which you could see game from the air; elephants, hippos, buffaloes, giraffes and other biggies. Following the flight out of the delta, I took my flight back to Gaborone and the University that already felt strangely like home.

Out-and-about in Gabs

I'm not going to lie, in many respects Gabs is a 'hole'. But you'd be surprised the great things we find to occupy ourselves in and around that hole.

Kgale hill: If we're feeling like a hill climb followed by Bottomless coffee, then Kgale is the place to go. It's about a 45 minute or so walk up, but it is always more fun to opt for leaving the path and climbing up the rocks instead. The hill has a beautiful view over the city where you can see the way savannah merges into the built environment, with Gaborone dam, residences, shopping malls, bushland and other small hills dotting the landscape. Mugg and Bean nearby is our favourite haunt for coffee, though I won't lie; I have abandoned hope in finding good espresso coffee here and drink the filter variety instead as it scarcely ever disappoints.

Music festival: A definite highlight for me was a music festival with live music performances 30km out of Gaborone on a Saturday night. It was held in a large farmyard/field with music and dancing under the stars. As a song came to a finish and everyone paused from dancing momentarily, I would turn around to see whirlwinds of dust kicked up and twirling in the air -- hard to describe, but it was awesome!

Old Naledi: My roommate frequents Old Naledi -- a poor neighbourhood full of orphaned children and on Saturdays they often attend Iwana; primarily a playtime session but held at the church with a bible story afterwards. In truth, I am not much of a 'natural' kids person, but Lindsay convinced me to join her one Saturday and it really was an experience. The children are so touchy, so clingy, so desperate to be picked up, to be hugged -- more than I have seen in any other kids. It really is such a basic instinct for children to have; the desire for warmth and love from an adult figure, a basic part of childhood, which these orphans lack. A local friend of mine, Glow, also does something similar down in Lobatse in a crime-prone neighbourhood and its great to see people taking the initiative to play with these kids and see that they have some fun and support in their lives.

There are also often small craft markets, theatre performances (I'm yet to see one though!), Indie movies on show, aerobics at the university, a humble game park nearby, sports and miscellaneous entertainment around the city. It might not be Melbourne, but I always find that I am successfully able to occupy myself. 

*Other activities to follow*

Classes and the University

Ultimately, there are many good and bad points about the university... to start with:

The bad: Logic, quite simply, is something you frequently have to learn to forfeit. Teachers may unwittingly teach falsehoods (and being the student you can't exactly 'correct' them) and you'll receive marks that just don't add up as they should and spend a good hour showing your marker that it should be 90% not 70%, until they finally realize the total score was meant to be out of a smaller value than they had, which was the cause of the discrepancies.

You'll lose marks for not converting your answer to units which don't actually exist in the real world and for not spelling out common basic mathematical formulae that should really be assumed common knowledge.

Lecturers will spend most of the lecture telling students off for talking when they shouldn't, not talking when they should and picking at any students they actually know the name of and then go over-time or not arrive on time.

BUT

The good: Ultimately, what they know best is their own continent -- as you would expect -- and that is exactly what I came here to learn. What problems face the country/continent, what the cultural differences are, what is important to them etc. And, the fact of the matter is, being in an entirely different environment is extremely educational, experiential and enriching thing in itself. I won’t lie; I have learnt SO much from being here and am continuing to do so; most of it just hasn't been from classes or the university itself per se.

Living in a new environment, immersing yourself in a new culture, learning about cultural eccentricities, having the ‘unusual’ become the ‘norm’, being the minority and not the majority and quite simply adjusting yourself to somewhere out-of-your-comfort-zone (ie being a vegetarian in a beef-fuelled country, a diver in the middle of the desert, an outdoors-ey person in a mall and commerce orientated city, a ‘greeny’ in a place without recycling, an engineer in a university with little logic…) teaches you so much indeed!