Truck Trip - Botswana Bushmen


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Africa » Botswana » North-West
August 4th 2010
Published: November 15th 2010
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Another day, another border crossing. Goodbye Namibia, Hello Botswana. We all spent our last Namibian Dollars and now have Botswanan Pula. Once again same exchange rate as the rand so nice easy calculations.
Tonight we are staying in a farm converted to a camp site, the toilets and showers are bamboo huts and have varying quantities and temperatures of water. They also have no doors so you tie a chain across the entrance to indicate it's busy. We have our largest fire yet in this camp, which is good as it's one of our coldest. We all know to wrap up warm when Tony tells us he's sleeping in the truck! Some people have opted to upgrade for $5 to a bushman hut, this is small thatched rondavel with no door, but camp beds. It turns out to be colder with mattresses thinner than our camp mats, but a good experience for some. I am snug in my tent with thermals and a woolly hat on!
The next morning is an early start for a sunrise bushman walk. The local bushmen and women that live on the farmland take us for a walk through the scrub land, with a translator as we can't speak their click language. First the old lady of the group digs up some roots which are used for stomach problems, her age is unknown but the others are between 21 and 28 years old. We are next given a seed to place under our tongue which should help us speak click languages, we try speaking but it doesn't help, then there is a yelp from the start of the line. At random moments the seed explodes in people's mouths, so that is how it helps the click language!! More roots are dug up by the bushmen all for different ailments, headaches, hangovers, to aid pregnancy. They also try to find an aardvark for us, but he's not in the burrow they pick. The aardvarks dig deep holes so that they can get to the ants, the bushmen then track them and eat them.
When we return to camp we have a fry up feast waiting for us, brilliant way to end the tour.


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