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Published: April 15th 2012
This is my first day off in a week and my first chance to post this blog which I actuallywrote a few days ago so lots more to update on next time!
My day started with shovelling elephant sh*t then walking 4 fully grown African elephants in the bush, and all before breakfast. After breakfast I was able to compare elephant sh*t to lion sh*t (elephant much less smelly if you're wondering) as my next duty was cleaning the enclosures of 5 males lions who were very noisily moved out of the enclosure first./ Cleaning the enclosure also involved picking out the very smelly remains of the previous day's meal of assorted cow parts. When you're at the far end of the enclosure by yourself doing this you have to really trust the staff will remember you're in there, so hearing the lions start roaring close by really gets the adrenalin going I can tell you!
But it's not all hard labour. The day can also start with a gentle stroll with one of the pairs of lion cubs they have here - Leili and Lewa or Penya and Paza - or the Ls and the Ps as they're known. The Ls are around 15 months old and the Ps around 13 months, which may sound as though they're quite big but they're nothing like the size of a full grown lioness. The Ps are still very playful and mischievous and mainly tend to stalk each other when they're out. But the Ls are a bit more advanced and on my very first walk with them Leili caught a mongoose. She then started to eat it alive with much squealing from the unfortunate mongoose! I'm told the Ls have each successfully killed small impala which means their hunting skills are developning well.
I've also been lucky enough already to have seen the lions in stage 2 of the project. this is where 8 lionesses from stage 1 of the programme have been put together with a male to create a pride. The pride has successfully bred and there are 5 adorable lion cubs - three are 4 months old and two are 6 months old. We can't interact wityh these lions, only observe, but it's a brilliant photo opportunity. My holiday snaps are going to be extremely boring for everyone to see - hundreds of lion and elephant shots!
It's funny how even tedious jobs like cutting grass with small, blunt, hand held scythes can be interesting when the grass is round a lion enclosure and you have a full grown lioness 6 inches from your nose! Yesterday I saw a lion feeding session for the tourists. The handlers take a group of the large males out of their enclosure then a rather disgusting pile of smelly cow parts is put in at the far end where the tourists stand (on the other side of the fence of course!). the lions then are let in and hurtle towards you snarling and growling. As the advertising blurb says, it;s the only time you'll see a fully grown lion racing towards you at full speed and survive! Having now seen what they eat, one of the duties i'm NOT looking forward to is meat prep......
About half the volunteers here have come on a community programme working in local schools, hospitals, clinics and orphanages and it's really interesting to hear their stories which, of course, involve extreme poverty and hardship in many cases but there are also many positives. The clinics by and large have enough drugs and there's lots of resource being put into health education programmes. But, as with may African countries, the levels of extreme poverty are in sharp contrast to the huge natural wealth resource of the country.
When I arrived in Harare I stayed with a couple who had been farmers until their farm was repossessed in 2006. They've had to start again almost from scratch in their mid 50's and then faced a second blow when their Zimbabwean dollars were wiped from their account when the country moved to US$. Any prospect of retirement is a long way off so perhaps the UK 'pension crisis' isn't so bad after all!
Some of the volunteers tell me it takes almost an hour to upload a single photo so i'll add some pics when i get back.
Off to enjoy a well earned break today. A bit of relaxing in the sun and an elephant ride is on the cards. Then I'll find out what my duties will be for next week!
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Emma
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So jealous!!!
Sounds incredible - and lots of different things to do than the one in Zambia. Can't wait to see (a cut down selection of) photos! Not surprising the lion sh*t smells worse with all the cow parts they're eating! When I did it, the poos after feasting on a giraffe were particularly potent so hopefully they won't be tooooo successful at hunting!! Lots of love from me, Smudge and Geoff xxxxx