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Published: July 11th 2007
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Q: What happens when you stick a visual thinker with a language learner and stick them in a car for twelve days?
A: This blog
Instead of detailing every single thing we did on safari, Shelley inspired me to trade in the pen for the watercolor pencil and draw mind maps (an activity we do with kids at work) of our days on safari in Africa. Admittedly, it's much better than trying to cram in every last detail about 12 days of events and instead, coming up with a visual rendering of our journey, even if it does look like it was drawn by a fifth grader.
My initial plan was to have very little text, almost none. Just a few bullet points for highlights with the official stats of the journey (they are now cataloged in one of the images below) and lots of pictures. But this isn't the blog I was supposed write. After all, this should have been published at the end of June from Arusha, Tanzania as my last hurrah before leaving the country. That blog entry would've covered the time spent from the 17th of June to the end of the month
on the "Northern Safari Circuit," including Arusha National Park (Mt. Meru), Tarangire National Park, Ngorongoro Crater, trekking in the Ngoronogoro Crater Highlands and finishing out with a few days in Serengeti. But upon my return to Arusha after 12 days in the bush, I was robbed.
Fortunately, I wasn't hurt and nothing of significant
"can't live without it" value was taken, not even my industrial strength hair dryer from Spaceballs. I was actually in an internet cafe checking email and apparently had focused my attention too closely on the emails at hand and didn't notice my bag disappearing out from under my nose, along with my camera and all the photos I had taken on safari. Had things gone according to plan, I'd have gone to Moshi that day, rejoined with Michelle who was holding on to my computer, and uploaded the photos for this blog. Instead, Kennet has graciously agreed to share his pictures with me, some of which
are posted here, and other photos of mine have been backed up and will be posted in the near future on the same site.
That said ... which is way more than I had hoped for this entry ... pretend
it's the end of June and please follow along our journey by looking at the mind maps and captions included in this entry. The artwork pictured is a collaborative effort from Shelley, Kennet and myself with our
IslandWood-issue watercolor pencils.
(And now back to the present)
Uganda On July 1 I moved to Entebbe, Uganda my semi-home base for the next six months where I'll be getting back to work with JGI. The national office is here in town, with housing upstairs for staff and volunteers as well as five dogs, two cats, and a zillion birds seem to make their way through our garden each day. I can look out the window on to Lake Victoria and I'm enjoying the very quiet, small-town feel of Entebbe, especially after such a long stretch in busy Dar es Salaam. After a few days of settling in, S&K rejoined me and we headed north with some of the JGI staff to Budongo Forest Reserve near Murchison Falls National Park, where we painted the interior of the soon-to-be-finished environmental education center up there. The forest is full of birds, baboons, monkeys and chimps and one evening we went on a sunset
outing to Murchison Falls (Nile River) a breathtaking site not far from where we were located.
Afterwards, I headed to Kampala for a couple days catching up with the Pynn's, some of my old colleague/roommates from Tanzania, and tomorrow morning I'm off to Kalinzu forest for about a month to work at a forest education center and to visit a number of Roots & Shoots groups in the local schools in the area, which is not terribly far from Queen Elizabeth National Park. So unlike my Dar-based stint in Tanzania, I'll be on the go much of the time here in Uganda and working in a number of locations. Another difference: much of this time will be spent far from cell phone service, internet access, electricity, or running water. So, this is going to be the last post for a while, but I hope to publish again in September when I'll be back in Entebbe for a good stretch.
In Loving Memory Today is the yarzheit of my dear friend Tricia Black who passed away a year ago today, on July 11, 2006, after losing a year+ battle with melanoma. Tricia was a lifelong friend of mine
(we carpooled to kindergarten together and went to school throughout our senior year in college before I moved out west) and is one of the most amazing people I have ever met. I could go on and on telling you how intelligent, fun, passionate, political, just, caring, dedicated, loving and amazing she was throughout her life as a friend, student, lawyer, wife and mother, but I'd probably break down in tears before I got to the end of the paragraph. So instead, I just want to say that I miss her dearly and continue to cherish her memory each and every day.
Teb's Troops are still fighting the good fight in honor of her memory; feel free to join us
July 23rd addition, posted in subsequent blog, but since its photos pertaining to safari, i'm copying here as well:
Hey folks, just a quick update, mostly sending along some photos that pertain more to the last blog than this one. First thing's first, in my haste to tell you all about my camera getting swiped, the weeks of safari, and scanning all those mind maps, I forgot to tell give you perhaps
the most important link pertaining to the safari.
Thanks to the link, it's not such a tragedy that my camera was stolen after all. The family featured on that web page went on a very similar safari, including a visit with Jane Goodall (or at least her alter ego), as well as lots of pictures. The similarities are uncanny!
Okay, hopefully you enjoyed that link. But in truth,
this photo link is probably more relevant as its actually the page with Kennet's photos, which he's been procuring and prepping before posting fully processed pictures, so remember to check back again soon to peruse the progress of his proceedings as additional photos should be plentiful. But seriously - big thanks to Kennet for sharing these pics and bailing me out of what would've been a safari with no photographic record.
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Emma
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you rock!
Nice Mindmaps! I love'em.