Blogs from Africa - page 2715

hey there, alan here, i'm still alive and kicking.. i'm just checking in to say everything here is great, it really is a unique, exciting experience one that i will remember for the rest of my life.. the people here are fantastic, they are nice, friendly and always smiling....as you prob know we live in a family home with a wonderful woman named gladys and her daughter and son...we have no electricity or running water..but its great anyway..the days here go so fast and the weeks even faster, i cannot believe we have been here for over three weeks....as for our projects, we are getting together some more things for the maternity and the community well, we also donated money to the building of a new school classroom which was halted due to lack of funds...so ... read more

Bring it on. After an early morning breakfast we said goodbye to the hippos and headed out to Kruger Park, only 5 minutes down the road. We entered Kruger via the Paul Kruger enterance and before we even entered the park we spotted animal tracks in the river. It is winter in South Africa and all of the rivers in the park are completely dry. Needless to say we made a bathroom stop at the enterance for fear of what would be awaiting us outside if nature called before we reached our camp. Needless to say nature was waiting for us at the bathrooms where a few warthogs were happily awaiting our arrival. On to the park - with our feet barely through the gate we encountered our first herd of Impalas crossing the road. ... read more

Well, my trip thus far has been interesting to say the least. Right now, at 4:15 in the morning, I find myself trying to fix a paper (my very last undergrad essay) that I turned in a couple days before I left for South Africa. The problem started on Tuesday when I check my final grade for the 2 credit indepent study class that I was taking spring quarter. The only requirement for two credits was that I had to write an 8-10 page essay by the end of the quarter. Unfortunately, the teacher suspected that I was guilty of plagarism and gave me an incomplete grade for the two credits... Because of this, I am two credits short of graduatin in the spring and have until July 20th to fix the problem or else ... read more

Tamba-SegouTom Griffith According to the United Nations, Mali is the third poorest country in the world. Now, I'm not sure how they come up with these rankings (it tells you here), but as someone from the third richest country, it sure feels poor to me. So how do Malians manage to be so open and friendly? I don't know. And why did the guy in the shop I just popped into, offer me some of his lunch? Again, I don't know. But Malians do have a reputation for being nice folks, and so far I haven't been disappointed - apart, perhaps, from the super-pushy touts and hassle-mongers of Segou. But more on them later. Mali's poverty stems from a variety of complex causes, but basically it comes down to two: colonialism and the envi... read more

It's a long road trip, so we stopped for another night at Tete in Mozambique. The roads are pretty bumpy and customs very slow..... Here's a few photo's anyway........ read more