23 August - Supporting the Community

Last night around the fire we found out that Juan, the Spanish veterinary student with whom I share a room, had turned 19 that day so my first job this morning was to catch the kitchen staff before breakfast and ask if they would make a cake for dinner that night.

Friday for some reason is a special day for breakfast: it is served an hour later at 9am and is cooked (for the rest of the week we get a cold cereals and fruit). Why this is the case I do not know but the lie-in was welcome. Friday is also the day that we go and do work within the community. This meant for one group helping build a climbing frame with slide in a pre-school and for the other helping teach the use of computers at an infant's school together with some litter clearing and tending a vegetable patch they had planted. Keeping 'in' with the local community is a key part of the Shamwari philosophy which strangely is not reflected in all wildlife reserves it seems. It helps maintain the good name of the reserve in the local community and forms part of a 'hearts and minds' approach that helps to prevent poaching by the locals.

Our two vehicles set off, and after a stop to top up at the liquor store, we headed off to our respective destinations. I had elected to help with the building group and we spent a constructive two hours building a platform on which to set the slide. This looked like it had been obtained from a derelict playground but it is clear that this is a poor community and a 'make do and mend' attitude very much the way of life. Despite this the children all seem happy, smiling and waving at us whenever they came outside and giving me little high fives' when I went to chat with them.

We headed into the reserve for lunch - the kitchen always prepares something for us to take and so far it has been excellent - and then we all headed to the Animal Rehabilitation Centre for the visit that had been postponed yesterday. It was a simple but smart set up, the aim of which was to take animals from the wild that need support and then reintroduce them back into that environment once they are ready. In an effort to keep the animals from becoming too familiar with humans they operate a no-hands policy and minimise any contact to the absolute essential. We had to look at them through screens as we were shown around the enclosures and told about the organisation's work. As well as buffalo, a couple of antelope and a warthog we saw three rhinoceros and...a sheep! It seems that when dealing with young rhinoceros the use of a sheep as an animal companion is very effective.

From the Rehabilitation Centre it was back to the accommodation compound via the area we understood the cheetah to be in yesterday. We still failed to see one but we did find fresh lion tracks in the dust at the side of the road so we followed these in the hope of seeing - and identifying - the animal. It took us straight past the compound fence... After another ten minutes our ranger decided enough was enough and we headed back for dinner and Juan's birthday cake (or 'Jaun' as they had iced it!). It was at this point I remembered he had told me he was allergic to eggs...

That night, being Friday, five of us had arranged for a taxi to take us to Alicedale and to 'Louis Pub' which we had been told was the place to go. I think we all expected - and hoped for - some seedy and cheap local bar but instead it was behind gates, more upmarket and definitely not a place the average Alicedale resident would - or probably could - visit. Nevertheless we had a good time, with me valiantly keeping up with all the beers and 'shots' the four hard drinking youngsters with me downed; three of them had a combined age of less than me!