Safari!

So over the weekend we went to Mukumi National Park for a safari!! After a 5 hour interesting car ride we arrived at our destination. The first animals that welcomed us were baboons and giraffes which is where the 48 hour photo shoot began. Between the two of us we probably have over 400 pictures of the same 10 animals…We drove through the park to our campground. This is where we realized we were going to be sleeping in a zoo only with no cages… On Saturday morning we woke up around 6:45, ate breakfast and then set out on our morning drive. Our group managed to anger a group of elephants which led to the largest elephant heading towards the car that our other group members were in. The driver had to put the car in neutral and rev the engine in order to make it back off. We think we have it on tape… Out of all the animals the elephants were the only one that showed extensive frustration towards us… the hippos didn’t care much for us either but they were too lazy to get out of the mucky water which consisted of their food and “dung”. During night two I (Megan) woke up around 3am to a thumping noise which occurred every 2-3 seconds… Since I am known as the “dramatic” one in our family, I figured I would wait to make sure this was something worth waking Christine for. For those who have seen Jurassic Park…. when the dinosaur footsteps start and the water is shaking in the glass... that is what this felt like. After about 5 minutes I realized they were really close so I woke C up and told her I think there are a bunch of elephants outside the tent. Sure enough we hear the elephants make their usual noise so at this point I’m scared and all Christine can think about is how she has to go to the bathroom. Of course… while there are wild elephants outside the tent, Christine decides she can’t wait any longer and goes outside. I couldn’t let her go alone and we figured our park ranger with his AK47 and flashlight was on duty watching to make sure we weren’t attacked. When we stepped out of the tent the fire was out and there was no ranger in site…oh great! Then we heard a tent unzip and out rolled our ranger… he had been sleeping…what a ranger he was. We said to him, “Tembo Tembo!!” (tembo means elephant in Swahili) He replied… “Yeah, Tembo” (He spoke no English). So happily we awoke for our 6am morning drive. This was the first time since we have been in Africa that sweat wasn’t pouring profusely from us… we actually were able to wear sweatshirts!! It was very quiet and the sunrise was beautiful! Definitely a great way to end our safari…. until we attempted to drive home. First the other car got stuck in the mud for about 45 minutes. ** Mind you it is now about 95 degrees, we are in the “bush” (where the animals are roaming freely,) no air-conditioning, and we are collecting rocks to shove under the tires of a jacked car. After we got it out, the car drove about 15 feet when they realized something was wrong with it. Luckily, Twiga (meaning giraffe in Swahili), our driver, was a mechanic and fixed it in about 30 minutes. So finally… on the road to home! Two hours into the ride we were pulled over by the highway patrol for speeding. Three hours into it we are on an unpaved road… possibly the most bumpy road we have ever been on, when a man on a bike kept peddling up to the window yelling something. We realized that the other car was no longer behind us. Their car got a flat tire. So there we were again… sweating... and standing on some road in the middle of no where - just waiting. Something we learned while teaching at the schools here is that you need to be resourceful so we found a pile of rocks and sticks and played baseball to waste time. Monday we had placement and then went to a Batik making class. We created our own design on a piece of fabric, then outlined it with hot wax and then dyed it. The process is more in depth than that but overall that’s how it works. Today (Tuesday), we just finished placement and we are sitting outside where we eat. It is raining pretty heavily which is a good thing… cools it off… but now our clothes on the line are soaked again. We have lunch at 1pm, Swahili lessons at two, then off to see the witch doctor/traditional healer at 3. Hopefully they won’t cast any spells on us… Hope you all enjoyed the photos!!! It only took us an hour to get 13 photos up!! We will write again soon J