Wild at Heart

Rant #500: Is it socially acceptable to tell the two-finger typer next to me in the library to stop hammering his keyboard like there’s no tomorrow?  I just want to study in peace without the constant keyboard banging. How many damn emails does this dude have?! With so many one would have expected a more efficient way of typing to have developed 😉   Concentrate on the classical music you’re listening to Jess! Urgg distractions are life’s evil, like updating a blog while aimlessly ranting about life.  Okok, back to learning about community structures… (exam on the 25th) ---> On a positive note - I managed to get in contact with animal foster heroes to offer watching or walking their doggos while they're out! Too much excitement! Just hope the dogs like me. Now I just need to find someone who has an adorable cat who needs love, although most don't need babysitting, unless it's a kitten. Ah I miss my cat at home, he's getting older by the day, Ma said she...

12 October 2018 Picture me, running through a busy city because smarty pants over here planned to be an eager beaver and gym between classes (yes I hate gym but I’ve been eating a lot of pastries, damn delicious pastries, and with winter setting in, I need to force myself to exercise).  So because I originally planned to go home to shower after gyming, I left my course reader on my bed. This meant that before the GIS class (that I initially wasn't going to go to) I needed to go fetch it as we had a IPCC committee member speak about the newest report during lunch so I had no other time. But instead, of immediately speed-walking back home, I ended up chatting to class mates  (well ranting about the immigration office AGAIN taking forever with my permanent residence card while they plan a Croatia trip). So at 10:20am I was running back and forth between home and uni to be on time for the GIS class. Huffing and puffing and beautifully red in the face I made it just in time. W...

Tonight I had the most overwhelming feeling of hopelessness and despair for my beloved country and the species that call it home. Having finally convinced myself that it was time to go to bed after reading a few pages from “A Rhino in My Garden” by Conita Walker, a thoughtful gift given to me by my loving sister, I was overcome with a deep sense of loss. I guess it’s the distance from home and feeling utterly useless while I tackle my much-anticipated MSc degree, or maybe it’s just hormones? Who knows what brought it along, perhaps reading of Conita’s immense love for the orphaned rhino and hippo she was raising, or her comparison of the slaughter of Africa’s wildlife to WW2, whatever it was, it just made me question the purpose of all of this. This life we’re all aimlessly living. Why have I been burdened (but mostly gifted) with this intense need to protect Africa’s heritage? Or this feeling of disparity? Why are so few of us so empathetic towards other species? A great read s...

A lot has happened since my last blog! I'm so bad at this. 1. Collared several more elephants - best time of course 2. Chased a few rough boys with a helicopter and paintball gun - what's not to love 3. Used chilli at a few spots again, had major success at the one reserve who's even gotten the private landowners and lodges to use the chilli 4. Applied for masters degree and scholarship 5. Got accepted into the program 6. Let me just repeat that, I got accepted to study in Europe. Me? A bush girl from Africa. Holy crap. 7. Became besties with a colleague, went on several dancing missions with her 8. Organised a fundraiser 9. Left my job at Elephants Alive 9. Waited forever for my visa (I might have applied a liiiittle late) 10. Said farewell to the fam-damily 11. Flew to Budapest 12. Started classes 13. Finally found an apartment after a stressful first week And now you're finally caught up! Exhausted me after a +15 hour flight from Cape Town to Bud...

We saw wild dogs during one of our field days!:) It was great until all the game viewer vehicles with tourists arrived - the guides had absolutely no respect for the dogs, instead of stopping at one spot and allowing the dogs to move naturally to wherever they were missioning too, they followed them up and down as close as possible to allow the tourists to see as much as possible. And one of the adult males was limping which isn't good, hopefully the injury isn't too bad. Then on our way out yesterday, a herd was on either side of the road, with an adult female browsing on one of the trees next to the road - instead of driving by slowly, an idiot driver decides to park right next to the cow and rev the car! WTF. No common sense has followed me from Botswana. This continued for about 10 minutes, during which a traffic jam was created because of this idiot. During his revving stunt, he chased away a few younger elephants close to the road, preventing us fro...

Matambu - one of our collared elephants. It's amazing watching him use his other senses to navigate around - he's blind but has the most gentle personality Wish I could help keep them safe  It felt like he was looking write into my heart So much has happened in the last month! I resigned - after getting an offer closer to home with (hopefully) less drama where I can actually gain experience in the field, I decided it's now or never. I didn't want to wait till things finally settled down and things became more organised - there were just too many variables working against it and the project was definitely no ones priority except mine. So here I am, back in good ol' South Africa, doing field work for a post-doc elephant researcher. It's just lovely, I get to go to the field every second day to record rumbles of collared elephant bulls while also taking ID photos of all the individuals we see. It's very different to Botswana - of course not...