I'm Back

I haven’t written on here in sooooooooo long.

Two reasons I haven’t been doing much writing are:
1) lots of work to do, and
2) planning trips!

I’ll skip the work part, because there’s nothing new and exciting there, and go straight to the visitors.

In exactly one week, we will be receiving 2 of our best friends from Ireland, Padraig and AlanM, and their respective girlfriends. We can’t wait! I have been planning stuff for months now and finally we get to do it all. It’s about time. They’re here for 2 weeks and we’re doing a combination of South Africa and Botswana stuff. I know I’m going to be devastated when they leave, because I’ve been dying to see these guys for exactly one year now and 2 weeks just seems like it will go too fast.

But anyway!

One month after the guys get here the aunt and uncle unit come from Humansville, MO, along with the cousin+girlfriend unit from the UK. Even more excitement! The reason I’m so excited about that trip is because I know they’re going to be blown away by everything and their enthusiasm is bound to double our enjoyment of just having them here. None of them have been to Africa before so everything will be outrageous and impressive for those guys. I have about 80% of their trip planned so far.

The husband is getting a little bit worried about taking so many days off work, but the good thing is that we’ve managed (through a bit of hard work and dedication) to get all our jobs up and organized to a point where we can abandon ship without abandoning jobs for a few days. It’s a work of art, in fact, how we just managed to pull a combination of reaching deadlines, achieve some impressive scheduling feats, and tastefully postponing a thing or two that would work for us. Of course we’ll probably have to check in at the office a few times during these periods, but again, even that has been scheduled for. More guests of the family variety coming in both June and July, from both sides of the fam. But more on that to come – it’s still early now.

Otherwise, I suppose some more news is that I have been accepted into a Masters’ degree programme at the University of Portsmouth, UK. I will be starting in April and the course I will be doing will be an MSc in Occupational and Environmental Health & Safety. It’s a correspondence course that will take about 2 years, and I will be taking my exams at the British Council here in Gaborone. Over the 2 years there will be one small 1-week trip to the UK for some formality, so anyone wanting to hang out with me in the Northern Hemisphere is welcome to take a quick trip to sunny Portsmouth!? Everything will be online, just like the course that Hannes is doing, only an extra year. I’m not sure what one does with 2 Masters’ degrees, but the curriculum and qualification is going to give the company a monopoly on the Environmental Health and Safety market in Botswana not to mention I feel like my brain is melting, so I kind of need the challenge.

The bad thing is that I have a memory of myself in 2000, swearing an oath to… me, that I would NEVER go back to school again, ever. EVER. And now I am. I may regret it. We’ll see.

It will be a shame to be losing out on even more of my already inadequate free time. By going to the gym at lunch time during the week, I’m loving all the reading I’m getting done these days, and we’re taking the dogs for a walk after work nearly every day. I’m really enjoying my new Hillary Clinton autobiography that Hannes got me for xmas, and learning a lot. She’s got a remarkable story to tell. I’m also double-timing with a Bill Bryson book that I’d highly recommend for anyone interested in the English Language, called “Mother Tongue”. I suppose once I have to start studying again, it’ll be goodbye to all things fun and relaxing for awhile.

Hot weather is rolling on in Gaborone. We had an incredibly monsoony rainy season this year, which could still come back to haunt us as the season is technically not over yet. It has been great actually being in the pool and being outside all the time. FINALLY.

So busy coming up in the next month or so that I will probably forget my own anniversary and birthday, but at least with the guys & girls here for Valentines day, combined with the fact that we have a big party to go to at the Gabs Dam, at least we’ll get one celebration out of the next 2 very busy months.

Stange January

It has been a very different January, if we compare things with last year. First of all I was looking at pictures on our blog from last year; I could not believe how dry everything looked. Now everything is green, and it keeps raining. There is standing water everywhere, some plants in our garden are dying because they are too wet. I had the pleasure of going to two site meetings for construction projects this week, and these construction sites had turned into total mud pools. Botswana does not know how to deal with this. The good side, the dams are getting really full, guaranteeing supply of drink water for the next 2 years, even if we do not get another drop of rain.

Also when we look back at last year, this January we were very much organised and settled. No waiting for furniture, no looking for jobs, no hectic tendering for all sorts of new projects at work. We have our house set up, have our cars, have things like bank accounts, residence permits, cellphones. We also know that we are working together, and even have a nice workload for the next months. I turned the opportunity to quote for a new project down today!

The other big difference is the recent power cuts. It is something we will have to learn to live with. At the office we have a power backup, that will last us for few hours when the power goes down, so we should not loose too much time. Otherwise it is always a good excuse to go home a little early….At home we have no backup, no power means candle light. Luckily we cook on gas, so we are able to prepare a dinner when the power is gone.

We have another two weeks until the Irish posse will arrive. We are trying to get as much work as possible done, so we can take time off as well. That is a benefit of having our own business, we can try to schedule work around these periods where possible. I am worried about the weather, it has been so abnormal, I don’t know what to expect anymore.

J1

Power

Southern Africa has a shortage on electricity supply. South Africa has been doing what they call 'load shedding', basically cutting off a few areas when the demand is too high. Unfortunately this is now also starting in Botswana. Since January we have already had two cuts in Gaborone. The situation will only get worse until 2011, when new powerstations will open.....

Johannes

Happy Newyear

First of all we would like to wish everyone a very happy 2008. Sorry it has taken so long to get this first blog of the new year on. It has been a bit of a mission, we had so many good pictures from our trip, and Internet was teasingly slow all last week, if working at all.



OK, so Christiaan and Susan (friends from Holland) came over to visit us, we spend a few days in Pilanesburg, then had Christmas at our house (Alan also joined), and then headed north to Chobe and Vic Falls.



Christmas day: Unwrapping our presents. Santa was very good to us again this year, including presents from overseas.





Johannes presents, including new hiking shoes, new shirts, books, towel, socks and lots of marsepijn.



Jills presents, including a purse, play station game, books, perfume, a towel, and.......a puppy named Sech.



Jills present called Sech, also our 'stand-in reindeer' for the occasion.





Our Christmas breakfast, with mimosa, poached eggs on toast, and Christmas music in the background.

After breakfast and presents, the preparing of the big Christmas dinner started. Jill had planned this for weeks, and managed to make the best Christmas dinner I have ever tasted, with roast turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, carrots, and salad.


Our Christmas dinner, enjoyed outside at the poolside.....

The day after Christmas, we headed north to Nata. This is about 7 hours driving from Gaborone, and our first stop on the trip. We camped at Nata Lodge, always a nice place to stop over.

Our camp the first night at Nata Lodge, with beautiful weather (sunshine)

Bushbabies at the bar, every night the staff leave some papaya out for them on a feeding table.

The swimming pool at Nata lodge, very nice after a long hot day in the car. The next morning we headed into Makgadigadi pans, a bird sanctuary in Nata. The pans were about 8 kilometers from the gate, but getting there was quite a challenge due to the rains we recently enjoyed.

On our way thought the sanctuary, where is our track??? Parts of the track were totally flooded, and many people turned around here.

Not us, with 2 other cars we were silly enough to go through the flooded areas, to really get to the pans. Luckily we did not get stuck or lost, and made it in the end. The good old Pajero did well again.

Here we are at the viewpoint, overlooking the pans. We saw some pelicans and some flamingos in the distance.

After the pans we headed from Nata to Kasane, another 3 to 4 hour drive, depending on the amount of elephants on the road.

Elephants along the main road, we must have seen at least 25 on our way.

We camped at Chobe safari lodge that night, where we were sharing the campsite with all sorts of visitors, including these warthogs.

There were also many monkeys, who are very quick when it comes to stealing food.

Chobe safari lodge is on the Chobe river, we had some sun downers enjoying the most beautiful African sunset.

Another picture of the sunset. It was extra special, because it started raining the next day, and did not really stop until the end of our trip.

More sunset, and us.....

Next day we went to Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe. This ended up being a pretty wet experience. Not only did we get wet from the falls, but it was also raining. Because of all the rains from the previous weeks, the falls were enormous though.

Me and Jill at the falls, not too wet yet.

More falls, and Jill.

After visiting the falls, and getting pretty soaked, we enjoyed lunch at the Victoria Falls hotel. It was a little surreal to have lunch in such a posh hotel in Zimbabwe, while we know the shops are empty. Final bill: 286 million Zim dollars!

The 100 year old bridge, as seen from the hotel. It is still being used by both trains and cars daily. After Vic Falls we went back to Kasane, the next day we headed into Chobe National park, our first camp was Ihaha.

A small crocodile we saw on the way through the park.

A beautiful bird that I have not identified yet. Maybe a reason to join Birdlife Botswana?

Elephants drinking at a water pool, there must have been at least 35 of them.

There were 2 jackals very happy to be photographed, they are usually very shy.

The baking of oliebollen at our campsite, it was one day early, but still a success. I ate to many (again)
After 3 days in Chobe, we headed back to Kasane, where we enjoyed a lovely New years eve dinner and dance.
Including fireworks and champagne (and more rain)......

The next day we headed back to Nata, on our way out of Kasane we saw these goats hiding from the rain. This is maybe my favourite picture of the trip.

Our car after the trip. It held up very well again. Damage: one lost licence plate, and a lot of mud.

J1

Office closed

We are officially closing the office for Christmas and new year in about five minutes. Lots of stuff to look forward too. We hereby wish everyone again a happy Christmas and new year. Next blog post will be in January, which lots of stuff about our first Botswana Christmas.

Johannes and Jill

Nearly Christmas

It is my turn for a post, after Jill has done an excellent job keeping everyone updated. Last weekend was a very busy weekend. On Saturday we got up early to go for a 18km hike through Mokolodi game reserve (starting at 6.30). You don’t often get a chance to walk through a game reserve, and even though we did not see as many animals as we had hoped, we did see warthog, impala, springbok and as it had rained recently we saw lots of tracks.

taking a break and enjoying the view over the FULL dam

'Vulture restaurant'

fresh hippo tracks

the Mokolodi cheetahs

I have to admit Christmas has been sneaking up on me this year, I am not sure if it is because we are so busy, or because of the weather, or because of visitors, but I did not have much of a Christmas feeling, until last weekend. We decided to buy an (artificial) tree, and got all the ornaments and lights out, and our house is looking rather ‘Chrismassy’

Jill decorating our tree

Reggie offering a hand.......

the result!

Our friend Gerrit asked me if I was interested to sail with him in a catamaran race on Sunday morning on the Gabs dam: the “Turkey Regatta”. Another early morning, but there was plenty of wind, and sailing a race like that with no previous experience was quite an adrenaline rush, especially since we managed to capsize the boat even before the start. In total there were three short races, and in the last race we even managed to finish second, and 8th place over all.

After the race there was a Christmas lunch at the yacht club, and Jill and Sophia (Gerrit’s wife) joined us. There were also the overall results of the race, and we even won a small prize, a six pack of beer! I am quite excited about this, and would love to join again in the next race.

The prize ceremony after the race

Gerrit and I accepting our prize

One more (busy) week at work, just signed 2 contracts for new jobs, so plenty of work for the start of 2008. But first we have a nice break to look for, together with Christiaan and Susan. A nice trip planned with stops in Pilanesberg, Gaborone, Makgadigadi Pans, Chobe and Vic Falls. Plenty of pictures to follow.

We would like to wish everyone a very happy Christmas, and a good 2008.

Johannes and Jill

Storm season

We're having fantastic thunderstorms, and the dam is so full it's even causing some rivers to flood. Amazing!

As far back as 2000 when we first ever came to Botswana, we have never seen a flowing river in this part of the country. Now they're everywhere!! Even one of our clients who has lived here nearly all his life has said he can't remember ever a time when the rains came so early, and as hard as they are this year.

Tomorrow we are supposed to be doing an 18km hike in the game reserve down the road at the gruesome hour of 6:30 a.m. However, the storms may have wiped out the route so we're on stand-by from the hiking club organizer to find out if it's going ahead or not. Still, no one complains... this is all so much better than the drought of last year!

Last weekend we worked the Art Fair for the SPCA that we volunteer for. We sold tickets, which was easy and required nothing more than to sit and enjoy talking to everyone who came up to the table to buy the tickets. Literally everyone we knew in town came out for the art fair, and so it was a very social outing for us, even though it involved some work. We brought Reggie along and he was quite the star of the show. Which was too bad considering there were several SPCA dogs that they brought out as well, looking for new homes that day! Actually, by the end of the day 3 of the homeless pooches had been re-homed, even though 2 of them are not permanent homes, but rather long-term foster homes with Diplomats who are only here for 2 years but would be willing to foster during their tenure. (Normally, in those situations they end up keeping the pups so it all works out in the end anyway - not many people can give up a family dog after 2 years of living together!)

The excitement is building for the holidays. Most of the companies in town are breaking up around the 14th of December... which is next week... and very hard to believe! I have no idea when we are shutting down, nor do I have any idea about the very vague Christmas Party that we are supposedly having. Hmmmmmm.... who is on the social planning committee??

On the 20th we will go down to Pretoria and do lunch/dinner with Family Polson, then late that night we'll fetch Christiaan and Susan from the airport. From there we have those 2, plus Alan for Christmas, and on Boxing day we head up north until the 2nd. Yes, it's going to be extremely, unbearably, miserably hot. But who cares! Just keep fingers crossed that no large mammals step on our tents during the nights.

Then the next big event on our calendar is February, when Alan M., Audrie, Pádraig, and Rachel come down from Ireland. Followed by the aunt&uncle&cousin posse in March!

It's just all too exciting!

Thanksgiving Blogging

Apparently, it is thanksgiving today.

It really snuck up on me this year more than ever. Primarily because I still haven't really got the whole theory down as to which week the holiday falls on each year. I know it's always a thursday in November, and I know it's always at the end of November. But I was always under the impression it was the *LAST* thursday in November, which would make it next week. Unless, of course the last day of the month is a thursday. Well in that case, my theory would be correct. But not this year. Actually, I've just been instructed by a friend-of-a-friend who happens to be an American living in Johannesburg, that it's always "the 4th Thursday in November". OK, that makes sense then.

At any rate it's hard to feel thanksgivingy when it's over a hundred degrees outside. But nevertheless we'll try and make an effort with our dinner tonight. Nothing planned yet but we'll see what we can do.

Back to Africa...

We were deathly ill last week. Lucky for us, it hit us on the same day and took us both the same amount of time to get over. Only had to take one day off work (it hit on a thursday), and after 3 days of torture and panic-stricken runs back to the toilet every 10 minutes, it was over. But the recovery period lasted a good week. Johannes reckons it was the sickest he'd ever been, with the exception of The Great Food Poisoning Debacle of '03, after our unlucky trip to the Galway Oyster Festival.

Here is a photo of my husband, incapacitated, on the couch:

Poor thing, he was in so much agony. This was about 3 hours before it hit me. I knew it was really bad when even he, the workaholic, wanted to leave the office an hour early that day. Not a good sign.

In other news, we have got vegetables.

I planted them this year.... about a million carrots basically. This is the first time I have personally propagated anything since I was in elementary school and we lived on Timber Trail. Thank goodness carrots are easy and don't require much effort, because it meant that I actually got some edible results!

These two got the award for looking the "most carrot-like". They're actually straight and normal looking.

This one gets 1st prize for looking the most retarded:

I also planted some red onions (we can't find them in the store here), leeks, coriander, chillies, cucumbers, eggplant, and watermelons.

I got one smallish cucumber that tasted like sawdust (?) out of the whole bed - the rest grew to about the size of my thumb and then shrivelled up and died.

The chili plants are only just now starting to poke through, so maybe they'll turn out, maybe not. The red onions are tiny - about the size of a tennis ball. They still taste like red onions however, so I can't complain. The watermelon vines are still growing, and I'm not even really sure where exactly I planted those eggplants, so I've kinda written those off.

Mary, on the other hand, is an amazing gardener.

Here is a photo of her tomatoes. Growing right next to my embarrassingly crooked and way-too-closely-spaced mess of a carrot patch:

Then there is her lovely bed of corn. She transplanted some of my watermelons in between the corn plants for me. Maybe that will give them a chance?

The long, snake-looking apparatus you can see at the back of this photo, is our grey water system. The dirty water from our sinks and baths goes all the way through the house and trickles into our garden through this +/- 30 metre long piece of pipe. We just alternate which bed it drains into, each day. And of course by "we", I mean "Mary".

I dream of someday having a garden from which I can grow everything that one needs to make hundreds of litres of homemade salsa, like my dad's. However, this year was the year I had to go through in order to learn that vegetable gardening in Botswana takes a lot of time and effort and next year I might start by:

a. spacing my crops at reasonable spaces/intervals, rather than throwing a whole packet of seeds into a trench that I dug using my right shoe

b. weeding regularly

c. shade cloth

d. asking around and finding out what succeeds if planted at which time of the year, first.

But nevertheless, I'm happy with my carrots and small red onions. I've never really been much of a carrot eater, but having about 40,000 of them is a good inspiration to start trying new things with them. Next up: carrots in chocolate-peanut butter sauce.

And finally, some photos of the nice, hot weather.

Johannes and Sech

Finally, the pool has been cleaned out and all ready to go for summer. Good thing, too, because summer started months ago!!