South Africa - Botswana - Namibia - Zambia

I should really space these places out but my photos are not all coming up on the screen so I can only choose some of them to publish. This means I need to be jumping all over the place. So hope it makes some sense, the thing is....its all good!

Well, I have now caught up on a few things and I will be putting more photos on here but for the moment I thought I would give you a bit of an insight in to what my 'Humanitarian Tour' has consisted of. It has started off with a group of 9 people coming together with 'team leaders' in 'Dan' and 'Paula' who should really have their own reality tv show they are just too funny together. Dan was born in Zambia and has been through loads in his life, 'Paula' is from California and was a bit of a hippy chick of the 70's and she and Dan are constantly at each other for something, Paula is always annoyed at him and everything in her vocabulary has a swear word as pronoun or verb! But they are besotted, just a really entertaining couple of people. In the group there is the oldest...ie me! The rest of the group consists of Matt who is an electrician from England and is pretty quiet most of the time in the group as we are mostly girls he does not get a word in edge wise! Then there is my 'tent-mate' Susan from Canada who is the Canadian sarcastic equivalent to me! We have Sibohan or 'Chevron' as we call her from the South as well (Southport) - she is crazy and has a comment for everything. Paula and Sarah are travelling together from Canada, Paula loves to pose and take pics when she 'thinks' the subjects of her photos are not looking! Sarah is a little quieter and has a calming influence on the people around her. Helen and Jessica are a couple of 19 year olds travelling together from meeting on a previous project (both from England), Helen is a pre med student and loves drinking games and watching 'hernia' operations. Jess is a slim girl with a very large appetite, always first in line for food and eats off everyone else's plate, she is also very sweet. Then there is Tim or Timmeeeeeeeeeeee as he is known to the group, he is the baby of the group from Scotland, he always has the same expression unless he is really hyper about something..like sitting on top of the land rover or swinging over a gorge, usual stuff really!

We have the opportunity to be sleeping in tents for this month we are spending together, and most of the time we have been eating outside when Paula tells us our food is ready. We have ate mainly the 'usual' kinds of food with a few African dishes thrown in for good measure, and I must say it has all been pretty fantastic. And so again from losing some weight...her it is piling on again! We have stayed first of all in a camp site near Kruger Park in Phalabora in South Africa, on the river there we got to see some 'game' - elephant, giraffe, crocadile and hippos mainly oh yeah and Buffalo. We were also 'told' that during the night at our camp site hyeena, buffalo and hippos wander about. I did not get out of my tent to see that! Another Camp site we went to in Botswana was called 'Elephant Sands' and we did have the opportunity of seeing an elephant drink by the watering hole near the camp which was awesome but I would have loved to see it during the day! We went on a 'game drive' there and were promised we would see 'loads'...we saw nothing...our guide even started talking about ants and how big their brains were at one point as they can organise armys - and? They told us it never happens that you don't see anything and so they have promised us that on the way back to South Africa we can go to another game drive with them for nothing! And we BETTER see something! Dan is getting a bit worried as all other groups have seen lots of 'game' by this time, we have saw hardly anything. Although the group was on a boooze cruise the other night in Livingston in Zambia and they saw a little family of elephants - why am I not a drinker???

Ok I don't want to go on all day so I will tell you what we have been doing in 'Mwandi' a small village in Zambia where some church's have set up a hospital and some schools for the local people as well as an orphanage/school. We worked there for just over a week teaching in the school for the young teens, the children in 'Stella's school' - Chief's grandaughter went there! Also went to a place called the 'OVC' - Orphans and Vulnerable children who teach as well as provide food and support for the kids, some of them get support to go to high school as well which costs them a lot of money. There was also work in the hospital and Jess and Helen were helping at one of the 'births'. Apart from that we worked at out patients weighing people and taking temperatures and helped paint one of the missionary buildings - Kudu house, which is now used like a guest house and generates some money for the mission. It is actually a Scottish couple who do a lot of the work there, Ida works in the hospital and Keith in the school, they are protestants and work really really hard to get things done there. Always trying to raise funds and appealing to their sister organisations in other parts of the world to help them. I really admire them for their work.

And so it was a great experience working in Mwandi and meeting so many lovely people there including Mwaka and her little girl Ruth who gave us a gift of a pumpkin. She was so sweet. We also went to a funeral of the 'chief's' daughter, who was said to have committed suicide by throwing herself over a bridge and then we found out the next day that she was in fact...alive. A very intesting experience, never been to the funeral of a live person before!

And now the group are in Livingston and doing all sorts of crazy stuff. Matt and Helen have done the Bunjii jump, I was petrified for them, they did it on 'no mans land' between Zambia and Zimbabwe off the bridge. Matt and Siobhan went on a helicopter ride over Victoria Falls, we also went a walk around there and got soaked. Most of the group went on a day out yesterday to a place they have abseiling, zip wire and gorge swing. I did all of it and was totally scared by the gorge swing. You free fall for a good 4 seconds and oh my goodness I actually stopped breathing at one point I was so petrified. But I did it another 2 times, one on a tandem with Matt and then a last time down myself with my eyes open!!! It has been fun but I have to watch my money and no more activities like that for me! The rest of the group went on an elephant back ride this morning, they were particularly motivated by the full english breakfast on offer! And we have got some 'team t-shirts' coming in today we have designed, we already gave the cash and so we hope the shirts will be forthcoming! Now I am off to the market to do a bit of 'trading' see what I can get for some of my stuff! Now I am so annoyed that I gave away so many of my clothes and shoes to people I could have had so many souvenirs....yeah it was a joke! In fact it was funny yesterday Paula traded her brothers sun glasses for a salad bowl and her socks for a necklace...and yes she was wearing the socks. I love this group they make me laugh, but I think I need a rest now!

Hope you are all good. Take care and all the best...and start planning your travels!