31st January
WHAT A DAY !!
We had ‘Working with Marlice’ today, now I have heard from other volunteers about this & it generally includes rocks, dirt & hard work !! WELL NOT TODAY !! Stein & I had to go to Marlices house, we sat on her veranda – looking out across the desert, the Siamese kitten required some cuddling, fruit juice was brought out & Marlice had to pop to the farm for a meeting as we sat & threaded beads , I enjoy arts & crafts, so this wasn’t really work for me as we watched a warthog family pass infront of us, I must admit we felt a bit guilty, knowing how hard others have worked on this activity.
Marlice returned & worked along side us, I can see why N/a’an ku se is so successful & has grown the way it has, she is so warm & open, giggly & sweet, we gossiped & chatted about Ebony ~ the young cheetah brought in after most likely being hit by a car, she must have had the accident at least three days before arriving on the farm, as she had a massive infection, she really needs to visit a hospital as the primary treatment has not worked, but in Namibia you need permits to transport wild animals ~ then permits for this & permits for that, so Ebony stays in her enclosure until somehow something can be done for her, I fell in love with that little cheetah, she is about eight months old, cheetahs generally take upto three months to imprint on a human ~ Ebony is a bit stubborn, however I spoke to her every time I passed her enclosure & like to think she felt more at ease with me. That led us to talking about them building a state of the art veterinary practice, afterall they will need to treat elephants & rhino at some point, I think Marlice said it will cost three million rand – but I am guessing I got that wrong & it’s considerably more ~ if I win the lottery ………………………
Soon it was lunchtime & Marlice said she had some of the students coming to help her in the afternoon, so if we would rather do something else, she was happy for us to.
Lunch was mac & cheese.
I met up with Nikki from Bristol who was on her last day & she was at a loose end, we chanced our luck & asked Abraham if we could come on the cheetah walk with the team with four other girls, he said ‘no’ ~ we all looked at him in disbelief & said ‘really??’ he was adamant, so we turned to go, he laughed & said ‘cum, cum cum’ which is how we call the animals ~ we set off on a cheetah walk.
The desert was very hot & empty apart from mice & three kurdu. The cheetah wasn’t really interested, given the choice I am sure they would have stayed in their enclosure & drank water, they climbed a tree & had a wander, not much, but it was still amazing, out with two cheetah, roaming free & coming when told ~ just like walking your dog ~ but on steroids!!
We returned to the farm, fed the cheetahs & then Nanna the brown hyena, the heat had made him pretty crotchety as well & we had to make a hasty retreat !!
Dinner was chicken in a sauce & weird, like boiled sugar puffs, followed by syruppy sponge & custard, yummy !!
One of the young guys came to tell us about his teams experience on watch tower the previous night. He was adamant at least one of his team was awake at all times, they heard some dogs barking & didn’t really think anything about it ~ HOWEVER ~ it turns out the security guy out doing a car patrol came across poachers with spears & DOGS, the security guy shot at the dogs, then apparently there was a high speed chase around the dessert, the young guy said they had seen headlights & again thought nothing of it ~ the N/a’an ku se staff came to the conclusion that the team were indeed ALL fast asleep & of course as five females listening to the story ~ we took the micky out of him MERCILESSLY lol
The Wildlife Volunteer 