Africa: I'm coming home

Summary: A snippet about my first two ventures into Africa in 1983 and 2002.

I have been exceedingly lucky in that this will be my third visit to the dark continent. At the tender age of 2, my parents brought me to visit the Shaws in Botswana. Even at that age, I recall our truck being chased by elephants and can still feel that thrill. I was baptized in Botswana, as well; thrown in by my mother as a "why not" gesture when my cousin Tom was receiving his dousing. Mum neglected to tell me this until I was 21. Perhaps it was this event that explains what happened when I returned to Africa in 2002.

As part of my university education, I participated in a study abroad program hosted by the University of Pittsburgh (since moved to the University of Virginia) which took around 600 students from about 100 universities and put them on a "small sliver of steel" for a voyage of discovery. After departing from Vancouver, Canada and visiting Japan, China, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia and India, we arrived in Mombasa, Kenya. From the first breath of African air, my heart felt that it had found home. I have a number of journal entries from the entire journey and I may post some of the more interesting ones in Tea Time Tales, but for now, I'll post just a short piece from 5 Nov 2002 that I wrote about my time in the Maasai Mara of Kenya.

I wrote a few thoughts in reflection of my time at the camp on my final night. I was pretty tired, but more than that, I was breaking down. I had messed up my eye on safari and it was really hurting me. But I stepped away from the pain. I felt a great connection to this place and the new friends I had made in the small, hot kitchen and did not enjoy much of the time I was around the rest of the SAS crew. I was annoyed by them and in part embarrassed by a great deal of their behavior. They were being loud and I would bet that they missed a vast amount of Kenya that I saw. Here is what I wrote:

Sore eye. Transformation to lion. Don't want to leave Kenya. Kindred spirit was born here and I see it in the eyes of the people. Jones, Mustafa, Meena, Gregory. They all seem like family. We cook together and they teach me about their lives, about cooking, and about Kenya.

Feel defeated. Feel like I'm starting over this time as a full-grown lion. I am so outside of the group. Quiet, contemplative, observant while trying to break away from tourism. I have left a piece of my heart in Kenya.

I wish I could explain all of that, but some I don't want to and some I don't understand myself.

Today, I sit four and a half years after writing that, poised for a return.

A return as a lion.