I saw the top two African killer animals...

And lived to tell about it! I can finally check off a tour of the Serengeti from my bucket list. It was beginning to be a bit embarrassing – to think that I’ve lived within a few hours’ drive of one of the most amazing game reserves in the world these past six months and it took me this long to see it. I have Kurtis and Carla to thank. I spent the past weekend with them and they suggested we go for a game drive. We hit the road before the crack of dawn and watched the sun rise over the Serengeti plains. As we drove along, we saw the shapes of giraffes, antelope, and elephants pass us by. The next five hours consisted of driving along various designated tracks and keeping a sharp lookout for anything that moved. Peter remarked how cool it would be to see a hippo out of the water for a change and, wouldn’t you know it, out walked the biggest hippo you have ever seen! He lumbered into the road on his stubby little legs, turned his head towards us, gave us this look of disgust, turned his rump in our direction, and shuffled right back to where he’d come from. Hard to believe that something so huge can walk on legs that short and be considered the second most dangerous animal in Africa. We continued on our merry way when, all of a sudden, I spotted something dark to our right. Kurtis hit the brakes and up popped three black heads – Cape Buffalo, the most dangerous animal in all of Africa! They are easily recognizable by their unique set of horns propped on top of their heads. They are completely fearless and will charge at the slightest hint of danger instead of running away like most animals. We sat in hushed silence, taking a few pictures before slowly driving away.

As we drove onto the vast Serengeti plains, we spotted a herd of about 30 elephants making their way slowly to a fresh feeding ground. The largest female took the lead and directed the others. It was quite the sight to behold as they moved majestically as one group, the newborns in the midst of the pack for protection. They crossed right in front of us without giving us a second glance. And then we hit the jackpot! Peter thought he saw some lions in the distance tracking a kill and, slightly to the left, some dark shapes were slinking away. His guess was cheetahs, a rare sighting! The lions were too far away but we were determined to see the cheetahs. The only way to do that was to follow a “path” off the main track. We were able to drive right up beside five (!) cheetahs lounging under a bush, keeping an eye on the lions in the distance. Some time later, we came across the same pride of lions taking it easy near a riverbed. One of the lionesses was taking her sweet time following the others and just as we stopped, she decided to catch up to the others. She walked right by our car window!!! Man, she was all muscle and, up close, her head looked completely out of proportion to the rest of her body – it was huge! She looked fierce.

A word of advice: If you’re ever in the Serengeti and are having trouble finding animals, just survey the horizon and find several safari vehicles at a standstill – you’re guaranteed to see something. We turned the corner of a pile of rocks and nearly slammed into about five safari vehicles crowded around one tree. We had no clue what they were looking at. Peter leaned out his window and asked another safari guide what was so interesting. A leopard, the guide casually replied, as if this was an everyday occurrence. We freaked! Just to give you an idea how rare a leopard sighting is, Carla has been living in Africa on and off for over 20 years and has never seen a leopard. The leopard was so well-disguised unless you knew where he was hanging out in the tree, you’d completely miss him. We just sat and stared in awe, waiting for the slightest movement to give us a better look.

What a day! We ended off by lunching and swimming at a nearby safari lodge. It was exhausting and exhilarating to have seen so much in one day. Our first safari tour and we’d seen just about every animal imaginable!

No News is Good News

I’ve been gently reminded that I have not posted any new entries since mid-January and people may be curious to know what I’ve been up to for the last month or so. Well, I’ve been up to my eyeballs in school work and loving it! It’s not a good excuse but the three courses I’m teaching this semester have definitely filled up all the free time I seemed to have to let you know what’s been happening. Again, my sense of admiration for all teachers continues to grow as every teaching day passes. The amount of time that goes into simply prepping a lesson and then marking the homework that you’ve assigned is often mind-boggling. I can tell you I’ve become a lot more efficient with my time; my days of procrastination are behind me. Part of being a good teacher is being prepared a week in advance, enough time to get together any teaching materials I might need and catching the photocopier on a good day, ie. it’s cooperating and the power is on, two key ingredients 

We just completed mid-term exams last week and I was encouraged by the overall rise in marks among my students. I have a sneaking suspicion they might have studied some this time around. I have really enjoyed the English class I was assigned this semester in addition to the two afternoon classes. It’s a writing-intensive course that is meant to prepare the Diploma I students to write solid research papers in English. We’ve gone over the different kinds of paragraphs and are now delving into composition writing with the standard format of introductory paragraph, body, and closing paragraph. I’m constantly having flashbacks to my elementary school days of trying to come up with a good topic sentence, not to mention a complete report.

I had an enlightening discussion with my advanced English class before the mid-term break. I was beginning to feel frustrated with the lack of participation and my inability to engage my students. I had exhausted just about every creative English learning activity I could think of when I decided to ask them again what they wanted to do during our class. I’d tried this several times before and had only received blank stares; I had no idea what to expect. I was pleasantly surprised by the number of suggestions they gave me and the amount of good ideas they came up with. Turns out they want to learn English through drama. They love to act but have no opportunities to put their gifts and talents to good use. I had no idea! I had never seen any of them perform a skit or drama during chapel and here they were telling me this is what they want to do and they’d love to put on some sort of play for the rest of the school to see. Our final semester project has all of the students working in small groups, writing and then performing their skits for the rest of the class. If all goes well, we’ll be doing more of the same in our next semester.

Overall, this teaching assignment has been a roller coaster ride with good days and bad days, moments of sheer excitement and complete disappointment. Through it all, I’m learning not to be so easily discouraged and to focus on the positive, especially when it feels as though everything I taught in the previous lesson has been forgotten. Learning is a long-term process, as my brother, Phil, reminded me. I may not see many results instantly but I can walk away knowing I passed on as much of my knowledge as I possibly could and what my students do with it is up to them. Relying on God is the most important part of my “survival strategy”, spending time every morning in prayer and facing the day with the knowledge that I am not alone in my daily struggles of teaching and living in a foreign culture. Your thoughts and prayers are also an endless source of encouragement to me. Thank-you!