A Blog In 15 Pictures

Once upon a time, there was a Dik Dik. These mate for life and are always found nearby their mates. The guide says if one of the pair gets killed the other will die soon after from anxiety 😦

The Dik Dik lived in Tangire National Park in Tanzania.  It had some pretty ugly neighbors, but some people like the narrator really like Warthogs. He was looking for a close up of one of these since he was in Botswana. Every time he got close, they pranced away with their tails held high.

Olive Baboons also live in Tangire. These travel in large groups. The young ride on their mother’s backs like a rider in a saddle.  Living in large groups mean there is many eyes to watch for danger and keep them from being surprised.

When this female lioness was first spotted, she was sitting under a tree near a dead Baboon that she likely killed. Sometimes many many eyes just aren’t enough. She left the baboon carcass. Posed for this picture.  Tried to kill a zebra and a reedbok. Failed. Then returned to her tree. The fate of the Baboon carcass remains unknown, but we can surmise it did not last long.

Not far from Tangire is a hotel where you need to be escorted to and from your hotel room to dinner because of the wild dangers.  This photo was shot just behind that hotel. Apparently, we could have just floated around in the pool, getting drunk and shooting pictures, instead of jostling around all day on the bumpy dusty roads in search of wildlife.

Every day on an African safari ends with a sunset just like this. The daytime creatures punch out at the time clock and the night time creatures punch in.  All of the daytime creatures go safely to their homes to sleep glorious dreams of another idyllic African sunrise.  The fate of the baboon will not be mentioned here.

Many tribes of people live in this part of Tanzania.  At 12, Masai boys are circumcised without anesthetic. If they show any sign of pain, they are dishonored for the rest of their life 😦  If they are not disgraced, they live apart from the village for a few months while they learn how to be warriors. 

Masai warriors jump as part of their ceremonies. If an eligible your woman likes the way a warrior jumps, they waggle a shoulder in their direction.  This could be the start of something special.

If you want to see something special, check out this picture.  I had some pretty mad jump skills. So fresh the camera could not handle them. Thus the blurriness. Unfortunately, I didn’t jump high enough to warrant a shoulder waggle 😦 That’s ok, though, because if I were really a Masai I would have been living in disgrace since I was 12.

One of the dark sides of Tanzania is the really lax Child labor laws. This child works 15 hours a day grinding corn to bring 15 cents a day home to her family.  Or she may have seen her mother showing us how to grind corn and decided she would show us how it is really done.  With so many stories to tell, it’s hard to remember which are actually true.

This is a Bushman.  My favorite part of the cultural exploration that we have been on was visiting the Bushman. They choose to live a hunter gatherer lifestyle, although they trade some with a local village for metal goods and marijuana.

Apparently, they really like marijuana. It is illegal in Tanzania.  Recently politicians had a campaign rally designed to hear the needs of the people in the countryside. The Bushman sent a representative to tell the government they needed more marijuana 🙂

What do you call a female Bushman?

The Bushman hunt every day. The day we visited they brought home a civet and a Dik Dik. Don’t think too hard about the fate of it’s mate 😦 They can even shoot small birds off of their perches in trees.  Naturally, they asked me to give them a few archery tips and I obliged.  They were wowed!

After I schooled them on the archery range, I decided to help out a bit more and teach them how to make fire by rubbing two sticks together.  They were very grateful and promised to name all of their future children Roy.  That’s the end of my Blog In 15 Pictures. Everything here in is absolutely true.  Except those parts which aren’t.