A walk to remember

Taking guests on a bushmen walk is not just my job but my pleasure, besides the fact that I enjoy to communicate with people.

Walking in the wild is always something to enjoy, the smell of the field, the sun on you skin and just the fact of being in nature makes it already a walk to remember.

What I enjoy the most even having done this a million times is watching the bushmen being in their culture. They are not quiet for one moment, the whole walk is like being at a performance of an orgastra, it is as if the clicking sound of their language harmonizes with the birds chirping and the insects wings buzzing as they fly past you. To put it simple it is just a walk to remember.

The things I show the guests on a walk like this actually teaches me just as much as it would teach them, only after seeing what plants and in what way the bushmen sees the nature would you understand how it is possible for them to survive in an environment that is defined as a desert.

I will be honest with you, if you do not know any better their foods and medicine actually does not taste that bad, keeping in mind that it is prepared by nature and no additives were added to enhance the flavors or to make it taste better. The medicine plants taste horrible to be hundred percent honest, but we all know the saying that says if the medicine taste bad it will work.

The more time I spend with these short, dark skinned, almost cloth-less

people the more I enjoy it, we are building up a relationship and we teach each other different methods.

Germans do get cold in the Kalahari

Just came from the most interesting be wild camp of my journey on this farm so far.

I had the a older group who are exceptionally friendly and willing to help them selves.

The bushmen walk was difficult because they would get easily distracted, like any group you have your one or two people who does not really care for the facts but would rather just hang behind the group and does rarely contribute to the conversation. You always who have this one guy who is busy with some sort of research and asks a lot of questions, it is those people who I like. Then you have that people who does not want to taste the veld food and I do not understand why, it might be the only time in your life that you get to experience such a delightful treat in your life.

The evening dance was quite one of the best even though I shorted two of the most enthusiastic dancers of my bushmen. The atmosphere was perfect and the timing was perfect. It was not to dark nor to light.

After the hungry guests almost finished all the food on the buffet, which I found as a compliment to our chef, I made a nice big fire and we all sat around it sharing stories and asking questions. The guests sat about an hour when they said they are getting cold and would rather spend the rest of the evening in bed, my mouth almost hit the floor. These people go through winters where it snows, and it was not at all a cold evening, don't get me wrong but I am a real softy to cold, if it goes bellow 20 degrees I put on my jacket.

Who knew people who experience very cold whether every winter and most parts of the summer would feel cold before I do??

You experience the most interesting guests when you get to work them directly.



Translated to German


Gerade kam von der interessanteste sein wilde Lager meiner Reise auf dieser Farm so weit. Ich hatte die eine ältere Gruppe, die sehr freundlich sind und bereit sind, sie selbst zu helfen. Der bushmen Weg war schwierig, weil sie leicht ablenken lassen würde, wie jede Gruppe, die Sie Ihre ein oder zwei Leute haben, die für die Fakten nicht wirklich egal, aber ich würde lieber nur hinter der Gruppe hängen und nur selten das Gespräch beiträgt. Sie haben immer die haben einen Kerl, der mit irgendeiner Art von Forschung beschäftigt ist, und fragt viele Fragen, es jene Menschen, die Ich mag. Dann haben Sie, dass Menschen, die nicht wollen, das Veld Essen zu probieren und ich verstehe nicht, warum, es könnte das einzige Mal in Ihrem Leben, die Sie erhalten zu erleben, eine solche erfreuliches Vergnügen in Ihrem Leben. Der Tanzabend war ziemlich eines der besten, obwohl ich zwei der am meisten begeisterten Tänzer meiner bushmen kurzgeschlossen. Die Atmosphäre war perfekt und das Timing war perfekt. Es war nicht zu dunkel noch ans Licht. Nachdem die hungrigen Gäste am Buffet das ganze Essen fast fertig, die ich als Kompliment an unseren Koch gefunden, machte ich ein schönes, großes Feuer, und wir saßen alle um ihn herum Geschichten austauschen und Fragen stellen. Die Gäste saßen etwa eine Stunde, wenn sie sagten, sie werden kalt und würde lieber den Rest des Abends im Bett verbringen, mein Mund fast auf dem Boden aufschlug. Diese Menschen gehen durch Winter, wo es schneit, und es war überhaupt nicht einem kalten Abend, verstehen Sie mich nicht falsch, aber ich bin ein echtes Weichei zu kalt, wenn es unten 20 Grad geht ich auf meine Jacke anziehen. Wer wusste, dass Menschen, die sehr kalt erfahren, ob in jedem Winter und den meisten Teilen der Sommer kalt anfühlen würde, bevor ich tun ?? Sie erleben die interessantesten Gäste, wenn man sie direkt an die Arbeit.

Porcupine photo shoot

I met this traveler called Jens. He really inspired me a lot to uptake photography and the reason for that being is that he gave me the real experience in what effort goes into a perfect shot.

We waited til about 8 o'clock in the evening until we met in front of the bar and had a quick drink before the shoot was to take place. It was pitch dark. We chatted a bit about everything and when I saw he was almost finished with his drink I brought up the topic about the photo he wanted to take and what he wants me to do. As I am the guide of the farm it was necessary for me to go with him because he needed to go inside the enclosure and my job was to distract "Piet" , our porcupine, to right place and make sure that he is standing in the correct position so that the perfect shot can be made.

We headed of to old Piet's enclosure and as expected he was out of his hole and very active, after all they are nocturnal. Before entering he took of the covers from his cameras and mounted them on a tripod. I literally had to look twice to make sure my eyes weren't deceiving me as he had the largest camera lens on this one camera. It looked as if he had a hand canon, ironically the camera make was also Canon. Upon entering Piet immediately noted me and I had all his attention, We struggled to get Piet alone in the shot because he followed to close to me. I then remembered we have a lot of left over Greek salad in the kitchen and I went to fetch it. The moment I got close enough to the cage I saw Jens running from the one side of the cage at top speed to the other, turned around and pointed the camera in the direction of Piet and of when the bizarre clicking sound of his camera taking what sounds like a hundred photos at a time. He repeated the process like three times before I broke out and laughed, describing it words does not sound as funny as the real sighting would be, 

I strategically placed the food in the enclosure and Piet immediately started eating, Jens' wife who places probably the most important role in the photo shoot shined the light in many different ways on the animal. later she used two flash lights. 

When the food was finished I was the one who had to run down the cage so that we could get in some more shots and we ended it of with trying to get a nice shot of his face.

I think he must have taken about 500 or more photos of the animal, and he told me the reason to that is, that you can not rely on one or two shots for the perfect shot. We exchanged emails and once he gets time he will mail me the photo we tried to create.

The silhouette of a porcupine was the idea and I myself have seen what a difficult task it is to take such a magnificent photo.

What inspired me the most was not his amazing camera but through what ends he would go for the perfect shot, I am telling you now, I have learned something new that night without a doubt.

Photo credits: Jens Cullmann
                       www.jenscullmann.de

what a few days it has been

So it has been a few days that I have been posting and that is simply because the last few days after my day of was just hectic, we have been extremely busy and it does not seem to get quieter on the lodge.

I really enjoy it when it is busy even though a normal working day consist out 11 hours working the last one were not under 15. I had the most spontaneous guests ever and all were interested in what I had to say when doing any of  my guide work. I did 5 bushmen walks and two dances in a weeks time and that is more than what I have done working here so I really enjoy it. The walks and dances are my desert of work. I get to build a bit more personnel relationship with my guests and do not have to be that formal. Tomorrow I have a " Be Wild" camp and cant wait for my guest to arrive but before that happens I kick my day of with helping the serving of breakfast and with no delay after that I will be presenting a bushmen walk, so tomorrow I wont waist much time at the lodge. The only sad part is that when I do the "Be Wild" I cant feed the leopards as I am at the bush camp that time and lately those two furry devils crept very deep into  my heart. I seem to be more comfortable around the porcupine also lately. Unfortunately I by accident wiped my phone so I don't have to many photos of the bushmen walks and none of the dances but I will be taking more tomorrow at the camp. Tomorrow I will also take notes on the bushmen way of life so that in my next blog I can give you more information regarding lifestyle and I will try to upload more detailed photos of plants and other interesting things they use in their primitive way.

I developed a new habit lately and that is "scotch on the rocks". A double every night diluted with a little bit of water and I sleep like a baby, of coarse it takes me at least 3 hours to finish it but I really enjoy the raw taste of the whiskey (scotch).

I am also thinking about writing a book but what about I am not yet sure, more information regarding that will be coming.

The bellow of the cows are now gone and I need to play a movie on my computer so that I can just fall asleep at night .

Your author
Alexander, SLICK, Serfontein

A day of

I had the privilege of getting the day of from work so I got to get up to date with all my series as well as getting in some sleep so I will be charged with energy tomorrow.

Unfortunately I don not have much to share except for the fact that I will be starting a new dream shortly and if it all goes well I will share it with you.

Best of greetings.

Our little animals

Cold and cloudy

3/16/2016

This morning I woke up fresh still with sound of the calves calling their mothers.

The whole day was a cloudy one with a light drizzle every now and then on my shoulders, real English whether. For a change it was nice but yet my hart longed to the blistering African sun. It was yet an ordinary day. The animal feeding went well and for a change I had Afrikaans speaking guests with me so I could present it in my home language, which was very nice and I could do a less formal presentation but I noticed that in some way I found it difficult not use English words when giving my guests factual information. Old "Piet"; our 12 year old porcupine; showed head for the first time since Saturday and he was very eager to eat. I get to see him a lot but he tends to be shy when there are a lot of guests with me on the feeding, keeping in mind that they are actually nocturnal animals, so it is actually a privilege to see him before 10 pm. The leopards seemed hungry tonight, they were more exited than usual and for me going inside with them I have to keep in mind that they are currently in the fase of their lives where you need o look at their caracter. The male starts to mature very fast being only 11 months of age. He is called "Seun" which is an Afrikaans word meaning "boy" but I guess one of these days  I will have to start calling him "Man". The leopard, especially the male, tends to become agresive as he gets older and that is due to his testoterone levels that become higher and when they go into mating season he will be very protective of his area. They still bring joy to my hart every night when I can be the one who fills their stomach and it is supringly how fast such a dangerous animal can get into your so fast. "Oterjas" our 'tame' Warthog was also acting strangely tonight and was not hersef, I guess it is the whether.

The rain turned from drizzle to almost thunder storm just after the animal feeding and a two more campers showed up. I will probably get to meet them tommorow.

I myself grabbed a bottle of ' Robertson Winery Merlot 2014' out of the bar before I dashed to my room when the boss told us that we can knock of the clock earlier. In this trade of working you need to make use of every extra minute you get of becuase tommorow can lead to a day of working 18 hours straight.

The wet whether and the only chance to enjoy red wine in room tempreture makes me long back home, but to think that the city noise will keep me up the whole night agian makes my stomach turn.

I will now send you away with a big great blessing and hope you to have a glass of proper wine and in your hand. Cheers to a great day.

Introduction

Alex ( Alexander)

Firstly I would like to ask my readers what are their definition of a dream job. I always answer it simply by using a phrase one of my friends, whom old enough to be my father but yet he is as energetic as a teenage girl seeing her favorite boy band play live, and he said to me one day that if you do what you love then you never have to work another day. I took that phrase very seriously, perhaps more than he wanted me to, and thought to my self, you are a Namibian born and raised who still has his life ahead of him and while your still young take your chances. I finally decided to start looking for lodge work. it was not long into 2016 when I was contacted by Zelda game and guest farm offering me the job that I was dreaming about. I now work as their field guide and during the day I would oversee the general farm work, gardens for the lodge and maintenance.

The fist month was a blur, I was thrown into the deep end and had to learn to swim and sitting here today thinking about it, it was the best thing that could happen to me. Having no previous experience in tourism I simply had to rely on my salesman experience that I have to communicate with guest. Nobody has shown me how to do the animal feeding neither bushmen walk and dance and to make it worse they leave me alone in the "be wild camp" with 6 people and I had to set table for them and entertain them at the same time. I had to saddle up that horse and just ride it, and in the end it was a major success. So as the the two months and a few weeks went by I had a few walks, two dances, a few game drives and at least every evening an animal feeding. I can confidently say that I am busy staying on top.

Today is the last the day the hunting guest, Russian, will sleep here and leave tomorrow morning after breakfast. I also had two guides, ladies, who are busy passing their route for a tour that they are planning and a lovely couple, retired, that camp here. This afternoon I took the two guides for a bushmen walk and as the devil wants it, near to the end of the walk, the rain started, but HEY! you are in the bush not in town so lets enjoy this. We decide to stop the walk and start heading back to the car before the rain falls down hard. We arrived at the"Be Wild" camp, that is the starting point of the walk and also the ending, I showed them the rooms and they tipped the bushmen something for their effort. What I found interesting about these two is that with all my other guests, you as the guide, first have to eat whatever the bushmen tells them to eat, before they would even think about putting it into their mouths, but these two simply ate it before I can even properly translate what the bushmen told them. They even ate the raw "bushmen salad" that I never give to the guest to sample as it is not that good in taste but rather used in a soup or with other fruits and nuts they use.

Earlier the day me and my workers, with the boss sitting in the car, had to round up the cattle, bring them to the stall at home, and do general work on them like; treating them for ticks, sawing of the horns, castrate the calves and all the other "nitty gritty" things. We then separated the larger calves from the mothers and had to chase them to a certain camp on the farm, take the car back home and chase the cows with their bull back to another camp where the grazing is better. It took us the whole morning, walking behind cattle in the sun and plowing through the Kalahari sand to get them at their planned points. Tonight my nose is pink burnt and my arms are coco brown. It has been a long day but yet another successfully pleasing one and tonight as I hear the the night animals calling and the wind brushing the leaves in the trees, I will close my eyes and start to dream another dream as I am living the African dream job.