Ok, so, I've definitely learned one thing from keeping a blog: I am no good at keeping a blog. Don't take it personally, internet, that I haven't updated in a long time-- its not that I don't care about you. I also took my first shower in a week yesterday. I've been all kinds of remiss.
But I've made a resolution: I will write one paragraph each day on this blog. I mean, at least then I'll put something out everyday that will give you some idea of what's going on here. Hopefully, quality will follow quantity. And hopefully the fates will not conspire to keep me away from this goal. And by "the fates," I mean waiting to load a video of "Boogie Boogie Hedgehog" until the internet fails for the night.
(that hedgehog scrunching up his face eating a carrot is just as adorable in Africa)
I think I might count this for my paragraph for the day, since I've still got a thesis funding application to write. Because I just can't get enough of the sweet sweet Kenya, but I've had more than enough of the sweet sweet airfares to Africa. But, there will be more, I promise you that.
p.s. pictures soon.
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
AAAAAAHHH (or linkety-link-link pretend I wrote stuff)
Time for excuses... I haven't had real internet connection in about 4 weeks, and I haven't updated in a more than 4 weeks and that is no good. I have been back at Mpala for 3 days now and I haven't posted anything yet, but in my defense, I've been kept quite busy making power points (I'm getting pretty awesome at making powerpoints) and crashing through bushes trying to gather data about dik diks for a final project. The most information I've gotten is that dik diks have a wonderful ability to look at you from 50m away with a withering glance that says, "I hope you're being ironic, because if you think that a big lumbering ape like you is getting close enough to see what I'm doing, that's just pathetic", and bound away like they've got trampoline shoes. But it's all ok, because I switched from an observational approach to experimental; I destroyed all of their latrines, and switched out the scent-marked sticks in one of their territories with sticks from two other territories. And tomorrow morning we'll see who's the big lumbering ape... well, still me, because I used my opposable ape thumbs to shovel dirt all over your middens and move your furniture around. Although it's not as hilarious as what Sam did. (Any readers from Sam's blog, ask him what he did.)
Anyway, I can direct you to two things I wrote were posted on the interblags for me, both of which include a picture of me holding Sondai, the late great baby ostrich.
Mom, can I get an ostrich?
Ok, so, in two days I will be halfway done with my semester here, and I will also have my first real day off since Feb. 22. And then I will put up those things I said I would write, that I've sort-of worked on. A little. And also about 1200 photos of beautiful things and not-so-beautiful things, and a CRAZY SNAKE THAT FELL FROM THE GRASS THATCH ROOF IN A DEATH COIL AROUND A MOUSE ONTO A TABLE A FOOT AWAY FROM ME.
Get excited.
Anyway, I can direct you to two things I wrote were posted on the interblags for me, both of which include a picture of me holding Sondai, the late great baby ostrich.
Mom, can I get an ostrich?
Ok, so, in two days I will be halfway done with my semester here, and I will also have my first real day off since Feb. 22. And then I will put up those things I said I would write, that I've sort-of worked on. A little. And also about 1200 photos of beautiful things and not-so-beautiful things, and a CRAZY SNAKE THAT FELL FROM THE GRASS THATCH ROOF IN A DEATH COIL AROUND A MOUSE ONTO A TABLE A FOOT AWAY FROM ME.
Get excited.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Last Bastion of Colonialism
There are some interesting elements of land-ownership in the Laikipia district. In Nanyuki (the closest town, probably a 15-minute drive on paved roads but a 1.5 hour drive on the roads that exist) and the surrounding areas, it's just about what I expect from a modern developing country: locally-owned stores, houses and small farms. Along the edges are grazing commons where people herd their cows, goats, sheep, and dairy camels (I want to try camel milk before I leave). But smack-dab in the middle of the district are a bunch of ranches owned by white folks from foreign countries. Now, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, especially for the wildlife; if the owners of the land have an outside source of income, like research or tourism, and don't need to make a living off of their cattle, they won't be grazing the land to death. It just has an odd feel of some sort of modern colonialism. We had our first direct contact with this when we went to talk to the ranch manager, Mike.
We visited Mike to get his opinion on some of the short studies we were thinking of doing for our first course here. Mike is a white Kenyan gentleman, whose family has lived in the area for generations, and has an old cattleman's intimate knowledge of the land. Of course, what first set the mood for the meeting was not Mike, but the ranch house. While pretty much all of the landscape is dry, patchy grass, shrubby trees, and dust of various colors, as we pulled up the long driveway to the ranch house we passed rows of blooming bougainvillea and parked our car under the shade of a 30-foot tall tree, which, in our absence, gently dropped tiny blossoms through the sunroof onto the canvas seats. There was a green lawn, and a garden of well-watered tropical flowers. We met Mike, and it was hard to know what to make of him. He had a British accent, so of course he demanded respect, and he invited us to sit on the veranda and chat. He lit a cigarette, took one puff, and then let it burn down like incense between his two fingers as he talked. He called in Swahili to a servant, who brought out a platter with a full tea service. It was like we had been spliced into a scene from an old movie.
In the last three weeks I've seen even more of this outside of Laikipia: after camping out by a river and spending a night in an... interesting hotel (more about that later), we stayed on an estate owned by Lord and Lady Delamere and were treated to the aristocratic hospitality of the ranch manager and his wife. In the last year they've been making major efforts to turn the land from a private ranch to a conservancy that takes community needs into account, but it's a very new project. Mike, too, expressed concern for the needs of the community around the ranch, talking about his upcoming project to build a system to catch rain from the roof of the school so the children would have access to drinking water there. It's definitely not old school, land-grabbing, culture-enforcing, white-man's-burden colonialism, but still-- they are wealthy white people who manage extensive fenced areas, and they've got that long British drawl and serve tea all the time.
One of my pet hobbies here is deciding how animals seem like people I know, but I have a sort of reversed feeling for Mike. He is weathered and tough, somewhat intimidating but really pretty tame, and he reminds me of a rhino. And like a rhino, he seems like a relic of Africa's past that nearly became extinct, but is being brought back, slightly altered, by conservation.
We visited Mike to get his opinion on some of the short studies we were thinking of doing for our first course here. Mike is a white Kenyan gentleman, whose family has lived in the area for generations, and has an old cattleman's intimate knowledge of the land. Of course, what first set the mood for the meeting was not Mike, but the ranch house. While pretty much all of the landscape is dry, patchy grass, shrubby trees, and dust of various colors, as we pulled up the long driveway to the ranch house we passed rows of blooming bougainvillea and parked our car under the shade of a 30-foot tall tree, which, in our absence, gently dropped tiny blossoms through the sunroof onto the canvas seats. There was a green lawn, and a garden of well-watered tropical flowers. We met Mike, and it was hard to know what to make of him. He had a British accent, so of course he demanded respect, and he invited us to sit on the veranda and chat. He lit a cigarette, took one puff, and then let it burn down like incense between his two fingers as he talked. He called in Swahili to a servant, who brought out a platter with a full tea service. It was like we had been spliced into a scene from an old movie.
In the last three weeks I've seen even more of this outside of Laikipia: after camping out by a river and spending a night in an... interesting hotel (more about that later), we stayed on an estate owned by Lord and Lady Delamere and were treated to the aristocratic hospitality of the ranch manager and his wife. In the last year they've been making major efforts to turn the land from a private ranch to a conservancy that takes community needs into account, but it's a very new project. Mike, too, expressed concern for the needs of the community around the ranch, talking about his upcoming project to build a system to catch rain from the roof of the school so the children would have access to drinking water there. It's definitely not old school, land-grabbing, culture-enforcing, white-man's-burden colonialism, but still-- they are wealthy white people who manage extensive fenced areas, and they've got that long British drawl and serve tea all the time.
One of my pet hobbies here is deciding how animals seem like people I know, but I have a sort of reversed feeling for Mike. He is weathered and tough, somewhat intimidating but really pretty tame, and he reminds me of a rhino. And like a rhino, he seems like a relic of Africa's past that nearly became extinct, but is being brought back, slightly altered, by conservation.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)