Things I’ve learned this summer (winter)…

First, my apologies for not writing as much this summer (winter) as I usually do. I think Botswana’s recent rating as the “unhappiest place on earth” (of 151 countries surveyed by the New Economics Foundation’s Happy Planet Index) may have rubbed off on me a bit. The question is - what’s happening over here?

In the limited amount of time I’ve been coming to Botswana (on and off for the past five years), I’ve noticed a change. In an effort to “modernize” or perhaps “become more developed”, Botswana has become more and more bureaucratic to the point that it seems to be almost “strangling itself in its own bureaucracy.” Even the simplest tasks seem to take on a level of absurdity that is hard to ignore.

Paul’s continuing attempt to deal with BURS (Botswana Unified Revenue Service, comparable to the USA’s IRS) feels like a Sisyphean task (you remember Sisyphus – the Greek king punished by being forced to roll an immense boulder up a hill, only to watch it roll back down, and to repeat this action FOREVER!).  Or a better yet, dealing with BURS is like a scene from the movie “Groundhog Day.” You may recall that 1993 movie where Bill Murray keeps waking up to find himself living the same day over and over again. Well that’s what it feels like when trying to deal with accounts and taxes here. Paul is on his fifth (or maybe sixth - I’ve lost count) book keeper in the time I’ve been here. His accountants are a disaster that are not only slow (they have had his year end accounts for 2010-11 since last July and they STILL are not finished!), but incompetent! To make matters worse, they not only routinely make mistakes, but then they charge for the time it takes them to fix those mistakes. Unfortunately, Paul is not alone in this book keeping/accounting nightmare. Just about everyone we talk to struggles with both. The only positive news about this, is evidence it provides for Paul’s eternal optimism - we are currently “test driving” some new accountants and Paul is convinced they are going to be wonderful! The glass is always half full! (Thankfully)

IF one can successfully gets through a financial year with records intact, you must then deal with BURS to try to get the infamous “tax certificate clearance” (imagine a choir of angels singing in the background to signal its importance). This coveted document is necessary for any government contracts (e.g. if Paul wants to make maps for any government office, he has to have a “tax certificate clearance” for his company). My favorite story regarding this took place in 2009 when Paul went in to get his “tax certificate clearance” (aaaaahhhh) for the year. Upon arrival to the office with year-end financials in hand, he was told that they couldn’t issue a clearance because he had a problem with his 2007 taxes. When he explained that the he had a clearance from 2007 which was necessary for the clearance he got in 2008, and asked how there could now be a problem in 2007 affecting 2009, he was told by the woman working in the office that, since she hadn’t actually issued the 2007 clearance herself, she didn’t know what had happened in 2008 but certainly 2009 was not coming from her! What’s the point of having a “clearance” if you’re not really “cleared”?

The absurdity continues when looking at the licensing of one of Paul’s businesses. Paul’s main work (in addition to the safari company and internet business) involves map making, printing (large format on a plotter/printer), laminating, copying, and more recently the development of guidebooks (like the “Maun Guide” – maps, advertising, and a directory of Maun). About a year and half ago, local government officials showed up at his office asking if he could make copies for him. When he said yes, and went on to say all the other things he could do for them, they informed him that he was operating a business illegally (tricky huh?) and that the “miscellaneous” license he was operating under was no longer available and he would have to get a new license. After much wrangling they decided the closest thing to what he was doing was a “bookstore and internet café” (what? He neither sells books nor offers internet services???). Later, when the health inspector came to do a sight inspection she asked, “Where’s the bookstore and internet café?” Ut oh! Fortunately, when he explained the situation, she signed off on the paperwork. I’m pretty sure it is only a matter of time before there’s a knock on the door informing him that he’s operating illegally again since he neither sells books nor runs an internet café. What kind of craziness is this?

The latest point of unhappiness among the expat community in Botswana is the new “point system” being used to get work and residency permits. While it is not completely clear what the rules are (except that you get 10 points for speaking English and must achieve 85% of all points in order to be granted your permits), there’s a lot of concern that long term residents of Botswana, people who have made lives here and been active members of the community, may not be granted “permission” to stay. Large financial investments and employment of many Batswana citizens seem to be key factors to approval. While I appreciate the desire of the government to help its citizens, this new approach seems to really be making it difficult for people who have been here for years to continue to live and work in Botswana. Even a co-worker, who is married to a Motswana (the term for an individual from Botswana), is concerned about getting the appropriate approval. If he can’t get permission to work, he can get approval for residency as the spouse of a citizen (like I have) but isn’t this worse? Wouldn’t the government rather have him work than simply live here? This is certainly contributing to widespread unhappiness.

And, as if you needed another example, recently in order to renew Paul’s PRDP license (needed to be a safari guide) he had to not only have a physical (certifying he wasn’t crazy, that’s right in a 10 minute encounter with a doctor they can certify that) but he had to be “re-fingerprinted” to make sure he hadn’t committed any crimes. When Paul queried as to why he had to be finger printed again (since his finger prints were already on file with the police) they responded by explaining that this was to see if he’s committed any crimes recently. Apparently they don’t review finger prints on file when crimes are committed?

Fortunately, I’ve been here long enough that there are moments that I can simply embrace the absurdity. The other day, for example, we were in the store buying wine. After being escorted to the “alcohol area”, a separate glassed-in room that you can’t enter on your own, we selected our bottles and proceeded to the checkout area. Our assistant put each of the bottles up on the counter and she scanned them into the computer to get their prices. After scanning one of the bottles, the attendant informed us that it was “out of stock” (mind you, this is as she holds the bottle in her hand??). Paul tries to ask how that could be possible given we had just pulled it off the shelf and she still currently had it in her hand. She insists, “This one is out of stock. You cannot have it.” Paul continues to try to argue with her (he really likes this particular brand) at which point I interject, “What she means is, it is here but is it not here, so we cannot have it.” And she replies, “Yes.”

Despite all this, I have learned a few things on this visit and I thought I’d share them with you:

1.     The air conditioner units Paul installed in his house on my first summer visit in 2007 (hoping I would not overheat and might ultimately return), are also heaters! This past April Paul had to have the units serviced, because they weren’t cooling as much as they used to, and in the process of checking the units, the service man switched it over to heat and tested that too. Paul says, “What are you doing?” The service man replies, “Checking the heaters.” Paul inquires, “We have heaters?” To think that we froze during the last five winters, huddling around the tiny space heater in the living room is quite funny! (FYI – most houses in Botswana don’t have central heating or air conditioning.) I guess this is a case of “better late than never” and we’ve enjoyed some mighty toasty mornings this year.

2.    After years of observation I’ve come to the conclusion that, when driving you need to worry about some birds flying into your windscreen (what we would call “windshield”) but not others. Horn bills, francolins, lilac breasted rollers, and guinea fowl - all risky and not to be trusted as they might fly out in front of you in suicidal ways. Doves, starlings, and plovers all safe – while they may be flying toward you they will likely get out of the way before they smash your windscreen. Unfortunately, I didn’t come up with this categorization until after a francolin took a suicidal leap into our windscreen on the way to Johannesburg to catch our flight to Copenhagen earlier in June. We spent most of my birthday getting it replaced before we flew out to Dubai.

3.    I like being “in the bush” much more than I like being “in the office” (which we’ve been doing a lot of lately). Wait, I already knew that one...

In addition to learning a few things, there have also been some new bright spots in Maun as it develops. A new art center, Motsana, now shows movies every other Thursday night. Given my love for movies, this is pretty exciting. We’ve seen “Iron Lady”, “We Need to Talk about Kevin”, “Sherlock Holmes” and last night “The Artist”. Maun is feeling quite cosmopolitan these days. Also, our Woolworth’s store has moved and expanded its food section (it is primarily a clothing store). This small annex off the side of the main clothing section of the store now offers us fruits and vegetables that don’t look like they should be thrown away, a variety of breads (some of which may include whole grain wheat) and chicken cutlets that are tender and juicy (as opposed to the texture of shoe leather, which most chicken tastes like around here). While there is no deli or bakery (that would be asking too much), what is available has definitely improved the quality of my life and helped to counter some of the unhappiness that seems to be hanging over Botswana these days.

Wild Dog’s Breakfast

On our recent trip to the Khwai Community campsites, just outside of the Moremi Game Reserve, we showed up, uninvited, to…a wild dog’s breakfast.

Escaping the office and Maun for the long four-day President’s weekend we head north about two hours from home into the bush. On our first morning we stay in the tent a bit later than one should, if you want to be out looking for cats, but the night was windy and the grass munching hippos were loud and I found myself up a good part of the night. This is not an uncommon pattern; Paul sleeps like the dead when we’re in the bush and I stay up at night… listening. There are lots of sounds to hear. On this particular night it was the wind (I feared our tent might collapse on us) and grazing hippos (which sounded like they were right outside our tent chewing away). On our second morning we woke to find spoor (foot prints) of both a hyena and a honey badger just inches from the corner or our tent - -where our heads were! Fortunately, I was so tired from not sleeping the first night that I slept right through it…

In any case, on this particular morning we stay in the tent a little longer, not only because I haven’t slept much but also because a cold front has come in with the strong winds from the south and it is ice cold. I mean ski hat and gloves, sleep in your thermal underwear cold! Still in our evening “warms” (what your warm clothes are called here…FYI pants are called “longs”), we begin driving around the sand tracks to see what we can see. This particular area has tons of elephants, hippos and impala but as we round one corner I see three wild dogs on an impala kill. This is very exciting as wild dogs are quite elusive -- I’ve probably had less than half a dozen sightings in the five years I’ve been here.

When the Furman group was here in May we saw a pack of four very close to where we were on this past trip. Even from our viewing point in May, across the Khwai River,  we could see that one had a recently broken leg (the lower part of the left front leg was simply dangling and the poor dog couldn’t put any weight on it at all and had to hobble on the remaining three). Interestingly, the other three dogs seemed to be caring/watching out for the injured dog; nudging her to get up when they were leaving, sticking close to her when she was lying down.

As we watch this pack of three on the impala kill I notice that one of them is limping a little and seems to have an injury to the left front leg. We’re convinced it must be the same injured dog we saw two months earlier. While she can now put weight on the leg and seems to getting along quite well, when given the opportunity she lies down to get off of it.

They take turns eating, pulling and tugging at what is left of the impala carcass (the innards sit in a bloody ball about four yards away from the rest of the body). We are so early on the kill that vultures begin to arrive as we watch (typically when you come onto a kill you know where it is by the abundance of vultures in the trees overhead). There is a pecking order to eating at a kill and the vultures are the last in line. As scavengers they have to wait for the hunters to finish first.

 

Apparently exactly “when” they are allowed to eat is not clear, as over the course of the morning they inch closer and closer to the kill only to be chased off by one of the wild dogs when they’ve passed some invisible line. The dogs themselves seem to have set up a system wherein one will eat while another chases off vultures. 

Interestingly the chasing looks more playful than aggressive. It’s as if it is a game. He elongates his body into a perfectly straightly line parallel to the ground – nose pointing out forward, large rounded ears down flat, white fluffy tale out straight… and then he springs into action, running into the flock of vultures sending them flapping into the air with their long wings crashing into each other as they try to take flight. From the safety of their perch they wait for another opportunity to stealthily land on the ground and inch closer to the kill, hoping for a bite. 

 

 

At one point, a group of vultures gets brave enough to go for the innards. The literally pick up the ball of yuck and transport it to the other side of a log. While the guarding dog takes a run at them, followed by a leap into the air, he doesn’t pursue them too far as he’s not interested in this part of the kill. Instantly a mass of vultures descend. All we see is a flurry of wings and dust and pulling and what’s been discarded by the dogs is gone in seconds!

Pregnant dog with wounded leg

We watch for an hour or more as the dogs take turns eating. They rip what’s left of the carcass in two and continue to eat. They intermittently rest, eat, chase vultures. Their stomachs are bloated with meat, we notice however, that the wounded dog’s stomach is more bloated and in fact conclude that she must be pregnant. This is a little late in the season for pregnancy and she looks like she could be due any day.

As more safari vehicles begin to descend on the kill (like vultures…by the end there are six vehicles total) the wild dogs decide they’ve had their fill and head off down the road. In moments, what is left of the carcass is covered in vultures. I now understand why their necks are so long. Their wings look like hiked up shoulder blades banging and crashing into their neighbors’ as a mass of vultures try to stretch their necks into the cluster to get a little bite! From our perspective it is all dust and wings and elbowing for position.

When we pass by the area later in the day, all that is left is the impala’s head and neck. That certainly was a “dog’s breakfast”.*

 

We spend three nights in Khwai before heading to a friend of Paul’s wild dog research camp. We are excited to share our story with the researchers and they are anxious to see if they can identify the dogs. While, to us, they simply look like beautiful mixes of black, tan, and white (sometimes called “African painted wolves”), to the researchers, they have a whole system of dog identification from our pictures. From what I can gather they look for distinguishing white marks. Our wounded dog is identified as “Ellen” (I’m not sure this is better than what I’ve been calling her, which is “Miss Booboo Leg”, but it seems there were a rash of talk show host names used to identify dogs for a period of time).

She is known by a distinguishing white check mark on her side. She’s actually been sited (in the past) all the way in Zimbabwe and the two males she is currently with are not dogs that the researchers know (suggesting she’s picked them up somewhere along her way). They agree that she is pregnant and will probably “den down” in about a week (in preparation for the arrival of her litter – typically 8-10 pups). They’ve seen her recently with another pregnant female who they suspect has already gone underground (so to speak). The typical gestation period is 60-73 days so she was fairly recently impregnated back in May when we saw her with her freshly wounded leg. We learn that she is an older female who has had previous litters. The researchers explain that it is not uncommon to see packs of dogs collaborate to care for a wounded dog... a happy ending to what we feared might be a life ending injury in May.

*Note: In Southern Africa there is a phrase used to describe things as a “dog’s breakfast”. While I’m not completely sure of its meaning, the context it is used in seems to describe a situation that is a complete mess. This certainly was the case for the impala on this morning.

Why I’d like to be a wildebeest

Of all the animals I see,

the one I would most like to be,

is the wildebeest.

While some may look at them and scoff, when I see them I just smile and laugh.

When I think of their funny array of leftover parts, it brings a warm feeling right into my heart.

 Horse like tail and punk rocker mane, with their mismatch of parts, they don’t seem to complain.

They are, in fact, quite cute when they’re small,  with a slightly lighter brown color to their fur overall.

Their side flanks, while they look dirty,

are actually “brindled” with two shades of furry.

With a rocking horse gait they can pick up some speed, and don’t get in their way if they start a stampede.

 

But the main reason I like them the most,

is that they seem to join any herd, no matter the host.

They simply blend with whomever they come upon,

whether impala or gemsbok they just tag along.

 

The most gregarious of creatures,

they simply disregard their features.

Back haunches too small for their larger front legs,

Wouldn’t you like to be a wildebeest too?

I think the question begs…