A How To

Begin by sitting in the bed of a white Toyota pick-up.  Look out at two ostrich running alongside the truck.  Then at four giraffe in the distance, a group of heads floating above the acacia trees.  Realize that, somehow, they have been existing here in this land without you while you have existed there, in America, without them.  Up until about a month ago, you lived a life totally apart from them.  That life is foreign to the bush.  And, in a way, is starting to feel foreign to you.

Imagine taking the people you meet here and bringing them there, back to your old life.  Laugh at the thought of game guards walking around your college campus in canvas boots, seeing things like brick buildings and scooters and snow for the first time.

Lie back in your tent in Sesfontein beneath a cliff overhang.  Look out at the brightest stars and moon you’ve ever seen and listen to music of your childhood.  Let Paul Simon sing as your mind slows and remember the first time you heard him tell you he’s going to Graceland.  You could have never known then that you would be listening to him here, in a different kind of Graceland, under Namibian sky and rock.

Sit by a camp fire.  Look at the faces of the other students around you.  Inevitably, compare yourself to them.  To Ellie, whose sense of humor can defy cultural boundaries wider than the Kunene, who can make even the most timid game guards laugh excessively along with the rest of the group.  To Katherine, whose selflessness inspires, whose reasons are always of the heart and who gives everything to watch over those around her.  And to Mike, whose determination and sense of purpose leave you blinking back at your own life, wondering what could have been if you had half the tenacity he has.

Pass by wrecked fences, kids playing without shoes in fields of broken glass bottles, cows so skinny every rib and hip bone so painfully visible.  Rethink every single time you ever thought your life was difficult.

Listen fiercely to what these people have to say.  Hear them talk about the rains as if she were a lost lover.  “This year has been hard.  So, so hard,” they’ll whisper, over and over.  Try to understand what it’s been like for them, two wet seasons passing by without the wet, then realize you really can’t.

Spend a weekend in Etosha with the German tourists.  Take a break from the dry, unapologetic heat of the bush and enjoy the sort of camping that is familiar to you: sites stacked one on top of the other. Breathe in the smell of hundreds of different camp fires.  Fall asleep to an incomprehensible lullaby of German chatter.

For two days, explore Namibia’s largest national park.  See lion, wildebeest, rhino, kudu, leopard, cheetah, secretary bird, impala, stork, jackal, zebra, warthog, spotted eagle owl, elephant, Africa. The wildlife here is easy, accustomed to seeing cars full of tourists armed with optimal zoom cameras and SPF 75.  Feel as if you are somehow cheating.

Lounge by Etosha’s pool.  Think about spring break, the little condo in Florida that you would probably just now be arriving at, embracing family then heading out to the shoreline together.  Shake off any sadness.  Week five under your belt, prepare yourself for Ehirovipuka, more conservancy work and more wilderness, more of what you came here for.