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| After our recent record-breaking 20 kudus in the garden, we were flabbergasted when 25 showed up all at once a few days later! |
“Sighting of the Day in the Bush”
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| I believe this is a hadeda bird who makes exquisite sounds flying overhead at dusk. |
There’s the issue with our package. It was sent by US Postal Service on May 28th and has yet to arrive. The cost for insurance for the contents was over ZAR 5754 (US $400). We didn’t want to pay this added amount and decided to take the risk. Never again. Not doing so was a big mistake on our part.
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| We must have gone through 10 kg (22lbs) of pellets while they visited. |
In the future, all packages we ship from the US will have to be sent via UPS, FED EX, and DHL while we succumb to paying the outrageous costs for expediency. In the interim, we continue to track the package which last arrived in Johannesburg where it’s been stuck since June 6th.
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| After waiting a while for more pellets which we wanted to save until Thursday when we shop, they began to wander off. |
Louise, who’s an absolute miracle worker in all areas, hasn’t been able to pin it down to get it here. I called Louise’s contact again this morning pleading for help and offering to pay a fee to have the package brought to us. This may work. We shall see.
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| “No more food? We’re off to the next bush house!” |
Apparently, there was a post office strike months ago and they still aren’t caught up at the processing center. The box could easily be in a shipping container, yet to be unpacked. Oh, good grief.
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| When wildlife, such as these wildebeests lie down in the garden like this, it may indicate they feel comfortable and safe enough to rest for a bit. |
Life on the move is often a mishmash of extraordinary experiences interspersed with problematic situations and challenges, some of which can be resolved with persistence, coupled with a degree of patience.
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| These could be a mating pair. |
This sounds like an oxymoron but it’s not. Kindly persistence is crucial. There’s no room for angry outbursts or threatening tones in one’s voice. As for being patient, once we’ve done all we can do, we must wait.
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| A young wildebeest made himself at home in the garden resting after a pellet frenzy. |
We remind ourselves, this is Africa, not the US where even there one can encounter endless cases of incompetence and lack of desire to get the job done proficiently. Not every worker is like many of us in our fields of endeavor as we strived to “get the job done” as seamlessly and quickly as possible.
But, expecting such degrees of competence and motivation is not always easy to find and when we do, it’s more glaring than those who aren’t competent. The competent become the anomaly.
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| Wildebeest Willie hung around for several hours, resting and eating a few pellets from time to time. He makes good eye contact, letting us know exactly what he wants. Do I detect a morsel of love in those looks? Could be. |
Now, as we struggle with our immigration issues we can only hope and pray that as we finalize future plans we can count on the people at the other end who will ultimately be responsible for our comfort and convenience. That’s a big bill to fill.
We often comment to one another how fortunate we’ve been during this past almost six years (upcoming anniversary of travels in 63 days) when each time we’ve paid for and arrived to rent a holiday home, it’s been mostly as described.
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| The kudus and the wildebeests get along well. |
The only exception to this was the very first house we rented in Belize which turned out to be a fiasco. There was only running water a few hours each day and many more issues. We left in seven days and lost our money. To this day, we don’t know how we didn’t turn back and say we didn’t want to do this after all.
However, without complaining to one another, we carried on as we do now, with the postal service issue, immigration issues, and whatever transpires from here. Whoever may think that traveling the world full-time is easy is kidding themselves. Like everyday life, wherever you may live in the world, life isn’t easy.
We can choose to embrace it all, figuring out solutions along the way, always striving for resolutions, and also preparing for disappointments.
May your day be filled with happy solutions!
Photo from one year ago today, August 29, 2017:
From this website: “The owl butterflies, the genus Caligo, are known for their huge eyespots, which resemble owls‘ eyes. They are found in the rainforests and secondary forests of Mexico, Central, and South America. Owl butterflies are very large, 65–200 mm (2.6–7.9 in), and fly only a few meters at a time, so avian predators have little difficulty in following them to their settling place. However, the butterflies preferentially fly at dusk, when few avian predators are around. The Latin name may possibly refer to their active periods; caligo means darkness.” For more photos, please click here.