'Tis the season

Maun, Botswana
Nov. 21, 2008

I cannot believe my eyes. When Sandy arrived from the United States on Nov. 2, the Botswana landscape was brown, parched, barren, absolutely crispy. In Moremi Game Reserve, the first blessed torrential rain fell on Nov. 4, and since then the cumulus clouds gather most days to announce we will have more rain, known as “pula.” The result? The landscape is awash in every shade of green. The trees are turning emerald, lime and sage. Sprouts of grass appear in the desert sand. Donkeys and goats on the roadside are having a field day, munching on what might be considered their version of fresh organic baby lettuce.

The mopane trees lining the sand track to my cottage pulled a Vermont on me last week: displaying leaves that glittered red and yellow for a couple of days as though heralding a Maun autumn. Someone must have flipped a switch, because the next thing you know those very leaves had clothed themselves in finery that was lime green. It’s stunning, the transformation that comes with the change of season. Even the air smells different.

The Thirstland loves its rain. And, as for me, someone who moped along badmouthing rain and clouds during the winter months in Sacramento, even I am a convert in a place like Botswana. In October the heat is unrelenting. The animals suffer. People feel edgy and crazy. October in Maun is bluntly referred to as divorce month and, worse, suicide month. With the rains, the land is coming alive, and the animals are on the move without frenetic desperation one observes in October. The temperatures are bearable again, and a breeze sometimes kisses your face. I can sleep without taking showers in the middle of the night to cool off. I live in gratitude for the relief.

From the bush planes this week I could see the magnificent greening of the Okavango Delta, how on Sunday that patch over there was green and on Thursday the color had spread for miles.

I want to introduce you to one of the flowers of the Okavango Delta that announces this spectacular rainy season: the Fireball lily. Its flowers are at least the size of my fist and sometimes the size of two fists. When I saw my first one on Tuesday on a walk at Palm Island, I stopped guide Lets Ngoma with the enthusiasm an Italian tourist would show for a lion. (And that’s saying something. “Leeeee-ooohhh-neeeee!” squeal the Italians.)

These explosions of scarlet dot the green landscape in the delta only for a short time and only at this time of year. I like to think of them as nature’s fireworks, alight to celebrate the advent of the rainy season. They are living exclamation points that say “Welcome, Pula!”

Take it from me, Mma Pula: Live through a Maun October, and you will know why a Fireball lily is a gift from the heavens, a sign of better times to come.