May the circle be unbroken

Dec. 5, 2008
Maun, Botswana
With photos of Richard Avilino and his girlfriend, Kay, and of Richard and me.

I like it when life runs full circle, when I find that closed parenthesis that helps order events. It happened to me the other day at Jacana Camp in the Okavango Delta.

I was spending the week at Jacana with Wilderness Safaris’ Children in the Wilderness program, and on this particular morning I was in the storeroom with Bonolo and Helena sorting crayons, t-shirts and craft supplies in advance of the children’s arrival. Someone rushed over to find me sweating among the Rubbermaid boxes: Richard’s here; he’s come over from Kwetsane Camp with two American travel agents.

Finally.

Richard Avilino is the guide who introduced me to the beauty of Botswana when I came on holiday with Wilderness Safaris in July 2007. He led six of us on a “Great Botswana Journey” arranged through Natural Habitat Adventures in Boulder. In the fall of 2007, I wrote about the vacation that had opened my heart to Africa and changed my life. I talked about Richard’s gifts as a guide who interprets nature, not just points out what he sees, and I seconded another U.S. newspaper columnist’s assessment that Richard is “an all-purpose human Swiss Army knife.” The man can track lions, talk on the 2-way radio, drive a Defender through water that covers the hood, shine a spotlight on a minuscule mammal in a thorn tree and mix a G&T sundowner without batting an eye. My story ran on the wire in newspapers throughout the U.S.

One of my first stops when I arrived in Maun in February was to march into Okavango Wilderness Safaris headquarters and leave my telephone number for some of the great staff I had met on my vacation, Richard included: I wanted them to know that Wilderness Safaris’ slogan was true: their journeys really do change lives. Look at me. I hardly touched my feet back on U.S. soil in July 2007 before I was trying to figure out a way to return to the bush of Botswana. Lucky for me, The Sacramento Bee granted my request for a sabbatical.

This year, Richard and I talked a few times on the phone and sent text messages, but we never saw each other. I was in the bush when he was out of the bush, and vice versa. He would sometimes hear about me at Maun Airport when he was talking to my guide friends from Desert & Delta. Everywhere I went I sang his praises, which the guides let him know, and they let me know when they ran into him. (I always held him up as a model for what makes a great guide – someone who can speak of the whole ecosystem and the culture and traditions of the country, i.e., “In the olden days, the leaves of that tree were used for medicine for….”)

So here he was, at Jacana. And it turns out the two travel agents were from Natural Habitat Adventures and knew about my newspaper story. Richard and I had only a few minutes to chat, but I was able to meet him and his girlfriend, Kay, at Bon Arrivee for lunch this week before he and I flew our separate ways into the bush again, he to the Kalahari and I to Savute. It gave me a sense of joyous completion to be able to thank him in person and say, ‘See, I really meant it when I said that Botswana moved me to tears and to a crossroads. I put everything I own in storage. I gave up my income. I hopped a plane. I’m here. I speak some Setswana. Want to hear me list the animals in your language? I eat papa and seswaa. I’ve lived in the bush. I’ve stepped over black mambas. I’ve stayed awake listening to lions and honey badgers. I can spot the Malachite kingfisher….”

Poor Richard. My words rushed at him like the river at Victoria Falls, but I could tell he liked hearing it. He got a good laugh over my Setswana language skills and my imitation of a lion’s roar. (It’s pretty good, if I say so myself. Even Richard said so. I’ll demonstrate when I come back to the U.S.) And what I learned from him reaffirmed the global power of the written word. Richard told me the article I wrote is posted at his company’s office, the only article singling out a guide. He’s being offered exclusive trips to lead in 2009. His bosses rated him on his last evaluation as exceptional, he says, and acknowledge the marketing value the article had for the company. Guests arrive at Maun Airport having read about him in my story on the Internet – they tell him they know all about him -- and others are requesting first thing that he be booked as their guide because of the story. It has been a good year for him, busier than ever. And what’s more, he had a rare sighting: a pangolin. (My landlord says if any of his guests photograph a pangolin in the wild on safari, the Karibu Safari mobile trip will be free. That’s how elusive this nocturnal, armored, anteater creature is.)

Richard was pleased to see how well I had done in Botswana. And he didn’t seem surprised by how I had felt at home. “You were open to everything you saw, and you had so many questions and you wanted to know everything,” he said about my week on vacation. And he said the people of Botswana know when someone is truly respectful of them and their culture. I had passed that test.

I took Richard shopping for a reference book on mammals as a thank-you gift, and I inscribed it “with deep gratitude”. We exchanged e-mail addresses, promised to be in touch, and cried out the Setswana farewell, “Tsmaya sentle!” Go well.

Somewhere in the Kalahari, Richard is looking up at the night sky and telling his guests about the constellations. Just the thought of Richard and his group huddled together, marveling under a blanket of stars, makes me happy.