|
THE TALE SPINNER
IN THIS ISSUE:Vol. XVI, No. 1 January 2, 2010 Zvonko Springer goes looking for wild animals in Kenya Richard Ross encounters life in an African village Betty Audet and Jean Sterling comment on previous items Tom Kyle searches for souvenirs of his landing in Canada Betty recalls a mixed-up address for a family home Bruce Galway, Dick Monaghan, and Wendy Fisher recommend sites  Zvonko Springer recalls looking for animals on their FIRST KENYAN SAFARI The park was crisscrossed by many tracks running between bushes, tree groves, and grassy plains in the hilly country stretching along the river. Just outside the stockade we came across a lioness resting in the shade; she was covered with dozens of ticks. We came so close to the animal that Ljiljana could almost have reached out and picked up the ticks. I could not remember that we ever came so close to a lioness. She was not bothered by our closeness and taking pictures, but we did not dare to get out of the car because of the ticks. After a while we continued upstream and found a number of reticulated giraffes. They were larger than the savannah ones that we had seen before. Their markings were larger and they had much darker brown coloring than their relatives on the plains. After 8km we turned at the northern park border and returned to the lodge just when our friends Christa and Gerhard arrived, almost five hours later than us. We left them to get to their accommodation while we went to the swimming pool. We met our friends at the dinner table again and heard about their trip from Meru. They had engine and tire problems that accounted for their late arrival. The menu was in French. The dinner was excellent, including the main course of venison. Ljiljana and Vesna enjoyed the venison, perhaps because they did not understand the French names for the meat that was from local wild animals. We went to bed and slept well under the mosquito nets and the veil of night, lulled by voices of crickets, monkeys, and many undefined sources. Animals were coming to the river to drink. The river was about 60m wide but the water level was low so we did not see either hippos or crocodiles despite the closeness of 15m to the lodge. We got up for early morning tea and were out by 6:00. First we drove up the river but saw no animals except a group of elephants. Back at the lodge, we found our friends getting ready for departure as they had decided to stop at Nanyuki. Their front axle needed some repair and two tires had to be patched up too. We said goodbye and agreed to get together later. From now on it was simpler to plan our onward journey as it was for a short stretch only. We searched on the opposite side of the lodge, but that proved to be in vain too: there were no animals except a few gazelles and guinea-fowls. We were back to the lodge for breakfast at 9:00, after which Ljiljana cleaned the car inside and out while I sealed the two holes in the steel floor plate. After that was done, it was time for relaxation at the swimming pool, where we met a couple and an American lady, with whom we had a pleasant conversation. The man was a former “white hunter” and his wife represented the owners' consortium, which ran first-class hotels like the Kenya Safari Club and the Treetops. The couple drove a Rover and looked after their American guest, who had been on safari for three weeks. After a perfect lunch and a short rest, we went out for another search, going upriver again. We found the lioness at another spot but nothing else, so we turned off the river path and followed a bush track in the hilly country. Soon we came up to the top of the ridge some 500m above the river, from where we had a marvellous view of the plains. We followed a herd of oryx antelopes but the shy animals disappeared in the thick bush. The bush tracks were loops so one would always return to the starting point. I chose one ascending track to the unknown until it started descending, most probably in the direction of the lodge. We came across two VW cars whose drivers were wondering which way to go. I suggested that I would continue downward, and if I did not return, they could follow me. I proceeded at a slow speed of about 20km/h, watching for rocks or other obstacles for low-slung VW cars. Suddenly we came across many groups of animals, mostly gazelles, water-bucks, and reticulated giraffes. I stopped often to take pictures up close as the animals were not disturbed by our presence at all. These were probably the best ones we ever made of these animals. We came down just next to the lodge and went on down river, but once again in vain as before. On the way back we came across six elephants standing in the middle of our way some 50m from the swimming pool. We had to wait some moments until the group made the passage free and to rush in the lodge to warn visitors about unexpected guests. A few minutes later the elephants were gone. It was soon dinner time and we were quite hungry. We were so tired after this exciting day that we were in our beds at 8:30. We were too tired to start with the packing now - we would do it tomorrow! To be continued. Richard Ross recounts his experiences in AN AFRICAN VILLAGE After the New Year, towards the beginning of February, all fifty or so of us who arrived together will return to the city of Theis for another two weeks of training. Now having a much more concrete understanding of the community we are serving, and a stronger command of the local language (Wolof in my case) and French, we will receive technical tools and techniques that are geared specifically to our site. Once I return, my work will really begin and the projects I‘ve been preparing for since I arrived in Saint Louis will have the support and funding to go their proper course - “Insha’Allah!” For the first two months, as a part of Peace Corps’ Senegal’s training, we were immediately heaved into the culture and the language, sink or swim. These memoirs chronicle the first few weeks, when I found myself in a West African village, with three other volunteers, with no real ability to communicate, or any real idea what the heck I was doing. They are written in the style that I prefer writing, so I apologize in advance if they’re, let's say, wordy and over-the-top. A Village Welcome In the late afternoon, while the shade was spreading, certain villagers of Kër Sadero sat so as to see the passing of cars. Mane Thaiw was one among the bevy thronged alongside the sulfurous pavement of Senegal. When the decrepit sports utility vehicle came to a halt, I was in the company of three sluggish Americans. We had all spent the first three days in Senegal damping our jet-lag and rifling in the mental rubble of culture shock. We gathered our bags, along with our water-filters, mosquito nets and medical kits we had recently received (with, I might add, the same feeling of empowerment as an infantryman when he receives his rifle and ammunition), and we lumbered to the shady tree where the Africans sat. When we reached it, motherly women were overjoyed, clapping their hands and warbling like fertile geese. Mane Thaiw, soon to be my mother, even appeared unsteady when she stood, trying for balance between vertiginous shudders of delight. She was plump and had the hips of a prolific child bearer. Her arms and legs were chunky with softness, like a feather pillow following a good fluff. Loosely and uncaringly, she wore colourful draping fabric, which was constantly aloft with the winds of her energy. I stood watching while her effusive flutters waned. 
When she regained her footing, she took only a few breaths before she smothered the little air between us with several stentorian sonorities, each one more singsong than the last. Rather obviously I was in a dither, having heard everything and having comprehended nothing. She assisted me by flinging a hand out while repeating two more freakish words, this time a bit slower: “Bay Zal ... Bay Zal!” I took her hoary hand and joined her in the sing-along: “Bay Zal ... Bay Zal” By now, I realized the emphasis attached to these two words, and as we went on repeating, I rummaged through my limited Wolof vocabulary, but that proved hopeless. Desperate for clarification, I nearly requested that any French speakers step forth, but before I broke the sacred seal of “Wolof immersion”, someone else did, and did so much more egregiously. It was Emily from the back: “I think it’s your new name,” she said in forbidden English. As if we were two whales in the deep-blue, we had brilliantly transmitted sound waves that were to be read by no sensory registers but our own. It all made sense. I was now “Bay Zal!” In this fleeting lucidity, I endeavoured to escape from her crushing grip, but she contested, as if to reaffirm her thrall. Suddenly, she heaved up another blizzard of verbiage, but this time, Peace Corps Senegal, and I was ready. “Nga Def!” Thankfully, Peace Corps had painstakingly coached all its trainees on the one facet of Senegal culture not to be ignored - the greeting. Not just in Senegal, but in all of West Africa, the greeting is an occasion when two people cross paths, and the excessiveness of mirth they share brings them to sheer deadlock. From there, it is gentle interrogation, independent of one’s true curiosity, and without fail, evokes the same sequence of question and response. So when I returned Mane’s question, “Nga Def,” I did so with conviction, for all across the land, there is only one accepted answer: “Mangiy fi!" In the prolonged clutch, I would go on to reassure her I had spent my day in peace and that my family in the United States, as far as I knew, was enjoying good health. By the time all matters had been addressed and my hand was unclasped, I noticed that all my belongings were in the hospitable hands of someone else. Mane Thaiw, as well, carried my red pillow and had taken several footsteps since our stand-still. Stalling at the entrance, she waved and wagged with that grand eagerness that charges all of us right before we introduce the ones we love. Rounding the corner, we stepped into the quarters of the compound, where appeared a broad selection of men, women, and children, all sitting low to the earth. Everyone looked extremely preoccupied with idleness and bliss. My arrival, however, breached the peace. I was immediately the rage. In a furious succession, I saw and met and greeted an indefinite number of jubilant people. Head nodding, handshaking, hip swaying and tongue twisting, I stepped into the ring with all of them. One after the other, I two-stepped with them, topping off with the paterfamilias in purple pants. Seeing that the merry-go-round was still in spin wherever I went, I grew more appreciative of my recent adoption. It seemed the whole cackling caboodle: the bare-footed, the bare-breasted, and the bare-assed were all wishing the white man a very special welcome. I was then showed to my tin-thatched room, which was built, unwittingly, around the basic thermal technologies of a sauna. When the door closed behind, I remained calm despite sharpening nips of anxiety. A brigade of creepy-crawlies scurried out to greet their new roommate, as well as a dozen or so mosquitoes, for whom my fleshy romp was just too mouth-watering to resist. Needing backup, the malaria-carrying nightshift was called in chop chop. Playing hard to get, I anxiously rigged the four-masted mosquito net and slithered in discreetly, as to not invite any into bed with me. With a white skuzzy net drooping onto my kneecaps like sunken snowdrifts, I laid there entombed, with nowhere to go. The bugs, so it seemed, had me trapped! It was not very late, I wasn’t tired, nor had I unpacked, but hearing all the buzz, I knew they were waiting. My headlamp gave light to the vermin that hovered noisily above, and as they bounced their bloodthirsty eyes off the sticky mesh, I did, in fact, decide to remain still. And so, rather than start another hullabaloo outside, I made my first real impression in the West African village on my sponge mattress. To be concluded. CORRESPONDENCE Betty Audet writes: You did amazingly well to get that [the last issue] out on boxing day, which is our wedding anniversary. I have been particularly enjoying the travel in Kenya. We were there this time of year in '82. Our experience of the road in to Samburu Lodge was a little better than that, but the old car, supplied by my brother-in-law's community college work, broke down there. The lodge got us back to the nearest town, but my husband had to escort my sister, our son and me back to Nakuru on local transportation, while my brother-in-law had to go all the way to Nairobi for a part, but did have a good bus. The car broke down again before we left Kenya, this time by a pool where locals were getting water. My sister and I hitch-hiked, being picked up by a professor from the university, and got to a bus back to Nakuru, where we could send friends out to help. This scam isn’t just in Canada. A woman near here was taken in by a variation of this a few weeks ago. She was a senior, but she lived in her own home. Her “son” called with the same tale of woe – had her drive to a nearby fast-food place and go inside while leaving the cash on the seat of her car. When she came out, as you might expect, the cash was gone. She learned she had been duped when she talked with the son later in the day. The story was in the paper as a warning to others. Tom Kyle, who immigrated from Scotland, has been searching for information about PIER 21 Since arriving in Canada, I have been interested in recalling my early days in the country. Part of that interest involves my arrival in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in May, 1950. I have always wished that I could have saved a souvenir of Cunard White Star, M.V. Georgic which I sailed on. And I recently found that there was an answer for me - on the Internet. PIER 21 was the docking location in Halifax for the many immigrant ships, troop carriers of WWII, and the ships carrying the war brides who came over to Canada in those days. The site is a source of information and nostalgia about those who entered Canada between 1928 and 1971, when more than a million immigrants passed through Pier 21. My prize in finding the Pier 21 web page was locating a picture of the M.V. Georgic.  A more elaborate immigrant page has been developed by the Ellis Island Foundation. This site provides an opportunity to search for information on the more than 22 million immigrants, passengers, and crew members entering U.S between 1892 and 1924 through Ellis Island and the Port of New York, including those continuing immigration to Canada. The ship companies that transported these passengers kept detailed passenger lists, called "ship manifests". With the help of volunteers of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, these manifests have been transcribed into a vast on-line archive, which you can easily search to find an individual passenger. This can be a very busy site, so don't be surprised if you are not able to enter. The first week it was online, there were 50 million visitors. Since the cut-off for Ellis Island information is 1924, I couldn't get any information on my father's trip. He came in 1925. I was able to locate the manifest of the ship in which my paternal grandfather sailed to the U.S. on his first trip there in 1903. I was able to check name, age, where he was going, where he came from, and how much money he carried. Turns out he had the same amount as I when I arrived - $75. P.S.: I still have $49.50 now, so I haven't spent very much! If you have ties to anyone who might have immigrated through Pier 21 in Halifax or Ellis Island - Port of New York, you should give these fascinating websites a visit: http://www.ellisisland.org/ http://web.archive.org/web/20030204120103/www.mts.net/~oldguy/jul01.html If you need information on how to 'backtrack' web pages, contact Tom at tfk@mts.net Betty Audet writes about THE HOUSE WITH THE CHANGING ADDRESS Although three generations of Lowdens had lived in the large red brick house on Lot 19, Concession 5, Barton Township, set well back from the road, there always seemed to be questions about the right address. The mailing address was fine. As long as anyone seems aware, that had been Box 95, Hamilton. The mail was collected at the post office and had been for many years. I recall an incident illustrating this. When a young teen, I had gone to collect the mail without having the key to the box. There were two men behind the desk. "Give it to her," said the older man. "She looks like a Lowden." But the location addressing was another matter. It must have been quite rural when it was built, probably on an old mud road that was later gravelled. By the time I recall, it was macadamised, and built to a sufficiently high level to ensure run off. About the time of WWI there had been a feeling that Hamilton was growing in that direction and that the property might bring a nice profit if it was surveyed and lots sold from the front. Uncle Ed's house was clearly spaced on one of the lots and so I surmise that it was he who had planned this. A sidewalk ran all the way from the top of the Dundurn St. steps past Uncle Ed's house. At the corner of our street and Fennel Ave., there was a corner pavement with the name Garth cut into it. But the street was called Dundurn. This seemed quite logical to me as a student, for there was Upper James, Upper Wentworth, Upper Wellington, and Upper Ottawa. These all corresponded with the streets below the "mountain", although those in between were numbered. Our street would have been West 20th, as Wentworth would have been East 20th. There was always the Garth/Dundurn street name problem, which has now been settled for Garth Street. But that survey also had an effect on the location address. There was a street surveyed to run between the house and Garth. It was called Westminster. When lots had been sold it was quite obvious that the house was on Westminster. To complicate things further, the original survey showed a street running from Garth St. straight back towards the house. The sidewalk along Garth clearly indicated its location. Its name, I seem to recall, was Parkview. But we never referred to it as anything but our front lane. We kept the grass cut, as part of the lawn, all the way to Garth. Father's beautiful iris beds ran along the north side of it. But eventually, when father had retired from teaching and was in real estate, the survey was changed, Parkview was closed and our old back lane two or three lots further north was opened as Denlow. (Lowden) Imagine all the descriptions of location that had been offered during those years! ED. NOTE: The mountain mentioned is the Niagara Escarpment, and at the time of all the confusion in names, Hamilton did not extend far into the countryside on top the mountain. Now the city has grown and engulfed all that farmland, including Betty's family home. THIS WEEK'S SUGGESTED WEBSITES http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9ZfnXU1Gow ~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~ Dick Monaghan sends the URL for a very funny cartoon: http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=jEjUAnPc2VA#t=20 ~~~~~~~ Wendy Fisher has a website devoted to people who are retired: http://www.retirement-online.com/retirement-planning-blog.html ~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~ It's common enough to make lawyer jokes, and some of the mockery is deserved. But sometimes people need a good lawyer - and Natalie Bridgeman and Accountability Counsel are on the right side. Natalie Bridgeman, a determined young attorney in San Francisco, founded Accountability Counsel after receiving an Echoing Green Fellowship, an international award for innovative social entrepreneurs granted to only 14 organizations world-wide in 2009. As you are aware, this issue is the first of the 16th year of publication of the newsletter. We deserve credit for hanging in so long, especially those readers who have been with me since the beginning. To you all, old and new, I send my best wishes for good health and contentment in the coming year, and in case I miss any occasions which I should be mentioning, please consider them covered by the following greeting: 
Edited by Jean Sansum. You can contact her at : Jean |