Plants with a Story

By Nolan Bunting

Wits Rural is a unique opportunity in our adventure in Africa. Being a research base surrounded with an electric fence, we have very few worries from the dangerous megafauna, such as lions and elephants, aside from the leopards that stalk under the stars and are not active in the day. This aspect provides us individuals the ability to walk freely through the African bushveld and learn about plants.

Plants hold a special place in my heart, as I have often enjoyed the peace of finding an organism over and over again to observe its subtle changes. In Wits Rural, three species of plants were so enthralling and entertaining, I just had to express my explosive passion.

The first of these plants is the Marula Tree, the stunning tree seemed to rise right from the camp and touch the sky. Within 30 minutes of our arrival at Wits rural, David discussed the potential ecosystem services a single tree could provide. One of them was shade, which I was glad for with temperatures in the 80s. The other was advertised to us at the airport. Without realizing it, every student upon arrival learned about the importance of the Marula economically in the form of a billboard advertising Amarula. Created with the fermented fruit of this tree, Amarula is the equivalent of Kentucky whiskey, a creamy drink like Baileys and is sold throughout the country. Marula is also used within communities in the surrounding bushbuck ridge to improve social connections within the community through trade and sharing of the liquid Marula beer, a seasonal local drink. Thus the tree provides an economic and social service in the surrounding areas. In addition to amarula and marula beer, the fruits can also be made into jams, jellies, and even eaten raw. This is a much loved tree by the communities and people of the area. Sadly, it also tends to attract the fruit loving elephants. Who break down the electric fence surrounding Wits rural in order to dine on the fruit, thus causing multiple infrastructure problems, but what an image.

Speaking of images, the next plant puts our cactuses to shame and truly demonstrates the ever present battle of plant vs animal: the Buffalo Thorn. This incredible plant, riddled with thorns, can be found throughout Wits Rural. Standing strong against Giraffes and other species, its two thorn system where one thin long thorn is followed by a smaller hooked thorn makes it near impossible to eat from this plant. Its Afrikaans name of blinkblaar translates as shining blister for its ability to create a painful feeling in your skin. Zulu, Swazi and other east African cultures have many uses for the plant. Leaves and fruits are edible and even the seeds could be used as a coffee substitute. Roots and bark are used as a traditional painkiller when created in to a paste. And the trees themselves make excellent khralls for cattle, a structure like a fence in the USA. Beyond these uses, the buffalo thorn had a spiritual use as well. A branch of buffalo thorn would be moved over the body to hook the spirit that died far away from home. The branch would then travel with the loved ones, who would talk to the branch until it reached its final resting place. The branch would be planted, sprout into another buffalo thorn to be used by the community. It was very common to see this tradition on the trains from the mines back to the communities, as family members hooked the soul of the fallen and took them home to finally get rest.

With so many amazing plants, it was hard to choose just three. As such, our last plant will be a specialized group of plants found almost exclusively in Africa, the Acacia. There are many species of acacia in Africa, in particular South Africa. Similar to the Buffalo Thorn, the acacia family is full of thorny plants that are a staple food for the animals of Africa. However, unlike the Buffalo Thorn, The acacias utilize chemical warfare through the production of tannins. Tannins, a common chemical seen in the fur industry for tanning hides, is highly toxic to ruminants in large quantities. This is because the digestion of tannin causes the stomach and connective tissue in the digestive system to harden, causing the animal to eventually die of starvation. However, the acacia only produces this toxin when under threat, as it requires copious amounts of energy to produce. While this defense is fascinating, it is a mere parlor trick to the other power of the acacia tree. This power, originally thought not to be found in plants, grants other acacias in surrounding areas awareness of the herbivores. This power is communication. Using the wind, acacias send chemical messages to other trees in the area to produce tannins and defend themselves. This amazing communication makes acacias in sense herd organisms that take care of themselves and watch out for others in their tree community.

//Community//. What is a community. We in the Imagine program truly believe in a community. Much like the acacias we watch over each other, and provide each other new perspectives and viewpoints. We share information like the locals share the drink produced from the Marula tree. We as individuals may be hard to approach with large thorns, but all provide the program the medication to improve all our life experiences. As I type, I think about how we are all bonded. Either through common classes or our brand new experiences. We are much like the plants of Africa. Individually, while spectacular, we are weak and flimsy, but together, with varied roots, form the strongest stand for the future on the savannah. So to you reading this, wish us luck and know that we are together and strong.

Sincerely,

Nolan Bunting

CC Program 2018

Poaching and the War on Drugs

By Jake Marinkovich

The fight to end poaching is constant and never ending. Billions of dollars have been spent on programs that have very little success and almost always have negative impacts on the poorest populations, while the people who actually profit from the process remain largely untouched. It’s led to corruption, human rights abuses, and the creation of a huge underground market, while its goal seems less achievable than ever. Sound familiar? The anti-poaching movement is starting to look scarily similar to the war on drugs.

When you break down who is affected by anti-poaching actions, it’s almost invariably the most destitute in the area. Its people driven to desperation who will be paid a minuscule amount of what the poached animal will be bought for. Those are the people being arrested or killed by anti-poachers. The people who are making the real profit are often untouched. They will normally be out of the country and selling the poached items within a day. It’s no different with the war on drugs. The people being raided and arrested by the DEA aren’t getting the kingpins. They’re getting low level drug dealers or addicts. The cartels making unimaginable amounts of money are largely unaffected by the DEA. The flow of drugs just hasn’t stopped.

This is the problem with illegal substances with a high demand. For illegal drugs it doesn’t matter if the supply is lowered. Thanks to supply and demand, we know that lowering the supply will just raise the price. While this may lower the sales of most items, drugs aren’t affected. There will always be a market because people have an addiction. For poached items, like ivory, lowering the supply will be ineffective as well. Again, lowering the supply will raise the price. One of the reasons ivory sales has increased in South East Asia is the growing middle class in the region still see ivory as a status symbol. Even if the price increases, people will continue to buy it, believing they are demonstrating their status. For both movements, waring against the supply side is a losing battle.

The solution to the war on drugs is relatively simple, especially in comparison to the anti-poaching movement. End the war on drugs and focus purely on treatment. If we treat the demand side, there won’t be a market anymore. We need to reduce sentences for nonviolent drug criminals and give them the help they need. I believe a similar practice can be instated to fight poaching. We need to stem the demand for ivory and other poached items. I don’t know what the best strategy for that would be, but propaganda, education, and politics can actually help. Of course, we can’t stop the anti-poaching movements in Africa, but maybe taking a non- violent approach like the Black Mambas of . Either way, if we hope to see a world without drugs or poached animals, we need to end the war against the supply side and focus on the demand.

One of These Is Not Like The Other

By Sabrina Romeo

Throughout my travels, I have been lucky enough to work alongside and experience many different animal rehabilitation centers in multiple countries. After receiving an interactive tour at the Moholoholo Rehabilitation Centre, my idea of the “perfect” rehabilitation center shifted. Not only was the foundation of their center based on cheesy tourist misconceptions, but also there was an obvious lack of transparency in what they truly do there in regards to animal care. This thought took me back to a few summers ago when I volunteered at the Old Hegg Turtle Sanctuary in Bequia, an island apart of St. Vincent & the Grenadines. The differences of intent underlying each facility were visibly evident within taking the first few steps into Moholoholo and made for an inquisitive tour.

The Old Hegg Turtle Sanctuary has one of the most profound backstories I have heard yet as for how an animal sanctuary/rehab started. It is a one-man funded animal sanctuary located right on the beach, off the beaten path of where tourists might go. The actual facility is a basic warehouse-type building that consists of massive ponds that are full with sea turtles, storage for food, a water pump directly from the ocean, a skylight window and that’s it. It wasn’t run-down, but it was easy to see that the main focus was just to ensure sea turtle well being with aesthetic on the end of the priority list. As a volunteer, we were given a clear explanation of exactly what he did there and were shown every inch of the facility in order to get a full understanding of just how much work he does for them. He explained that his work involves monitoring the beaches, checking nests for eggs, and protecting eggs and adult turtles from poachers. His biggest project, which is what we helped with, was with juvenile sea turtles where he collected them as young, raised the until they were strong enough to survive on their own and released them into the ocean,. This plan ensures that almost all of the thousands of eggs he has collected make it back into the ocean and reach maturity. It was beautiful to see first-hand the release of many of these turtles and take part in all forms of care he provides them.

You can see his plan for sea turtle rehabilitation involves no breeding, no profit, no exploitation of animals; just a beautiful place actually trying to right the wrongs of animal-human interactions. No charade, no attraction aspect or cheesy façade put on to fool us. He even gave us a realistic look into what these sea turtles actually go through and what he had done to them in the past. Of course, there is no way to know a animal rehabilitation center’s true intentions other than fully experience it for yourself, but unlike the Old Hegg Turtle Sanctuary, I did not need an immersive encounter in Moholoholo to understand what their true goal was.

At Moholoholo, I cannot say the experience was quite as transformative as the Old Hegg. We enter the gates to be greeted by a tourist store, coffee shop and a gory museum with taxidermy animals in horrible conditions demonstrating human impacts. The man in charge gave a huge spiel filled with inaccurate facts, cheesy jokes and hyperbolized stories about all of the “great” work they do there to prevent anymore harm to the animals they encounter. However after two weeks straight of conditioning myself to see through all of the tourist traps, this façade was easy to see right through. They talked about how they bring cheetahs to hunting conferences to try to show them what beautiful animals they are killing, but didn’t quite touch on how they actually steal baby cheetahs from their mothers and use them as a ploy to attempt to educate people. They claim that they help facilitate the relationship between farmers and leopards in their field, but actually end up keeping the animals isolated for months after capturing them in order to try to “condition” them to not want to interact with humans anymore. How they do that? To be determined.

A few things they were open about was that they hunt local animals, like warthogs and impalas, to feed the animals in their care. They also said that they do intend on releasing a lot of the animals, but finding a home in a reserve for a reportedly aggressive leopard that roams to eat dogs in villages is not always a walk in the park. As for their permanent residents, they did disclose the fact that the animals we were seeing on the tour were in fact going to live the rest of their lives in their enclosures. Other than a few transparent facts, the single foundational practice I found was that they (claim) to appropriately feed their animals with their natural habits in mind, barring the snacks they feed them to get them to come to the fence for tourists. That is about as good as it got for direct representation of what they actually do for these animals. We were not shown any facilities or what they would refer to as “the back”, where they claim to keep their short- term residents. Overall, the routine they provided us as visitors was scripted and more focused on spewing as many facts out as possible about the species we saw rather than telling us the story of each specific animal.

What I take away from each experience is that no animal sanctuary is perfect, but there is a way to go about things that actually benefits the animals they come in contact with. As a tourist or visitor, there has to be a level of honesty that doesn’t necessarily need to be full transparency, but at least some realistic view on what the facility provides. Each center had less than ideal conditions because there will never be a way for an animal to be living in perfect conditions unless it is truly out in the wild. However, places like the Old Hegg Sanctuary do a hell of a job getting their facility to be as close to the wild as possible. The Moholoholo Animal Rehabilitation Center was a disheartening experience that really just left me feeling like there is so much education left in the world to provide animals with the best care, in and out of captivity. Although the two facilities I have compared are vastly different, they both related to animal care. If Moholoholo is the only experience tourists have regarding animal rehabilitation, they may be blinded by false information, contributing to a bigger problem.

South African Time

By Alex Shaughnessy

Jet lag is a common occurrence anytime you travel, so it wasn’t surprising that it took me a few days to adjust after crossing over eight time zones. What was surprising was that the adjustment didn’t stop there; time continued to pass in a different way than it does in the United States. To be fair, we were warned that South Africans live their lives at a different pace than the rest of the world. We were informed that scheduled times and events are more of a suggestion than anything else and if you expect something to get done right away you must tell people that its happening ‘now now’. If someone says something is happening now that really means it’s happening later, while ‘just now’ implies that they’ll get to it at some point. At first it was hard to get used to this lack of structure. The transition from a very structured week at home to a more fluid schedule proved to be quite challenging. After a few days, I started to lose track of time and slowly began to settle into this new South African pace.

Think about the last time that you greeted your neighbor, not by waving from down the street, but by stopping and asking them how they’ve been or what’s new in their life.  In many cultures across South Africa it is considered rude if you don’t converse with someone when greeting them. In the U.S., taking the time to have full conversations is often considered a luxury that people cannot afford, we feel rushed to get things done because we’ve been told that our own to-do lists and errands are more important than building relationships with the people in our lives. There’s even people who participate in a South African tradition called sundowners, or having a drink and watching the sun go down while reflecting on the day with friends.

Stopping to enjoy the scenery, to communicate with the people around you sounds nice, but I wasn’t convinced it was a practice that reached all the communities in South Africa. It seemed unlikely that more rural villages were partaking in sundowners or had the luxury of free time. Coming from a culture in which time is not to be wasted I was skeptical that this new time-scheme might be something that only the more developed, affluent communities experienced, but after living in the village of Gondeni in HaMakuya it was clear that they viewed time in the same way.  While they weren’t having sundowners everyday, they were engaging with their neighbors, getting their daily chores done, and finding time to enjoy themselves. Daily chores were just that, chores that were to be done at some point during the day, and it wasn’t uncommon for family or community members to step in and help get things done if someone needed it. Staying in Gondeni made me realize that the difference between this way of life and my own is not that one culture values time more than the other, but that each one has a different perspective on how that time should be prioritized.

The concept that everyone lives their lives and accomplishes their own goals at different paces is an important one. In the last three weeks, I’ve gotten to know sixteen people of all different ages and walks of life that have each been successful on their own paths, and although they’re overlapping right now they are sure to branch out in various directions. As we get ready to return home to the U.S. I know that the passage of time is only as valuable as you make it and that getting to know the stories of the people around you is the only way to really appreciate the one that you’ve laid out for yourself.  I’ve realized that my to-do list can always wait until ‘just now’ and the only thing that really needs to be done ‘now now’ is to remember that forward is still forward, even if you’re moving slower.

The Anti-Violence Approach

By Jess Faber

When I first heard we were going to meet the Black Mambas I had no idea what to expect. Truthfully, my only previous knowledge of them was that they are an Anti-poaching unit. It wasn’t until after meeting them and learning of the cultural values of the community, that I was able to really understand how they are successful and how they differed from other anti-poaching units.

For those that don’t know about the Black Mambas, they are an anti-poaching unit made up of women in the Balule Nature Reserve of the Greater Kruger National Park. Their objective is not only to protect rhinos through patrolling the area but also by being role models in their communities. What sets them apart from other units is that they follow a non-violence policy. These women are seeking out dangerous poachers completely unarmed. There is no question that they are brave, they put themselves in harms way everytime they go on patrol. I became ecstatic when I learned that we would be meeting them.

We had the privilege of visiting Balule and listening to a couple of them talk. I was not expecting what I saw when the soldiers first walked out. They were completely normal looking girls, and not the typical soldiers one would expect. They had styled hair, some even had pink braids. Without their army uniforms they were women you would expect to find walking our own streets.

Getting to meet these fearless women and listening to them speak about their passion for conservation and even success in their field was an experience I think none of us will forget. But there was still a piece of the story was missing for me. I knew what they were doing, but I still didn’t understand how they were doing it and why it was working.

It wasn’t until several days after when I had a discussion with our tour guide, and now friend, Nkosinothi, that I clearly understood how these unarmed women are more successful than the armed anti-poaching units. Being a South African native, Nkosinothi shared the cultural views of women and their influence.

The way Nkosinothi explained the cultural intricacy that most of the men doing the poaching don’t want to be doing it. To them this is the only way to make money to support and feed their wife and children. For the most part they are just normal villagers who are desperate for livelihood. People know that poaching is illegal and they shouldn’t be out there doing it. So they are scared of being seen. That’s the reason poachers go out at night when there’s less light and chances of being seen. Almost every single poacher caught is found carrying some sort of traditional medicine relating to invisibility. The most common one is called the Plumago; poachers believe that this is a magical plant and that carrying a bag of this allows them to become invisible to the rangers.

Nkosinothi also explained that women in South Africa are the head of the household and are well respected. It’s easy to kill someone coming at you with a gun because of the shoot-on-sight policy, the poachers want to go home to their families as well. However, no one wants to reap the consequences of killing a beautiful woman, as it will get you shunned or worse in your community if it is found out you killed a woman. So, when that beautiful and innocently unarmed woman walks out and catches a poacher in the act of something they already know is wrong, it catches them off guard. The common reaction is to drop their guns and run the other way before the Black Mamba can radio in for backup.

You can kill as many poachers as you want, but they will never stop coming. There will always be more poor, desperate men trying to feed their families. What happens to the families of those men if they are shot on sight? The Black Mambas may not be eliminating the poachers but they are stopping them from killing and being killed. And they’re preventing those families of being orphans, as that only creates a cyclical cycle of poverty in the community.

The Art of Travel

By Joe Burke

Sometimes we need to get away from it all. For some of us its relaxing on a beach, and for others it’s a tour of Notre-Dame. When we travel, we experience so many new things, and sometimes there can be a sensory overload. There are new sounds, new feels, even new sunsets. While we are experiencing these new things, I believe that it is important to take a second to really soak it all in. It is too easy to let time fly by when you are out experiencing amazing new things. I have spent the last few weeks of my life in South Africa, and the expression, “time flies when you’re having fun,” speaks true to the time I’ve spent here.

When exploring new places, it’s easy to get caught up in the rush of it all, and quite easy to miss the little things passing you by. My father once told me that when you’re traveling you should stop for a minute or two, and soak in the little things. Listen to the sounds filling the atmosphere, watch the people dancing on the sidewalks, smell the air that you are immersed in. When you do these things, I promise that you will have a new appreciation for the places you travel to. Go out and join those who are dancing, find out what that sweet smell wafting around the corner is! When you take yourself out of your comfort zone, true colors of the human spirit begin to break through. Also, when travelling; either nationally or internationally, carry yourself with a sense of respect.

When you treat people with a true sense of respect, they will do the same for you. This is true for any situation. They may not trust you, or even like you, but they will give you the respect that you have given to them. These last few weeks I have learned new perspectives, and used them to shape mine into a more understanding one; and it’s because of the people I’ve spent my time with. From our drivers to my group members, everyone has taught me something whether they know it or not. Everything from how Leopard tracks differ from Cheetah tracks to how life works in rural Alaska, and everything in between. To me, life is about learning. Traveling is one of the best forms of education, if you carry yourself with a sense of respect and take in the little things. When you combine those two you will see more, hear more and even remember more about the place that you have visited. You will also carry a new perspective on life, one that you may have never even thought possible. I have gotten the pleasure of meeting and talking with many brilliant people because of this philosophy.

So, I say, go and smell the roses because you never know what you will stumble on or who you could meet. Walk the Earth enjoying the little things, carry a sense of respect, and you will unlock things that you truly never thought possible.

The Struggles of Tourism

By Joe Burke

Tourism can be a fickle thing, especially in such a fragile country like South Africa. With a terrible history of colonization, the tourism industry must work extremely hard to rebalance how people see and enjoy this country. As a Natural Resource Tourism major, I have seen and experienced many things throughout this country that have showed me where the tourism industry stands, and how some people are fighting to change the old apartheid ways.

I came to South Africa with fellow students from Colorado State University, all with a common goal to understand how communities and conservation play a key role in protecting culture, animals and nature alike. To me, it seems that the tourism industry plays a very important role in all of it. Tourism can either make or break not only a tourist’s experience, but an entire culture itself. In that, I mean if tourism is done in an incorrect way, it can hurt the people who are supposed to be benefiting from it, and leave a bad taste in everyone’s mouths, from the tourist to the communities bordering these parks. Over the past few weeks of exploring South Africa I have talked to many different people in the field of tourism to help gather as much information as I could. Through talking to these people, my eyes have been opened in many ways, some that I could never imagine.

I have talked to tour guides that have seen the best and the worst of the tourism. I have talked to game ranch owners and employees, and I have talked to locals about their view on tourism. I have learned, and seen, that racism is still present in today’s South African tourism industry, and that it does benefit some communities. During it all, I have come to find that many people have the “wrong” idea about tourism.

Many people seem to think tourism is about making money, when it’s truly more than that. Tourism should be more about showcasing culture, preserving nature and all its glory, and all at the same time using profits to benefit communities and landscapes that are struggling; especially in places like South Africa. Far too often have I seen big fancy gates of a game reserve and just a few miles down the road there’s a struggling town where many of its members cannot find jobs. When our group was in one of these fancy game reserves, we were promptly greeted by white employees, then we were met by white managerial staff members. It was only until I truly began to search before I saw black employees, who were working the “back of the house” jobs. After introducing myself and gaining the trust of a couple of the black employees, I found out how truly rigged the system was. I was told everything, from it being nearly impossible for black workers to rank up to the owner and that the chief of the community, who was supposed to be sharing the benefits, was basically stealing the community’s money with the owner. I was also told this was not the only reserve that was doing this, and there are much larger reserves out there holding the same practices.

Though large game reserves have a bad reputation throughout the community, many of the locals that I talked to still had faith in the tourism industry. They believed that if tourism was done correctly, and done by locals, they could benefit not only from the land and animals, but themselves as well. The group I’m with, myself included, got a great taste of this at a community-run nature conservatory.

During apartheid, many communities were moved from the land they had lived on for so many years, but some were able to reclaim the land they once lived on. Lekgalameetse, one of the homelands reclaimed, had been turned into a nature conservation area, run completely by the community. In this area, only community members get hired to do the work. Only community members get to say what happens, and that’s the way it truly should be. The land and animals should not be exploited for profits by wealthy Afrikaans, English, and Rhodesian owners, who care little about either one of the two. Furthermore, these reserves should not be exploiting local community members for low wages, just because there is no other work around. I truly believe that tourism should have a bad reputation in South Africa from what I saw first-hand at this game reserve. I know it is unfair to give all of them a bad reputation off a few days experience, but from what I have gathered through various interviews, it is many to most of the game reserves that are being ran like this. It’s time for the tourism to take a step forward and change how things are being done, or the land, animals and communities are going to ultimately suffer in the end.

Zoos, Fences, and Other Thoughts

By Kaitlyn Ammerlaan

The only exposure to large mammals that most Americans have is within the context of zoos. Zoos offer people who live in the middle of the suburbs, as I did growing up, the chance to experience the beauty of animals from faraway places. Along with offering the opportunity to see exotic animals essentially in your own backyard, zoos act as an active center of youth education surrounding conservation and sustainability. Growing up, my dream was to be a zookeeper at the San Diego Zoo so I could work with koalas every single day. As I grew and learned more about this crazy planet that we all live on, I knew that our species needed more than just an enclosure and some zookeepers to sustain their value. These animals need an ecosystem and our ecosystems need them in return. Cue my interest in South Africa; I wanted to be able to experience the dynamics of a fully intact ecosystem and see the animals that I grew up watching in zoos in their natural habitat.

Upon landing at the Hoedspruit airport in South Africa and traveling to Wits Rural Facility (our first stop), I noticed fences and boundaries between the different private game reserves and our own facility. I was somewhat reminded of zoos. I had the false perception that the region we were going to be traveling in would be completely open. I knew there were private game reserves, designated wildlife areas, and human communities but, I had the impression that the lines between all of these were blurred without real boundaries. A lot of these areas, however, have fences surrounding them, including or excluding certain animals based on the needs and goals of the owners of the land. At first glance, it made me sad that some of these animals appeared to be “penned in” and even to learn that some had been hand selected for the area. Had I traveled this far and given up so much to experience these animals in their native ecosystems and all that remained were very large zoos?

Beyond first impressions, after lectures about the region and travel around Kruger National Park, I realized that the ability for animals to interact in a stable ecosystem (even if it has boundaries) is so important in the complex web of the urban and wild interface. The South African game reserves and nature preserves along the border of Kruger national Park support many needs of the community and hold a much stronger value in terms of conservation than zoos. In terms of the community, the fences can help protect local livelihoods while maintaining a tourist industry that is so apparent in the regions that we’ve traveled so far. This accommodates the growing human needs that are often overlooked by a strictly preservationist perspective. Additionally, the preserves are unlike zoos in that the animals are free to interact with one another. The animals are wild and they need to survive for themselves without a reliance on humans for care. For example, a pack of wild dogs has recently moved into Wits Rural Facility and they are having a substantial impact on the populations of other animals in the area. The wild dogs have eliminated the facility’s population of nyala, altering the community and exemplifying the self-sustaining nature of this system. These areas with boundaries and fences like those we have seen and visited in South Africa are critically important to sustaining native populations of species that millions of people across the world can only see zoos.

The Blessing of (Home) Staying

By Sydney Vander Waerdt

While in Africa we stayed in hostels, research facilities, village homestays, community run nature reserves, and even a luxurious safari lodge. What was so interesting about experiencing all of these places were the extreme differences between their management, their missions, and their purposes. Every reserve had at least one of the same goals which was to conserve the land and its animals. But even so, every place had its own unique approach to the management of their staff and tourism. After experiencing so many different styles of tourism throughout the 3 weeks we spent in South Africa I developed strong opinions about every place and the way that they were run.

The change that struck me the most was the transition from the village homestays in Damboni, Humakuya, to a luxurious safari lodge know as Ndzuti. After a couple weeks of being driven around by locals of Hoedspruit, experiencing a stereotypical “jeep jockey” for the first time was shocking. The artificial customer service was strongly felt within the first couple minutes of being there. Don’t get me wrong, the luxury was greatly appreciated and fun to experience, but after a couple weeks of experiencing the authenticity of Africa, staying at the safari lodge felt like a lie. And to think that the majority of tourists that come to South Africa just to experience that luxury was very saddening. What is the point of coming to Africa if you are not going to truly see what life is like for both the animals and the people? Why would people come to Africa just to continue their luxurious lifestyles? Why can’t they step out of their comfort zone for a few weeks? It made me realize how the existence of affluence can blind people from so many ugly truths. So many people are blinded from the complex water problems happening right across the street and from the hard work that others do to pick themselves up from a life of hardship. These realizations about the lack of authenticity in the traditional tourist experience were incredibly frustrating to me, especially after our genuine experiences staying with the local people. After leaving Ndzuti, it took me a couple of days to shake off the feeling of doing wrong. The first thing I wanted to do was go back to the homestay to bless each others lives once more.

Being immersed into the culture and becoming so close with our drivers by hearing about their lives and listening to their perspectives was so interesting. They would tell us the truth about our surroundings and weren’t just trying to get tips by cracking jokes and over-exaggerating animals’ behavior. I think about how genuine and heart-touching those experiences were. These emotions became even stronger after comparing them to the ones I felt at Ndzuti.

We then went to a community-run nature reserve called Lekgalameetse; a complete change in management and purpose. It was much easier on my heart and soul to contribute to that reserve. It was so hopeful to see land that was given back to a displaced community. The people in this community took so much pride in conserving their land and teaching others about it. It was a breath of fresh air comparing it to Ndzuti because I directly saw how it was helping the community rather than just seeing a few locals in the background while the white people ran the house. The land that they lived on was providing them with jobs and community resilience- exactly what South Africa needs.

Every kind of conservation work should be appreciated, no matter how it is done. However, understanding the different forms of tourism is very important when traveling. When becoming a part of a community, even if it is for just a short while, it’s important to understand how you might be contributing to their problems, or to the conservation of the earth and its inhabitants. Having all of these experiences helped me realize how important it is to pay attention to what might be going on behind the scenes and what my presence may be contributing to. When I travel in the future I will be sure to pay attention to what type of tourism and conservation I am contributing to