Sesfikile!

Josh writes:

So, we are finally here…or not just here but home, which is what I was going to write, as that is what this magic place called Phinda will be for us for the next 3 months. Months of planning. Or dreaming rather. Just how hard can it be to arrange unemployment?? Just amazing to be back here after a year and half. And to be here together!! What a privilege…


Our home is a run down, falling apart old house. There are cracks running down most walls, and the ants have excavated under most of the floor. A huge flat-crown albizia tree towers over the building and gives some shade to our host’s many bonsai trees in the garden. Ross knows more about the bush than anyone else I know, and his passion for Africa and the African people I have also never met before. A rickety fence does a half job of keeping us in and the animals safe.


Saturday afternoon we arrive. Neither of us can believe we are finally here. First Zulu exchanges with the security guard at the gate – a public road runs through the reserve – and my confidence is boosted. A bit.

It’s a spectacular day and we are content with an afternoon bumble up to the lodge in our overloaded Toyota Tazz.

It is so amazing to drive through the reserve and see it all with fresh eyes, with Kristal’s eyes. First Nyala. First Impala. First almost everything. We spy a black rhino on a burned section of veld in the distance. The binoculars bring him closer. This little encounter reminds me of the t-shirts the Phinda Game guys sometimes wear, to advertise the Black Rhino Range Expansion Project (also funded by previous boss, WWF, funnily enough)…the t-shirts read “Wathintha ubhejane... Wathintha thina!” or in isiNgisi, “You touch the black rhino… You touch us!”. Gonna try get my hands on one of those for sure!


We meet up with Flippie (Head Ranger of Forest Lodge and class-mate from Stellenbosch). Good to see old mates and we all share some beers over the end of a fairly dismal Tri Nations rugby game in the staff canteen.


We link up with Ross after game drive and follow him home, ten minutes drive up north, out of the Sand Forest. He wasn’t joking when he said welcome to Josh Cox Lodge. He wasn’t joking either when he said we were having a party. A pretty shoddy job with a marker pen turned the “Josh” on the previous ranger’s son’s bedroom door, into “Josh Cox Lodge”, on our bedroom door. A pink pen adds the “and Kristal” after we arrive.


Rangers, reception staff and anyone and everyone who is tired or entertaining guests all day arrive to be entertained at our home. Zulu house music….I think…I know (!!) is pretty quickly pumping through the air and a bunch of interesting, good people, dressed up with nowhere (else) to go, bop around the living room out of time with the music. Another group, rangers, swop stories of the day’s grade two walking assessments and compare canteen recipes for “blokkiesvleis” (Phinda Game Reserve) and bone stew (Madikwe Game Reserve).


It seems that everywhere I go lately I meet people from Israel. But surely not at Phinda?! Or not a ranger at least?? Wrong! Gadi, the ranger, is from Haifa and has been ranging (and roaming) in SA for 2 years now.


Well, we make it to midnight and try to enjoy the cool house beats from our bed for about three hours beyond that. Sigh. Next morning we woke up and got our first view of paradise. Warthog, impala and nyala came to greet us at our front door, similar scenes I guess that &BEYOND legend Les Carlisle would have enjoyed at this house in the years that he ran conservation efforts at Phinda from here. It’s crazy to think that this is the original house they stayed in when the conversion of Phinda, from farmland to game reserve, started back in 1990. What a long way it has come!

Lazy Sunday morning start and we head off to Izwelihle (the central offices), or “Izwe” to meet with Reserve Manager, Simon Naylor. I meet the guys, the izinduna, that I will be working with – Jimson, Seven and Musa. Good people too, I can see it already. No “Wathintha ubhejane” t-shirts just yet unfortunately, but 2 nice green, uniform shirts and a hat. I’m sorted!


We head off into Hluhluwe. A spot of shopping. Well, if like R1800 counts as “a spot”. Thank goodness the fridge is massive and we were doomed to spend the R400 on a mini-oven the moment we got thinking (and worse, talking) about oven-fresh bread.

We cruise back to Forest Lodge in time to pick up a game drive. Well, a staff bumble with a trainee ranger. No snacks, no impressive drink stops, but we did each get a cold beer and some pretty impressive sightings. Not bad if you think it’s all FREE!! We hit the marsh up in the north, big herd of buffalo in the distance, then umkhombe, or two white rhino actually, drinking at Pipeline Pan. Great interactions with 3 8-month old lion cubs, who weren’t sure if they were curious or scared of the rhino. Mom looks on lazily.

Leftover pasta dinner. Early night. And then it’s the first day of work. GULP!! No-one likes a “first day of work” and I must confess I was pretty nervous. Would I just be an idiot and understand nothing? Would they understand me? Would they like me? Would I just break lots of stuff and be more of a hassle than a help? Well, it was fine, in fact it was amazing!


Today was the first day in my life where for a full working day all I spoke with my fellow workers was Zulu. Kuphela! Qha! Nkosinathi (God is with us), Vusi, Seven and Jimson, these guys are my team and the best guys I could have hoped to end up with. All super keen to teach me, all very confident that I will quickly gain fluency, all going out of their way to teach me the language and the work. I even picked up some zulu animal names. Nice!! It all goes into my little notebook, either to remember or to look up as homework in the evening.


Fencing. This was the job. Replacing old, broken fence-poles and buggered up fencing wire. Hard work at times, with all the digging, but not too bad actually. Getting fit and strong can’t be too unhealthy either. The nyala and impala watch on as we work. A staff vehicle is stopped, asked to reverse and then reprimanded just because they don’t greet us. Well, they know for next time!


A male nyala barks (yes, almost like a dog) his disapproval at us as we lie down to rest for a bit during the hour’s lunch. Hopefully he was warning the animals about us and not the other way around…


Finished replacing a section fencing, did a few more fence poles and then we head up Makhasa boundary road, with Makhasa Community Reserve on the other side of the fence. We meet the digger driver on the way – something about a puncture up ahead. We load the punctured tyre from the tractor and wait for I’m not too sure what.

Two common reedbuck dance off through the long, yellow grass on the open marsh here in the north of the reserve. They look back and wait. We wait too, some more, and then head off, dropping the tyre with the guy from the vehicle workshop at Tabankos’.


A nice loop down south, along “Main zinaav” and before I know it I’m home. It’s only 3:15pm. So great to have the first day done. I didn’t break anything. I wasn’t rubbish at everything. And there were only 2 or 3 times where I could not make myself understood at all. It’s gonna be goooood!!


Our room is transformed. Only a woman can make a home. And Kristal had spent lots of the day doing just that – it looks amazing!! And oven-fresh bread too! A quick taste (yum!!) and we head off to visit Able (Zulu name: uMduduze) at Bayete Camp, going via Forest Lodge to show Kristal the guest pool and sign indemnity forms. Oh, and to meet “Chippie”, the nyala who eats carrots from your hand. Naughty naughty Forest Lodge staff!!


Kristal is lapping up the Zulu and learning loads; it’s so great to share that with her. I’m sure she has learnt more than me today, positive in fact.


Home for delicious rice, cheese sauce and beans. Yum again! The hyena’s can probably smell the food and let out a few whoops of jealousy. We aren’t bothered. We drink it in. Soon the nightjars join in the chorus. Aaaah…


Some Zulu homework for us both and another tough day in Africa has come to an end….