Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Things are moving!

It was another week before I went back to visit the building site and things were moving. These guys don’t hang around. There’s a big green structure with water tanks on top – looks like a sort of HQ with people going in and out all the time. Word around the bush is that they’re building something for tourists, but I can’t see tourists sleeping in this thing – not posh enough.


In fact, as I got closer I noticed outlines in the soil, all curves and big spaces, under the acacias and all staring straight at Kilimanjaro. Something tells me this is the real thing. After all, if I were a tourist I would want to wake up to that great mountain.

I see it all the time of course, but I never tire of it. It’s the second biggest attraction in Amboseli, after the elephants of course. Most people come to see us with Kili in the background – makes great photos.

While I hung around a big meeting took place with lots of people including the local Masai. I’m told that the Masai get involved with tourism these days, earning rent from the land and from every tourist who visits. That’s good news – not only for them but for us too – now we can all live in peace.

Meanwhile the construction goes on and that brick making machine is working overtime.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

Making bricks from mud!

Being only 11 I’m not so used to wandering off alone. In fact I’ve only just started. My mum lets me because she knows that in a few years I will have to leave her and my younger brothers and sisters to make a new life for myself. It’s scary but exciting at the same time. But I’ve got to get used to it. So I go off for the day and find my way back to Mum later. Seeing these strange men made me realise that I still have a lot to learn. I decided to go and fetch Mum and see what she made of it.

I was amazed at the activity when Mum and I got there the next day (with a few others in tow). There were men digging trenches and others making bricks. As we got closer they noticed us and stopped to look, but not for long. One thing really caught my attention – a metal machine which the men filled with soil from the ground and then pulled one part on top of the other. When they opened it out popped this
perfect little mud brick which the men laid on the ground in a neat row along with others that they had already made. Then they took each brick and shovelled it into what looked like a chimney with a fire at the front. Mum said that was how they made the bricks hard so they could be using for building.

So that was it! These men were building something.
 I can’t wait to find out what.

Wednesday, July 2, 2008

What's going on?

Just the other morning as I was searching for some tasty leaves, something caught my eye. Well, my ears and my nose mostly because they’re pretty big. Behind me, about 10 elephant steps away, there were people – not the usual people in red blankets with sharp spears who inhabit these parts, but new people – men – dressed in trousers and wearing shoes. There were lots of them, making noise but saying very little. Mostly they were concentrating.
Being an elephant around Amboseli is a pretty good life. We have space, food, water (usually) and best of all, we are protected from an elephant’s most feared enemy – the poacher. So when I see people I’m not afraid. They don’t want to hurt me – mostly they just want to watch me, and although it can get on your nerves at times – this lack of privacy – I put up with it. Because these people, tourists they’re called, are really my bread and butter. So long as they come to Amboseli to see us elephants living here (and there are many) we will be protected and our babies can grow up peacefully with their mums.

So who were all these people, ignoring me, concentrating on other things with their shovels and string and tents? Curiosity may have killed the cat, but it never killed an elephant. I needed to find out more …