As we know, a photograph is chemistry. Chemicals develop the image onto the paper. And once, the image appears you can not reverse it.
What happened to me 10 years ago was similar. I stood in front of the Ngorongoro Crater and I was just awe struck. When I arrived 20 minutes later at the Malanja Depression I saw that the volcanoes slowly gave way to the busiest plains in the world.
I swore to myself that I would come back. And live here.
Two and a half years ago, it happened. I had the chance to live and work in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. It is a land declared as a World Heritage Site, dubbed often as the 8th wonder and always featuring in the "top 20 places to see before you die" lists. It is a place with the highest concentration of wildlife on earth, a place of volcanoes, rolling hills, mysterious forests and the open savannah. The Serengeti National Park is just on the other side. It is without exaggeration, a land of superlatives.
I was going to live here and a dream from almost a decade ago was coming true.
In the two and a half years Ngorongoro provided me with many privileges. I have seen the most beautiful skies, the most breathtaking vistas and wildlife has visited my doorstep, literally. I've had elephants scratch their backs on the walls of my house, lions that have slept outside my verandah and buffaloes have munched their way through the night on the patches of grass outside my bedroom.
I have seen the sunset over Ol Deani that has painted the sky in the most warm, soul stirring hues and rain that has traveled from the clouds just above in a vengeance.
So many times, i have had the privilege of seeing the largest mammalian migration on our planet. I can not even begin to describe those days on the plains. The smell of moisture, petrichor, the grunting and soft bellows of the wildebeest. The horizon with rain approaching from a distance. Lemakarot, the ancient mountain looming over the grounds.
How many times I have adventured myself to recreate in my mind the place 2 million years ago when our ancestors walked the plains. I have driven past the spot on so many occasions where some of the most important paleo-anthropological discoveries were made by the Leakey's. Footsteps of hominids preserved in earth from 2 million years ago. I have imagined these people, so different in physical form yet having the same fears as a man on an open plain. I envisioned them moving with the volcanoes regurgitating that orange phlegm from its belly that had been brewing for so long. Large predators and other animals walking in the same areas where I was, then.
I have been raptured by the sense of openness, the sight of nothingness and the air that has swirled around me has, each time, carried with it a piece of my soul. And I gave it to this land so willingly, like a martyr. I have never felt so alive with no purpose, except to live and breathe and then so fulfilled in just that. I have never lain my eyes on a part of earth so pulsating with miracles. I have never, ever, ever… been so overcome.
I have walked in a sea, yes a sea, of wildebeest as they starred with their silly faces at this bi-pedal animal. I have been stuck in the mud, the dust, the rain and I have wished that it wouldn't ever end.
In spite of more than half a million visitors annually, the land has always invited me into it's secret garden. I have found myself alone so often and taken previews of wonders with not another person around(except for Gilles). We have lunched under the acacia with a lioness and her very young cubs just a few 100 meters from us. We have slept under the open skies and around the most beautiful yellow barked acacias as giraffe, lions and leopard have all slept not far from us. We have driven through the Serengeti night looking for an odd hyena like creature called the aardwolf and then spotted it (thanks to a friend). We have been alone for miles on end and in retrospect, it has been the greatest privilege.
It has also been very hard sometimes. Working in a patriarchal society, being taken seriously as a woman has been so challenging. Being seen as the mtoto (child) and then trying to explain that you are serious, has been hard. I have also been very hurt sometimes, too hurt to wake up and start another day at times and for the first time, it hasn't been a boyfriend. I have felt so abused and betrayed and my anger has often vented itself in uncontrollable tears. I have made very few local friends. Most people have just wanted to "receive" something for the friendship. Favors in the form of jobs, advances, loans, recommendations. But then I have been to their homes, little mud huts surrounded by thicket to keep their livestock and children safe from the hyenas, leopards and lions. I have seen the incredible hardships of their lives as the perch precariously on the pivot of then and now. Maasai that dress in shukas (traditional red cloth) and carry spears. The young, fierce looking boys with moram (red earth) in their hair and the extravagant displays of their beaded jewelry yet carrying a cell phone in their hand. A people left so vulnerable by the rich tradition of their culture and moving into modernity with its tantalizing temptations of the many possible acquisitions.
It has helped me in my lowest ebbs, to reconcile this truth with my feelings. The people that I work with are the first generation of their kind that have received any (if any) abysmal education. They are still pastoral and yet they are looking for something more. I have found that they have hearts of wanderers which is far from romantic, hearts hardened by the harsh travails of their existence yet they have imbibed from what they see and make contact with, the need to settle and acquire.
I have lost my optimism in my workings with the government, the administrators of this jewel. Their commitment to their job, sincerity, capability is really non-existent. The corruption, the frivolity and nonchalance regarding pressing issues has amazed me. In this dark cellulose of administrative hell, the few (and i mean perhaps 2-3) have stood out like angels and I have great respect for them.
My job has also put me in contact with more than 15,000 people that have passed through the lodge and I have hosted them fortunately and unfortunately.
It has taught me an incredible amount about people, their bonds, relationships and the human mind. I have seen love that's still ignited, love that has turned to comfort and dislike. I have met teachers, bankers, politicians, bureaucrats and gods people. Designers, sportsmen, artists. I have met crooks, racists, assholes. I have also met people that had a light. I have seen just as much beauty in people I never knew, as I have seen in the plains. And I have seen just as much repulsive behavior.
I have made a few good friends....a nurse and a sports teacher, lion researchers, a photographer and lodge managers. I can count them on one hand but I have been enriched by these relationships. They have all taught me so much and I know that we will always be friends. We are tied some how through our experiences and fundamental understanding of the place. They know what its like and then, when you recollect your horrible story, somehow you can still sit around a camp fire and have a roaring laugh.
So then why am I saying goodbye?
Because, it was hard too. Because, I would've become too comfortable…. in the dysfunctionality, the mess, the routine. I felt settled. I felt I could handle and become used to the chaos to the point where I would forget it existed. Because life is for exploring. Because there is beauty everywhere and adventure is really breaking out of your secure zone. Life's most beautiful gifts are just out of view, but also just on the other side.
The person I have to thank most is Gilles. My friend, my other soul, my reflection. I have cried myself silly with anxiety and fears as he reassured me. He has protected me from abuse and he has loved me at my most impossible. He has helped me to look inside with the most critical analysis and to look outside with love and gratitude. I don't know if I could have done this without him. He has been the baobab that has rooted me as I grew higher.
The only thing I have missed is sharing this immense beauty and the peculiarity of the place with people that mattered the most. But I am also so thankful that I have been loved in absence and I have loved, remembered and missed them. That I have had the passion to share this experience, the opportunity to carry them with me in the most spectacular, the most breath-taking, the most religious of places. They have been with me in the most spiritual moments.
So, photographs are chemistry. So is something beautiful. I know that I may not remember the pictures I have seen, forever. I may forget the sunset I said I would always remember. I may forget the African full moon. But the chemicals in these events have been my catalysts. They have transformed me, exhilarated me and perhaps, they have implanted me with their beauty. So even if I do forget these images, their effect has been etched on my existence. It has been a reaction that can not be reversed.
And thank god for that, because if I had to die tomorrow, I have felt alive.
What happened to me 10 years ago was similar. I stood in front of the Ngorongoro Crater and I was just awe struck. When I arrived 20 minutes later at the Malanja Depression I saw that the volcanoes slowly gave way to the busiest plains in the world.
I swore to myself that I would come back. And live here.
Two and a half years ago, it happened. I had the chance to live and work in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. It is a land declared as a World Heritage Site, dubbed often as the 8th wonder and always featuring in the "top 20 places to see before you die" lists. It is a place with the highest concentration of wildlife on earth, a place of volcanoes, rolling hills, mysterious forests and the open savannah. The Serengeti National Park is just on the other side. It is without exaggeration, a land of superlatives.
I was going to live here and a dream from almost a decade ago was coming true.
In the two and a half years Ngorongoro provided me with many privileges. I have seen the most beautiful skies, the most breathtaking vistas and wildlife has visited my doorstep, literally. I've had elephants scratch their backs on the walls of my house, lions that have slept outside my verandah and buffaloes have munched their way through the night on the patches of grass outside my bedroom.
I have seen the sunset over Ol Deani that has painted the sky in the most warm, soul stirring hues and rain that has traveled from the clouds just above in a vengeance.
So many times, i have had the privilege of seeing the largest mammalian migration on our planet. I can not even begin to describe those days on the plains. The smell of moisture, petrichor, the grunting and soft bellows of the wildebeest. The horizon with rain approaching from a distance. Lemakarot, the ancient mountain looming over the grounds.
How many times I have adventured myself to recreate in my mind the place 2 million years ago when our ancestors walked the plains. I have driven past the spot on so many occasions where some of the most important paleo-anthropological discoveries were made by the Leakey's. Footsteps of hominids preserved in earth from 2 million years ago. I have imagined these people, so different in physical form yet having the same fears as a man on an open plain. I envisioned them moving with the volcanoes regurgitating that orange phlegm from its belly that had been brewing for so long. Large predators and other animals walking in the same areas where I was, then.
I have been raptured by the sense of openness, the sight of nothingness and the air that has swirled around me has, each time, carried with it a piece of my soul. And I gave it to this land so willingly, like a martyr. I have never felt so alive with no purpose, except to live and breathe and then so fulfilled in just that. I have never lain my eyes on a part of earth so pulsating with miracles. I have never, ever, ever… been so overcome.
I have walked in a sea, yes a sea, of wildebeest as they starred with their silly faces at this bi-pedal animal. I have been stuck in the mud, the dust, the rain and I have wished that it wouldn't ever end.
In spite of more than half a million visitors annually, the land has always invited me into it's secret garden. I have found myself alone so often and taken previews of wonders with not another person around(except for Gilles). We have lunched under the acacia with a lioness and her very young cubs just a few 100 meters from us. We have slept under the open skies and around the most beautiful yellow barked acacias as giraffe, lions and leopard have all slept not far from us. We have driven through the Serengeti night looking for an odd hyena like creature called the aardwolf and then spotted it (thanks to a friend). We have been alone for miles on end and in retrospect, it has been the greatest privilege.
It has also been very hard sometimes. Working in a patriarchal society, being taken seriously as a woman has been so challenging. Being seen as the mtoto (child) and then trying to explain that you are serious, has been hard. I have also been very hurt sometimes, too hurt to wake up and start another day at times and for the first time, it hasn't been a boyfriend. I have felt so abused and betrayed and my anger has often vented itself in uncontrollable tears. I have made very few local friends. Most people have just wanted to "receive" something for the friendship. Favors in the form of jobs, advances, loans, recommendations. But then I have been to their homes, little mud huts surrounded by thicket to keep their livestock and children safe from the hyenas, leopards and lions. I have seen the incredible hardships of their lives as the perch precariously on the pivot of then and now. Maasai that dress in shukas (traditional red cloth) and carry spears. The young, fierce looking boys with moram (red earth) in their hair and the extravagant displays of their beaded jewelry yet carrying a cell phone in their hand. A people left so vulnerable by the rich tradition of their culture and moving into modernity with its tantalizing temptations of the many possible acquisitions.
It has helped me in my lowest ebbs, to reconcile this truth with my feelings. The people that I work with are the first generation of their kind that have received any (if any) abysmal education. They are still pastoral and yet they are looking for something more. I have found that they have hearts of wanderers which is far from romantic, hearts hardened by the harsh travails of their existence yet they have imbibed from what they see and make contact with, the need to settle and acquire.
I have lost my optimism in my workings with the government, the administrators of this jewel. Their commitment to their job, sincerity, capability is really non-existent. The corruption, the frivolity and nonchalance regarding pressing issues has amazed me. In this dark cellulose of administrative hell, the few (and i mean perhaps 2-3) have stood out like angels and I have great respect for them.
My job has also put me in contact with more than 15,000 people that have passed through the lodge and I have hosted them fortunately and unfortunately.
It has taught me an incredible amount about people, their bonds, relationships and the human mind. I have seen love that's still ignited, love that has turned to comfort and dislike. I have met teachers, bankers, politicians, bureaucrats and gods people. Designers, sportsmen, artists. I have met crooks, racists, assholes. I have also met people that had a light. I have seen just as much beauty in people I never knew, as I have seen in the plains. And I have seen just as much repulsive behavior.
I have made a few good friends....a nurse and a sports teacher, lion researchers, a photographer and lodge managers. I can count them on one hand but I have been enriched by these relationships. They have all taught me so much and I know that we will always be friends. We are tied some how through our experiences and fundamental understanding of the place. They know what its like and then, when you recollect your horrible story, somehow you can still sit around a camp fire and have a roaring laugh.
So then why am I saying goodbye?
Because, it was hard too. Because, I would've become too comfortable…. in the dysfunctionality, the mess, the routine. I felt settled. I felt I could handle and become used to the chaos to the point where I would forget it existed. Because life is for exploring. Because there is beauty everywhere and adventure is really breaking out of your secure zone. Life's most beautiful gifts are just out of view, but also just on the other side.
The person I have to thank most is Gilles. My friend, my other soul, my reflection. I have cried myself silly with anxiety and fears as he reassured me. He has protected me from abuse and he has loved me at my most impossible. He has helped me to look inside with the most critical analysis and to look outside with love and gratitude. I don't know if I could have done this without him. He has been the baobab that has rooted me as I grew higher.
The only thing I have missed is sharing this immense beauty and the peculiarity of the place with people that mattered the most. But I am also so thankful that I have been loved in absence and I have loved, remembered and missed them. That I have had the passion to share this experience, the opportunity to carry them with me in the most spectacular, the most breath-taking, the most religious of places. They have been with me in the most spiritual moments.
So, photographs are chemistry. So is something beautiful. I know that I may not remember the pictures I have seen, forever. I may forget the sunset I said I would always remember. I may forget the African full moon. But the chemicals in these events have been my catalysts. They have transformed me, exhilarated me and perhaps, they have implanted me with their beauty. So even if I do forget these images, their effect has been etched on my existence. It has been a reaction that can not be reversed.
And thank god for that, because if I had to die tomorrow, I have felt alive.
