When asked last night what time for breakfast “7 something?” I replied 7:59. I was up at 7:20 and went over to talk with Frauke on the side patio behind the kitchen. She has been nice to me for over 12 years. I appreciate her as a fine person and a dear friend. She is a hard working ranch/farm wife, mother, and grandmother. She is coping with the loss of her husband Hans Peter of 40+ years just a short time ago. Peter was a special friend to me and I deeply miss him. I can't imagine her loss.
Frauke told me today Jule was born in the same house where I am staying. Frauke’s children are: Frita, Jule, Heinrick, and Phillip. A black worker, a cook, was the mid-wife delivering person for Jule. Frauke said it was a stormy night when Jule was born and it was too far and too risky to go to the hospital. She had her baby on the farm. Her father-in-law sat up waiting for the birth to be complete with a bottle of champagne and a paper to write down the moment the baby cried. -- everyone was so involved with the birth he drank all the champagne alone in his night shirt and fell asleep.
I have a significantly infected toe on my left foot. Pretty bad. Swollen and the skin is coming off the top of it. Dax is concerned and said I should go to the doctor here. I should get on anti-biotics. I said I didn’t want to go to the clinic here because of the multitude of strange-exotic and potent germs that were there at the clinic. I would have no resistance to them being a gringo. I think Dax told everyone about the infection and Jim Sorensen brought out some antibiotics he had brought with him. They were purchased in Mexico but I took them 3 times a day for the rest of the trip. Sigi brought me some anti-inflammatory medicine and I took it twice a day. I sent an email message to the Supreme Commander back home to get me an appointment with my regular doctor for the day after I came home. She did. Frauke brought me the farm's traditional foot-soaking tub and some special “green soap” and I soaked my infected foot in hot water with the green soap twice or three times a day. It made it feel better for a few minutes.
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| Grossest photo of the trip |
On the hunt: Sigi left off Tobis and I with some chairs to watch for game coming into a drinking pond. I was not up to walking much with my sore toe. We watched as a momma warthog came to drink and wallow with her 4 babies. It was cute. She did not see us nor smell us. A big eagle came to drink and it was beautiful to watch nature live. A juvenile warthog male came in and saw us after wallowing and drinking some. He took off so momma warthog did too. The babies kept saying, “Why do we have to leave -- we were just starting to have fun?” Eventually Sigi came to pick us up in the truck. We headed back to the farm house for lunch. They had not seen any shootable game either. Lots of blame is on the helicopter that is constantly trespassing in Farm Garib air space.
Lunch was hamburger patties (beef), brown gravy, boiled new potatoes, tossed salad, baked squash, some kind of and onion-cabbage slaw? Desert was pistachio pudding. After lunch we had nap time. I soaked my foot again before dozing off.
Drinks at 4 p.m. on the main patio. Everyone on the back patio started buying Frita’s jewelry that was on display in a locked case in the dining room. Several hundred dollars were spent by the hunters.
Sigi, Dax, William and I went to Joe Luhl’s place. We saw a warthog at distance and Dax took a shot at a jackal without luck. Finally some rain started and we head back at dusk.
Joe Luhl home So. 23º06.264’ E 17º45.115’ elevation 4,718
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