I finally had access to relatively fast internet and was able to upload the remainder of the pics from Carrie’s mom’s visit. In this set, we visit Volcanes National Park, which is part of the region that is the home of the world’s remaining silverback gorillas.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cassiodorus/sets/72157606469226407/ 

- e

Here are our pics:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cassiodorus/sets/72157606157292902/

Enjoy!

Some quick pics. The internet connection has been way too slow to upload our photos lately, so these will have to do.

A few weeks ago, Carrie’s mom came for a visit and we trekked about Rwanda in the lush, volcanic north to see the world’s surviving silverback gorillas.

Below is Shinga, the alpha male of the Hirwa group of the Virunga Gorillas in Rwanda’s Volcanes National Park.

East of Kigali are the grassy savanah’s that Africa is typically known for. No elephants or lions, but we saw some giraffes, wildebeast, hippos and impalas galore. Most of the Big Five lie to the south east of Rwanda, in Tanzania and South Africa.

That’s all for now!

- e and c

1. Have your security guard reprimand you for leaving the bananas ["matoke" in kinyarwanda] in the tree for as long as you have since some of the bananas are actually yellow – not that you didn’t not notice it, you just thought they would fall off when they were ready even though you bought bananas from the market in the New World when their were as green as you.

2. Go back inside the house and put your boots on because, you know, no one in their right minds harvests bananas in their bare feet right? But in reality, you put your boots on because you know you’ll have to use the machete and you are afraid of chopping off your toes.

3. Have the security guard show you how it’s done.

4. Have a go yourself but have your wonderful wife snap a photo of you while the security guard is laughing his ass off at your timid machete use.

5. Avoid getting the sticky banana tree sap on your clothes as it’s a bitch to get off.

6. Take the requisite hunter-gatherer shot to send back home to all your city friends to show off your rugged resourcefulness in your pjs.

7. Show your wife relishing said rugged resourcefulness [no photoshopping please].

8. Give most of them away but keep a big branch for yourself but never eat them so that whenever you come home you can feel good about yourself.

9. Repeat when feeling of rugged resourcefulness runs low.

What more could I guy need?

Some pics of our new kitten, Bean:

A colleague of mine brought her in last Monday because their house boy [i.e. maid/security] picked her up from next door. But they couldn’t keep it because they had an aggressive dog, so C and I took her.

‘Bean’ because she has a bean-shaped dot on her belly.

I’ve been bringing her into the office for the past week, and she’s become the official Rock-Solid mascot. She may also double as the UNDP’s Governance mascot.

Turns out I might be slightly allergic to cats. Pooh.

Anyway, like all cats, she’s a big attention whore and I swear her meows sound like “Meee! Meee!”. We wanted to name her after Mr.Miyagi because she had a whole wax-on, wax-off way of attacking but after I told Carrie that wax-on, wax-off was a defensive tactic rather than offensive, and that her temperment was more like Jackie Chan, there was a lot of humphing and discord in the group: I think it was Bean.

Some random pics from my camera phone:

Carrie on a ‘moto’.

A phone store in Kigali, where they don’t have 8GB microSD cards.

Happy Easter everybody!

- e, c and b

A sign from Johannesburg airport indicating future construction plans:

It’ll probably be used to keep track of all the lost/stolen luggage [of which ours will be included]!