Four Years

What's your address? seems like a funny thing to ask your husband the day before your fourth anniversary, but that's exactly what I asked last night! Nathan started at Pipestone National Park on Wednesday and is busy learning all about sacred rocks.

Last Thursday I DID pass my PMP Certification exam, so I am officially a PMP! (I always pronounce that "PiMP" in my head, which makes me chuckle.)

Three weeks ago, I finished my Hiking Challenge strong with a hike along the Round-Up Horse trail, Jones Creek, and the Loop Road for about 6 miles.


I didn't see anything out of the ordinary: some horses, but no bison on the trail. When I finished, the entry above mine in the register said they saw a scorpion. When I got back to the Visitor Center, I found out a guy had brought in a picture of a Rattlesnake sunning itself from the day before. I was not quite as lucky to see such exciting things!


Nathan's brother, Justin, graduated on May 16th and we went to Madison, WI to partake in the festivities. Lucky for us, we didn't have to be crammed into the Kohl Center waiting for 2,000 names to be read off. Nope, the LaFollette School of Public Affairs has their own, intimate ceremony in the Assembly Chamber of the Wisconsin Capital. We were in and out in an hour - now that's what I call a graduation!

Justin and his Wizard Sleeves

It also gave me a chance to marvel at how amazing their capital is (take note, North Dakota!) - a fact that I just don't think I appreciated as much on our 4th grade trip to visit it. Now that I've been a few places and have seen works of art like St. Peter's Basilica in Rome and Chichen Itza in Mexico, I agree that Wisconsin's capital really is something special. And to think - you can walk in any time from the Farmer's Market on Saturday just to use the bathroom!


It was really good to see all of Nathan's family. We almost didn't, save the last-minute trip to Milwaukee to see Nathan's mom. We even got the chance to stop into Buraka for some delicious East African food.

Which reminds me! I had a chat with one of my African Wildlife Foundation buddies and found out that they have not only secured funding for the Eco-Lodge I worked on, but they plan to start construction in June. Who wants to come with me to the Grand Opening?!

Manyara Ranch Video

Finally, after trying to upload this for two weeks, I got it to work over lunch today. Here's a video I made after two of my teammates and I visited AWF's Manyara Ranch during our first week here. It's also out on You Tube.

Enduimet WMA

Over the last few days, I found out what my project with the African Wildlife Foundation would officially be. I am in charge of creating the business plan for a Wildlife Management Area (WMA) called Enduimet, which is located just West of Mt. Kilimanjaro. The WMA is a community-chartered and organized association where about 8 villiages came together to figure out how they can conserve the area, while developing it just enough to start making enough money to lift themselves out of poverty.

Thursday, I got a chance to visit the WMA. It is located 2 hours from Arusha and has a beautiful countryside. The inhabitants are mostly part of the Kisongo Masaai tribe, so they are traditionally pastoralists. They are some of the most welcoming, wonderful people I have met anywhere in the world. While I was there, I traveled around much of the WMA, checking out existing campsites and interviewing their managers to get a better idea of how the tourism industry in the immediate area works.

In the middle of the day, we ended up driving around in the Kitenden Wildlife Corridor. This corridor facilitates the migration of many animals between Amboseli National Park in Kenya and Kilimanjaro and Arusha National Parks in Tanzania. The landscape was incredibly beautiful - typical of what you picture Africa looking like based on the Discovery Channel - lush green islands of trees and scrubs in a sea of roadless brown dust. We saw a plethora of animals including gazettes, baboons, zebra, giraffes, elephants, and wildebeests. We even crossed the Kenyan border and since there were no roads or signs, we were free to criss-cross the land as we pleased (not the best thing to do if you’re interested in conserving it, but that is something the community knows they need to look at).



The highlight of the trip was actually the ride home when we picked up a Masaai hitchhiker who was trying to get back to Arusha for school. His name was Metwiy and after I figured out that he spoke English, we had a great chat about the Masaai culture. Masaai are able to marry multiple wives, so his dad had a wife in Olmoti (one of the villages in the Enduimet WMA) and Ngorongoro. He had 7 siblings and 6 half-siblings. Since the Masaai are traditionally pastoralists, half of the kids in a typical family are chosen to go to school, while half of them stay home to tend the cattle. Unfortunately, I got him to admit that most of the time the women get the shaft. The males' families pay a dowry of cattle as a brideprice and many times marriages are still arranged – sometimes when the girls are still in secondary school. However, times are changing because you are free to marry whoever you want, and Metwiy had a cell phone and email address. I’ve got video of him explaining his incredible life that I’ll post later. It was fun to get such an up-close look at one of the last remaining traditional world cultures.



This little guy was tending a herd of goats out in the middle of nowhere with his brother. In Africa, it seems there are zero child labor laws. I see children as young as six tending livestock, driving carts, and hauling huge bundles of sticks and water. In fact, I see far more children working than adults. I guess those are the unlucky ones that don't get to go to school. :(