When I made the decision to come back to South Africa after a good six years of travels, I came back with two goals. One, grow within my chosen career, and two, travel Africa.
After a good five months in a small local game reserve, with good people and great experiences and memories, the option to head to the more vast, untouched part of Africa has finally come up and who could say no to that?
Sometimes on the long roads around South Africa I drive through so many small towns, and if I had to squint anymore trying to take photos with bad eye sight of all the old buildings, farm cattle and churches, you would swear I was Asian. Everyone knows Asians see and take pictures of everything around them. They also don't just click once and take a single digital image, they click three to four times per shot. They need to be certain that they have a few good photos of that old, decrepit house and dirty goat.
I find that these long road trips excite me alot more than they used to when I grew up here. I am so aware of my surroundings and take pictures of things I never used to notice before.
Sometimes you don't need to jump on the first plane, or in my case a ship, to another continent to travel. Sometimes you can just take a weekend camping trip to a local dam or a road trip to another province. Or if you are as travel obsessed as myself, you can go as far as to make a goal to reach as far north as the African continent allows you. Travelling around Africa never appealed to me when I was younger. I never appreciated living in Kenya as a child and I certainly had no plan to galavant back there as an adult. After those six years away from Africa, I grew very desperate to head back and really go and see it with new eyes.
Now I also take three to four snaps of a dirty house and a dead tree to make sure I got the best shot, and I really get excited to sit and watch an African sunset and drink a dark beer. Making the decision to get a job in the bush was one of the best decisions I have made for my current years. The pace is not according to a clock or the day of the week. Nature and people and moments separate days. Trips to local towns and weekends away to more desolate areas are as exciting as a trip to Paris.
"Always keep your eyes open, keep watching, because whatever you see can inspire you. "
"One way to open your eyes is to ask your self, what if I had never seen this before? What if I knew I would never see it again?"
