Last week I was reading the posting board at work and came across a very interesting post that is uniquely African. The post read "auction of animal skins." Below that, it listed off the types of animal skins that would be auctioned: crocodile, zebra, kudu, antbear, lion, cheetah, and leopard! We anxiously waited for the following Friday to roll around and headed to the auction. (A little pretext to this is that Amanda really wants a Zebra skin to hang on the wall for some reason and I just really wanted to see what this crazy event must be like.) At the auction were about 20 different skins of animals laid out on the sand. The interesting thing to me was that they had not been tanned in a proper way; they simply looked like they had been cut off the animal and put into rock salt. The wildlife department then went over the auction rules all in Setswana (I only speak basic conversational Setswana.) Apparently, the rules were that you had to be a citizen and have a trophy license. Bummer. The skins were then practically given away at auction. They sold for between P25-P70 ($6-$10)! Amanda haggled with one of the game dealers to try and get him to sell us a zebra for twice what we bought it for but he said that he could tan it and sell it to South Africa or overseas for P4000. After talking more with the people from the wildlife department we learned that these animals had either been killed by car or shot by farmers protecting their stock, they also sometimes confiscate skins from illegal poachers.

Last time I think I mentioned that bats live in our attic. Well, last night we confirmed that the creatures that shriek and squeal all night are not primarily bats but a family of large owls! We went outside and shined a light onto the broken water heater on our roof and sure enough, 3 owls were sitting there staring back at us. They like to hiss and scratch their nails along our metal roof about the time we are going to bed, but other than that they are cute.

I would say that we have discovered a newfound love of cooking but really, it is newly found time for cooking. We do a good job of keeping ourselves busy during the daytime but since it is winter, it gets dark early. We have really cooked some amazing meals. I will have Amanda write up a post all about it. We have significantly fewer resources but more time to be creative.

Last week I discovered a chameleon living in a bush in our backyard. A few weeks ago when I was clearing the yard I almost removed the bush but decided to keep it and I am glad I did. He has been there for about a week now.

Today we are headed up to Shakawe –about 2 hours north- for and HIV/AIDS candlelight vigil.