Sweet sounds of a Moremi night

I have to have full disclosure here as I am just now catching up on my week and these posts, so they are in fact desperately trying to be written in the past-tense,  without little success as I notice I come in and out of past and present.... ;-)  

After a delicious steak dinner Graham escorted me to my tent; probably to humor me and again thinking this poor Canadian must be terrified!  I was exhausted and could not wait to lie down and put my head on my pillow and fall into a deep sleep........ what I was not prepared for was the sounds of a Moremi night.  I of course, could not identify any of the sounds on the 1st night.  I heard birds chirping, birds singing, birds making sounds I had never heard birds make. A pale grunting in the distance, a roar further out.  A screech at a about 2am.  I slept very little. But somehow woke feeling well rested.  My nights since then have been glorious and peaceful, I now know the grunts are the hippos laughing, the roar a lion calling in the distance, the screech a Hyena (yes this one does terrify me a little). .... the birds a lullaby....

I am amazed at how comfortable I am.  How well I've adjusted to the time difference (only some minor stomach issues) and how very long ago it seems that I was in the cold......  

Going to the loo is always an adventure for me here.  It's been known that you will see lion, hippo and the rest walking across our path on course to the loo.  After dark it is forbidden to go.   Today, I was sitting admiring my view from the throne when I heard a hippo grunt (if you are in their path to the water they will eat you) I've never sat up so fast from the toilet in my life, I swear my pants were barley up as I started to walk back..... Graham has taken to a few (many) good laughs at my expense......  it is a good thing I am always happy to provide some entertainment.  At the risk of sounding too organic, though it is a part of camp life I should share, if you have to pee in the middle of the night you go outside your tent.   1st you listen carefully to hear what lurks outside (this sounds easy enough if you've lived here for a year and know all the sounds, right now every sound I hear sounds as if it may eat me!) then you look for eyes in the dark.... um ya.  Then you risk your bare bottom to the wild.  This was one of my 1st questions to the ladies how do you manage such things!  and of course as a women there is more for us to be concerned about, we not only can't just let it hang out the door,  but we also have menstrual cycles to deal with!  Sorry boys but it's a fact of life and something to consider when living in the bush!!.  And I know most of the ladies have asked me these questions as well....They were wonderfully helpful with tips of all sorts and even shared the secret of the potty.  Yup the ladies have a potty in their tent, so we don't have to worry about our precious bottoms being bate for what lurks in the night..... LOVE the potty.  Again, Graham shakes his head and laughs at me.... but I am ok with the potty.  I am one with my potty.