On our tour of Tanzania there was a female Australian named Zoe that, quite frankly, was absurdly stupid. Travelling alone (probably because anyone who met her for more than three minutes would never consider travelling with her), her idea of a fantastic holiday in Africa was to go out on game drives and spot animals. Fair enough - sounds like the same sort of idea we had, right? Alas, where we came to a difference of opinion was that when we found an animal, we were able to fight the urge to lean out the nearest window and scream loudly at it. Zoe was not…

Every time we came to a pond containing hippos, Zoe would excitedly scream “HEY! HUNGRY HUNGRY HIPPOS! DO SOMETHING! GET OUT OF THE WATER! MOVE! MOVE! HEY! HIPPOS! HUNGRY HUNGRY HIPPOS!”

She would also scream inane things like “HELLO BAMBI!” at impala, “HELLO KITTY! HERE KITTY KITTY KITTY!” at lions, etc. The animals naturally reacted by moving away from the truck quickly so all we saw were rapidly receding backsides. Obviously this was not the sort of thing the other travellers wanted so they tried telling her to be a little quieter but to no avail.

During one game drive when she yelled at an impala, I leaned over to Di in what I honestly thought was a quiet fashion and muttered “Does she have to yell at EVERY animal?“. Evidently it was not quiet enough because Zoe heard me and then barked at me that she could in fact yell at every animal she wanted to because she had paid for her trip and she was entitled to enjoy it so I could go to hell.

In a lovely karmic twist, and I wish I could take credit for slipping her laxatives in her coffee but cannot, Zoe got a large dose of gastro the next day and spent the rest of the week lying asleep on the truck during most game drives. Too afraid to yell out the window unless squeezing her abdominal muscles led to an unexpected release of bodily fluids, the world was suddenly a better place.

Categories: Travel, SPOTD, Africa 2007