I returned to the soil I was born on in January of 2024. It was half a century after I first arrived needy and wrinkled into the bright sunshine of this colourful continent.
I was returning to my roots. Not my ancestral ones but my personal ones. To the memories of my childhood spent very happily running barefoot under mango and avocado trees.
I wanted to see the red soil. Hear the call of the birds. Look up at huge tropical tulip trees with their flaming red petals. Walk the neighbourhoods and smell the woodsmoke.
I wanted to be around the people. The familiar sound of chatter and traffic and the artistic creativity spilling out of every corner.
The grey cold damp British winter melancholy had firmly set in and I was longing for an African summer.
Ready to swap my blues for brighter colours and brighter temperaments.
To feel like I was at home.
Among the people & the animals I grew up with.
To return to my love for elephants. The reason I studied Zoology at University.
Mak - Imire's giant - a true gentleman!
So I returned home and reconnected with so much that I had been missing.
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