Corona Crazy

April 8, 2020April 8, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

“Is theese Bwana Jimmee?!” the crackling telephone kept screaming at me, to which I replied in French, that yes, I was the safari guide, Jim Heck, to which the enthusiastic person on the other line screamed again, “Is theese Bwana Jimmee?!!!”

Didn’t know what to do. I’d really been looking forward to a few hours off, basically just reading in my little room in the Mille Collines. I’d sent my group out on their own to stroll Kigali. I started to lose interest until the message changed, delivered by the same high-pitched screech, “Friends arrested!!”

Corona Chloroquine

April 6, 2020April 6, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

I know something about chloroquine. It was the reason I first got malaria.

It’s also the reason I’ve lost about 50% of the vision in my right eye. I listen with malaria shivers to a TV president espousing chloroquine as our vial of hope, and I’ve come to realize that it isn’t just evil that’s destroying our world, today. It’s also hope.

Calculating Corona – III

April 1, 2020April 1, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 1 Comment

You can’t travel for a year.

Nothing is available to suggest an older person will feel comfortable traveling very far from her home until she’s vaccinated against Covid-19, and Spring 2021 is likely the earliest this will happen. But once that sunrise arrives, you better be well prepared for what the fields will look like.

This is the final in a series of three blogs about managing your travel in the era of Covid-19. To fully understand these recommendations about your future travel, please carefully read first the previous two blogs.

Calculating Corona – II

March 31, 2020March 31, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 1 Comment

When will it be safe to travel, again?

This is the second of three blogs about travel in the era of the coronavirus pandemic. Yesterday’s explained why so much money is tied up, now, in scuttled travel and tomorrow’s will carry my recommendations about what you should do.

Calculating Corona – I

March 30, 2020March 30, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

American’s travel dollars are at greater risk than likely any other investments they hold. This is the first of three blogs explaining why and what to do in the era of Covid-19.

I’m going out on a limb, here, so it’s important that you follow my reasoning so that you can perceive its weaknesses and let me know. I’m as anxious as any traveler to find the looking-glass.

This first blog explains why these dollars are at such a risk and always have been. Tomorrow’s blog does my best at projecting when travel might be possible, again, and what other parts of the world – particularly Africa – will look like. And Wednesday’s blog will give my recommendations on what to do.

Corona Closeness

March 27, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 1 Comment

South African police and military are enforcing one of the strongest shelter-in-place orders in the world. Airports, rail, buses and all borders are closed. The country just exceeded a thousand cases and two deaths.

Two thousand miles north, Kenya has 31 cases and one death. All international flights are banned and police are rigorously enforcing physical distancing and a dusk to dawn curfew. Are these locally draconian policies proportionate to the threat?

Corona Insured

March 26, 2020March 26, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Travelers generally come from privileged classes so it pains me to talk about the unexpected suffering attending travelers, today. But that’s my job. It’s where my life’s been anchored.

Airlines and travel insurance companies are screwing travelers royally. In fact, they’re abusing them. Most larger non-American airlines unbound here by the stricter regulations constraining them on their home turf are exploiting the disastrous incompetence of our government to wave American passengers off with the finger. It’s turned our industry into a pack of thugs.

OnSafari: The Pig

March 24, 2020March 24, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

I’m supposed to be on safari now, filing my “OnSafari” reports back to you. Neither Kathleen or I can remember a March in our past when I wasn’t in Africa writing diaries before blogs, and try as I have with the overwhelming work cleaning up the mess of mass cancellations, I just can’t shake thinking I’m on safari.

Corona Conscience

March 20, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

“This sounds like something we’d be talking about in an underdeveloped country,” the Mayor of New York said today.

If I attributed that remark, as any good journalist would, even some of the fairest liberals would hesitate and wonder if it were “political” or “biased.” And we’d never get to the point of whether it was true.

Corona Containment

March 18, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Withdraw into our shelter-in-place and our vision contracts. Personally I find it harder and harder to concentrate on Africa. My children are much closer.

This week’s winner for best current phrase is, “Let’s keep politics out of this.” Don’t conflate “politics” with “truth,” “trust,” or “experience.” Don’t allow phrases to replace thought. We’re near the point of a federal collapse, a mushroom cloud of dollars blown off the tips of skyscrapers onto state and local authorities that are running helter-skelter below swinging nets trying to catch some.

Corona Africa

March 16, 2020March 16, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

America, wake up.

“There is no shortage of lab tests [for coronavirus] in Africa,” Rosanna Peeling, chair of diagnostics research at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine told South Africa’s Fin24 a few hours ago. Stated, yet still hard to believe.

But because of this perception together with the widely exposed negligence of America managing the virus, Americans have been banned from South Africa and Kenya as of last night.

Corona Don’t Fly

March 13, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Might this have had something to do with the rush by all the world airlines this morning to waive all fees for changes over very generous time frames?

“I certainly wouldn’t get on a plane for a pleasure trip. If it was just for fun, no way would I do it,” says Dr. Anthony Fauci to CNN.

Corona Crisis

March 12, 2020March 12, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Oh my. A careful reading of the Presidential Proclamation limiting travel starting midnight Friday, and Homeland Security’s accompanying brief shows how woefully inadequate and perhaps intentionally baneful the action is.

The limitation does not apply to Americans, green-card holders and a host of others including most NGOs, cargo and health workers, nor of course the crews and staff of airlines or other transport companies. These exemptions put in certain doubt the effectiveness of the ban.

Corona Collapse

March 11, 2020March 11, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

I’m not a scientist or a medical doctor. I’m a safari guide entrusted not just with the safety and enjoyment of my clients, but with the integrity of their prepaid travel. What do I do?

This isn’t hypothetical. I have a safari scheduled for next week to Tanzania. Because the African vendors there will share the financial miseries, I’ve postponed the trip. Why?

Corona Chaos

March 9, 2020March 11, 2020 by Arusha ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

Coronavirus is creeping into Africa but at a much slower rate than some expect given the high levels of transport exchange between Africa, China and even Italy.

South Africa reported a seventh case, prompting a school closure in a suburb of Johannesburg.

Twenty-two passengers who arrived Uganda yesterday from China, Korea and Italy were given the option of two weeks self-funded self-quarantine or to turn around and go back. They all went back.