Julien’s Journal
Meeting the farmers…
I have lined up today to go out and interview the farmers. Each
interview might take 1.5 hours, so I’ll be happy if I can do 4 or 5. I’m going off
very soon to meet my interpreter and we’ll head into Dingleydale. I’ll be VERY
pleased if these interviews go well as I’ll have made a big start to my work by
the end of the week. I only intended to speak to 12 – 15 farmers while here so
I’ll have hopefully done a considerable piece of my work by the time I see
everyone back at Hectorspruit on the weekend.
I attended a farmers’ workshop yesterday and got to address a small
group of farmers, extension workers and officials. It seems they will need
considerable prompting in the interviews to get answers out of them. I’m hoping
this won’t cause a problem of validity with my work as prompting them too much
may be leading the interviewee.
The only thing keeping me back at the moment is my guts. I’m just about
to dash off again and Immoduim is fast becoming a staple of my diet. Not fun at
all.
I also went on one of the most frightening bushwalks of my life
yesterday. Sarah, one of the other students here, who assured me that she was
an accomplished bushwalker decided that we would go out, in our shorts and see
what bugger all is out there. After seeing that snake when I first got here I
won’t go anywhere unless I’m safely tucked away in my car. These snakes are as
long as I am tall and the venom gets through your blood faster than gin. You
don’t even have time to say “ouch” before these things have killed you. And
there I am, in the middle of the long grass, following a girl in shorts
whacking a big stick into the bushes. Geeeeeeeeezzzz! No wonder I’ve got the
shits so much!
Now, getting on the internet has been a bloody mini-series here and so
I’m not even going to bother this week. I’ll do another entry on Saturday and
upload everything I’ve been doing on Saturday at Nelspruit mall, the only place
in the country so far I’ve found a decent internet connection.
Bye for now,
Julien