Chapter 15 - Trumper

After a successful week of work in Moshi, we headed to Arusha where we planned to take a safari tour before our next volunteer experience.
We had hoped that we could get a discounted tour from operators connected to the charity we worked with, but the company we were put in contact with seemed to want to charge us about double what we were quoted from other operators, so we negotiated with Fig Tree who happened to have a sale on and book a 5 day tour of North Tanzania.
We arrived in Arusha Tuesday afternoon after a very cramped and full shuttle that should have taken 2 hours, but instead took 3.5 and should have taken 22 people, but the conductor had other ideas. As we travelled to Arusha, shocked at the conductor’s constant acceptance of new passengers with no consideration to the existing passengers that they would be practically sitting on. Luckily, we arrived with our legs still working, and due to the rain starting, we took the first cab driver that stuck his head into the window to talk to Caz. We hadn’t planned to take a taxi as the hotel was supposed to be close by, but the rain was falling hard and we wanted to get away from the crowds of people trying to tout at us.
We arrived at the Venice hotel, a simple but nice hotel in the heart of Arusha. The hotel had been booked by the tour company and we had expected to meet the operator that we had already paid 50% to, but when he texted to inform us that he would meet us at breakfast, we were glad to have a free evening.
After a hot shower and change of clothing, we headed out to a local restaurant, with the intention of dinner and getting out the final payment from an ATM. It was already nightfall, so we walked with purpose through the main market in Arusha to try and find the restaurant we had found on google maps. Sadly, we couldn’t find it, so had to settle for our 2nd choice, which didn’t serve booze! We ordered burgers and some tasty coffee, finished up our dinner and headed to find an ATM. We had had some issues with our travel money cards, so after trying 3 ATMs, we managed to get out a lump sum and were glad not to have to worry about ATMs and card machines for a little bit and returned to the hotel for an early night.
The next morning, we packed up and grabbed breakfast and met with Henry from the tour company to hand over the outstanding amount for our tour. By this point our apprehensions about getting ripped off were calmed and we were just keen to get on the road! We were informed that we would pick up another traveller in Arusha, before meeting the rest of our group just outside Arusha.
We jumped in the car, only to get stuck in traffic and take over 30mins to travel what would have been a 10min walk.
When we finally got to the collection point, we were met by another car that had two Masai guys escorting an older American woman.
She seemed sweet, if not chatty and scatty, so we entertained her endless stories and mostly complaints about being conned by her tour operator. We were empathetic to begin with as being conned was one of our fears, but as we waited over 25mins to leave, our patience wore thin.

Once on the road, she spoke about everything and anything, she asked a million questions and boasted about her extensive travels of India.
Before we had even left, she had concerns about where she was staying. She had been emailed one place yet given two different names which were not where we were due to be staying. We could see the colour leave her face as she realised that we would be staying in Camping accommodation! We could tell with her frail body that camping would be her nightmare!
You couldn’t help feeling sorry for her, she had been up since 4am, hadn’t eaten breakfast, had been conned out of money, and was now possibly having to camp? But the complaining was starting to weigh on us and we were glad to arrive at the next collection point and meet the rest of our tour group and hopefully get a break from the complaints.

As we loaded into our tour car at a petrol station, our American friend was quick to retell all her complaints and issues to our tour guide.
We could have moved, but instead she insisted she needed food, while haggling with the Masai women for trinkets to take back to the barristers in her local Starbucks.
Our tour guide was patient and even took her to see where we would be staying later than night, while we waited at the petrol station.

The rest of our group was European and from their facial expressions, you could tell that there had already formed their opinions about our American tour buddy. We found out later it was because she had rudely demanded they move seats because she had been promised the front seat.
Once on the tour, we sat at the back of the bus, but this didn’t stop her directing all the questions and complaints to Caz. She seemed to have formed an attachment and insisted that she should visit her in Florida and joked about how Mark could come too.

Our first stop was Tarangire and by that point we were all looking forward to being distracted by the African Wildlife. As we waited at the gate to get our entry processed, she took the chance to question everyone about where they are from (her fave thing to do) instead of going to the restroom or get something to eat.
She was going to be hard work, but we assumed that observing nature might stun her into silence or at least quiet.
As we entered the park and were fortunate to come across a large pride of Lions, we learned that silence or indoor voice wasn’t something she could do.
We recorded videos of the lions strolling past us, but many were ruined by her practically screaming “Isn’t that amazing” or “oh wow” in the background.

Our game drive around Taragire was wonderful (except for the insistent jabber), we saw many lions, Zebra, Antelopes and a large herd of elephants! Mark was very excited to come so close to nature and although we had seen lions before on previous trips to get this close to a pride of lions and a herd of elephants was amazing. Marks camera was constantly clacking trying to get shots, but Caz could tell he was trying his best to ignore Trumpers constant talking, viewing wildlife up close is a moving moment so its difficult when someone is ruining the moment with their loudness.
The sun had come out in force in between the rain showers, but the rain meant that more of the wildlife was out.

We stopped for our packed lunch in a public picnic area that was crowded with monkey ready to pounce at your food the first chance you get! We were told to stay vigilant and understood why when one Monkey snatched one of the groups lunch boxes quicker than she knew what was happening!

After lunch we set off for our afternoon game ride, where we view more Lions, Zebras, and Wilder beast in larger amounts than we expected.
It was 1730 but the time we got to our first camp, and after almost 11 hours in the car, we were keen to get settled in and get a drink.
American Jabber had arranged to speak to the owner of the campsite, because even thou she hadn’t planned on staying onsite, she thought complaining to another person about her tour would get the issue resolved? For all our sakes, we hoped she would find a happy resolution and we would be able to have a complaint-free tour.

We sat watching the sun set from the Kizumba Campsite with wine and beer in hand, happy to have peace while we reflected and reviewed photos of the wonderful creatures we had seen today. That peace was quickly disturbed by our American tour mate, who after having a meeting with the owner, had decided to cut her tour from 14 to 5 days, so she could finish out the tour with us (Coz she liked us so much).
We had barely socialised before the subject of American politics came up, something we would have avoided had she not started talking about the conspiracy theory she believed was going on in the states. This peaked Caz’s interests more than Mark, but we entertained the conversation and stupidly asked why! That’s when we found out that she was a Trump fan that not only believed that Obama and Soros were staging a coup…. but that all black people love Trump?
We tried to hide our disgust (Caz more than Mark), but when we actually engaged her in a debate challenging her beliefs about his black supporters, Republicans regularly fail to garner 20% of the African American vote and Trump received roughly 8% in the 2016 election (Peter Baker New York Times), she responded aggressively and shut down the conversation. She then got up saying we shouldn’t talk about politics and walked away leaving both of us stunned at what we had just heard and witnessed.
We should have known considering she kept insisting on us visiting her in Trump strong hold Florida, or the fact she considered herself a liberal because she had gay friends (and that her daughter coming out to her at 40), but we would have never expected someone who boasted about how much she loved India and was currently travelling Africa, could actually be a Trump supporter!
Despite how awkward it got, we hoped that this would give her less reason to talk to us!

All our meals on the tour were communal, so we had no choice but to go and sit at the same table with her for dinner. As we approached the table, sitting on the furthest end, we made sure to avoid eye contact, but before we had even sat down, she piped up to say, “I really like you guys, we shouldn’t talk about politics!” To which Caz responded, politics is fine, just not Trump.
The rest of the dinner we did everything we could to talk to the other people in our group, but she tried everything she could to get Caz to talk to her.
After dinner, we tried to quickly exit and head to our tents, but she grabbed Mark as Caz walked away, to comment on how she thought he was rather aggressive! Apparently, challenging her beliefs was a sign of aggression! By that point we wished she had cancelled the tour, as the next 4 days were going to be tough!

The following morning, we were up at 5.15 to pack and get in breakfast before we had to go and collect the Trumper from her alternative accommodation.
On the drive there, the rest of the group got to vent about her and how she was working all our nerves! We just hoped that her accommodation was up to scratch and that she had some damn breakfast.
As soon as we arrived at her lodge, we spotted her in the dinning area eating, yet she came out immediately to complain about how she was supposed to be having breakfast at that time. Considering we had all woken up an hour and a half earlier than her, just to get to her, started our day off wrong.
We had all already discussed one avoidance tactic, and we planned to don headphones to minimise conversation with her, but once she started complaining about breakfast and telling another person not involved in the tour about her issue, we were quick to put them on.
When she finally got into the Van, she was handed her breakfast, but we were delayed again because she had to double check her luggage was on…. even thou it had just been loaded.

Trumper aside, we were excited to visit our next location, the Serengeti! Our tour guide also offered us the opportunity to fit in a visit to a Masai village.
We would be travelling through Ngorongoro before arriving in the Serengeti, so we stopped at the submit view to take some photos from the top.
On the road we spotted many Baboons, Zebras and Giraffes! The Giraffes seemed quite shy and aware, so it was almost like they would try and hide from your photo.

After the summit view of Ngorongoro, our next stop was the Maasai village about 2 hours away.

The landscape was vast and harsh but wasn’t enough to distract the Trumper from complaining and trying to make conversation with us. Us wearing headphones wasn’t enough to stop her, she’d just flail her hand at your face until you were forced to take off the headphones.
She was physically limited, so we took the opportunity to stand up and watch the view from the safari sunroof. It was harder for her to get our attention, and it was easier for us to ignore her.

When we arrived at the Masai village, we were greeted by the head of the village, who would be taking us on a tour. We had seen a few Masai villages on the way that already had tourists, so were glad that we were the only ones at our village.
Pretty quickly into the tour, the whole village stared at Caz. The women in our group were taken away to be dressed, before being included in the welcome performance. A lot of the curious stares were because they all believed she was Masai and when Caz was dressed, she really did look one of them. After the welcome performance was finished, we were taken on a tour of there water site, where they informed us that they had to pay for water, at which point Trumper so graciously offered another $10 to do her part. We then moved on to the school and interrupted a class to hear a student do the alphabet and count to 10 in English. The village leader informed us that English was now an important part of the Masai education, to keep up with changing times.
The teachers in class also commented that Caz must be Masai!
The rest of the group refrained from taking too many photos, as it was already awkward, but Trumper jumped in the middle of class and had to have her photo taken with the kids.
After leaving the school, she commented nonstop about how magical it was to be there, despite this being her 2nd Masai village tour.
Next we visited a traditional the home of the Masai tour leader, we had to bend halfway just to walk through the door into this dark hut that consisted of two compartments and a storage space. It was shocking how small the space was, and even more about the rules of sleeping. Men only shared a bed with the women when they were trying to procreate. Considering that the children slept by the makeshift stove, we imagined them trying to sleep with their parents going at it in the next room, that was just separated by wicker.
We had been split into two groups by this point and we drew the short straw and had to share a smaller space with Trumper and her incessant questions.

The tour naturally ended with us shopping! There was a big large display of handmade crafts, so we couldn’t resist adding to our bracelet collection! We had not expected that we would pay like $35 for 3 bracelets and a pair of earrings?! Thankfully we had managed to haggle it down from $60 dollars due to having limited cash on us. Trumper had also bought a couple of bracelets, but we were in the car 2 mins before she forgot her generous ways and commented on how “we obviously got into the wrong business’’ alluding that the Masai leader was a bit of a wheeler dealer. We partially agreed but thought it funny she was willing to give away money for free but had issue with paying a certain amount for buying something.

After our short excursion to the Masai, we continued for a couple of hours before arriving at the official gate of the Serengeti. There wasn’t much to do there, so we took a pic and quickly moved on to start our afternoon game drive.
As soon as we officially entered the park, we viewed several hyenas chilling out! We would have liked to hear them laugh, but they were just sunbathing.
Trumper had a habit of forcing people to move so she could take a shot on her iPad, Camera and phone, before deciding that our driver was best placed to take photos for her.
The driver had a constant radio connection with other tours guides, so after hearing that there were more lions close by, we went somewhat off road in search of the lions.
It was another 40 minutes before we spotted the other tourists cars surrounding a grass mound signalling that we had found them.
We drove up as close as we could to the mound and started taking pictures of three females just relaxing. It was so awe inspiring, that our group and the other groups watched them quietly, yet Trumper couldn’t help commenting about them at the top of her voice, as well as practically screaming “Where are you from” (her fave question to start with) at tourists in another Van.
It was so infuriating to have the peace interrupted by her chats with other tourists, that there may have been a couple of times we ssh’d her. However, the lighting was perfect with dark clouds behind the lions and bright sunshine lighting up their fur, Mark was happy for the good lighting conditions and snapped happily away.
Eventually, the area became more and more crowded by other tourists, so we decided to continue, only to find another lone female wondering. We had been lucky with the lion sightings so far.

There were a lot of animals in migration, so we spotted a lot of wilder beast, Zebras, Impalas and Antelopes. Every time we passed another group of Antelopes and Gazelles, Trumper needed to ask “What are those” like she hadn’t already seen like 100s of them.
Nightfall was approaching before we caught a glimpse of cheater! We found 2 or 3 tourists cars sitting patiently trying to spot the Cheeter in the long grass. He was lying down, so we waited eagerly for him to pop his head up. Despite being told to keep our voices down not to scare him away, Trumper couldn’t resist making benign comments.

By this point we were tired and hungry keen to make our way to our next campsite. The day had been long and tiring, especially since we only really ate two items from our lunch box, as we didn’t like the rest of what was offered.
As we approached our 2nd camp, we realised how wild it was going to be, and Trumper could not help but comment “oh you guys are really camping” with a smirk. We had stayed in Banda tents the first night, but tonight we were staying in traditional tents. Despite our surprise at how basic the camp was, we were glad to be getting away from Trumper.
We exited the van, grabbed our stuff and headed to our tents without so much as a goodbye or even looking back.
As soon as we had settled, we realised that we were missing something vital – booze! This camp didn’t have a Bar, so we had to find other ways of getting booze. When we saw the other campers turning up with booze, we knew that we had missed a trick in bringing our own.

The evenings always felt more relaxed without Trumper around and gave the rest of us a chance to get to know each other without Trumper dominating the experience. That night started as normal, we took the chance to vent about her and laughed at her self-obsession and lack of awareness. Surely, she knew that none of us really liked her?! Especially when we realised, we had been travelling for almost 24hrs and hadn’t even had a chance to share our names

with each other.
As night fell, the bugs came with a vengeance! We had asked our tour driver to try get us some booze after he returned from dropping Trumper off at her accommodation, and as we waited in the dinning room, surrounded by flying creatures, we eagerly awaited his return. Lucky for us, there was a small shop in the Serengeti that was for the workers, so we scored some beer and wine.
Although, as we ducked and dived the multiple flying bugs that were attracted to the lights, we wondered how Trumper would have been able to take it if she was here!
By the time the tour guide returned, we were all slightly traumatised and really appreciated the alcoholic beverage!
Dinner was an experience too, as sitting under the lights, not only did we have to duck, but we had to protect our food. We eventually opted to move tables to a darker corner, as ate our dinner in hysterics in the dark.

Caz had started a conversation with a wildlife photographer that had been staying in the Serengeti for 2 weeks and took the opportunity to excitedly introduce him to Mark. He gave us a tip on where we could get a sighting of a Leopard and its cub, as they don’t tend to travel very far when the cubs were young.

We had another early morning, so after a delicious and impressive dinner of Pasta and Stroganoff, we headed to bed to finish off the wine in

our tents.
Going to the bathroom was like a nightmare as not only were the lit doorways were swarmed with bugs, but the bathroom floor was covered in them. Only thing to do was get your hood up and run through the swarm and try not to freak out.
We went to bed praying we wouldn’t need to go to the bathroom again, not only because of bugs, but because we could encounter a buffalo or 2 that roamed the camp. This truly was wild camping.

The next morning was another early breakfast and we were treated to the sunrise and a viewing of an elephant travelling through our camp! Despite the fact we would be returning for Brunch, we had to go through the process of packing and loading our bags before heading to pick up Trumper at her accommodation. We were looking forward to seeing more of the Serengeti and hoped that Trumpers accommodation would give her no reason to start the day with complaints.

We had shared our intel about the cheetah with our tour guide, but on route to pick up Trumper we were blessed by a sitting of a leopard in a tree! We had caught site of it just after a kill - a dead antelope folded over a branch nearby, but having spotted us watching, it left it kill in the tree and tried to hide itself in the tall grass lands.
It was so great to be able to view the leopard without any background noise or

comments.
We couldn’t stay long as we were already 20mins late to pick up Trumper, but before we continued our journey, we had all promised not to mention it to her, for we knew that this would make our lives harder, and we would not hear the end of it.

We arrived at her camp, which was much posher with large bell tents to find her drinking tea and scrolling through her phone. Luckily, she was happy with this accommodation and attempted to be sarcastic by saying “This is really terrible isn’t it?” we had been so used to her complaining, it took us a minute to register that she was happy with the place.
A couple of the staff members seemed keen to get her on her way and they ushered her into the car with a packed breakfast and lunch. Unfortunately, she found issue with the tour guides cologne, so he had to go and wash himself off, because it was affecting her sinuses.
We all rolled our eyes and exchanged sympathetic looks with him when he returned to set off on our journey.

Sadly, for her, we didn’t spot anymore leopard that day, but lucky for us we didn’t have to experience it with her. Our headphones were on pretty much all the time, as it was getting harder not to call her out for her complaining or incessant questions, or asking the driver for the 50th time the same question? The answer was almost always…it’s a Gazelle or it’s an Antelope. If we had booze available, we could have turned it into a shots game and got very drunk!

After a morning game drive, we headed back to our wild camp for a cooked brunch and the first time we didn’t have lunch boxes. Karma must have been working, as Trumper joined us only to have to eat from her pre-packed lunch box. She commented that she had a lunch box because her lodge was more expensive yet was eyeing our delicious feast enviably.
We wished that we didn’t have to eat lunch together, but it meant another session of her talking over everyone, while we just tried to be polite and get through our lunch.
There were still remnants of the flying creatures, but the camp had been cleaned up. She commented on the dead flies on the floor and we all smirked imagining how she would have coped the night before.

Caz was at the end of her tether and was quick to leave the table to avoid enforced conversation, especially since she was still stuck on her! She envied our German tour mate’s ability to not only ignore her, but also avoid responding to her questions! She had the ability to make a facial expression that would send us into laughter, and she had said she thought Trumper was crazy and a full-time job.

We finally left the Serengeti after an amazing experience, the drive out of the park is quite a long one and we all gazed out of the window as the vehicle bumped and jumped along the dusty rocky road. We got to the main gates and had to stop so as our driver could finish paperwork with the park wardens. We were all waiting in the shade of the safari track trying to stay out of the hot sun when the Trumper took the opportunity to pull Caz aside for a chat. She was off to a bad start and was adamant that all black people in America are pro Trump and no has done more for African Americans then Trump has. Caz was upset that she felt that she had the right to talk for all black people even in the face of evidence that shows that wasn’t true. The discussion got very heated and Caz went through many of Trumps sexist, racist actions and comments. In the end Mark had to pull Caz away from Trumper and take her away to cool down and relax. Some of the tour came over to check if Caz was ok and everyone was upset but also annoyed. Trumper was both ignorant of the issues people of colour face whilst blaming those same problems on either Obama, or on the people themselves. She was also willing to be on Trumps side regarding the tragedy at Charlottesville and his inability to condemn the act of violence and fascism that occurred there, both Mark and Caz were confused at her inability to see the rise in racism since the onset of populism across Europe and the USA. Mark had already decided there was to be no reasoning with the lady and was keen to protect Caz from her. After returning to the van Trumper started crying and kept saying how people usually love her and that her experience so far had made her behave strangely, we both looked at each confused by our theatrics and her rationale for her behaviour. She had written some notes on a piece of crumpled paper and gave them to Caz. We both assumed that they were an attempt to find peace or even an apology. However, we opened the paper up to find birther theories about Obama being born in Kenya, and other fake stories the Right in America has been spewing to its followers. Mark commented why does Obama being born in Kenya (he was born in Hawaii) have to be a bad thing anyway? Surely that is a sign of racism there, the fixation that Obama shouldn’t be a president due to being born in Africa. The fact that Trumper would act so childishly at her senior age was gobsmacking, a small crumpled up bit of paper given as a peace offering, only to be full of trump propaganda. The note was swiftly thrown in the bin.
Next was the wonderful Ngorongoro, a large crater just south of the Serengeti. As we all crammed back into the vehicle though Trumper (noticing Caz’s silent treatment) started to make snide comments about “some people” being rude or unkind, everyone in the safari truck started to ignore her completely.
We dropped off in Ngorongoro to camp for the night and we were to be in basic tents again, but we were more than happy to relax outside of our tent for a while chatting with other safari goers and enjoying the sunset over the crater. We knew it was another very early morning to get down the crater the following morning so had an early night, this time we were prepared and had already bought some wine!
We were supposed to be picked up super early around 6am, but our lift was late, apparently there had been issues with Trumpers accommodation meaning the safari truck was late for us to go down the crater. The driver apologised, but we all knew it wasn’t his fault. Trumper made rude comments about how it smelt and it must be Caz that was smelling(Racist moves 101), she was trying to tell one of other people in the safari truck that Caz smelt, but she was ignored, we had by this time been camping for four days straight and buffaloes had been wandering through our camp site so there was bound to animal dung everywhere. She proceeded to say more rude comments about Caz under her breath(anything to get a reaction), or to anyone who would listen, but she wasn’t very good at reading the room, and by this point everyone on the tour didn’t want to listen and was behind Caz so her comments landed on deaf and irritated ears.
Ngorongoro was stunning, mist was over the hill as descended the steep climb into the park down the crater wall. It was breath taking, even though the park had less animals and possibly less to see it was still beautiful. We saw lions eating at a distance, and were lucky enough to catch some lions mating, many of the trucks got very close to the male lion and he sprayed one vehicle!

After an amazing experience in Ngorongoro we started the long drive back to Arusha where we would be staying in the same hotel again. We were all exhausted and couldn’t wait for a good night’s sleep and a hot shower. We all took measures not to share our hotel location Infront of Trumper as we had been informed by our driver that she had asked him for everyone’s information (without asking anyone) so that we could all go out for dinner together...Seriously? In what world was she living in? As we got close to Arusha the rain coming down hard and we could see evidence of a lot of flooding on the streets. We said our goodbyes ignoring Trumper as much as possible, our friends from the tour were keen to say goodbye but they couldn’t leave the vehicle as the rain was so strong, so we shook their hands through the window and ran off to shelter. Caz looked happy to never see Trumper again, but sad to say goodbye to our friends from the tour. We got to our hotel room exhausted and had an amazing journey but learnt that today’s politics can be so divisive, especially in the climate of populist leaders