Facing death in the African bush

I travel to the African bush frequently, at least once a year. It takes my mind of British politics. The trips often involves watching predators hunting down their prey and then tearing the poor animals limb from limb. Red in tooth and claw, the African bushveld reminds me of the fragility and brevity of life and the ever-presence of death.

A week ago I was in the Botswana’s Okavango Delta, at the safari operator Natural Selection’s new North Island camp, when I suddenly found myself confronting my own mortality. I had gone to bed early after a pleasant meal in the camp’s mess with several fellow guests, including two eminent Americans, a wealthy New York investment banker and a prominent Miami medical professor. I lay in my tent dozing off to the soothing grunts of hippos in the nearby pool.

My dreams that night were vivid, as they often are when I’m in the African bush.