Soon after our return, we experienced another side of what it means to build something like this.
The safari vehicle that Tebogo had purchased two years ago — with donor support — was being driven across a deep channel to collect us from the airstrip.
The water was higher than expected.
The vehicle became submerged, and the engine stopped.
Once that happens, it cannot simply be restarted. Water entering the system can cause irreversible damage.
The driver sought help from a nearby camp, and a plan was made. A large truck, passing through from Maun with building supplies for another camp, would assist in pulling the vehicle out.
A few days later, the vehicle was recovered.
But when Tebogo arrived to retrieve it, he found that key components had been removed:
All five tyres.
The fuel injection system.
The battery.
They had been taken.
The large truck was later searched in Maun. Nothing was found. The parts had been offloaded somewhere along the way.
This has been a significant blow.
Not only financially — though the impact there is real, as funds intended to complete the camp and support ongoing work must now be redirected — but also in spirit.
There is something deeply disheartening in encountering this kind of loss within work that is rooted in care, trust, and relationship.
And yet, this too is part of the landscape. Not separate from it.
It is easy to speak about new ways of being in conservation and philanthropy when everything is flowing.
It is more revealing to remain in that orientation when things do not go as hoped.
This experience does not diminish what is being created.
But it does ask something more of it — and of those of us who feel called into relationship with it.
Patience.
Resilience.
A willingness to meet uncertainty without retreating into control.
And perhaps, a deeper understanding that work like this does not unfold in ideal conditions.
It unfolds in the real world — with all of its complexity.
Nothing about what we witnessed in the Delta has changed.
The quiet, steady creation of something rooted in place.
The absence of performance.
The presence of real relationship.
If anything, this experience has clarified what it means to stand alongside it.
Not only in moments of awe and coherence —
but also in moments where things fall apart, and must be tended to, patiently, piece by piece.
If we are to support work like this, we are not supporting a polished outcome.
We are participating in a living process.
One that includes beauty and difficulty.
Creation and loss.
Trust and the testing of that trust.
And perhaps this is part of the shift.
To move away from expecting certainty, control, and clean narratives —
and toward a form of participation that is willing to remain present within the full reality of what is unfolding.
Share this link with your friends.
About The Wonderment Co-op
