And we found Steve Singleton, thanks to Trevor Stone who was Odibo's chief mechanic and fleet manager at that time. And so, he and his old buddy Steve Hill are now connected. Neat, hey?!

WELL! Since posting this in February, a huge adventure is unfolding, with the result that in a week's time I'm heading to Stockholm Sweden to hug and touch and talk and talk and talk with Veronica Hiyalwa, who while in exile chose the name Tamina and then married a Swedish man, has a lovely daughter called Primrose, lives in Stockholm and is right now finishing her Masters thesis about "E-Health in Rural Namibia" inbetween working in the Immigration department, and often visits her 94 year old mother in Onamunama which is east of Odibo. Our reunion started the moment she replied to my email following her post here on this blog. She said "I'm turning 60 in June and I want you to celebrate it with me." While I was prepared to forfeit my life's savings to take her up on such an irresistable offer, my friends here rose up and offered all sorts of help, the most amazing of which was a donation of 60,000 airmiles from co-worker Sherry. And Kellie is driving me to and from Calgary airport, leaving here next Monday. That gets me all the way to Stockholm and back. And Caralea is lending me a good camera, and calls this the "It takes a village to send Antoinette to Namibia" project. Then Veronica offered to buy 'plane tickets (ndapandula, Veronica!) to fly me, Primrose and herself to Namibia, arriving on June th 9th. We'll be staying with Vistorina who subsequently nursed at Odibo and became Matron of the hospital, and who married Nathaniel Nakwatumba who was the music teacher when I was there and who is now the Anglican Bishop, based in Windhoek. On June the 12 we will celebrate Veronica's 60th birthday in Windhoek! Hopefully by then the news will have spread on the rapidly-growing grapevine, and any of the surviving students who are in the Windhoek area will join us, for what might also be their first ever sort of Highschool Reunion. Some possibilities are:- -- Monica Namweya who is working as a permanent secretary in one of the ministries. -- Veronica Nainguedja who lives in Windhoek. -- Josephina Hamutenya, now nDimfutu, who Odibo's ex-chief mechanic Trevor Stone recently reported having received a message "that she would love to see you when you are passing through Windheok. Best to contact via cell phone. …. She works as a nurse at Katutura Hospital. …… Josephina's life story has had many sad moments, as she recounted to me at Roger's house (the Deanery, in England) in 1996". -- Maybe Nancy Robson (who was elsewhere while I was at Odibo but is back there now, at age 74, building up an archive collection and eagerly awaiting my scrapbook) might be in Windhoek at this time with -- Meme Canner Kalimba (Nandi) who also still lives right outside the Odibo mission compound. -- Furancina Nandi who now goes by her indigenous name Netumbo. Netumbo Nandi-Ndaitwah is currently Namibia's feisty Minister of Environment and Tourism. Her husband is chief of the Defense Force. Just a couple of days she replied to my email, saying: " “Dear meme Antoinette, What a day to get an email from my teacher. I am looking forward to meet you. . . . . . . Toni you are very much well come back to Namibia. Regards Netumbo” and has invited me to a conference of environmental NGO's in Windhoek on June 13th, and on the 17th the "Day to Combat Desertification" at Opuwo in the far north west. It's likely too far west of the Odibo area where we'll be going, but who knows. I think it's where the ovaHimba are ... the people featured in that great "Babies!" movie. -- And Loth Chappel's son Petrus Haukongo will likely join us. Then we'll head north into, past the Etosha Pan game reserve, to what used to be called Ovamboland. In the Oshana region we'll hopefully find Julia Paulus who is apparently a businesswoman in Ondangua, and Hilika Joseph, who Trevor reports "is now a primary school teacher some 15 kms west of Engela and 20 kms north of Oshakati. This area is probably in some of the worst flooding" (the flooding that happened this March and April). Then eastwards into the Ohangwena region to Odibo where Loth Chappel worked for a long time and still lives nearby, and will have time with Canner and Nancy of course. Nancy would like my scrapbook for the archives she's been building. We'll see ... if I've managed to scan the whole thing by then, perhaps at Odibo is where it belongs. And hey! According to the labelled Google Earth image of Odibo that Nancy emailed us, the row of rooms now labelled "Guest house", where we will be staying, is where my room was, so I might be sleeping in my own room! Then further east to Veronica's mother's village, Onamunhama. Canner's fields, which she still tends, are over that way somewhere too. Then maybe west to Opuwo in the Kunene district to be with Netumbo again and learn about stemming the advance of desertification. Then back to Windhoek, flying out on June the 23rd. We were going to go back to Stockholm, but might be able to change our itinerary to visit Roger Key who is now rector of the Anglican church in Hopton Corton in England, and we've invited Cathy Wood and Trevor Stone (the head mechanic at Odibo when I was there) to join us at Roger's if we do that. My only regret is that I haven't managed yet to write the stories I'd so wished to, what with the whirlwind of emailing and sleuthing to find others, and then the very demanding Federal Election that was sprung on us here and whose Revelstoke NDP organizing I got 'volunteered' into coordinating because all the usual organizers were out of town etc. .... perhaps I'll write some stories on the 'plane. And I intend writing a running commentary on this trip, on a new page on this blog. So, stay tuned ....