Having been born and lived in Africa for the first 38 years of my life, I am passionate about wild animals. I have seen them up close, very close. Not as a hunter or on an organised safari, but from the back of a landrover, or sitting patiently waiting at a watering hole in the Kruger National Park, or floating down the Zambezi river in a small boat.
My favourite has to be the giraffe, vegetarian; graceful and elegant; calm and peaceful; long, lanky, gliding along on a breath of air.
I have just seen a documentary on Television about hunting and killing them as trophies to be taken back to boast about and hang over the fireplace, (usually by Americans). Although it is an economic reality in Africa these days, it sickened me.
If you've never been to Africa, do go, see these marvellous beasts, but please take ONLY photographs away with you when you return home.
