Namibia…now Botswana

I had a great time in Namibia.  It is the cleanest country I have been in.  There is not one piece of paper or plastic bag blowing around anywhere!  Really!!  Apparently they teach the kids from the time they can pick things up that it is their responsibility to keep Namibia clean and beautiful.  Hmmm…start them off young with the right training and you wind up with a sparkling clean country.  Perhaps this works for other things.

To my great pleasure, I was taken to NICE for dinner.  This is the spectacular restaurant in a beautiful old mansion run by Namibia Institute of Culinary Education, in Windhoek…yup, students doing all the cooking.  In addition to the wonderful food, service, and decor, they have the most interesting photographs on the walls: the cooks and the famous dunes of Namibia…together.  Take a look…you owe it to your eyes.  And visit…you owe it to your taste buds.

And I came away with a great possible project involving 10 southern African countries…which is a story for another day.

Now I’m in Gaborone, Botswana…another huge country with only a few people.  Namibia has less than 2mm people while Botswana has just over 2mm.  But it does have a nice little business…25% of the world’s diamonds come from Botswana.  I visited the senior folks at the Botswana Diamond Hub where we talked about…diamonds. 

Getting in is high security, fingerprint ID readers and lots of guards.  At least I wasn’t in a red zone where they strip search you before you leave!  Makes those damn assume the position pornographic airport scanners seem positively benign.

We actually knew people in common.  It never ceases to amaze me how if you wander around, talk to everyone, stay in touch a bit…your network eventually encompasses the entire world. Wow!

Today I’m off to meet the Deputy Principal Secretary of the Ministry of Trade.  I wonder who we’ll know in common.

By the way, one of the things that Botswana Diamond Hub is interested in is Diamond Tourism.  Let me know if you’d like to visit a diamond mine and wander around inside.  Maybe they’ll thrown in a safari to the first 100 people who come and visit.  Hmmm, perhaps a project?

Jwaneng Diamond Mine, Botswana…richest diamond mine in the world

Diamond Tip: Talk to people…you might find one