Petrichor

I never knew there was a specific word for it, but there you go. Petrichor, the earthy smell accompanying rain. We smelt it strongly a couple of times today, and it was very refreshing after the mugginess. The rain first spat and then hammered down for a heavy shower in the afternoon. I don’t know what their local name is but these bursts of rain before the main wet season remind me of Cambodia’s ‘mango showers’.

Wildlife are glimpsed and leave their traces everywhere. Whether it be the spider descending to dangle over dinner, the lizard leaving its excrement on my soap (possibly the same culprit who lurks under my towel), the bushbaby shrieking outside the tent, the pair of orange eyes in the dark trees, the crocodile drifting submerged down the river, the vervet monkeys using the vehicle as a playground, or the whip spider living on a wall in the shower.

This block to the left, now housing a laundry room and a store, was where Wim and Chelene pitched their dome tent when they first arrived in Chuilexi and when it was simply a patch by the river with a lot of elephant carcasses.