Gael Whelan 
Nomondi’s Basket 

Two men entered a branch of Barclays Bank on Pearl Street in Salisbury this morning. They held the four bank employees at gunpoint whilst they robbed the vault that had just been opened for business hours. They escaped with five hundred thousand pounds. Along with the money, three newly minted seal matrixes and their molds were stolen. The seals are unique in that two of them are used in the office of the prime minister Sir Godfrey Martin Huggins, while the third seal is a newly designed seal, designed by local artist Lawenta Godari. This seal has been minted in honor of Her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth IIs upcoming visit to Southern Rhodesia in August of this year. Seal matrixes of this type are often considered to be powerful political tools, as they are used to seal and confirm agreements between foreign governments. The seal designed by Godaria is known as the Great Rhodesian Seal and was to be used to notarize the signing of the agreement between Northern and Southern Rhodesia to build the Kariba Dam Hydro Electric Project.

At time of going to press, the British South Africa Police Robbery Branch have no leads as to the whereabouts of the thieves or the stolen property. Barclays Bank has offered a reward of twenty thousand pounds for the return of the stolen property and the capture and conviction of the thieves.

Über den Autor

Gael was born in Scotland and went on her first journey as an infant from the United Kingdom to Canada on the Queen Mary liner. This was to be the first of many journeys to come. When she was three years old, she moved to Africa with her family. It was here that she learned that Africans referred to a journey as a safari. Somehow, the family adopted safari for every trip, as it built anticipation for an exciting adventure!

The earliest safaris took the family along the strip roads of northern and southern Rhodesia (now Zambia and Zimbabwe), where there were many close encounters with wild elephants, buck, birds, crocodiles, rhinos, and people! To this day, every member of Gael’s family continues to call their trips safaris.

It was on one of these safaris to Mana Pools that Gael introduced her young children and their cousins to the characters of the Masawani Game Park to entertain them on their safari. The children enjoyed the stories immensely, especially when their ideas were woven into the tale, and time seemed to stand still. Gael’s sister Lexie, thankful for both the peace and quiet of the distracted children and the memories the stories evoked, insisted that they be recorded!

Well, here they are. It is the author’s hope that everyone who reads her stories will develop a curiosity and a respect for life and nature in other countries.