Mary Wafula

Alfa Network (Nairobi, Kenya)

Today’s Date: 16 July 2008

1. What interaction with an animal and/or nature in your life has had the biggest impact on you?

Cattle, especially bulls, My Dad used to keep bulls very big that you could think they were Buffaloes, and they had big horns, so one day I passed next to one charging Bull called Mulinge all of them had names, it swept me high on the air, landing down, people thought that I was dead, unfortunately my dad wasn’t far they did first aid for me, and the Bull was dehorned there and then.

2. Did you have a favorite place in the great outdoors during your childhood?

I used to go out with my dad to take care of the Bulls (grazing them) and I could not miss during Bull fighting, that morning before taking the Bulls for fighting we could feed the dedicated Bull with special foods more than the others, because it is victory meant a lot it will rebuild the reputation of our family name so my dad did a lot of effort to see that he maintains the reputation and respect to the community

Now? Life is expensive over here and I don’t have a favorite place at the moment.

3. As a former zookeeper, I would love to know what your favorite animal is and why?

Cattle, I have three cattles one cow two Bulls, I use bulls for ploughing, the cow dung is used as fertilizer, also we use wet cow dung for smearing the house, actually it is used like cement. You mix it with mud and you smear your house.

4. What do you think is the greatest environmental challenge facing us now, and what do you think will be the greatest challenge in the future?

Pollution from various places, like factories and industries, dumping which as cause disease and deaths, exhausting the forest for timber production, lacking water catchments, the forests attracts rain, no rain no production, starvation increases resulting to death.

5. If you could give one piece of advice regarding the environment and our natural resources, what would it be?

Environment is life and our natural resources is our wealth for foreign exchange, we should take care of it