Saba Douglas-Hamilton
Saba Douglas-Hamilton | |
|---|---|
| File:Saba-douglas-hamilton.jpg | |
| Born | 7 June 1970 |
| Nationality | Kenyan |
| Alma mater | University of St Andrews |
| Occupation | Broadcaster / Naturalist |
| Spouse | Frank Pope |
| Children | Selkie |
Saba Iassa Douglas-Hamilton (born 7 June 1970) is a Kenyan wildlife conservationist and television presenter.[1]
Early life
Born on a farm near Naivasha in the Great Rift Valley in Kenya, she is the daughter of zoologist, Iain Douglas-Hamilton and Oria Douglas-Hamilton née Rocco. Saba means "seven" in Swahili. She was named by Maasai women because she was born on 7 June at 7 o’clock in the evening, and was also the 7th grandchild.[1] Her first language was Swahili and she grew up playing with the local Kenyan children. Her father came to Africa as a young man to study and conserve elephant populations. Her white African ancestry comes from her mother who is the daughter of Italians who originally settled in Kenya in the 1920s. Her mother still farms at Lake Naivasha in the Great Rift Valley.[2]
She is a great-granddaughter of Alfred Douglas-Hamilton, the 13th Duke of Hamilton. Her sister Mara Moon Douglas-Hamilton, known as "Dudu" (which means 'insect'), is a film producer.[3]
Education
Douglas-Hamilton didn't start school in Kenya until she was seven, then went to the UK to an all-girls boarding school for three years which she later described as 'like a prison'[4]. She went on to attend the United World College of the Atlantic in South Wales to study for the International Baccalaureate. She gained a place at St Andrews University in Scotland and was awarded a Masters degree in Social Anthropology with a thesis on 'Concepts of Love and Sexuality amongst the Bajuni People of Kiwaiyu Island, Kenya'.[5]
Snake bite
When she was 18, Douglas-Hamilton was on a camel safari when she was bitten on her leg by a venomous snake. Sometimes misreported as an Asp (reptile) this was identified as a carpet viper. Small and aggressive, carpet vipers have an extremely virulent hemotoxic venom. Bites from them are possibly responsible for more deaths than from any other species.[6] Friends made a pressure bandage and gave her electric shocks to keep her awake until they reached help.[7]
Marriage
On 4 February 2006, Douglas-Hamilton married maritime archaeologist and author Frank Pope in a traditional Kenyan ceremony. They live in a small cottage outside Nairobi that was once an animal sanctuary. In March 2009, their daughter Sielke was born. Her name is a variaton of the selkies of Scottish legends of the Orkney and Shetland islands which are half seal and half human and said to be able to change into beautiful women. The baby was born outdoors in a birthing pool in a friend's garden in Cape Town, South Africa.[2]
Charity work
When she returned to Africa from her studies in the UK she worked for the Save the Rhino Trust in Namibia, mentored by conservationist Blythe Loutit.[8] Saba is a trustee of Save the Elephants, a charity founded by her father.[1] Based in Samburu National Reserve in the Great Rift Valley of Kenya, Save the Elephants carries out rigorous studies of elephants, including elephant collaring and more recently, sophisticated elephant tracking techniques. Through the charity Douglas-Hamilton has worked to support and protect African elephant populations and increase awareness of issues which threaten to erode elephant populations and the habitats in which they live[9].
In 2008 Douglas-Hamilton supported Merlin (Medical Emergency Relief International), the UK medical aid agency, to raise money for emergency health services following post-election violence when some 500 people were killed and more than 300,000 Kenyans left without homes or clean water.[10]
Television career
Since 2000, Douglas-Hamilton has appeared in a number of wildlife documentaries produced by the BBC and others. Many of these have been set in Africa and have featured elephants — an animal with which she became very familiar during her childhood. Since 2002, she has been co-presenter of the Big Cat Diary series, with Jonathan Scott and Simon King. She has also appeared in wildlife programmes set in other countries and regions, such as India, Lapland and in the Arctic, where she filmed polar bears. Since 2004, Saba has presented a number of short pieces featuring vacation destinations in the BBC Holiday series. In 2006, she appeared alongside Nigel Marven in one episode of Prehistoric Park in which she traveled back 10,000 years to study sabre-toothed cats. One particularly interesting documentary she produced and narrated was called Heart of a Lioness. It was about a wild lioness called Kamunyak, "the blessed one," who acted as a maternal guardian for the lion's natural prey: an antelope. In 2008 she produced and presented "Rhino Nights" for Animal Planet, using night-time cinematography to capture a previously unrecorded aspect of black rhino behaviour.
In March 2008 she presented a three part BBC documentary, Unknown Africa,[11] reporting on the state of wildlife in Comoros, Central African Republic and Angola.
In 2009 Douglas-Hamilton presented a three part BBC documentary series, The Secret Life of Elephants with her father Iain which explored the lives of elephants in Kenya's Samburu reserve and the work of the 'Save the Elephants' research team.[12] The series was also produced by the BBC as a successful DVD.[13]
Nissan advertisements
Douglas-Hamilton presented the Nissan Adventure advertisements shown in 2005 and 2006, where she drove a Nissan x-Trail and blew up a mine in Africa. As an avowed environmentalist, her decision to be involved in the promotion of high carbon-emitting vehicles provoked criticism, and she is now on record as saying that she would not do it again.[14]
References
- ^ a b c Biography at www.douglas-hamilton.com
- ^ a b Robinson, Stephen (2009-06-18). "Saba Douglas-Hamilton on giving birth outdoors". The Times. London. Retrieved 2009-06-21.
- ^ Dudu Douglas-Hamilton
- ^ "Interwiew:Saba Douglas-Hamilton". Retrieved 2009-10-18.
- ^ BBC Nature and Science
- ^ Mallow D, Ludwig D, Nilson G. 2003. True Vipers: Natural History and Toxinology of Old World Vipers. Krieger Publishing Company, Malabar, Florida. 359 pp. ISBN 0-89464-877-2.
- ^ Independent Questions
- ^ Daily Telegraph
- ^ "The Elephants of Samburu". National Geographic. Retrieved 2009-01-29.
- ^ "Save Kenya: Saba Douglas-Hamilton helps launch Merlin's emergency health appeal for Kenya". Retrieved 2009-10-18.
- ^ http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b009l505 BBC
- ^ "The Secret Life of Elephants". Retrieved 2009-10-18.
- ^ "The Secret Life of Elephants (DVD)". Retrieved 2009-10-18.
- ^ The Independent: "Saba goes off-road and into hot water"