We are visiting Botswana, a peaceful and stable country located in the center of Southern Africa. There are around 3 million people living here, and the capital is Gaborone. The official language is English, but most people speak Setswana in their daily lives.

Botswana covers about 581,730 square kilometers, or 224,610 square miles. To imagine its size, the country is roughly the same size as France, or about the same size as the state of Texas in the U.S. Despite being quite large, it is one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world because so much of the land is covered by the sandy Kalahari Desert.

The most popular sport is Football, though the country is also world-famous for its Track and Field athletes who are some of the fastest runners on the planet. Their national animal is the Zebra, which was chosen because its black and white stripes represent the harmony between people of all different backgrounds.

The flag features a light blue background with a black horizontal stripe in the center, bordered by two thin white stripes, where the blue represents water and life-giving rain, and the black and white stripes represent the zebra and racial harmony.

The food is hearty and centers around local crops. The national dish is Seswaa, which is a slow-cooked, salted beef or goat meat that is pounded until it is very tender and served with a thick porridge made from maize or sorghum. They also eat Mopane Worms, which are large caterpillars that are dried or fried and are a very healthy snack full of protein!

Botswana is home to the Okavango Delta, a massive inland river delta where the water doesn’t flow into the sea, but instead spreads out over the desert sands, creating a giant green oasis full of elephants, lions, and hippos. The country produces more high-quality diamonds than almost anywhere else on Earth; in fact, some of the largest diamonds ever found in history were pulled from the ground here! Botswana is also home to the world’s largest population of African elephants, with over 130,000 of them wandering freely across the northern plains. Because water is so rare and precious in the desert, the national word for money is Pula, which literally means “rain.”

From the giant baobab trees to the sparkling diamond mines, Botswana is a land of natural wealth and wildlife. Ke a leboga! That means “Thank you!”