Girl Tippi and her wild animals
Born on 4 June 1990, Tippi Benjamine Okanti Degre grew up in Namibia. Long before the birth of Tippi, her parents wildlife photographers Sylvie and Alan went on a trip to Africa, and stayed to live there. In total, the family lived in the Kalahari desert for 7 years, on the border between Namibia, Western Africa and Botswana. Sylvie and Alan took lots of pictures there. Tippi’s parents in search of new photos spent much time outdoors, and took their daughter everywhere with them. Friends in children’s games and friends for Tippi since infancy were wild animals, including old elephant Abu, a Leopard, crocodiles, Lions, enormous frogs-bulls, chameleons and lots of other animals.
Having returned back to Paris, Tippi attended a local state school for the first two years, but was then home-schooled because she had little in common with the other children in Paris. She is now studying cinema at la Sorbonne Nouvelle University in Paris.
Her book “Tippi – My Book of Africa” about her adventures was published and translated into several languages, it has become bestselling novel of Tippi’s adventurous life in Namibia. She also set up a website, and returned to Africa to make six nature documentaries for the Discovery Channel.
According to Tippi, she has a special gift of talking to animals. ‘I speak to them with my mind, or through my eyes, my heart or my soul, and I see that they understand and answer me.’ Tippi had no fear and believed animals were her friends. For ten years her ‘brother’ was an elephant, her friend was a leopard and the African desert was her playground. She could lie peacefully with a young leopard or could sit cross- legged with a young cheetah or on the trunk of Abu, an elephant.
Girl Tippi and her wild animals
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