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Leonie Joubert

@leoniejoubert

Science writer, journalist, disobedient woman. Quit business-as-usual to report from the frontline of the climate crisis is Africa - from a van. Follow the @StoryArkDiaries

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25.11.2024
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Latest posts by Leonie Joubert @leoniejoubert

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Fabulously flotsam, the latest Captain's Log from the Story Ark journey.

Read it now on storyark.co.za 🌞

www.storyark.co.za/captains-log...

13.11.2025 11:19 πŸ‘ 4 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 1
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Story Ark was featured on Sarah Kent's Substack, A Field of Dreams: open.substack.com/pub/sarahlke...

β€œMy dream is that every woman listening here can be fired up to push back against the social norms that try to tell them to dress, groom, think, behave and comport themselves in certain ways.”

22.10.2025 12:52 πŸ‘ 4 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Then this happened. Just in case anyone thought #StoryArk is #ElizabethGilbert doing an #EatPrayLove tour of Rome's pizzeria, it most certainly isn't. Far more gritty, living extreme weather while reporting on it. @coveringclimatenow.org #daillymaverick #storyarkdiaries #climatejournalism

21.10.2025 07:51 πŸ‘ 3 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
Story Ark: one year and 20,000km down; many more to go
Story Ark: one year and 20,000km down; many more to go YouTube video by Story Ark Diaries

Story Ark has been on the road for a year. What a triumph, what a trailblazing opportunity for climate journalism at a time when we’ve never needed it more urgently.

Full recap video on YouTube now: youtu.be/NjAwrYu81y4

13.10.2025 13:01 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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One year and 20,000km in. #StoryArk is still 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years, all the stories. But now, with a stowaway.
#climatecrisis #mobilejournalism @henrynxumalofund.bsky.social #schoolforclimatestudies @TEDx #TEDxCountdown @coveringclimatenow.org

08.10.2025 08:26 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Traditional healer Malibongwe Ndovela collects plants for medicines and mystical charms that grow in the grasslands and forests at the Mtentu River mouth, a popular overnight stop for hikers.

Read: news.mongabay.com/2024/08/ever...

30.09.2025 11:09 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Mouse has a sister-by-another-mister. How do you weigh a kitten to work out their formula needs, when one is in the middle of nowhere? Kitty in the left hand, 400g of beans in the right. Meet Birdie. #vanlife #adventurecats #storyark #storyarkdiaries

29.09.2025 11:14 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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When trees have navels.

Story Ark: 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years... all the stories 🌍
#StoryArk #storyarkdiaries #sciencejournalism

26.09.2025 13:22 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Xolobeni’s rusty titanium-rich coastal dunes are synonymous with the amaMpondo’s 20-year battle to keep extractive mining out of their ancestral lands.

Read: β€˜Everything is a being’ for South Africa’s amaMpondo fighting to protect nature.

news.mongabay.com/2024/08/ever...

25.09.2025 11:11 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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2025 | Countdown β€” TEDxJohannesburg

Story Ark's unique take on pollution will feature at #TEDxJohannesburg. Part of #TEDCOUNTDOWN to UN climate summit. What we achieve in next years, to slow carbon pollution, will determine outcome of life for thousands of years to come. Every. Second. Counts. www.tedxjohannesburg.com/2025-countdown

24.09.2025 13:17 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
Login β€’ Instagram Welcome back to Instagram. Sign in to check out what your friends, family & interests have been capturing & sharing around the world.

When an elder dies, it’s like a library burning down, said Malian writer/intellectual Amadou HampΓ’tΓ© BΓ’ re keepers of culture thru oral trad. What are we doing to ensure next gen of Africa's libraries retain knowledge? Fano Tembe, carries Thonga fishing culture. www.instagram.com/reel/DO6GmS2...

24.09.2025 07:44 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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In the presence of the elders. #Emkhuze #mkhuze sycamore fig forest, KZN. #storyarkdiaries #storyark #climatecrisis #climatejournalism #SchoolforClimateStudies @henrynxumalofund.bsky.social

24.09.2025 07:38 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Trade in your cute little kitty heels for some no-fun flats. They’ll take you places your city shoes never could.

Story Ark: 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years... all the stories 🌍
#StoryArk #storyarkdiaries #sciencejournalism

23.09.2025 12:59 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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The amaMpondo want economic development, but on their own terms, with many preferring light-touch tourism over extractive mining.

news.mongabay.com/2024/08/ever...

22.09.2025 11:28 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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One person’s whimsy is another’s weed. Aliens, everywhere! We shipped them around the world, now they’ve gone feral. Our bad, not theirs. Now are we counting the tally.

Story Ark: 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years... all the stories 🌍
#StoryArk #storyarkdiaries #sciencejournalism

19.09.2025 10:56 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Herbalists burn imphepho, African sage (Helichrysum odoratissimum), as an incense during prayer. This fragrant herb grows wild in the Mpondoland grasslands.

Read: β€˜Everything is a being’ for South Africa’s amaMpondo fighting to protect nature.

news.mongabay.com/2024/08/ever...

18.09.2025 11:28 πŸ‘ 2 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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When a professional recording studio is nowhere to be found, and the wifi is slower than early dial-up (cue: that dialup sound), find a kindly hotel and hire their board room when you patch through to the BBC’s Wales office.

Story Ark: 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years... all the stories 🌍

17.09.2025 12:02 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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When traditional healer Mamjozi Danca was born into a violent apartheid state that tried to dispossess her people of their land and culture, the amaMpondo fought back. Now, they are fighting to protect their heritage from mining corporations.

Read: news.mongabay.com/2024/08/ever...

16.09.2025 11:15 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
Pollution, Power and Storytelling: Leonie on Climate Journalism and Community Resilience | S03E04
Pollution, Power and Storytelling: Leonie on Climate Journalism and Community Resilience | S03E04 YouTube video by Tangelic

Who profits from pollutionβ€”and who pays the price?
#TangelicTalks and #SouthAfrica #sciencejournalist #LeonieJoubert talk on how #pollution, #foodsystems, #plastics are interconnected crises.

An African take on a global systems problem.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUnu...

12.09.2025 05:42 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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When a professional recording studio is nowhere to be found, and the only place to get good phone signal is parked under a tree on a side road in #Hluhluwe, do your live radio interview thusly. With chief navigator and plucky comic relief, the Cat Called Mouse, supervising.

09.09.2025 11:36 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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A spiritual connection with β€œthe land” fuels the amaMpondo’s resistance to extractive mining on South Africa’s Wild Coast, and it is this same force that fuelled a peasant revolt against the apartheid government in the early 1960s.

Read: news.mongabay.com/2024/08/ever...

08.09.2025 12:37 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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There’ve only been three times in the past year where I’ve thought I might have to throw in the towel on the Story Ark voyage.

Each time, because of fear.

Fear, brought on by heat.

Read the full story: www.storyark.co.za/captains-log...

05.09.2025 13:39 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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A Free State of mind: Clarens, where the cosmos is wild, well feral-wild. One person’s whimsy is another’s weed. Aliens, everywhere! Set feral by us, having shipped them around the world. Only now are we counting the tally.

Story Ark: 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years... all the stories 🌍

04.09.2025 11:34 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Always have a second pair of eyes check your copy before you go to print. Lest you find yourself in the lingerie drawer, when you’re actually reaching for the coffee in the bleary-eyed dawn. Look close. No, closer still.

Story Ark: 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years... all the stories 🌍

03.09.2025 11:19 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Have a place for everything, and keep everything in its place. Meticulously. Entropy is snapping at your heels.

Story Ark: 1 van, 2 crew, 3 years... all the stories 🌍
#StoryArk #storyarkdiaries #sciencejournalism

02.09.2025 09:52 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Recent research shows that airborne microplastics are likely blowing in over the Katse Dam, one of the largest reservoirs in the Lesotho Highlands Water Project which feeds water to South Africa, Botswana and Namibia.

Read more here: bit.ly/4mmgHnd

01.09.2025 11:51 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Plastic poisoning is the new β€˜passive smoking’ We’re only just beginning to realise how serious long-term exposure to microscopic plastic particles is likely to be for our health. While plastic polluting corporations lobby for business as usual, n...

Plastic poisoning is the new β€˜passive smoking’ and we’re all soaking up this toxic sludge. What's a lethal dose of plastics poisoning? Don't know yet, but we'll soon find out.

www.dailymaverick.co.za/opinionista/...

27.08.2025 20:53 πŸ‘ 1 πŸ” 1 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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Young people like Tukulo Mtshayelo can protect their neighbourhood from the fallout of pollutants such as invasive trees or disposable nappies. But how to they safeguard themselves against airborne plastic pollution blown in from tens or hundreds of kilometres away?

For more: bit.ly/4mmgHnd

26.08.2025 11:52 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0
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BBC World Service - Unexpected Elements, Mountains of overtourism As Nepal makes 97 non-Everest peaks free to climb, we look at the science of overtourism.

#BBC #UnexpectedElements: journalists #CarolineSteele, #ChhaviSachdev, #LeonieJoubert find they're thrill seekers according to chill-seeking prof Ken Carter #EmoryUniversity. Advice to thrill-seekers, when feel urge to leap before looking: ask 'What Would Ken Do?'
www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w...

25.08.2025 14:32 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0

citizens through NB democratic pillar that is accountability-driven journalism, they’re quiet. Either they’re deliberately ghosting in hope that they can kill the story, or they don’t give a damn. #plastics #capetalk #clicks #PicknPay #Woolworths #Shoprite #Checkers
@coveringclimatenow.org

25.08.2025 13:46 πŸ‘ 0 πŸ” 0 πŸ’¬ 0 πŸ“Œ 0