Authors: Fanie Viljoen
Simoshile was still with her dad at the hospital. Armed only with water bottles, André and I began strolling down the dust road. He knew the way, I just followed.
Like a shining balloon the sun was moving higher against the crisp blue sky. I could already feel its hot rays burning down, stinging my neck.
‘Where do you go to school?’ I asked André.
‘Do we have to talk about that now?’ he groaned. ‘I’m trying hard to forget about the S word.’
‘Okay,’ I shrugged.
‘It’s holiday, I don’t even want to think about school. Ah! There; you made me say the word!’
‘Sorry,’ I grinned.
‘Might as well tell you now. We, that’s Simoshile and I, attend school in Bela-Bela. It’s a High School. We’re in grade nine. A bus picks us up every morning and brings us back in the afternoon after sport practice.’
‘Sport practice?’
‘Rugby in winter and cricket or athletics in summer.’
‘You play rugby?’
‘Yes, I’m left wing. Fastest boy in our grade.’ His eyes glimmered with pride. ‘And you?’
‘I don’t like sport much. I like watching boxing. And soccer.’
‘And what grade are you in?’
‘In England we don’t call it grades. I’m in year nine, which I guess is pretty much the same.’
‘I can’t wait to finish my Matric …’ sighed André.
‘Matric?’ I asked.
‘Last year of school.’
‘Oh, we call it A levels.’
He nodded. His face suddenly lit up. ‘I want to be a game ranger just like my dad. And you?’
‘I don’t know yet.’
‘You’ll have lots of time to think about it here, Engelsman.’
‘Engelsman?’ I frowned.
‘Englishman,’ he translated, smiling mischievously. I shook my head, smiling back.
We reached a huge gate made of iron and spanned with lengths of wire. A sign next to it read: Kusasa.
‘This isn’t the one with the lion, is it?’ I asked carefully.
‘Of course not,’ said André, opening it. We slipped through. He closed it again behind us.
Ahead of us a dirt road wound its way through the trees, shrubs and grass. Easy enough, I thought, until André stepped off the road, and into the bush.
‘Kom!’ he said. It sounded like ‘come’. I followed him. At places the ground was smooth, allowing us to march along without trouble, but at other places it was quite uneven. There were tufts of grass everywhere. Some sap-green, others dry
and yellow. I kept my eyes on the ground, trying not to sprain an ankle.
‘At the rate you’re going I reckon a tortoise would overtake you,’ said André. He stood ahead of me, hands at his sides. Waiting.
I quickened my pace.
All around us, I could hear birds calling.
‘Look!’ said André. Ahead of us two birds were seemingly trying to chase another bird out of a tree. They called sharply:
zwee-zwer
!
‘The two birds with the blue-grey bodies and long orange-brown tail feathers are paradise-flycatchers. The other one with the long crooked beak is a redbilled hornbill.’
After watching the battle for the tree a while longer, we decided to be on our way. A cool breeze picked up, momentarily bringing relief from the scorching sun.
‘What are all these brown things?’ I had barely said it when I realized it was the dumbest description I could give for the type of plant I had seen growing all around us. It had caught my attention because it was so different from all the others: a dark brown stem protruding from the earth, looking very much like a cigar, but about two or three times longer and thicker. Lengthy green leaves grew out of the top. To me it looked like a kind of miniature palm tree.
‘That’s a Bushman’s candle,’ said André. He broke one off, just above the ground. Then he lifted the top part of the plant away. The stem was made of circular bits of fibre, like tightly packed pencil shavings. There was a small indent in the middle. ‘The bushmen used to place a hard, glowing coal inside. Then they would put the top back on. The coal would keep on burning. They would carry it around with them until they had to make a fire again.’
‘Clever,’ I said.
‘You can use the leaves as well.’ He broke one off and handed it to me. ‘Try and break it.’
I tried. It was incredibly strong.
‘You could twine a couple together and use it as a rope.’
‘Almost like Tarzan’s monkey ropes!’ I laughed.
‘Yeah, almost,’ he grinned. ‘Come along!’
Walking further, André’s keen eyes seemed to survey our surroundings, darting from the ground to the trees, to the sky.
We came across a tawny bird with a black and white breast, wandering around in the underbrush. The bird was about the size of a smallish chicken. ‘We call it a swempie in Afrikaans,’ said André softly. ‘I think it is a coqui francolin in English. Some of them are so tame you could almost touch them. Their call sounds as if they’re saying: be-quick,
be-quick! The males also have a loud
high-pitched
crow: kek, KEKekekekekekek.’
The bird turned its head and quickly scampered away. I laughed at André’s imitation of the birdcall, loud at first, then gradually becoming softer.
We moved on, stopping regularly so that André could show me things.
‘This is a silver cluster-leaf tree.’ He picked one of the leaves. It had shiny silver hairs on the upper-side. ‘Zulus used the leaves to shine their pots. And if you chew it …’ He placed it in his mouth and chewed, indicating that I should do the same. I picked a leaf and stuffed it in my mouth, chewing only on the one side. It was almost tasteless. Then I felt it: my mouth went numb on the inside.
André smiled. ‘It’s good for toothache if there’s no dentist around. And speaking of teeth, let me show you this …’ I followed him further. We stopped at a shrub. ‘This is the Kalahari star apple or blue bush.’ He cut
a stem off with his pocket knife, cleaned the bark off the end and gently started chewing on the exposed yellowish wood. Very soon he was left with a frayed bristled tip. ‘This you can use as a toothbrush. You can use the roots as well. At first your mouth will burn and turn yellow, but soon you will have shiny white teeth and fresh breath!’
It was amazing.
André then showed me the weeping wattle, whose leaves could be used as toilet paper. ‘Don’t confuse it with the common hook-thorn acacia, or what the Zulus call umtholo. The leaves might look the same, but they have little hooked thorns that will ensure a nasty surprise!’
The candelabra tree was a huge succulent tree without any leaves. André scratched the plastic-like green bark with a twig. Within seconds a milky latex seeped through the bark. ‘Indigenous people used this fluid to stupefy fish.’
‘To help catch them?’
‘Yes. By hand.’
I walked around, staring up in amazement at these plants that at first were just clumps of trees to me. Now I saw them in a different light.
André suddenly stopped dead in his tracks, stretching out his hand and touching my shoulder. His eyes were wide with excitement. ‘Do you feel it?’
What? I thought. Then … the hairs on the back of my neck suddenly stood on end.
Ghoo-oo-oo.
It was like a gust of air. My eyes widened. What the hell was that?
‘It’s okay. Look, there!’ whispered André. He pointed ahead.
What I saw took my breath away.
A gigantic giraffe came strolling by, a mere fifty feet away from us. Its long neck
swaying gracefully as it walked. I could hear its hoofs pounding on the ground. Doof, doof, doof!
Its coat shone in the light of the sun. Yellow with dark, almost square marks. Eyes black, long lashes. Horns with tufts of hair on top.
I wanted to step back, but André put me at ease. ‘You’ll be okay,’ he whispered confidently. He certainly wasn’t afraid. ‘It’s a giraffe cow. Her horns are still covered with hair, do you see?’ I nodded. ‘The bulls’ horns are smooth from fighting each other.’
I still remembered the numerous fights I had been in. The cut lips, sore fists. So if I was a giraffe, I thought, my horns would also be smooth by now.
A twig snapped under my feet. The giraffe turned its head, watched us for a while with its black eyes, and then started moving away with steady, graceful strides.
‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’ said André.
I nodded, still completely speechless.
We spent the morning in the bush, and only went back when pangs of hunger overtook us. My legs were tired, feet aching and my skin warm from the sun. I drank the last drop of water from my bottle as we walked down the dust road back to the main building.
Mama Unahti was waiting for us. ‘Eh! And what have you two boys been up to?’
‘Bush school,’ said André grinning.
‘I hope you were careful?’
‘Don’t worry, Mama, Buyi is in good hands.’
She shook her head and clicked her tongue. ‘If a lion catches you, don’t you come running to me.’ We only laughed. She turned, and while making her way back into the building said, ‘Come, let me get you some fruit juice. No lunch for you today, the boss is around. He doesn’t like it when I feed non-paying customers.’
We followed her past the reception area and the dining room where we’d had breakfast that morning. The TV was playing in the lounge, the volume turned way down. Seeing the familiar flashing images was almost like getting an instant fix. But André dragged me off.
The kitchen was spotless. Mama Unahti poured us each a tall glass from a pitcher. It was the best juice I’d ever had. Sweet and icy cold. Somehow being bone-tired made it taste like heaven.
‘We should go swimming now,’ said André.
It had been a while since I’d been to a swimming pool. Or at least that’s what I hoped he meant – swimming pool, not swimming in a river with crocodiles or something. So I asked him, just to be sure.
‘Of course it’s in the pool. But we could go to one of the watering holes if you like. And never mind the crocs, you should see the hippos! They kill more people in Africa than any other animal …’ Again his eyes glimmered mischievously.
It seemed like I had somehow ended up with the most free-spirited person in Africa: a whiteboy with a love for danger.
‘No thanks, I think we’ll stick to the pool,’ I said, hoping that I didn’t seem like a girl’s blouse.
A Land Rover stopped in front of the building just as we were on our way to get
our bathing things. It was our dads, together with a tracker.
‘You must be Buyisiwe,’ said André’s dad. ‘I’m Johan.’ A tall man. Blonde with a friendly, handsome face.
‘Pleased to meet you, sir,’ I smiled.
My eyes caught Themba’s. ‘Hallo,’ I said.
He nodded. ‘You two been keeping out of trouble, I hope?’
‘Yes, Mister Ngonyama,’ answered André quickly.
‘Stay out of the bush for a while, okay?’ he said. It sounded like a command in a way. I instantly knew I shouldn’t tell him that we had already been to the bush that very morning.
‘Sure,’ said André. Then, ‘Have you found the lion?’
‘No.’ My dad’s gaze again met mine. ‘The footprints were washed away by the rain.’
‘He could be anywhere out there. But we’ll get him,’ said Johan looking back at the rifle in the Land Rover. A shiver ran down my spine when I saw the wooden butt, the black metal barrel. ‘Point 375 calibre Remington,’ he said smiling.
‘Be good, there will be some tourists arriving this afternoon. They’re from Japan. Don’t bother them, okay?’ said Themba. André and I nodded. ‘The owner of the resort is also around. Mister Dreyer. Stay out of his way as well. He is not very fond of children.’
André accompanied me to our chalet. We grabbed something to eat. Bread and coffee was all there was. All the other food was frozen. We must have finished the whole loaf of bread, toasting it and eating it with thick spreads of butter and jam.
‘Who’s this guy?’ André asked as we sauntered into my room. He was looking at
the poster I had put up the previous night.
‘His name is Amir Khan. He is a British boxer, of Pakistani descent. A born fighter is what his dad calls him. He became famous after winning the silver medal in the lightweight division at the 2004 Olympics. And he was only 17! He’s since turned professional. Oh yeah, and he actually comes from a long line of warrior kings.’
‘So, why do you have him up on your wall?’
‘I like boxing, I told you.’
André shrugged, and then turned to me. ‘Get your trunks, let’s go.’
I didn’t have swimming trunks. The nearest I had was a pair of black shorts.
‘That will do,’ said André. We grabbed a towel from the bathroom and off we went. The pool was near the guest lodges. I marvelled at the stylish buildings and luxury tents scattered around the camp. It
seemed very serene here. A few antelope wandered around between the chalets and tents.
‘Impala,’ said André softly. They stopped what they were doing and turned their heads our way. ‘If they hear something they’ll instantly try to find out if someone or something has noticed them. If they think you’ve spotted them, they’ll bound off; if not, they’ll continue grazing.’
These ones must have seen us watching them. With quick leaps they disappeared.
We had the whole swimming pool to ourselves. It was great fun. Hurtling through the air, diving, splashing, swimming. André tried to duck my head under the water. And I tried to return the favour. Playfully measuring up each other’s strength. André was incredibly tough for a boy his age.
Later on we flopped down on our towels, exhausted.
‘Your dad said I’d find you here.’ I stared up, looking right into the sun. I had to shield my eyes but I recognised the voice. It was Simoshile.
‘You should’ve come earlier,’ said André.
‘I’ve only just arrived back from town.’
‘How’s your dad?’
‘You know him. He’s ready to take on the world again.’
‘Let’s go say hi to him,’ suggested André, already getting up as if it was a done deal.
I followed suit, knowing what he was after: he wanted to know exactly what had happened the previous night.
We found Lwazi sitting with Mama Unahti at his chalet. She was fussing over him, asking if he was comfortable, offering to send some food over from the kitchen, without the owner, Mister Dreyer, noticing.
‘It’s terrible,’ she cried. ‘You poor man!’ She threw up her hands and clicked her tongue.
‘Oh, look who’s come to visit,’ said Lwazi, looking relieved to see us.
‘How are you doing, Lwazi?’ I asked.
‘Fine, fine. I just need to keep still for a while. That’s what the doctor ordered. Of course, he wanted to keep me there for another day or two, but I refused outright. It is just a scratch. Who stays in hospital for a scratch?’ As he said it, his upper body twisted somewhat. He bit back the pain and smiled bravely. ‘Besides, they gave me all these pills –’
‘Pills?’ interrupted Mama ‘You haven’t said anything to me about pills. Have you started taking them? Don’t let me catch you slacking off when it comes to taking medicine. Men never grow up! Always need a woman to look after them.’
Simoshile giggled. Lwazi shrugged helplessly.
‘Tell us what happened!’ said André, not able to keep his burning curiosity at bay any longer.
Lwazi fell silent for a while, and then he started to recount the night’s events. ‘The night safari went very well. We saw lots of animals. Even a leopard –’
‘A leopard!’ shouted André.
‘Yes and you know how elusive they are. Excellent camouflage keeps them hidden,’ he explained for my benefit.
‘But then we ran into trouble. All this rain we’ve had turns the roads to great pools of mud,’ he said, turning to look at me. ‘And before long the vehicle got stuck. Johan climbed out to see if there was anything he could do. And then we heard it … a lion’s roar …’
André’s eyes suddenly widened. Mine too, I guess.
‘It was a deep, terrifying sound, thundering through the dark. I quickly got hold of the search light, and soon found the lion. It was an old one. You could tell by the look of his shabby mane. I tried finding the rest of the pride, but he seemed to be alone.’ Lwazi lowered his voice. ‘And he was watching us … Every move!
‘The tourists, of course, were taking photos. Couldn’t believe their luck. I don’t know what happened, but one of them accidently dropped his camera. The stupid man then got out of the vehicle to pick it up, even though they were warned not to do that. Before we knew it, the lion was heading right for us.
‘The tourists screamed. I jumped out of the Land Rover and told them to stay calm. Lions sometimes just want to scare you off, at first charging with all their might, only to stop dead in their tracks a few feet away from you. That is what they teach you in training. But they also teach you that lions become totally different animals at night. It is their hunting time …’
Lwazi paused a while, staring each of us in the eye before he continued. ‘I had my rifle ready, but I didn’t want to use it. I didn’t want to kill this beautiful animal just because it had been frightened by a man who didn’t do as he was told.
‘The lion kept charging. He was now so close that I could see the scar above his left eye. One that he probably got from a fight. The people behind me screamed. Terrified. “Stay calm,” I repeated. And then, within seconds it was all over …’
‘What? Did he kill the man?’ asked André breathlessly.
‘No,’ smiled Lwazi. ‘The man had somehow managed to scamper back onto the Land Rover. But I was still there, standing in its way. Staying between the lion and the tourists, like I have been trained. Within seconds the lion was upon me, sinking its teeth right into my shoulder. Here, you see?’ he explained, with his hand spread across his shoulder. ‘Going for the throat, as they do when hunting. It was then that
the shots rang out. It was Johan. The lion fled, disappearing into the night without another sound.’