From the air the destruction of the African bush was apparent. The local farmers make use of the traditional “slash and burn” method, where the bush is chopped down, set alight and the ashes ploughed in as fertiliser – for a single crop and for only one season. Then they move on. Leon told me about his second wife and their child back home.
At one stage we flew across Lake Malawi. It is a huge expanse of water. An anxious thought crossed my mind: If this flying machine should crash here, how the hell would we come out alive? It would sink like a stone and we would not be able to get out from under the rotors. Not until the water had forced them to a standstill. What was more, I had never exactly been Mark Spitz. Leon told me his wish was that if he were to die, it would be in a helicopter!
Once everyone had arrived at the rendezvous, we set to work. The scenery was incredible, with mahobohobo veld as far as the eye could see. Scattered rocky inselbergs towering over the surrounding landscape. The Ruvuma River with its masses of water and countless herds of elephant, buffalo and Lichtenstein’s hartebeest! We saw sable antelope and kudu. Clearly the war had not wreaked complete havoc here.
A Pomzet antipersonnel mine is a terrible thing. Mind you, it merely does what is expected of it, namely to bugger up the person who steps on it in such a way that it costs a great deal of money, effort and logistics to evacuate him – or her – and to put the person together again. If it happens to a soldier, he is usually out of the game of war permanently. The state is obliged to supply him with a medical pension and to support and look after him, an invalid for the rest of his life. Thus the main aim of a Pomzet is to force the enemy to its knees economically.
By the time we reached the child, her terrified, screaming little friends were crowding around her. A landmine casualty is really bad. I’d rather not go into detail. Sometimes the victim simply dies of shock.
The other children were ushered away and, ignoring the threat of Aids, we began to rip up cloth for bandages. We all had basic first-aid knowledge and we managed to stop the bleeding. The little body was rigid with shock and the eyes were white in the face. I realised that the child was not going to survive if she wasn’t evacuated to receive proper medical care.
We looked at each other. The child was dying under our hands. Some distance away stood the chopper . . . It was a nine-hour flight to Maputo – it would cost thirty-six thousand rand, not to mention the time lost.
Before anyone could say a word, a black woman came charging through the bush.
She didn’t cry. She didn’t scream. The anger in her eyes seemed to supplant all emotion. She clutched the child to her breast, looked at us as if she wanted to say, “Leave my child alone, you bastards,” and walked back into the bush, carrying the broken little body.
P.S. Two months later Leon died in a car crash somewhere between Nelspruit and Watervalboven. The rescue helicopter could not evacuate him.
Sangoma
The air conditioning in the departure hall of the Windhoek airport was nothing to write home about. And it was sizzling. There wasn’t even a proper bar – just a Coca Cola fridge against one wall, stocked with lukewarm beer. I sat in the smokers’ section, slurping at a Windhoek Lager and drawing on a cigarette.
Duty-free at any international airport is just a gimmick. Everything is more expensive, in my opinion, and it’s all part of a devious plot to con the tourists out of the last of their currency. Windhoek didn’t have much on offer, however. Except for the ubiquitous perfume and liquor, there was a lone novelties stand, attempting to peddle African souvenirs. Now, if there’s one thing I have learned during my travels, it is to distinguish between the real thing and a fake article, destined for the tourist market. En route to the beer, I recognised the mass-produced goods of Kenya, Malawi and Zimbabwe – nothing uniquely Namibian. The shop assistant was a Vambo woman, neatly clad in khaki. But there were no interested buyers.
My flight back to the Republic was still a half-hour away and I fetched myself another lukewarm beer. Among the usual crap on display, I had noticed a few exceptional items – small clay passport masks from Gabon and the Cameroon in West Africa. The little masks fit in the palm of your hand and in the old days served to identify the bearer when people moved from one area to another.
African art has its own particular attraction. Some like it, others don’t, but to distinguish a fake from the real thing you need a little knowledge. Not all ethnic groups concentrate on creative art, but certain items remain distinctive. In Zimbabwe the Shona make the most beautiful soapstone sculptures. Fertility dolls are typical of Kenya. The Maconde statues, depicting an entire community and made from a single piece of wood, are endemic to Tanzania. The bronze castings from Mali are remarkable, as are the colourful figurines from the Côte d’Ivoire. Coin-studded masks usually come from Nigeria, just as heads carved out of hard ebony are typically Zambian. Handwoven, brightly coloured fabrics from Burkina Faso compete with mud-painted cloths from the Korogo in the Ivory Coast and batik from Zimbabwe.
“Are you a sangoma?” the lady at the stall asked, noticing my collection of copper and leather bracelets.
It was a loaded question – especially if I chose to answer truthfully.
The blacks in suburban Pretoria had adopted me as their sangoma. I – who shopped at the supermarket in bare feet and kikoi, who dropped off a crate of beer at the garage at Christmas time and walked in the Irene koppies in the afternoons for exercise, with my walking stick and backpack, passing illegal shebeens on my way. “Induku” they called me – “kierie”, or “walking stick”.
I usually protested: “No, but . . .” For I knew this was a domain better avoided by the uninformed. But the displaced person needs a sympathetic ear and I began to listen. The problems were always the same:
“My husband is cheating on me.”
“I can’t survive on my wages.”
“I’m going to court tomorrow.”
“I’ve got a pain just here . . .”
“I’m looking for a job.”
My “consultation room” was furnished with Malawian chairs, carved from a single piece of wood, and numerous statues and masks from all over Africa. During “consultations” a big fire blazed at our feet, underneath a Karoo thorn that had been specially planted in suburbia. Advice was meted out carefully – the logical Western kind. Not once did I resort to traditional cult practices. I was never more than the listener and the induna, who offered advice based on his own experience. But it must have worked, because there was never a lack of callers.
“I don’t throw dolos and I don’t dance, but what’s the matter?” I once again ventured into the unknown.
“I’m looking for a job. I only help out here at the stall. Please help me,” said the woman.
I gave her a Western reply: “If you sell a lot of things and make a lot of money for the owner, he will think: ‘Perhaps I should keep this girl.’”
“But no one buys anything! I have been here all day. People just walk past and get on their planes.”
The announcement came: “Passengers on flight 832 to Johannesburg are requested to go on board.” I got up, relieved, and laid a hand on her shoulder. “You’ll see,” I said as I left.
I settled into my seat, fastened my seatbelt and got ready for the two-hour flight. Suddenly there was another announcement: “One of our in-flight attendants has been taken ill. We are waiting for a replacement from Windhoek. The flight has been delayed for an hour. Passengers may return to the departure hall to stretch their legs.”
I was the first one out. The woman at the stall looked at me, surprised, as I passed