I was able to see many interesting animals at South Luwanga National park but accommodations were not what you would expect. I wrote about them in my last post . I revisited my memories from this park some more. It was a really cool experience because we saw lots of animals like zebras, giraffes and impala. We also saw the more dangerous animals out in the open. Mosquitoes happened to be the most dangerous animal in Africa, but thankfully that was not one of our main villains for this period of time. They were a few months earlier during the rainy season in central Africa. For us, the dangers this time were hippos, elephants, lions, other big cats and the slithering variety of animals. These three images kept coming to me while I processed these memories.
Hippos are the 2nd most dangerous animal in Africa, which is surprising because they seem to be docile vegetarians. They do spend most of their time just chewing on vegetation in the water, however they have fiery tempers and can run about 20 miles an hour on land. Pair that speed with their size and if you ever see them yawn, they have huge teeth. They are responsible for a lot of accidents and deaths in Africa and we were warned by the locals to stay away. We watched them from a distance and stayed away from watering holes where they could be chilling underwater fully submerged, without your knowledge. There is not much to do if they come on land toward you.
One night, before we even made it into the park, we were sleeping in our tent when I was awoken by loud chewing noises. A peek outside the tent led to the discovery of a hippo eating grass just outside the tent. It was as big as the tent and far stronger than the few poles and stitches that held the faithful old tent together. There was no escaping the nylon jail. I did not go back to sleep for the rest of the night, and slept lightly from then on. How easily it could have just pushed the tent down, but thankful nothing set it off and it wandered away in time.
I tried to be grateful, but I had a hard time enjoying myself during the day either. When I tried to play with the few toys I had, the monkeys were always trying to steal them. One time the monkeys actually stole my dolls clothes and carried them up a tree. I was at the bottom of the tree with my one naked Barbie, completely miserable for the loss of a few handmade outfits that I owned for her. They dropped a few of them, but I did not get them all back. I was too scared to play with my toys anymore and kept them safe in a box.
Tortured by a hippo and monkeys and we had not even entered the park yet!
Once we got inside the park, monkeys were not that common anymore and the hippos tended to stay near the water, so we kept away. The lions were not as scared in the park. We could hear them all night long. They have this low deep roar that makes your bones rattle. When you are sleeping and you hear that moaning roar, you’re up for the rest of the night, because you cannot pinpoint where it is coming from and how close it really is. Still it was a while before we ever saw them and my dad really wanted to be able to show me a lion in person.
One afternoon the men at the work site announced that they saw a lion outside the camp and my father immediately grabbed my hand to see it. I was excited to finally see a lion in person, from the edge of our camp. There, a long way off on the grasslands was a crouching male lion out in the wild. I had never seen anything so grand and magnificent in the wild, only at a zoo. It was great and I was enjoying the experience. Then, my dad took my hand and suddenly we were walking down the bank and towards it. My insides were screaming, but I dared not speak because I was so scared that we would be spotted by this wild animal. I was sure that he was looking right at us, and what if the rest of his pride was in the grass. I did not yet know that males were typically solitary, but either way when you see a lion, I think it’s safe to assume there might be more. Here I was walking behind my father, right toward this lion, already terrified and confused when he squeezed my hand and whispered “if I tell you to run, run back as fast as you can”.
I have no memory after that. I don’t know if I ever ran back, if I turned around, if I said anything, I just know that we did not walk all the way to it, and we did not see another lion with it, and I lived. We saw lions a few more times. When we were driving in the land rover, I would never step foot out again, as lions are the fifth most dangerous animal in Africa and I no longer had a desire to see them.
We saw other big cats, like a baby leopard one of the time while we were driving. It was the cutest thing ever. Most things in their mini form are extra cute and this definitely was cuter. The jeep stalled while we paused to take look. This happened often with that old jeep, and the only way to start it was to get out and push. We always brought a few of the men to town with us to act at the jeep starter because you needed a few extra hands. Out there in the middle of the national park, which a baby leopard was watching from 20 feet away, they all had to jump out of the jeep and start to push.
I stayed in because I was afraid that a baby meant there was a mother and I was scared of being mauled. I did not look out because I did not want the mother to show up while the men were outside. My imagination wandered to a bloody leopard attack while I hid in the jeep and hope it would not find me. I don’t know how they felt but it seemed they were used to this life. Two men often rode on the front of the jeep on it’s headlights because elephants would be in the road. Often they argued with each other for the privilege to prove their bravery.
Elephants happen to be the third dangerous animal in Africa. Another large vegetarian animal that can be docile but have a temper if provoked. They are typically scared of loud noises, so the men would smack the side of the jeep if they saw them around. I was so impressed with these men because, although it normally scared the elephants, the elephants could have changed their minds and knocked them to the ground with their strong trunks. I did not want to be as brave as them. I tensed at the sight of elephants and I would simply pray that the elephants would leave if I saw their large shapes in the distance.
The memory from this time that sticks out the most to me was one night in the safety of our little camp when I went to the tap to get water. I had this strange feeling and stopped short of reaching out and turning the tap and I stared as I watched something moving in the darkness. The only light was a couple of fires crackling from behind me and the light of the moon’s reflection. In that pale light, I could tell there was something moving on the water pipe. I ran back and it came out as a croak when I asked for a torch (what we call a flashlight in Australia).
It was unusual for me to ask because I had great night vision. I did most of what I needed to in the dim light because the battery use of a flashlight was a real luxury for us. I expressed that there was something on the water pipe so my dad and a few men got up to look. There, slithering away, up the pipe towards the water tank was a snake so bright and green, that the men immediately identified it as the eastern green mamba.
We cannot be sure of course, but I remember exactly what they said about it. Even though it is the least venomous of the mambas it was the one of the most venomous snakes in the area and unless the snake injected only minimal poison and immediate medical attention was provided, it was almost certain that a bite was fatal. My young brain filled in the gaps that less poison was needed for my size and that we were hours away on dirt roads from any sort of medical attention, much less a major hospital that I would have probably needed. If I had reached out, I probably would not be here.
I never liked snakes, but I was never truly afraid of them until that day. I never dared to admit it because I always felt like my father was proud of my lack of fear. I held them when he asked. He taught me to catch them. He was so proud, so I hid my fear, but I hate snakes. For a decade after my dreams were haunted with snakes. If you have ever seen the Indian Jones scene with the snakes in the tomb, that was what my dreams looked like. I did not see that movie until after my dreams, so I did not insert that scene into my dreams, my dreams just formed those ideas.
I could be having the time of my life in the dream, enjoying a stroll, a picnic or hanging out in a house and then these snakes covered the floors or fell from the sky in my dreams. It would be almost impossible to walk without touching a snake. They stayed as a constantly occurring dream until I pushed everything from my past into that figurative box that I locked when I decided to only focus on the future. This is the figurative box that was opened again in 2020, and those snakes spilled back out. I try to be brave around snakes now, but sometimes I just need to walk away. It depends on the day and my mood and the amount of strength I hold at that particular moment.
