BUSH STORIES

ADRIAN AND HIS BLUE BUTT

It was one of those weekends where the lodge had no bookings and that meant we could all relax a bit.  Or so we thought till a runner from Hippo lodge arrived breathless at the door of the diner, he had been running for one and a half days.  “audi bambo!” he called which roughly translates excuse me boss. Oupa walked out the back door of the diner and asked what the message was.

Adrian had sent a radio message that he would be arriving on Friday afternoon which meant he would be arriving that day.  Oupa thanked  Chimbango and said he could stop for the night with Robert and his family. After giving Robert a ration of meat and mealie meal for chimbango’s supper. 

Ouma proceeded to rush about, sending Robert up to the store to fetch more beer and cool drinks for Adrians arrival.  She rushed to and from one of the single chalets making beds and getting alec to make a fire in the Rhodesian boiler outside for hot bath water for Adrian.

Well with all the action and flustering going on I decided to go fishing for the afternoon and hoped to catch some big bream fish for the barbecue that night, which meant Ouma wouldn’t have to cook that night and she could do some catching up on the Lusaka gossip. Which Adrian and Ouma could spend hours doing, and would sometimes spend till the early hours of the morning talking round the campfire.

I had caught about fifteen decent sized bream by the time I heard the pontoon workers singing as they pulled the pontoon across the river.  Adrian’s engine fired up and the unmistakable roar of his Land cruizer could be heard on our side of the river in the distance.  I packed up my fishing gear and slung the fresh fish over my shoulder.  I reached the lodge before Adrian did and had just enough time to gut and clean the fish before he arrived.  I grabbed a beer and went to sit outside under the huge Duiker berry tree in front of the diner. 

Adrians vehicle approached the diner and we were all stood waiting outside for him.  The vehicle screeched to a dusty halt, the door was flung open and adrian launched himself out of the drivers seat running straight past us all and shouting as he ran while simultaneously undoing his trousers: “Ouma is there loo roll in the gents?”.  He dashed through the kitchen and slammed the door to the gents loo where he spent a fair amount of time. 

After about 10 minutes he emerged and had a grin on his face.

“ I had some take away in Mumbwa, I’ve been stopping all the way here, it seems to have given me the runs.”

Ouma got a few beers out of the fridge and we all sat around the veranda and made idle conversation with Adrian shooting off every now and again to the loo, not to mention letting off a bit of gas in between.

The sun finally set and the darkness was lit up by a roaring camp fire.  We barbecued the fish and swapped hunting stories, Oupa had kept us entertained with all the stories of his old hunting days with Adrian.  It was  way past midnight when we all decided to go to bed.

I was kept awake for most of the night by the flushing of the toilet in Adrian’s chalet, and of course no animals came into camp that night.

I saw the morning born from the darkness, the birds chattering and Robert banging pots and pans further down stream.  Adrian and I were the first ones awake and the first ones to reach the diner where we had coffee and toast.  I asked what his plans for the day were and he had decided that fishing would not be a good idea as there were no spots to go to the loo on a boat in the middle of the river.  We agreed that a game drive would be an idea, since  Adrian wanted to see if his old blind was still up from a previous hunting trip.

Ouma and Oupa soon came along and finally Robert turned up for work and we all had another few cups of coffee, much needed for the hangovers we all had from the previous nights entertainment. 

Oupa went out and started the old Land rover.  Once we were all prepared to go we all piled into the Landy and off we went.  Oupa headed off to the first dambo where we found a family of warthogs crowded around what seemed to be another warthog.  We drove slowly closer and found they were feeding on the remains of an Impala.  Finally after discussing the fact that pigs eat meat and wondering how in the first place they had managed to get hold of it, we moved on to the next dambo that was filled with herds and herds of zebra that kicked and sounded alarms before dashing in panic into the treeline.

We decided to move on to the hot springs where we could all have a dip and a beer.  We were on the river drive that took us right up alongside the mighty Kafue.  It was not long before Adrian shouted to Oupa to stop the Landy.  Grabbing  the “bog roll” and making off at full speed into the bush with the white tissue in hot pursuit.

We waited and waited until finally through the bush came Adrian, his trousers still below his knees flying through the air still holding the “bog roll”, over the Landy and landed roughly near the waters edge on his face.

We all stared in awe, then finally walked toward him. We later found out that he had been minding his own business doing his thing when he was hit from behind by a very angry bufalo square on the backside.  Finally we managed to get Adrian and his injured blue fundament into the van.  We never did find the “bog roll

CHARGED BY AN ELEPHANT

A hippo sounded from the river below, another snorted as he came to the surface of the water for air, I could hear the chatter of cheerful birds around me and I took a moment to appreciate the fact that I was in the bush and that I was fortunate enough to be able to call it home. 

The sun hung low on the horizon and the world began to awake with the distant sounds of zebra, impala, bush buck and elephant.  I rolled over in my bed in the chalet and reached for my cigarettes, the weather looked clear and sunny as it is a lot of the time in October.  We had heard over the radio reports of a lone bull elephant causing trouble around the villages, trampling crops and ripping out trees, being aggressive without being taunted.  

I had decided the previous night to take Phiri with me into the bush in search of the elephant and have a look to see if he had perhaps just run into a snare and if so how bad the damage was.  Phiri had been my best tracker for many years and he knew how to use a rifle as I had taught him to shoot accurately with the 308.  I walked off toward the diner where I would have coffee and start the old Lister generator for the fridges while I waited for the workers to arrive.  I put wood into the old wood stove and got a fire going to boil the pot of water.  I left out the kitchen door and went up the hill to start the generator, checking that there was enough fuel and oil, it started first time which was unusual so I decided to go up to the reservoir to check the emergency water level.  As I got up to the side of the reservoir I reached out to remove the tarpaulin that covered it and stopped dead in my tracks.  About an inch from my hand lay a rather large Mozambique Spitting Cobra with his head raised ready to strike.  I knew if I made any sudden movements I would have 10 minutes to get anti venom into my body if that long.  I stood frozen, after what felt like ages the snake lost interest in staring at me and moved off slowly slipping without a sound into the long dry grass.  I dropped to the ground and let out a sigh of relief. Being more careful I checked the water level, recovered the resevoir and walked back to the diner with my close call with the snake set firm in my thoughts, hoping that the pot of water had boiled since I could do with a cup of hot coffee and a cigarette to calm me down.

Outside on the veranda overlooking the river I sat back with my cup and enjoyed the view, the sun was quite high off the horizon and it would be 7 o’clock soon when the workers would be there, I listened carefully and I could hear them through the bush singing as they walked to work. They claimed that their singing chased the snakes and animals away so that they would be safe on their way to work.  It must have worked as I had never yet lost a worker walking to work but only in the village when a woman had left her pots outside and a black mamba snake had bitten her when she moved them. We could not get the anti venom to her in time and she died in 4 minutes.

Robert, my chef, was the first to arrive and came out to the veranda to great me clapping his hands together in a manner of respect.  I answered his greeting doing the same before sending him off to find Phiri.  While he was gone I fetched Rasputin my 375 rifle and the 308 and proceeded to check ammunition, cleanliness and sights before snapping the trigger locks on so as to avoid accidents which could easily happen at a moments notice while walking.  Although anyone from the bush knows not to panic in a situation one generally does panic a bit, some more than others and then you get the totally losing it type who are usually the ones that have the accidents with their rifles and end up shooting their own trackers or themselves.  Worst case scenario they end up wounding an animal and if that animal happens to be a buffalo, elephant, leopard or lion then you know your’e in trouble.

Phiri arrived at the diner and waited for me outside next to the Land Rover. I Handed him the 308 rifle and slinging Rasputin over my shoulder motioned to Phiri to follow.  We walked down the old dirt road to the lodge, side by side we scanned the ground for tracks.  We came across some elphant tracks but they were from a herd of about 10 and not our lone bull. We headed towards the hot springs since that would be the area that the most sightings were.  The hot sulphur springs boiled and made the day seem hotter than it actually was.  Although the water in the hot springs was above boiling there were still types of fish that lived in the water and we watched them swimming around.  On following the hot springs river down to the main Kafue river where we found what we were looking for.  On the side of the confluence sunk deep into the mud were his footprints.  I looked around for droppings and found one that I thrust my finger deep into and judging by the heat of the centre I knew he was not far off.  The mud around the footprints was still falling in on the sides, he must have been here not more than 5 minutes ago.  I looked around and just as I spotted his huge bulk feeding off the trees about 15 meters away he gave a huge trumpet flattened his ears an on he came, dust billowed up from the dry earth and formed a huge dust ball behind him.  Phiri threw down his rifle and shot off in the opposite direction,  I threw Rasputin to the ground as I struggled to get my t-shirt off, I aimed for the tallest bush around and flung my shirt into its tops as far, hard and high as I could.  Hopefully the scent on my shirt would stop him from following me.  There I was shooting through the bush like a bullet, my bits exposed and me trying to run at full speed at the same time as trying to get my shorts off in case the shirt didn’t distract him.  I had just got my shorts off when the thunderous noise of the chase behind me turned into a lot of snorting, trumpeting and ripping sounds.  I stopped and looked back.  Standing in my birthday suit I watched the huge form ripping my shirt to threads.  I scanned his body for injuries but found that he was not injured nor snared, he was simply musting, which meant this young bull was hormonal and just had a bit of aggression to work out before finding a mate, the villagers would just have to be patient with him till he found his herd again.  I put my shorts back on and picked up my shirt as I went back to where Phiri had taken flight.  Putting back on the remains of my t-shirt, it didn’t seem as ripped as I had thought. I picked Rasputin up dusted him off and was alerted by a hysterical laughter that came from the branches high up in a tree.  It was Phiri.  He was laughing at my streak show at top speed through the bush.  This goes to show that sometimes you don’t need a gun.

STUCK IN A TREE

We had spent the whole day searching the bush relatively close to the lodge in order to find a suitable spot for our new camp site, the place needed to be level and not too close to the lodge or the river.  Finally through the thick bush I spotted an opening, it was perfect and just needed a little bush clearing.  Since the day was coming to an end I decided to start work on the camp site the next day. 

I sent the workers home early, they were very happy and went back through the bush laughing and joking.  That night the village in the distance could be heard.  The sound of dancing, drums, singing and laughing flooded the night.   I decided to have an early night since the next days work would be heavy and physical.  I would need every mans strength plus my own if we were to get the camp site cleared properly. 

I woke up just as the mist was clearing off the surface of the mighty Kafue river.  A herd of Elephant were having their morning splash across the river right in front of me.  I watched them for a while and giggled to myself as a teenager gave a young calf a smack with her trunk making the calf squeal.  They never ceased to amaze me, it is shocking just how like humans elephants really are.

George our resident crocodile floated lazily past under the watchful eyes of some of the senior elephants.  But George wasn’t interested and continued on his morning float down river. 

I got dressed and walked off to the diner for my coffee and to start the old generator up.  The workers were ready to leave for the camp site.  I sent them ahead with Phiri who knew the basic plan of where I wanted cleared and where I wanted left alone.  He also needed them to clear a wide footpath from the lodge off to the camping site.  Once this had all been achieved I then wanted a slipway cleared for the campers to launch their boats.  The difficult part would be building long drop toilets and showers.  They would need adequate supply of water so we would be welding two forty four gallon drums together length ways and constructing a rough basin beneath it for washing pots in.  There would be fresh drinking water brought to them on a daily basis which they could use for cooking.  This would be water from the river that had been treated with water purification tablets.

Phiri led the other workers off while I had my coffee and got the old ford 2000 tractor started and hitched the trailer to it.  There would be a lot of mess needing clearing and the trees that were to be taken out would be loaded up and used for firewood or building.  I had picked a spot right under a huge marula tree.  It was perfect.  This tree had often been a treat for the elephants when the marula fruit was ripe and had on many occasions rendered a lot of elephant totally intoxicated from eating the fruit that lay fermenting on the ground in the hot African sun. Drunk elephants were indeed something funny and make great entertainment. Because this tree had played such a big part in the elephants lives and being that marula fruit are a real treat for them and the fact that there werent many of these trees around.  I decided to build my campsite just in front of the tree and to leave the tree more or less in the bush so that the elephants could still eat from it and the campers could still enjoy its shade leaving both out of each others way.

I arrived on the tractor at the site.  The workers sang as they chopped.  I got hold of an axe and began chopping an old dead Mubanga tree.  The splinters and wood chips of the timber falling onto my bare feet.  It didn’t take me long to get through its trunk, this tree would be perfect for firewood to warm up the drums for shower water because it was almost as hard as leadwood or rail way sleepers so therefore it would burn longer and use less wood to heat the water.  I loaded the wood onto the trailer to be moved to another spot where all the firewood would be kept for the camp site.

At lunch time  Phiri cooked some mealie meal and relish that they had brought with them.  I handed out 2 beers to each worker and sat down to  catch some fish to make the meal more interesting.  It wasn’t long before I had three big bream which would be plenty to go around.  Finally we all sat down and ate a hearty meal.  Lunch time begins at 12:00 and ends at 2:00.  At 1:00 we had all eaten our fill and drunk our beers.  While the workers did their own thing I cracked open another beer and gave one to Phiri while the two of us sat and did some fishing for our supper.  Some of the other workers joined us and others just found a tree and had a sleep.

Finally the day came to an end and I dismissed the workers early, they had done well and got most of the bush clearing done.  I was left alone to move the wood to another place.  I wasn’t sure where exactly so I decided to go on foot through the bush before firing up the tractor.  I spotted another big tree through the bush and headed for it. The bush was quite thick and I couldn’t see very far ahead of me but this would be a perfect spot to keep the firewood since it wasn’t far from the lodge and it wasn’t far from the camp site.  As I got about 3 metres away from the tree there came a grunting and rustle of leaves from behind me on the side.  I had a glance and then ran to the tree climbing up as fast as I could.  Below me stood a group of bushpig angrily snorting.  Had one of these hit me with their tusks they could easily have broken my legs and inflicted a lot of damage with their bites and tusks.  There I sat in the tree with the bushpigs below waiting for me to get out of the tree.  I could see the lodge from where I was in the tree but anyone at the lodge couldn’t see me unless I climbed to the very top, and then I would have to shout really loud to get their attention.

I climbed to the top and taking off my white bra and waving it in the air I shouted at the top of my voice for Phiri to get the rifle to scare the pigs away.  Finally he came and let off a shot and the pigs scattered into the bush.  I must have looked quite a sight waving my smalls from the top of a tree.  Once again as he had on many occasions, Phiri fell to the ground in hysterical laughter.  I was not amused.  To this day the story is often brought up by oupa and ouma around the campfire much to my embarassment.

ADRIAN AND THE RUNAWAY LANDY

Adrian had sent a message on the radio to Hippo lodge that he would be spending the weekend with us.  He had a bit of business to do with Ally  in connection with buying his camp.  Adrian had also just bought a new 4x4 and he wanted to see how it performed in the bush over long distance.  He would be travelling for 8 hours and without a doubt a lot of the roads would still be very muddy and some even flooded with big pools of deep water from the 14 day downpour of heavy constant rain.  Luckily it wouldn’t be too bad since it had not rained for 2 days.

Ouma went about setting up Adrians usual chalet on the Friday morning while I had left on the Thursday on foot to the Lunga river for fishing, it was the best spot and the biggest fish could be caught there.  You could only reach it on foot not with a vehicle.  It took all morning and well into Thursday afternoon to get to the Lunga but it was worth it.  I did some fishing while Phiri got a fire going and opened a couple of beers.  We camped the night at the river and set off just before lunch time on the Friday with our enormous quarry of fresh fish.  We had caught 14 or so good sized tiger fish, and the rest were Bream measuring around a quarter of a metre each.  It took us longer to get back to the lodge since we were weighed down by the fish. 

By the time we reached the lodge Adrian had arrived and I set about cleaning and gutting the fish ready for freezing.  I kept two of the tiger fish out for the barbecue that night.  Around the camp fire Adrian and Oupa chatted while I dug thorns out of my feet.  Ouma always fussed over me when I came back from a trip into the bush, she would clean the cuts and scratches on my limbs and dig out the thorns from my feet even though I told her that I didn’t feel them and they would come out on their own, she insisted, giving me a lecture about wearing shoes when I went off into the bush.  I was a bush baby and the less I could wear the better. 

We all ate heartily that night, we had impala steaks, tiger fish and guinea fowl with some mealie meal and great gravy that ouma had made.  She had also baked a pudding for us.  We retired to our beds after midnight.  Our full bellies pulled our eyelids closed and all of us slept like the dead.

Oupa and I were the first ones up and from the diner we could hear Adrian singing in the shower at his chalet.  There were no window panes on any of the windows just fly screen.  We had decided to keep the lodge as natural as possible when we were building it.  Most of the building materials had come from the bush, the only things that didn’t come from the bush were the doors and the wood that we used to make the furniture with, not to mention the bathrooms.

Finally Adrian made his way along the footpath towards the diner whistling as he walked.  We all had a cup of coffee and some toast for breakfast.  We walked over to Adrians new vehicle and looked it over.  Adrian mentioned to oupa that he wanted to drive over to Ally’s camp along the short cut since it would take too long to  use the old road and that would mean he would be driving back in the dark.  Oupa suggested he use the Land rover since  the short cut hadnt been used for some time and it would be overgrown and rough.  If he used his new van it would be scratched to pieces which would be a pity.  Adrian agreed with Oupa and confirmed the old system of shooting off two shots if he ran into trouble. 

Adrian drove off in the old Landy with his packed lunch and cold beers on the seat next to him.  His rifle behind the seat pointing upwards bounced around as the  vehicle navigated the rough bush road.  He drove up lookout hill and down a steep rough road into the dambo.  He turned left and started to cross the dambo when he hit an anthill and the landy stopped dead.  He put his foot on the gas and accelerated but the anthill had stuck itself firmly under the dif and was not  moving.

Adrian got out of the car.  As he looked under the Landy he thought of a plan, if he wedged the accelerator down with a stick and put the landy in gear, then lifted the landy up from the back in 4 wheel drive he may be able to lift it just enough to get it off the anthill. 

As he lifted the Land Rover shot off on its own across the dambo with Adrian running after it.  Finally the landy came to a stop when it stalled going up a big anthill.  Finally Adrian out of breath unwedged the stick and reversed it off the anthill.  He switched off the engine, cracked open a beer and sat there drinking.  He went right back to the lodge and told us all of his days bad luck.  He had us all in stitches.  Only Adrian could do something like that.

THE LEDGEND OF THE ELEPHANT GRAVEYARD

It was another warm October morning and the sun had already begun beating down on the bush without mercy.  The already dry grass thirsted for water but the sun was relentless.  The heat around midday would be unbearable but being native to the bush, a lot of us would not feel its full wrath.  We would merely go for a swim with the crocodiles.  We would take turns standing on the bank with the rifle checking for approaching crocs and their telltale swirl in the water from their tails while the other had a dip in the nice cool river. 

I felt relaxed that morning as we were swamped with a full camp of clients over the past weekend but I could finally go about my morning without rushing about since they had all left early.  I decided to stroll off to the diner and see what the plan was for the day.

As I got to the veranda where Oupa sat drinking his coffee I found myself bursting to ask him more about the ledgend of the elephant graveyard that he had told us the story about round the campfire the previous night with the clients.  Oupa always could spin a good yarn keeping the clients entertained for hours.

I sat down at the table outside.  The river ahead was beautiful, it was like something out of a postcard.  This  is what the rest of the world only see in books and their deepest dreams.  I wondered if the rest of the world knew that such a sight really existed.  Finally I asked Oupa if the graveyard really did exist or if it was just another tall tale.  Oupa didn’t say much but merely told me to finish my coffee that we had a lot of bush burning to do. 

We drove off in the old Land rover.  The dust filling our nostrils and the Tse-Tse flies were biting wildly as they always did when it was hot.  We were used to their bites and they didn’t bother us so much, they were however a nuisance.

We drove for about an hour then we finally stopped.  Oupa got out of the vehicle. “This is Elephant hill.”  I had never been there before and I wondered why Oupa had brought me here.  This was not a part of the bush that we usually came to with the clients so I couldn’t see why we had to burn this particular part.

Oupa began to walk up the hill.  Although it wasn’t that steep, there were a lot of rocks so the climb became more physically demanding.  Compared to Oupa’s seventy odd years I felt ashamed that he could walk up that hill without panting or puffing and I did.  We were both smokers but he walked up there like a rock rabbit. 

Once he reached the top he stopped, took a cigarette out of his pocket and found himself a nice flat rock to sit on.

Finally, out of breath I flopped down next to him.

“my girl, what you are about to see, no-one has ever seen before and if they have then the sight and knowledge of it has gone with them to the grave.  Some may even pass it down to generations that they can trust won’t abuse nor use it for power or money.” He pointed ahead of him. 

“just over that ridge” he said.

I walked up to the ridge and peered over it.

It must have been a while before I realised that my mouth was open.  I shut it as I stared overwhelmed by the sight before my eyes.  In front of me lay the proof of many stories and tales told around a blazing camp fire.  The ridge gave way to a steep embankment that ended below in a huge opening that was filled with white bones of elephants.  Huge tusks lay still embedded in their skull sockets, weathered by rain and sun.   Huge molars stood loose but in place in jawbones,  ribs forming series upon series of cages. 

It was the legendary elephant graveyard.  I wanted to go down into the crater but an unusual ghostly feeling came over me, whether it was amazement or the fact that this place was somehow sacred, I could not get myself to walk down the well trodden elephant path to the bottom of the huge crater.

I turned to Oupa who was sitting quietly on his rock, puffing on his cigarette.  He let out a chuckle.

“you thought I was pulling your leg hey girl!” He said shaking a finger at me.

I still could not speak.  I sat down on the ridge and lit up a smoke, took out the beer from my pocket and popped the lid off with my lighter.  I put my lighter and the lid back into my pocket and shook my head in utter disbelief.

“Who else knows about this place?” I asked finally.

“Just you, me and Ouma, and that’s how its going to stay isn’t it?”

I nodded as I swallowed the last drop of beer.

That afternoon while we burnt the bush, all I could think about was the elephant graveyard, I couldn’t believe that what I had seen was real, it came across as a dream, a fantastic figment of my wild imagination.  But I knew it was real and I hadn’t been dreaming.  Oupa and I drove back in silence.  Finally we got to the lodge and I walked in through the kitchen.  Ouma took one look at me, went over to the fridge and opened an ice-cold beer.

“You showed her the graveyard Pa didn’t you.” She said knowingly.

Oupa winked and said: “What graveyard Ma? You know that’s just a myth.”

PROOF OF THE SLAVE TRADE

The rainy season was coming to an end.  The bush looked green and healthy.  The animals had eaten well that season and they all looked healthy and fit.  The poachers would be moving into the area in a few months time which meant that Oupa and I would have to start bush patrols again.  Many animals were killed as a result of snares and many left maimed from traps and snares that they had managed to escape from.  Some of the lucky ones died, but others spent weeks even months with limbs hanging from a string or rotting wounds that left them as easy prey to predators. 

The game scouts had moved into the village near the pontoon that morning and one of the senior scouts had come to the lodge to let us know that they were in the area.  The scout bought some rations of mealie meal for his team and left.

Oupa had heard through some of the villagers at the pontoon that there was a fishing camp near the Italian rocks and that they were using small nets which were against regulation.  We got our rifles, picked up a game scout and headed off to the Italian rocks in the Landy.

Along the rough bush roads, it would take us about 3 hours to get to the Italian rocks.  None of these roads were ever smothed out properly with a grader since it would cost too much in Diesel and oil to get a grader out from Lusaka, so we went along the mostly used roads once a year with our workers and filled in the holes with soil and stone and compacted it with a plate compactor.  This only kept till the next rainy season when the road would become either a big pool of deep water and or a huge mud puddle, putting our winches on our vehicles to good use, not to mention testing the strength of the trees and our patience.

On trips that would take longer than an hour, we would need two very important things that were vital to bush survival.  The first would be two cases of beer, and the second would be a packed lunch.  Obviously fresh drinking water and a first aid kit with an anti-venom pack would always be in the vehicle.

The last two items were not however a vital part of the contents of the Landy since we could live off the river water.  And as far as snake bites went we would only have to shock the holes of the bites with the Land rover battery, this would cook the venom and shock the muscle around the bite stopping the poison from going any further into the blood stream.  Or alternatively we could open a bullet and pour the gun powder into each of the bite holes and set them alight.

We stopped an hour into the drive for lunch, a few beers and a quick dip in the river.  Oupa never swam in the river, he said he was too old, but he would sit on the bank with the rifle and watch for the typical swirls of the crocodile and dangle his feet in the cool Kafue.

  I would sink into the water up to my shoulders and sit on the bottom with my beer in one hand and my lunch in the other.  I never used a towel because when it was hot my wet clothes would keep me hydrated, cool and keep my body temperature low so the Tse-Tse flies werent as attracted to me.  There is nothing worse than bites all over you in the steaming hot sun, they itch twice as badly. 

We were back on the trail heading along the road again.  We were quite deep into thick bush area when finally we turned off the road and stopped.  Oupa handed me a beer and I took my position on the bonnet of the Landy. 

The drive through pure bush without a road to guide us was slow and difficult.  I would hold up my left or right arm to steer Oupa away from ditches, anthills, or rocks.  In some places where the grass was very thick I would hold up both my arms and he would stop allowing me to walk with him following painfully slowly through the grass till we were once again clear.

The trip had taken us four hours.  The bush was thicker than what Oupa remembered.  We parked the Landy under a tree near the Italian rocks.  The villagers had trodden a path from the river to their village which we followed.  I loaded Rasputin and flicked up the safety catch.  Oupa took my 308, he wasn’t going to take a chance with his old 22 hornet.  We had no idea what we were walking in to so we prepared ourselves for the worst and hoped we would not have to threaten nor shoot our rifles off.

We finally got to the village where we found illegal sized fishing nets, large amounts of dried fish, dried antelope meat and skins.  Clearly this was not only a fishing village.  Oupa spoke to one of the men from the village and finally they began loading the Land rover with the meat, skins and fish while the women packed their belongings.  We waited a long time and finally they moved off.  We had a long drive back but first we would have to check the river for nets and traps.  We left back through the bush with a big sack full of snares and about 12 illegal fishing nets.  We also found a few turtles that had died and a crocodile a metre long, still a baby.  We cut the crocodile free from the net and set it free into the river and it swam off exhausted from its struggle in the net.

As soon as we hit the dirt road we headed for the lodge. I got a beer from the back and Oupa drove with a cigarette hanging out the side of his mouth and his beer sitting between his legs.  The afternoon had gone quite smoothly and we decided since it wasn’t that late that Oupa would show me the old slave trading spot from the colonial days. Ouma had often told me about this place whilst playing cards in the afternoons as Oupa went for his forty winks.

We turned left onto the road that led to Hippo lodge and finally came to an open area that looked like it once could have been a road or possibly an old Tse-Tse fly barrier.  Tse-Tse flies cant fly great distances so the Colonialists cut out double roads for the barriers to their farms or camps so that the flies could not infect their cattle with sleeping sickness. 

We drove down the wide clearing.  Although the grass still grew down the clearing it grew thin and short, nothing else seemed to grow there.  Finally Oupa stopped and we got out of the car.

Ahead of me stood the most enormous Baobab tree I had ever seen.  It seemed large enough for twenty men hand to hand could not surround it. Nothing grew beneath the monstrous tree.  Lodged deep into its trunk were just the tips of metal rings.  The tree had over the time tried to repair the injuries.  There was an opening in the form of a very wide road to my left and to my right.  Nothing grew there either but short unhealthy grass.  On either side of the wide road not too far apart there stood palm trees disguised in the thick bush that grew beside them.

Close by in the opening there were cast iron poles sticking out of the ground.  I asked Oupa what the place was.

He explained that it had been part of the old Mumbwa road, the same road that ran many years ago through my lounge in Lusaka on the farm.  His answer explained the many graves that I had found in the bush on the edge of my piece of land and also the face brick foundations I had discovered when I planted my garden. 

 I tried to imagine the scene of hundreds of African men and women chained together.  The hard cold iron cutting into their bare flesh.  Some calling for water as they gasped desperately in pain and exhaustion.  Some sick with neglect and others just falling to the ground in surrender not having the strength to even cry out when the whip cut into their skin.  I could almost hear the cries, the crack of the whip, the shouting of the men as they flogged fallen men, or women that walked too slowly.  In my mind I could see the dust as their bare feel walked along the boiling hot soil.  I took a moment to appreciate the fact that the slave days were over. 

Our trip back through the bush was not so bad since we had already made a road through the thick grass.  Our trip back to the pontoon took three hours and fifteen minutes where we stopped at the game scouts village and handed over the confiscated meat and fish. 

Finally with the full day gone we sat down to a great stew made by Ouma.  We were exhausted and fell to our beds slipping deep into slumber as soon as our heads hit the pillow.

ADRIAN’S MEETING WITH A BRANDBLAAR AND OTHER BUSH NUISANCES

Most of you will not know what a brandblaar is so I will try my very best to explain.  The brandblaar directly translated from Afrikaans into English would be burn leaf.  This leaf grows on the ground and if you brush against it while walking in the bush you come up in welts that not only look like burns but blister and feel exactly like a bad burn.  It is generally advisable that if you are walking through the bush in the rainy season that you either wear long trousers or make sure that you don’t brush against this particular leaf.  The only cure for this pain is to treat it with burn ointment.  Trying to wash it off does help a little but is not better since the welts begin to itch frantically as well as burn.  If you have no burn ointment, the only thing left to do is to put up with the problem until all the hairs from the leaf fall out of your skin and finally stop causing a burning itch. This however can take up to three days and even then if you put on a pair of socks you were wearing at the time you got burnt then the chances are that they will still have hairs in them and create a relapse of the condition.  So as a result we in the bush learn from quite an early age about the insects and plants that could cause unnecessary uncomfortable situations. We tend to treat these small things as nuisances as there are far worse things that could go wrong in the bush and far worse situations to get into. 

There are a few other little nuisances in the bush which I will tell you briefly about before I continue with my story about this particular encounter that Adrian had.  Another utter nuisance is a buffalo bean, which is a pod that grows on a specific tree.  One usually encounter this pod when you walk under the tree or drive under the tree and the pod bursts from the heat of the sun and sprinkles tiny little hairs onto you.  It usually takes about two minutes for the victim of the pod attack to start running around frantically and scratching all over.  I have personally seen a grown man driving in an open top vehicle have one of these pods burst all over his lap.  His reaction was to stop the car, and go running toward the first puddle in the road and shedding tears from the terrible itch began rubbing himself with the mud in the puddle and then sit there for a full half hour waiting for all the itch to go.  He drove the rest of the trip with nothing on apart from an old greasy engine cloth covering his bits, so he wouldn’t experience more of the vengeful buffalo bean itch.

Another common one during the dry season is the hairy worm which is a small catterpillar that protects itself by shooting off tiny hairs creating the same kind of reaction only it is easy to get rid of by washing the area off with soap and water. 

Tse-Tse flies are another thing of the hot dry seasons, they bite into you which is quite painful and suck out blood leaving a very itchy spot on your skin or for some that have a reaction to these bites they leave a huge swollen inflamed area sometimes leaving an entire limb swollen and bloated.  These flies can bite more than once, are more aggressive in heat and thick bush, and when going through an area of the fly you can easily be bitten over twenty times leaving you with twenty itchy spots that keep you awake all night for about two nights.  Luckily you can get used to them or simply rub yourself full of TCP disinfectant or citronella oil which they don’t like the smell or taste of.  These flies cannot survive in cool climate nor can they fly far in one go so they are pretty easily repelled by cutting barriers of open stretches.  These flies can cause sleeping sickness in humans, kill livestock, and blind domestic animals over a prolonged period.

Malaria is something that we have all heard about and probably one of the worst killers in Africa.  It is the female mosquito that carries the disease.  One can take precautions with pills and mosquito nets, but if you live in Africa you tend not to take pills to prevent malaria so it is something that is common to get once a year.  Malaria turns your liver, kidneys and spleen into jelly and if you get up and move about during a bout of malaria you stand a good chance of rupturing the organs and can die.  Malaria can keep you in bed without being able to eat, high fevers, cold sweats, blinding headach, watery stomach, vomiting, without being able to drink water and keep it in your system long enough to rehydrate you.  All of this lasts three weeks and if you get up too soon you can get a relapse that will last a further three weeks or even turn into black water fever which is cerebral malaria. Few people survive a relapse.

Finally the very worst and most disgusting of all is the putsi worm.  This starts off as a fly that lay eggs in clothing that is still damp or damp skin, hair, any where that is warm and damp they lay eggs in.  The eggs then grow into worms and finally hatch.  If you hang your washing out on the line to dry and wear it without first ironing the clothes to kill the eggs, you can be guaranteed to have putsi eggs dropped onto your skin and then burrow into your skin through the pores and finally develop into an infestation of 50 to 100 putsi worms growing under your skin and feeding off your flesh.  Finally the worm fully grown will be about the size of a fully grown maggot will force itself out of the tiny pore which is very painful and drop to the ground. The way to get rid of these is not to squeeze them out causing a festering boil, but to plaster petroleum jelly thickly over the infected pore and suffocate the worm with a plaster over the petroleum jelly.  As the worm starts to suffocate it moves about under your skin which itches unbelievably until finally it pushes itself out of your skin to get its last breath of air.  Since there is a plaster over the pore it cannot get out and sticks to the plaster and finally after about 48 hours of itching you pull the plaster off when you feel the worm is no longer moving and with a lot of pain you can pull it out.

Well back to the story of Adrian…

On a fishing trip out to the lodge Adrian had decided to stay upstream in the bush in a camp he had made.  He wanted to catch big fish and he knew that it would involve fishing late into the night and early morning rising.  The camp was not far from the lodge and we could hear him in the evening making his fire and humming to himself as he cooked the fish he had caught earlier that day.  We at the lodge had retired at about 11:00 after eating our supper at the camp fire.  It had rained that afternoon and the sounds in the bush carried much further than it normally did when the bush was dry.

The sound in Adrians direction finally fell silent. The bush was alive with the sound in the distance of male lions calling the females, the baboons on the mountain, the night jars, and hyenas chattering. 

I had stayed awake in my chalet as I did on many occasions just to see the hippo, elephant and some times even lion and leopard walking and feeding through the camp on the fresh grass.  There was always something in the camp at night and I enjoyed sitting on the veranda in my chalet with a few beers on the cane chair and sucking on a cigarette as I waited in the dark for the animals. I had on many occasion in October moved my bed onto the veranda since there were no windows just huge openings from the floor to the roof of fly screen to separate me from outside.  I slept better on the veranda as it was much cooler than in the bedroom, and with its openness I got to see most of the camp in the bright moonlight and witness the ongoings of some of the animals that came into the camp.

It was about three in the morning and I had just finished my last beer.  The hippo were grazing outside within touching distance of where I sat. I had decided not to move until they moved on.  I didn’t want to disturb them and make them scared to return to the camp again.  All of a sudden the hippos pricked up their ears, I heard it too.  There was the rustling of someone walking through the bush on the other side of the camp.  The steps were human and I could tell that whatever moved only had two feet.  I knew it was Adrian.  Finally the Hippo moved of toward the river where they felt safer.

There was a loud shout and then a thunderous charge could be heard.  Within about two minutes Adrian came running through the camp and banged loudly on Oumas door.

“Ouma I need burn ointment quick.”  It was Adrian.

Finally he rushed off back to camp. 

After a reasonable nights sleep we all awoke in the morning and made our way to the diner.  Adrian was there first, drinking a cup of coffee.

He explained that he had not slept a wink during the night and had spent all night on the veranda of the diner drinking coffee and treating his backside and dangly bits with burn ointment at regular intervals during the course of the night.  He explained that he had go his shovel and loo roll to go off into the bush to do his business and not taken a flashlight since the moon was light enough to see where he was going.

As he had squatted he had begun his business and began to feel the unmistakeable burning of the brandblaar on his leg. He had ignored it since we were all quite used to injuries on our legs.  As he was about to pull his trousers up and cover his deposit with soil he had felt the burning on his backside and on his dangly bits.  It was bad enough when you got brandblaar on your arms or anywhere else but he had managed to get it right where one didn’t want it.

We all had a good laugh at Adrians misfortune since he seemed to be the most unlucky in the bush than anyone of us had ever seen. For the rest of his fishing trip he refused to go anywhere in the bush for a number two unless he could sit on a toilet seat.

THE DEATH OF A KING

It had been a dry week in October, The rainy season had given us two continuous weeks of heavy rain and then nothing for a week, the bush was very dry and the heat was unbearable, the animals moved away from the huge open dambo`s and lay hot and exhausted under whatever shade they could find, and even under the protection of the thick leafy cover, the heat left them panting and too hot to move to the river banks during the day, they would have to risk the trip at night when the predators were on the prowl. 

Oupa and I had taken a trip into the bush up to lookout point just checking that the rains had not damaged our bush trail to the lookout point and that it would be accessible to us if we were to bring clients through and that we would not be faced with uncomfortable terrain and difficult navigation. 

The road to the point was in relatively good condition give or take a few land slides and boulders that had washed down from the top of the hill on the lower sections of the road.

We took a look around for leopard spoor as we had a resident leopard at the look out point just below the rock we stood on to view the Kafue National park, but could find none and despite being territorial we had to be careful in case we brought clients up and got a nasty surprise.  The only tracks we saw were antelope and Elephant tracks that were all pretty fresh.  Finally we got back into the Landy and drove off to the hot springs to see if our Leopard had taken a walk down there to wallow in the sulphur water which they often did to get rid of the ticks and other parasites that they would pick up in the bush. 

At the Hot Springs I took a dip myself in the nice warm water.  One had to ignore the smell but that kept the tsetse flies away so I didn’t mind it too much.  Finally we were back on the dirt track towards the lodge; our day had been uneventful as far as game spotting went so we decided to return along the river to see if we could spot anything across river on the far banks. 

The sky was blue and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, the bush was getting drier and the river had dropped half a meter already in one week, we needed rain and we needed it soon. 

As I scanned the sky for any sign of rain I spotted a flock of vultures circling not too far into the bush and that usually meant there had been a kill or there was going to be a death.  I pointed this out to Oupa and naturally we went to investigate since we had to report any unnatural deaths in the bush just in case there were more snare deaths. If there were more snare deaths we would have to another bush combing to retrieve all the snares and put out watchers to catch whoever it was that was setting the snares.We had driven along the dirt road as close as we could to the vultures and turned left into the thick bush keeping an eye on the huge birds as they circled.  Finally we stopped as ahead of us in a tree sat a vulture that looked at us without a worry in the world.  At first none of us could see anything but with another look we spotted a bit of light brown movement and drove slowly closer to see behind the big anthill that stood in the way of what was moving.  We were cautious since Vultures and Malibu stalks usually meant a kill and that usually meant  leopard, lion or poachers.  In this case we found lying on the ground a female lion that didn’t seem too bothered by us. 

We stayed in the car and inched foreward toward her to see why she had not run off .  We were shocked to see how close we could get with the vehicle without her moving.

Finally we were about a metre away from her and all she did was growl a bit.  This was not normal behaviour for a lion.  We looked around and saw the reason for the vulture gathering.  At the base of the anthill lay the remains of a warthog that she had dug out of the anthill.  That was also strange since the kill had been made a while ago.  Not far from her she had urinated and defecated, another very strange thing for a lion to do since they didn’t sleep on their kills and neither did they stay in the place that they had used as a toilet.  Lions were very clean about this.  What was also odd was the fact that we could see no other lions nor signs that there had been any others, and she seemed to be alone.

Oupa and myself agreed to   leave her and come back the next day to see if she had gone.  Before returning to the lodge Oupa and I stopped off at the game scout village and reported our suspicion of the lion, suggesting it may be injured or diseased.  The scouts did not find anything suspicious about her behavior and seemed more interested in drinking themselves into a stupour with local bush moonshine, so we left for the lodge.

That night I was quiet round the fire, I couldn’t seem to get my mind off the lion.  She didn’t act aggressively and didn’t run away.  I had a feeling something was very wrong  with her but could not say what without spending more time observing her.  Humans can tell other humans what is wrong with them but animals show humans and most humans don’t take enough time to analyse and observe animals when they are not typically themselves.  We all finished our food and went off one by one to bed.

I lay on the veranda in my bed with my beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other.  I tried to picture the lioness again, I wanted to see if there was something I had seen but not registered and ignored while we were there.  I racked my brain but could find nothing.  Finally with my mind still on the lioness I fell asleep.  I was woken in the middle of the night with a movement right next to me.  I had moved my bed right up to the window opening.  I looked out the window beside me and could see nothing for the pitch darkness.  I found this odd since only the night before we had bright moonlight.  I looked out the windows ahead of me and then out the other side window.  The moonlight was as bright as ever.  As my senses awoke I smelt the fresh smell of elephant, the unmistakable sweetness that followed them.  It was then that I realised that what stood beside me only a breath away, half an arms length away was an elephant.  It must have been a big one too to make the whole window dark.  Finally it moved off and I went back to sleep with the grumbling of the elephants stomach not far from my ears sending me off to dreamland like the soothing of a mothers song to her new born child.

I slept very well the rest of the night dreaming of the lioness that lay under the tree next to an anthill not far from the lodge.  Even in my dreams I sensed that something was wrong. 

I awoke the following morning with a bee in my bonnet.  I wanted to get up and move out to the lioness as fast as I could, I just had this nagging feeling that something was wrong.  For some reason I took Rasputin and cleaned him thouroughly, I finished by loading a full lot of bullets into the magazine, which was unusual as I always only filled Rasputin with four bullets not eight.  Oupa always sent me off into the bush to hunt for dinner with only one bullet, but I always believed that a lot could happen before and after hunting for your dinner.  Can’t be too careful in the bush. 

This occasion seemed to be different, I knew that a lot could happen in the bush.  You could go out looking for a  lioness and come across an injured and very pissed off lion that wants you for her next meal.  Although we don’t have the attitude to shoot if we get into a spot of trouble unless it becomes completely necessarry we still have to have a little bit of backup and in this case that extra backup came in the form of four extra bullets in each rifle.  I made sure of the type of bullets so that I could make a clean kill with as little pain and suffering as possible – something I was very obsessive about.  

Finally I had finished my coffee and had cleaned the rifles, both held eight bullets in the magazine and held one in the barrel with the safety on lock.  Oupa had finally come to the diner.

“youre up very early my girl, couldn’t get a good nights rest or just anxious about the lion?”. He asked as he sat down opposite to me on the veranda.

“it’s the lion Oupa, I just have a feeling that there is something wrong, but I don’t know what.  It just isn’t like a lion just to sit there with us so close and not react.” I said.

We sat on the veranda drinking our coffee in silence.  We both knew that something wasn’t right and didn’t say anything about it since we knew what had to be done if we found her there this morning. 

We loaded the Landy with the rifles and two of our workers with Phiri.  Phiri read my mood and knew not to speak to me.  We went off to the scout camp where we picked up two game scouts.  

Finally after a small trip of silence but for the hum of the old landy, we arrived at the place that we had found the lion the previous day.  We decided to park a little further  away than the day before and go the rest of the way on foot in hopes of getting a better view of her from all directions to find out exactly what is wrong with her, and perhaps how we could help her. 

The dew on the long grass was wet and left our legs soaking, but we ignored this as well as the tse-tse  flies that bit us with a little less fury than the day before because of the cool temperature of the morning.  We walked slowly and cautiously since we  could not be sure if the lioness had moved or not and if she hadn’t what her response would be to seven people on foot in her space.  From our right hand side came a deep throated growl.  It was weak and a pathetic effort for a fully grown lioness.  We slowed right down to a creep a minute, keeping our senses highly tuned, every man for himself kind of thing, everyone using their own instincts… and  there she lay.  Her head hung weakly but she fought to keep it up high enough to see us frozen in our positions. 

Oupa  coughed but did not move.  He had used this cough to test her skittishness, he wanted to see just how much she would react and what she would react to.  Under normal circumstances his cough would have initiated a charge, even if it was only a mock charge it would have been a charge.  This lioness did not even flinch, but just lay there and gave a very sickly shallow growl.  It was then that Oupa and myself knew what must be done.  We realised that she was very weak and definitely dying.  Oupa looked at me and with his eyes upon me I felt that all the others were staring at me too.  I had Rasputin, the most powerful rifle there, the only rifle there that would ensure immediate death in the most painless manner.   As I layed on the sights I felt the tears streaming down my face.  I lowered the rifle and brushed them away, I  could not afford to have blurred vision nor emotions at this point, I had to make a shot that hit the brain then re load and shoot again breaking her neck.  I then had to re load just in case the bullet between the eyes had not killed her instantly.  I was sure that the one between her eyes killed her but with my hunting ethics I reloaded and shot again breaking her neck.  She had died after the first shot into the brain but I shot again into the brain just to make sure.  All three shots were clean and accurate and took only  a few minutes. 

The lioness lay still as we watched the last breath escape her mouth.  I turned away when I was sure she was completely lifeless and walked into the bush a fair way and leaned against a tree while I allowed the tears to flow from my eyes and where I knew the sobs could not be heard.  I heard Phiri and Oupa in the background  telling the others that no one was to go near the lioness till I was back, it was respect and it was also my call.

By the time I got back to the lioness, the game scouts stood up at attention since this was not something a woman could do in their eyes and through this I had gained a lot of respect.  I called Phiri to the lioness and told him to load her onto the vehicle.  Phiri knew me well enough now to know that dead or alive an animal deserved the utmost respect if not more than a human being and that the animal was to be put gently onto the vehicle not thrown like a bag of potatoes.  While  Phiri supervised the moving of the lioness, Oupa had opened me a beer and taking Rasputin from me handed me a cold beer. 

I said nothing and everyone knew not to try and speak about the incident to me nor ask stupid questions.  I hated killing any animal and found myself in tears almost every time.  I knew in this instance that it was for the best since she was too far gone for repair or treatment, not that one could get any treatment for a lion in Zambia and if one could she would not have lasted eight hours for someone to drove out from Lusaka.

We drove back to the lodge.  I knew what needed to be done.  As if having to put down a magnificent beast was not enough I still had to go through making a full report to the wildlife rangers and also because the law said so I had to skin the lion so that the skin could not be used by anyone for black market sale.  Not only at this moment did I despise the  game scouts and everything they stood for because had they been doing their jobs then this lion would not have died from such drastic wounds of snares that left it too damaged and lame to feed itself but I also hated them for rubbing salt into the wound by skinning it and insulting its natural power and essence of the bush.  I hated every part of human life at that moment and it  was at this point that I handed all the rest of the formalities over to Oupa since I knew if I stayed any longer that I would explode. 

I took one last look at the lion.  What we had thought was a lioness was infact a very starved and very ill male lion who had been so ill that he had lost his mane.  His rear legs were both hanging by a thread and the wire cables fashioned into snares were still there holding on to what was left of his legs.  His teeth marks were definite in the cable where he had tried to chew his way free of it and then further up on his leg where the injury was most evident I saw again his teeth marks where he had tried to chew his own leg off to free himself.  I lifted up his cheek and found a bloody mouth with very chipped and broken teeth.  He must have eventually chewed his way through the cable that held him trapped to a tree or stump.  The wound looked about as old as three weeks.  He could not have hunted nor eaten being in his state and I realised we had made the right decision.  My hatred for mankind grew and grew and became so furious that I took rasputin and fired a shot into the air, dropped him on the ground and walked off into the bush where I could be alone even though I knew Phiri followed not far behind and I knew he would follow me and stay with me till I decided to return.

I sat on the river bank for the rest of the day then the whole night.  The following morning having not had a wink of sleep either, Phiri cautiously came up to me and took my arm.

“madam, you must come with me to home, you will make yourself sick, lets go.”  He said, trying to lift my depressed body from where I had sat like a statue all night watched by my faithful tracker.  I let myself be lifted by Phiri’s strong hands and was guided all the way back to the lodge where ouma had prepared me a cup of coffee. 

“I knew you would be coming in about now, sit down and have some coffee.” Ouma said without mentioning nor questioning where I had been all night.

I took my coffee and  poured another for Phiri.  I also asked Robert to prepare a full plate of mealie meal for him.  I had not asked for his service nor company but he had stayed with me all night not sleeping nor eating.  I will say he was definitely the best tracker I had ever taught.  Phiri only let go of the 308 rifle when his food was served and together we sat in front of the lodge on the river bank where we chatted and I thanked him for his protection and dedication to his job during the night.  Phiri told me something that stuck in my mind.  He said he would not be such a good tracker if he did not know everything about the person who taught him and if I felt sore so did he, if I didn’t sleep or eat, then neither did he, and this is what made him the tracker he was.

Phiri and I had finished our coffee and food.  We marched off to the cottage where the two other workers and the game scouts were busy skinning the lion.  I looked at it and shivered.  It looked like something out of a science fiction movie.  Most of the skin had been removed, its teeth removed and its claws removed.  All of these things they removed from its body were things that could be sold on the black market, so by law they had to be removed and documented by the game scouts and witnessed.  What was done with the remains was up to us. 

Finally we took the remains of the lion and recommitted it to nature by sliding it into the river for food for the crocodiles.  The game scouts could not leave fast enough for me.

That night I dreamt of a lion standing proud, his roar dominating every sound of the night, his majestic form strutting smoothly through the bush with the moonlight casting a metalic glow on his smooth body.  It was in this dream that I knew we had done the right thing by putting him out of his misery, it was in this dream that I knew I had to do more in the way of snare combing in the bush around the lodge and as far as I could.  So the next week I hired another thirty workers just for snare combing.

It is thouroughly disgusting how  one human being can take the most proud and most majestic big cat of them all in the bush and degrade, insult, etc… into nothing, into a skinless, toothless, prideless, clawless piece of flesh that cannot even chew his own food nor catch it.