What I Found in Africa
Of soul-homes, sky-temples and safaris
A young Pakistani traveler's unforgettable first encounter with Africa
By Menel Ahmed
The Mara Simba lodge is a pretty, misty, quiet woody place
nestled deep in jungle brush on the banks of the Talek River. Mobile phones
don't work here, and the lodge landline is usually out of order. It was like
being time-warped into another dimension, an unknown parallel world ' a world
where we became different people, new people, our minds cleared of past
memories, knowing that here, we were truly away, unreachable,
untraceable, undiscoverable ' free. It was a strange, liberating
experience, forgetting who you were and just being. It stirred my soul,
made me glow, made me grow, and I felt there wasn't a happier, serener
person than me in the world that day.
We checked into our (simple but lovely) rooms, had
some lunch on the lovely patio-restaurant, witnessed a mongoose family-quarrel
under the terrace, saw two monster crocodiles sunbathing on the shore of
the river, and then, we were ready to go.
David was waiting for us outside, with the homely old white
van transformed into an intrepid top-open safari jeep. We all were suddenly
rather grave ' this was it, this was the moment, this was the reason
why people from all times and ages came to Africa, this was why we
had come to Africa, what we had dreamed about doing. And here we were! I
couldn't believe I was actually there. Every part of me was trembling with
excitement ' what would I see? What would I find? What would I feel? Would I be
disappointed, or would it be something beyond my wildest expectations? And as
David revved up the jeep and we slowly climbed onto the track heading to the
simple wood-posted entrance of the Masai Mara game reserve, I knew already that
I was in for the experience of a lifetime.
***
From the moment I started writing this article, I've been
wondering (and fearing) how I was to write about this part. Some things are just
inexpressible. You may go crazy taking photographs and videos, but when they
come out and you see them back at home sitting in your living room, you realize
that they are utterly soulless. Only in imagination can you recreate the vision
that really was, that you saw, and then maybe you can try putting in into
words ' you may or may not be successful, but you still try. And that is what
I'm going to do.
The wind rips past your face, screaming in your ears, your
hair flapping madly behind you, your cheeks white with cold - and all of a
sudden there unfurls above you a picture; a canvass so wide it fills every
corner of your vision, overwhelming you and absorbing you in its depth, it its
sheer vastness. And at that moment, you feel there is nothing and no one in the
world between you and your God, but that great, rolling, timeless blue sky.
I cannot even begin to describe that sky to you. It took my
breath away. You remember I talked about soul-temples in the beginning of this
article ' that sky, that sky I beheld at Masai Mara in Kenya, that sky
was my temple. You cannot appreciate sky living in a city, or in a forest, or
even in the mountains. But there, aboard that rattling jeep in the middle of the
wild gold African savannah, there, I understood. I understood why the
steppe peoples of Central Asia worshipped Tengri, and the Native Americans of
North America worshipped Manitou - how could you not venerate, how could you not
adore something so awesome, so pristine, so ineffably beautiful?
It looked like God had just re-painted the roof of the earth with the freshest,
purest of colors, and if you reached out a bit in front you could actually grab
a tuft of cloud in your hands, or brush against the sky with your fingertips.
That sky was something that could make believers out of
atheists.
I could write a book just describing that sky, and the
feelings it evoked in me, but don't worry, I'm not going to do that here! We
did of course see other things on the safari, many other things.
David had
warned us not to expect to see anything, however, apart from droves of
gazelles and zebras (which was a bit disconcerting) ' he said that since the
animals wandered about the savannah completely at will, sometimes in Masai Mara,
sometimes crossing over to the Serengeti National Park in neighboring Tanzania,
it was near impossible to predict where any of the animals would be at any
particular time. But the Sky gave us hope, and at least I knew in my heart that
I wouldn't be disappointed.
We romped about in the jeep for an hour, zigzagging
through ubiquitous dirt tracks and drinking in some spectacular scenery. How
David knew where to take us in that limitless unmarked expanse of savannah is
beyond me ' but soon enough the gazelles appeared, Thomson's and Grant's,
grazing prettily on the sides, skipping along in front of us, occasionally
casting curious glances in our direction with their wide dark eyes. There were
antelope too, great grand curvy-horned bucks, and innocent-looking impalas, and
then wildebeest, with their unmistakable shaggy gray beards, and this other
unimpressive bovine creature called topi. We saw them, sometimes lounging
around in intimate little groups, sometimes in enormous herds, all swishing
their tails, twitching their ears, and ruminating over supper, quite oblivious
of our presence. Sometimes they'd be seen hanging out with funny looking birds
too, crowned cranes, Marabou storks and blue quails, and sometimes we'd catch
them in rather embarrassing positions.
Soon the zebras also
showed up, but they were never seen by themselves, or even in pairs.
Zebras are fully aware of their own desirableness in the eyes of a lion, and
sticking together in big bunches is the only defense mechanism they have to save
themselves from becoming cat food. So when a lion sees a flock of zebra, he
actually just sees an indistinct muddle of stripes, and while that can even
confuse us at times, it is positively bewildering for the lion, who is
also color-blind. But if you happen to be an individualistic, itinerant kind of
zebra, it's not likely you'll even last the day.
While David was telling us all these things, I was thinking
how exciting it would be to actually see a lion making a kill. Not that
we'd seen any lions yet. In fact, there was no sign of them anywhere. The zebras
and all the other creatures were in quite a placid mood - there seemed to be no
cause for alarm in the near future. David observed this, and after pondering a
moment, abruptly swerved the jeep onto another track heading in the opposite
direction. 'This way,' he intoned under his breath, and we silently wondered
where he was taking us.
TM