The Witchdoctor's Bones

by Lisa de Nikolits

  Stepfan jumped to his feet. “What does it mean when you have a huge penis that is constantly erect? I must be a Bushman of the first order.”

  “Stop it.” Lena pulled him down.

  Jono sighed out loud. “The point is, it was a very shocking thing to do, to stop a man and take a measurement of the angle of his private parts.” He exchanged a glance with Treasure. “Are you ready for some dessert?”

  “We’re ready.” Ellie and Jasmine leapt to their feet.

  “The chocolate sauce is ready too.” Treasure announced. “Jono, would you please fetch the ice-cream from the ice box in the bus?”

  “I will.” Harrison said quickly. “The ice box is most efficiently organized and Richard, I hope you did not disrupt my system when you got your beers.”

  “God forbid,” Richard muttered, cleaning dirt out from under his fingernails.

  Harrison returned. “It was not too badly upset,” he said sternly to Richard who tried not to laugh.

  “I’m so relieved,” he said dryly.

  “Treasure, this is truly heaven,” Sofie dug into her dessert. “Oh, oh, oh.”

  “Tonight’s ice-cream soft-porn melting moment is brought to you by Sofie,” Stepfan said. “Listen to Sofie as she takes it in her mouth and wait, will she, won’t she, yes, she swallows.”

  “You’re so disgusting, Stepfan,” Kate said, with Sofie and Gisela agreeing loudly. Lena seemed lost in her own world and was gazing out into the darkness.

  “Come now ladies, have a sense of humour. I’m only joking around a bit. Lighten up.”

  “Charisse,” Treasure asked, “won’t you have any dessert?”

  Charisse blushed, wishing Treasure had not said anything. “Keeping an eye on my figure,” she joked.

  “And a very fine figure it is too,” Stepfan piped up and Lena clenched her jaw.

  Jasmine’s enjoyment for her dessert vanished; she had watched Charisse and noticed that she hardly ate a thing and Jasmine took this as a personal slight, as if every mouthful Charisse did not eat was a reproach for every one that Jasmine swallowed. Jasmine had no way of knowing that far from subsiding, Charisse’s stomach pains were getting worse.

  Jasmine pushed her bowl away and turned to listen to what Jono was saying.

  “Treasure’s dessert has made me forget where I was with my story…” Jono said. “To continue, the Bushman calls himself Ju, which means ‘people’, in the same way one might say lion, or elephant. They see people as only one of the numerous species of Creation permitted to walk on the face of the earth. We humans are not superior to other creatures but are simply fellow eaters of food, fellow dwellers on this planet. Life in the wilderness is a struggle between equals who have equal rights to live, eat, die, and be eaten. The Ju say they have words in their bodies and by this they mean that they have dreams that are premonitions and that is why they are powerful and highly respected diviners.”

  “Words in their bodies.” Lena leaned forward. “How lovely.”

  “Not as lovely as you,” Jono blurted out, surprising himself and the others. “You are the supermodel on this trip, Lena. How is it you are never dirty, or wrinkled or tired?”

  “I trained her well,” Stepfan stated proudly and Lena slapped him lightly on the arm.

  “You trained nothing.”

  Jasmine, uncomfortable on her tiny stool, felt even more bitter. Another example of the importance of looks. Lovely Lena and cheerleader Charisse, getting all the applause and attention. Jono would never compliment her, not in a million years, and she wished everyone had to live in her body just for one day, because then they would change their way of thinking, yes, they would. It made her sick that even Jono thought like that and she was disappointed in him. She looked at Lena and felt a wave of dislike.

  Jono gave a small bow in Lena’s direction.

  “There is one final fact I would very much wish to share with you. Will you indulge me?”

  The group nodded encouragingly.

  “You all know of the Nazis, yes?”

  “Of course,” the group was disoriented by this turn.

  “Hitler was not the first to use concentration camps. The British implemented secured ‘camps’ for civilian enemies during the Second Boer War in South Africa. Boer women and children and black civilians were put in these concentration camps and a lot of them died. But that is not all; the connections between Nazi totalitarianism and South African apartheid can be traced to right here in Namibia.”

  “What do you mean?” Marika spoke up. “I’ve never heard that.”

  Jono nodded. “Back when Namibia was a German colony called German South West Africa, war was being waged between the Herero and the German settlers and General Lothar von Trotha put the Herero into concentration camps and killed close to 70,000. This General also invited a certain Dr. Eugene Fischer, an anthropologist, to come and study the captured Herero.

  “Based on his visit, Dr. Fischer wrote Principles of Human Heredity and Racial Hygiene, in which he claimed that the Herero were animals and that the German race was superior and he applauded von Trotha’s concentration camps. Adolf Hitler read Dr. Fischer’s book in jail and it contributed to his writing of Mein Kampf. This same Dr. Fischer was put in charge of training the SS doctors who later performed experiments in the concentration camps.”

  “Oh my God,” Sofie said, “it’s all entwined.”

  Jono nodded. “And it gets even more so. Marika, do you know who Dr. Hendrik Verwoerd is?”

  “Of course. He was a prime minister of South Africa and the so-called architect of apartheid.”

  “Quite correct. And Dr. Verwoerd also studied under Dr. Fischer in Berlin which gives evidence of a very strong link between the origins of Nazism and apartheid.”

  Marika was horrified. “Jono, how come I didn’t know?”

  “History is written by those in power.” Jono shrugged. “We are told what they want us to know.”

  “But what about now? Why hasn’t this been brought to anyone’s attention now?”

  “Because,” Stepfan flicked at the ground with a twig, “no one cares. People like you think you’re supposed to care but in reality, no one does. Life’s about power and money, and there’s no profit to be made by talking about ancient history.”

  Kate looked over at Lena and wondered how she could be married to such a man. Lena was staring down at her clasped hands, her face closed.

  “Stepfan, there is no point in even trying to talk to you,” Sofie said.

  “I outwit you my dear, it’s as simple as that.”

  “You see,” Enrique burst out, “that’s why I like flowers better. They don’t torture or kill each other like men do.” He’d been quiet throughout the evening, listening intently.

  Eva, sitting next to him, nodded.

  “What a nice fireside chat this is,” Stepfan frowned and leaned forward. “Do you have much more you’d like to share with us, Jono?”

  “Does it make you uncomfortable to hear some hard truths?” Harrison asked. “Too close to home for you perhaps?”

  “We Germans are always blamed for everything.” Stepfan retorted. “I can’t even go on holiday without finding myself accused of some genocide or other. It gets very boring.”

  “Stepfan!” Sofie cried out.

  “What? You armchair moralists, what do you want me to do about it? Say that I’m sorry? It’s all the fashion these days, to apologize, as if that fixes anything. I’m so bored of it — the guilt, the shame. We need to move on. That’s all in the past. We need to get on with our lives and I, for one, want to get on with my holiday.”

  “Leave if you’re not enjoying yourself,” Harrison gave a dismissive wave of his hand. “Unlike you, Stepfan, I like to know about the people in whose land I am a guest.”

  Kate shot a glance at Rydell, wondering if he woul
d pop up and recite something from his book on filth and protuberances but he was lost in his own world. She watched his lips moving silently, as if he was reciting a prayer or a poem. He was dressed as always from head to toe in pale, wrinkle-free attire and he must have sensed her gaze because he looked up at her. She smiled at him and he offered his wet twisted grimace in return, immediately looking away and flicking at his trousers.

  “Does anybody have any questions?” Jono asked.

  “I do have a question,” Richard said. “It’s about the Bushmen and trance dances. I’m dying to hear more. Mia and I are hoping to attend one … or have one or some such…”

  “Enough talking, it’s nearly 9:30 and we must do the dishes…” Harrison said.

  “Dishes … forget the stupid dishes…” a chorus rose.

  “I don’t think the dishes will suffer, waiting for another half an hour,” Helen’s tone was cutting and she leaned back on her stool with her hands in her pockets.

  “I’ve been thinking about paper plates…” Harrison began but he was shouted down.

  “The trance dance,” Jono said, “has the women sitting in a circle around the fire, clapping and singing. The men dance around them, trying to enter a trance. They believe that when they are in this state, they gain supernatural powers from some of the animals they respect, and from their ancestors. Then they lay their hands on the sick people and the sickness comes from them and goes into the medicine man, who is also known as a shaman, and it comes out through a hole in his neck, called the ‘n//au’ spot.”

  “Is this the same as the sangoma dance we talked about last night?” Richard frowned in concentration.

  “There are similarities but it is different. The end result is also to heal but the way of doing it varies, although both tap into ancestral spirits and ask them for help. The shaman is the one who enters the trance in order to heal, to protect from evil spirits, to foretell the future, bring good weather, and generally look after the well-being of his people.”

  “These fellows aren’t crazy like the sangomas?” Jasmine asked.

  “They are not filled with the sangoma madness we were discussing, nor are they trained in the same way as the sangoma, who spends years learning his craft. These are ordinary people who use dance to channel energies to receive visions and help to heal. Dancing has always been an integral part of African society; we dance to celebrate, to heal, to offer prayers; all sorts of things. Every African was born to dance.”

  Mia put her fingers to her mouth and gave a loud whistle of appreciation. “How, exactly do you make a trance dance happen?” She pulled her cardigan tightly around her, unscrewed a bottle of vanilla vodka and signalled to Jasmine who dragged her chair to sit beside her.

  “The first few hours are relaxed and sociable and the women sit and clap and sing while the men dance around them. The men have rattles on their legs made from dried seed pods,” Jono explained.

  “Bleedin’ sexist,” Mia objected, “I want to dance, not sit and clap and I also want to wear seed pods on me legs.”

  “I suppose you can do whatever you like,” Jono said, “but it is generally a man thing. Anyway, the dancers go faster and faster until they start to hyperventilate and that, with their intense concentration and the rhythm of the dancing, makes the potency of the moment come to a ‘boil’ as they call it, and they alter their state of consciousness. If a shaman is inexperienced and cannot control his concentration, he falls unconscious to the ground. The shaman also sweats a lot and breathes heavily and he has a glassy stare, like he is ‘seeing beyond’, which is how they describe it.”

  “Sounds like a sort of self-hypnosis,” Eva commented.

  “Or like an intense meditation,” Sofie said, “where you kind of leave your body and enter a spiritual world.”

  Jono agreed. “Shamans often have nose bleeds and experience terrible physical pain because trying to access this other world hurts a lot. When they are in the trance, they lay their hands on people and perform the most important of all their tasks, that of curing people. They draw the sickness into their own bodies and with a high-pitched scream, they expel it through the hole that I told you about.”

  “Where does the sickness go, once it comes out of the neck?” Eva enquired.

  “It is thought that it goes back to its source and the source is wicked, unidentified shamans,” Jono explained.

  “Have you ever seen a trance dance or been in one?” Gisela asked.

  “No, but I have spoken to a lot of people who have attended them and you will meet one such person when we get to Sossuvlei. His name is Thaalu and he is a wonderful Bushman, who will take you on a walking tour and you can ask him all your questions.”

  “A trance dance is really like a rave, isn’t it?” Mia said. “Who knew a rave was a spiritual ceremony. I think we should have one with just us.”

  “Having a hole cut in my throat and a nosebleed isn’t my idea of fun,” Helen was scathing. “But each to his own.”

  “I don’t think we should fool around with things like that,” Marika hugged her arms to her chest. “You never know what kinds of evil you might stir up.”

  “Afraid of a little black magic are you?” Richard joked, “I’m not afraid.”

  “Then you are foolish,” Jono looked at him steadily. “There are always consequences and you should have respect for that which you do not understand.”

  “He understands,” Mia asserted. “Take drugs, dance around a fire, wave your arms and see visions. Our kind of party.”

  “Jono, last night you mentioned that you knew about muti killings and such, can you tell us about them?” Richard asked.

  “That is a whole different kettle of fish,” Jono replied, “and I’m very tired now, so muti, which is traditional African medicine for those of you who do not know, is a topic for another time. And now I must change the subject entirely and ask who wants to go canoeing tomorrow morning? I must let them know at the lodge office.”

  Richard, Mia, Ellie, Jasmine, Brianna and Enrique put up their hands.

  “A big round of applause for Professor Jono.” Richard said and the group clapped enthusiastically.

  Jono smiled and set off across the lawn. He had found the group to be very tiring but he hoped that Kate had been impressed by his knowledge — that at least would have made the evening worthwhile.

  Kate and Harrison were left to clean up the mess, while the others settled down at the pub where multi-coloured lights hung from the trees and there was the faint smell of citronella on the breeze.

  Mia drew patterns on the wooden table top with a melting ice cube while she and Jasmine made inroads into the beer, shooting back vodka on the side.

  “Look Richard, MheartR.”

  “Very nice,” Richard patted her back.

  “Sounds like a riot,” Mia said, “the old trance dance. We should ’ave one.”

  Richard agreed. “We’ll need to get masks and drums for a start.”

  “We should have one every night,” Ellie piped up. “It’d be better than history lessons on the Bushmen.”

  “I bleedin’ second that.” Mia high-fived her across the table.

  “We should do one around Rydell’s tent to cure him of snoring,” Richard commented. “Have you heard him? Snores like a hyena on steroids.”

  “I heard him alright,” Stepfan was bitter. “I didn’t sleep one single wink last night because of him and then I slept all day on the bus and missed everything — great.”

  “I’ve never heard anything like it,” Richard said, swigging beer.

  “Be careful, here he comes,” Sofie warned.

  “Who cares?” Stepfan said. “With that sort of medical condition, he shouldn’t inflict himself on us normal people trying to have a holiday.”

  Rydell sat down and ordered a beer.

  “As well as the trance
dance, I really want to learn how to do the Marula,” Mia said. “I saw a fing about it on YouTube, it’s a famous African dance.”

  “Yeah, right, elephants get drunk on the fruit from the Marula tree,” Jasmine said. “And there’s that liqueur made from it too. Let’s get some in the next town.”

  “Jasmine,” Stepfan said suddenly and Gisela saw Lena stiffen. “May I please ask you a question?”

  “Sure you can,” Jasmine was affable. “Ask away.”

  “How is it, and why – and mind you I’m only concerned for your well-being – are you the big size woman that you are? Because you are, or could be fairly attractive. Why you don’t try to lose some weight?”

  The others, horrified by the turn of conversation, did not know what to say.

  “My goodness,” Jasmine was shocked, tears welling in her eyes, “No one’s ever asked me anything like that. I’ve told you before, I’ve got a lot of medical issues and I do exercise a lot so this is just me.”

  “A calorie’s a calorie, you either burn it off or it gets stored as fat. You must eat more than you burn off. Why don’t you stop yourself from doing this? It’s not healthy, never mind the damage it does to your attractiveness level.”

  Jasmine was searching for a reply when Rydell piped up.

  “If you were a Hottentot, you’d be considered very beautiful. The Hottentots love a fat girl so much that young girls preparing for marriage drink liquid fat. The fatter they are, the more value they have and a big bottom is especially good.”

  “They drink fat?” Gisela said. “That’s revolting.”

  “It is, but that’s because they’re dirty,” Rydell was emphatic. “They find peculiar pleasure in dirt and stench and are among the filthiest people in the world, although they’re not considered the filthiest. The women eat the vermin that swarm in their clothing and the details of their marriage ceremonies are too monstrous to talk about.” He giggled.

  “Crikey Moses, where on earth do you get these dodgy facts?” Mia enquired. “You sound like National Geographic gone haywire.”