Saving the White Lions

by Linda Tucker

  Battered and exhausted, I retreat together with my team to the sanctuary of the White Lions’ heartland.

  A COUPLE OF HOURS HAVE PASSED since the public participation meeting, and Jason and I sit with the lions as the heavy sun dangles behind the filigree of bushveld savanna. We are outside the pride’s enclosure in Jason’s Land Rover, a little distance away so as not to disturb them. My primary objective is to try to regain my emotional equilibrium, which has been entirely destabilized by today’s public assault. I suspect Jason is as seriously shell-shocked as I am; he’s quiet and downcast. To add insult to injury, directly after this afternoon’s hostile pounding, a microlight has been flying low over our land, circling and doubling back again and again, staking it out. It was so low that Jason could see the color of the two pilots’ helmets, but as yet we’ve been unable to make out the license number on its wings to identify the culprits and take action against them. Sitting with the lions as the spying machine flew over, we watched, fuming, as Marah and her cubs cowered, then fled for cover under the acacia trees, huddled together out of sight. This intrusion over our airspace added to the general sense of foreboding, which has darkened these past few months. Many mornings I wake up with a start, dreading feedback from Nelson and Nelias and wondering whether the electric fence has been breached again, or whether they have picked up alien footprints branding their imprint on our land, intending to do damage to property, or worse, lions.

  These highly endangered innocents urgently call for humanity’s protection. Yet the entrenched pro-hunting mindset on our borders holds a different opinion. I often think of Ian’s warning, prior to my purchasing land in this region. Despite his caution, I went on to secure the heart of the White Lions’ ancestral homelands as a protected area, an isolated bastion, under attack on all sides. Still, I don’t regret it. It’s a foothold in the White Lion kingdom, infinitely better than having Marah exiled in a dungeon or cooped up in a cage with other animals awaiting the hunter’s bullet.

  And I know protecting the heart of this kingdom is simply part of my shamanic work as the Keeper of the White Lions, the next step in the process toward creating a better world for Nature and humanity. So, while Jason has been in discussion with his colleagues about setting up an armed response unit stationed on our property, I’ve been working with alternative methods to secure our boundaries. The shamanic techniques I was shown by Maria Khosa, Credo Mutwa, and a number of other high-level African medicine people have enabled me to establish an invisible forcefield around our perimeter, which barricades against access by dark forces. In fact, the energy shield I have activated on our borders works with the frequency of love, thereby converting “all guilt into gold,” such that no one holding negative intention toward us or the White Lions can gain entry. Only by converting this base intention into love and light would access be made available to them. Above the land itself, a pyramid of pure light has been created, rendering the White Lions invisible from the air, so in my estimation, the invading microlight over our airspace is more of a nuisance than a real threat to these radiant sun creatures.

  In the golden glow of sunset, these playful animals lift our morale. Just for fun, the youngsters have made a daisy chain of three parts, holding onto each other’s tails. It’s simply adorable! Marah’s loving bond with her cubs is so strong, they seldom leave her side. They dote on their mother, tugging at her to join their play, attempting to grab onto her tail as it sweeps by. If her children stray too far for too long, Marah summons them back with a soft, guttural grunt, lovingly licking their faces and nudging them on their way again. Then, spectacularly, she springs up the trunk of a tall marula tree, climbing to a height of about seven meters, where she settles comfortably in the branches.

  Jason and I watch totally spellbound. No doubt she hoped to grant herself a bit of peace from her overexcitable brood. Regally she stands, high in the tree’s branches, staring out over the Timbavati wilderness and the distant Kruger National Park. I can hear her thinking, “One day, all this will be reclaimed and brought together under the White Lions’ supreme governance.”

  Despite the pride’s fun and games, it’s sobering to remember that Marah and the cubs are still housed in a mere five-acre enclosure. Albeit dense with trees, this area is not much larger than the camp in which they were housed in the Karoo for nearly a year. It was designed simply as an acclimatization area, originally intended to provide temporary housing for a couple of weeks before releasing the lions onto the surrounding bushveld wilderness of Tsau’s protected area. But in the current climate, with the legal battle pending and hostile neighbors making claims that we are introducing lions illegally into the region, we can’t risk freeing the pride from this confined area.

  “Sometimes I can’t get over the absurd paradox that Marah’s freedom means that I, of all people, have to build fences,” I observe, trying to suppress my rising frustration, but I can’t stifle the pain that wracks my heart.

  “It’s the only way to ensure their safety for now,” Jason reminds me.

  “Yes … true … but …”

  What more is there to say?

  There’s an overwhelming sadness burning in my chest, as I watch these loving creatures make the most of the forced captivity unenlightened humans have imposed on them. The cubs have gathered at the base of the tree, looking up at their mother before darting off to play. Marah is in the tree’s highest branches with her eyes closed, fast asleep. What a scene.

  Squeezing my hand encouragingly, Jason mutters, “This makes everything, absolutely everything, worthwhile!”

  CHAPTER 22

  Not Forgotten

  JULY 5, 2005. THE PUBLIC PARTICIPATION MEETING is long since behind us, as Jason and I pass through the fortified gates of a property abandoned by the godfather of the canned-hunting industry. Dislodging himself suddenly from the region, he’d left devastation behind him: empty cages and desolate land. It remains incomprehensible to me that a concentration camp like this could exist in this region for decades without neighbors objecting or Nature Conservation authorities shutting it down. Observing their aggression toward our project, I wondered why they were so afraid of the light.

  The canned hunter’s property is up for auction. Corelight has courageously offered to put in a generous bid, so we are here to represent them. While it would be good to rescue this besieged land and lovingly restore and nurture it, we’ve heard the canned hunter has placed an astronomical figure as his reserve, so it’s unlikely we’ll be successful. Nonetheless, I need to return to these lands to remind myself what I’m fighting for. This time, the parking lot is vacant; there are no troop vehicles, and the electrified gates to the crowded cages and coops that held the lions captive over a period of several decades stand half open.

  Jason strides ahead of me on the gravel path, so as to fill in the auction’s registration forms at a trestle table set up on the concrete patio. While he fills in the details, I force myself to walk over to the house itself. Approaching this grim residence, I recall visiting two years earlier. I can still vividly see the image of that shadowy figure, leering out of his house, itself a fortified cage in the middle of the surrounding lion coops. Looking at the structure more closely, it occurs to me that even the warden of a high-security prison would not live in such barricaded incarceration.

  I step across the threshold into the interior of his private world. A grim stuffed elephant head greets my arrival in his home. Glancing from left to right, I’m saddened to see lion trophies on either side of the entrance hall. It grips me as a gruesome parody of Egyptian sacred architecture. In Giza, everywhere one looks is a marvel of magnificent marbled guardian lions in Sphinx poses, serenely protecting every temple gateway. Here, by contrast, living lions are stuffed and positioned in simulated postures of killing each other, mouths grotesquely opened to show their impressive incisors.

  It’s hard to imagine what his friends and guests must have thought, arriving to this macabre welcome. I vaguely wonder what th
e other prospective buyers must be thinking. Looking through the grills fixed to the window frames, I catch a glimpse of several safari suits clutched into a gathering outside, each gripping a can of beer. Which one, I wonder, will be the proud new owner of this bloodstained fortress? If Corelight were to be the highest bidder and claim this property, the idea is to turn this stronghold into a monument, so people were reminded of the atrocity that canned hunting represents.

  Stepping into the dark interior, I notice that pinned in the middle of the wall ahead is a painting with two elephants fighting to the death. All around me, the windows of the hunter’s house are barricaded against the sunlight. Not only are the outside entrances of the house grilled up; every room in the dark interior has its own security grates and bars, barricade after barricade. The entire house is a mausoleum, stuffed with trophies of animals in dreadful grimaces of anger and trauma. The entrance hall, lounge, dining room, each and every bedroom I force my way through is crammed with taxidermies. Even the so-called “living room” is stuffed with dead creatures. Entire cheetah and leopard families of taxidermies are clustered together. Then, with a wave of nausea, I see the stuffed subadult white lioness and the stuffed baby white lion cub—will it ever end?—wherever I look, I feel like choking!—stuffed vervet monkeys and stuffed baboons with snares around their necks and rugby caps, as if a macabre joke. Soon I am gasping for breath, trapped in a morgue.

  I hurriedly depart the house. Outside, amidst the safari-suited bargain hunters, I feel hemmed in by the intensely oppressive sense of incarceration all around me, and the feeling of entrapment hits me in the belly like a wallop of nausea. I experience the pathology behind it all, the condition of fear and inner hatred that wreaks havoc on the outside world. Caged human, caging all of life.

  Only by healing ourselves can we humans stop wounding the beautiful creatures that surround us. But the dreaded question remains, Will humanity actually reach this point of understanding with our natural environment and fellow man?

  Jason is outside too, finishing the forms, and I hasten to join him. I tug at this arm, recommending a walk into the surrounding grounds. I notice the concerned expression on his face and try to straighten myself out. I am desperate to escape and suggest we drive out to view the property.

  It’s a relief being back in the Land Rover and moving, but I notice that the lands too have been raped and carved up into multiple fenced sections, denuded and overplowed. I tell myself all is not entirely lost, remembering how Mother Nature recovers in response to love. The indigenous trees will grow again over time if allowed to, and the soil has not been entirely stripped of its fecund richness. As usual, Jason is offering some encouraging comment about the land having every potential of being nurtured back to life. It’s a soothing thought. We drive around a clump of alien gum trees and there, suddenly, unexpectedly, we are faced by another fenced camp. Somehow, I’ve let my guard down, so I am caught totally unprepared. This electrified camp is one of the last lion camps remaining on the grounds, separated from the other coupes we’d already seen—and there, ahead of us, are the lions, waiting. Oh god, the lions! I didn’t realize that the canned hunter had left five lions behind on his land, two white and three golden, allowing a last opportunity for the new owners to enjoy a bloody trophy hunt. The lions standing in front of us are the last members of the surviving bloodline, from that original proud White Lion male stolen from the wild!

  On spotting us, the two White Lions separate from the others and move quickly right up to the fence, facing us squarely. They are making direct eye contact, and it is extremely painful. It is like looking into the eyes of a wrongly convicted death-row prisoner, a desperate prisoner who is moreover one’s close relative. Still watching, the subadult female starts retching and retching, her stomach contorted in pain, right in front of me. I can feel my own stomach turn. I know intimately how she’s feeling. My whole being feels sickened.

  Then the male starts digging at the fence line, as if making an urgent bid to escape. The tears are burning down my face, but I simply shake my head at him. Escape is pointless—he’d just be tracked down and shot, or returned and flung back into death row. The helplessness I feel is excruciating—there is nothing, absolutely nothing, I can do to relieve his desperation. With Marah’s own life and future at risk, how can I plan any further action or rescue attempts? As if hearing my thoughts, the young male suddenly stops digging. He looks at me with a pitiful expression, but with supreme dignity. I see that he and the young female are badly damaged, not only psychologically, but also, I fear, physically or even genetically. But his soul and true spirit are unbroken. He knows exactly what is at stake. Looking straight into my eyes, he communicates courage and perseverance, as if he knows that behind the madness there is a plan. It is not the White Lions who need to escape their shackles; rather, these great beings are waiting for humans to free themselves. I tell this beautiful creature, and the young female in pain beside him, and the three golden lions who have remained huddled together in the background, watching: “You are not forgotten; you are not forgotten!”

  I am weeping copiously, sobbing my heart out. I beg Jason to take me home, as fast as possible. Jason has submitted Corelight’s bid, so I can’t see any point in lingering for the auction itself. My helplessness makes me burn with anger and frustration. I simply can’t see a solution. I need to get back to Marah and our lion family, as fast as possible, to try to settle my distress.

  I’M BACK ON THE WHITE LION HEARTLAND, sitting in the Land Rover with Jason. He is trying to comfort me with words I can’t even hear. Marah and her cubs lie close to the dense thicket at the center of their boma. I am heartbroken, totally shaken, as if nothing in the world will alleviate the pain. But seeing the family shining with contentment and serenity encourages me to wipe away my tears. I am sniveling without a tissue and Jason has taken off his T-shirt, chivalrously presenting it to me to dry my face. I feel the first inklings of humor and love returning. Queen Marah has her back turned to me. Her daughter, little princess Zihra, is lying snuggled up with her brothers. Zihra’s paw is flung over one of her brothers affectionately, while all three contentedly doze. Their luminous white coats glow in the afternoon sunlight. I try to suppress my miserable snuffling as their beauty begins to instill a calm back into my soul.

  But suddenly, as if she’s heard something, Zihra springs up on all fours. She looks anxious rather than alarmed and comes padding over toward me, as if to gain clarity on something that’s bothering her, something that I’ve said, or shown her. She looks up, right into our vehicle, and intently makes eye contact with both Jason and me. Her gaze is totally direct, as if reading our minds. Then suddenly she begins retching and retching right in front us. Her stomach contracts again and again, as if in agony. We are both dismayed. Neither Jason nor I have seen this behavior before, in the many months of observing them. Jason’s immediate reaction is concern for her health. He’s ready to speed back to base camp, to call in our veterinarian. But, watching closely, he changes his mind. He’s thinking what I’m thinking. This is no coincidence. This behavior completely replicates that of the young female in the dreaded canned-hunting camp a couple of hours earlier. I’m stunned, wondering what it could mean. After a few bouts of repeated vomiting, Zihra quickly recovers. She gives us a lingering look with intense sapphire-blue eyes, then relaxes and turns tail to join her brothers. She shows no signs whatsoever of prolonged discomfort. I scrutinize the other lions. They are all sitting up, watching her. Most especially, I take my cue from Marah’s regal expression. She transmits a serene knowing, the corners of her mouth curled up into a hint of a smile. Zihra flops back down next to her brothers and characteristically flings her paw over one of them, again. As if to say, “Okay, job done. Back to cuddle land.”

  I can see the loving care etched in Jason’s face and I feel his relief that Zihra recovered so quickly. He’s holding both my hands to his lips, kissing them gently, sighing with relief.

  I breathe d
eeply too. From my training with Maria Khosa, I can only conclude that Zihra’s unusual behavior is a form of “distant healing,” specifically aimed at assisting the ailing lions in the canned hunter’s stronghold. The most powerful shamanic healers, like Maria Khosa herself, are able to alleviate pain as well as heal wounds, long distance.

  Time and space are no constraint for them. I realize this painful episode was yet another lesson in White Lion magic. For me, it confirms Maria Khosa’s view that White Lions—like all great avatars, including Christ—are supreme healers, working miracles, performing healing and magic. Understanding this gives me incredible relief. I suddenly find my strength again. I can feel the invisible connection of love that exists between Marah’s family and the other big cats in distress. And that makes all the difference in the world. Poignant though the situation remains, Zihra’s healing technique helps me understand that the canned hunter’s lions, incarcerated in the death camps in the south, are not forgotten—not by Nature at least.

  CHAPTER 23

  Waiting Game

  JULY 10, 2005. THE SUN IS RISING, silhouetting and gilt-edging the dry bushveld. A fish eagle calls high above us, circling. And the pride lies contentedly in a heap. Since our venture into enemy territories two weeks back, we’ve managed to raise the funds for a second-hand Land Rover. For the purposes of our project, it has been custom-altered: closed in at the back, which is ideal for all-night observation, with bunk seats that easily convert into a double bed. Awake after one of many wonderful nights out with the lions, Jason and I need to get on with the practicalities of the day. We reluctantly head back to base.

  The kitchen door stands open, and Cibi and Sam come careering out as usual to greet us. A little disheveled from our night out with the lions, Jason and I enter the farmhouse kitchen. Everything begins really early in the bushveld, and our team rises with the sun. The only missing team member is Mireille, who had to depart just before the auction two weeks prior in order to attend to her affairs back home. She left a huge space, and everyone’s hoping she’ll return soon to add vibrancy and good cheer to our gatherings.