by John Fowler
Peter invited me to help with the lantern repair and we took seats in the shadows at the table, while Kanyaragana sent his young helpers out for more water. Completely unfamiliar with the workings of the pressure lantern, I was still thankful for a project, and a seat, that would keep me out of Dian’s way. In the darkness, I fumbled with the tiny brass tubes and rods, baffled by what went where.
Carolyn had taken her things down to a separate cabin where she would spend the night and, when she arrived, Peter sprang up to open the kitchen door.
“How do you like your cabin?” he asked her.
“Very nice, I can hear the stream running by it.” Carolyn had toweled her hair dry from the rain, and had changed into a fresh dry shirt and jeans.
“Has Dian said anything about who will be going to what groups tomorrow?” Peter asked Carolyn and me. “I spend most of my time with Group 5.”
“Oh, I’ve read about Group 5 in one of Dian’s articles,” Carolyn responded.
“Yeah, Group 5 is the most habituated group, great to work with. I’ll show you their pictures on the wall out here.” Carolyn followed Peter into the dining area. I wanted to go too, but stayed behind with my lantern project in the shadowy kitchen, which was beginning to feel like the only sanctuary from Dian’s wrath. I continued to be amazed by Peter boldly venturing back out of the kitchen so soon after our scolding.
“Ahem . . . shut the fuck up Peter!” Dian hissed, as Peter began explaining the photos of Group 5’s members to Carolyn, “You don’t even know what the hell you’re talking about . . . ahem.”
I peered out into the lighted dining room, while Carolyn edged away from the tension down to the living area where Stuart, Judy, and Liza greeted her. Peter pursued Dian to the other side of the table.
“Why are you treating me this way?” he asked, in a loud whisper.
“Really and truly Peter . . . You think you know every goddamned thing . . . ahem.” Dian cleared her throat in the telltale sign that she was well into her bottle of Scotch.
“Bullshit!” Peter exclaimed.
What balls, I thought. Wish I could talk to her like that!
After a brief exchange with Dian that was too hushed for me to hear, and interrupted by Dian’s increasing throat-clearing and gorilla vocalizations, Peter came back into the kitchen clearly exasperated.
“What’s she so mad about?” I whispered.
“She’s drunk,” he said, looking over his shoulder.
“She bought a case of Scotch in Kigali,” I said.
“Yeah, good ol’ Johnnie Walker Red Label.” Peter leaned into Kanyaragana’s ear. “Shit . . . goddammit . . . motherfuckit!” He said in a loud whisper, stomping his boots in a mockery of Dian.
Kanyaragana’s shoulders bounced convulsively as he stifled his laughter, nearly spilling the potatoes he ladled out of a pot of boiling water.
“Mademoiselli . . .” he muttered, shaking his head, as he giddily tried to resume his task at the stove.
In a grand shift of demeanor, Mademoiselli summoned her guests to the dinner table.
“Reeeally and truuuly you guuuys . . .” she gushed with maudlin effect to Judy and Liza, characteristically drawing out her vowels for emphasis. “I truuuly can’t thank you enough for coming all the way up here to take care of the baby for me while I was in Kigali.”
I followed close behind Peter, as if he were my human shield, and joined the assembly at the long rectangular wooden table, strategically choosing a seat at the opposite end from our hostess. With everyone seated and scooted in, Kanyaragana brought plates, warmed in the oven, and set them on the table. He and the boys soon followed with larger platters of steaming potatoes, and roasted beef. Judy and Liza complimented Dian on her ability to find a decent cut of meat for us in the Ruhengeri market.
“Yeah, you have to find one without too much green on it,” Dian joked as she picked at the food on her plate before hacking off chunks of butter and working them into a slice of bread in a scene that had now become familiar to me. After a heavy shake of salt on these, she ate them with gusto, holding up her end of the conversation between bites and swigs of Primus. The small talk shifted to the latest news about expatriates in and around Kigali, and Judy asked Dian what she knew about the Japanese film crew that had been in Kigali requesting permission to camp in the Parc des Volcans and film gorillas.
“Eht mwah, did you see their goddamn tents down below?” Dian asked, referring to the tidy campsite I had noticed on the climb up from the base of the mountain. “Those Japs have been waiting down there for weeks now.”
“What have they been doing?” Judy asked.
“The bastards want to come up and film the gorillas, but they can just stay the hell down there and do their thing with the V-Ws.” Dian turned her head and mockingly spat at the floor, as if to get the bad taste of mentioning someone out of her mouth as I had seen her do in Kigali. I didn’t yet know who she was talking about just then, but I would soon learn.
“Do you think they’ll bother the gorillas?” Liza asked.
“Eht mwah, mwaaah . . . everybody wants to bother the goddamn gorillas.”
To break the silence that followed, Dian quickly changed the subject to who would do what the next day. “Peter, in the morning, you and John will carry Judy’s and Liza’s luggage down the mountain when they leave.”
“Uh . . . okay . . .” Peter replied, setting down his fork, his mouth open in a dazed look of mild surprise.
“After that, you can go to Group 5. And take John with you.”
Peter closed his mouth without arguing. I thought about the arduous climb we made on the same route that afternoon; we would be making that same hike and much more, but the thrill of seeing the gorillas face to face outweighed my concerns.
“Carolyn . . . ahem . . . you’ll move to the guest room up here, and help me with the baby.” My heart sank for Carolyn. The idea of living under the same roof with Dian was unthinkable. But better her than me though, I thought. Carolyn had been a longtime admirer of Dian’s, and Dian seemed to like her, but Carolyn, like myself, was just beginning to get to know our new boss.
Dian talked to Stuart about contacting Group 4 and Nunkie’s Group. Named for its lead adult male or “silverback,” Nunkie’s Group had been missing for weeks.
“I just know they’ve been killed by poachers,” Dian lamented loudly. “Really and truly somebody’s just GOT to find them, Stuart.” Stuart nodded emphatically while declaring his support to this cause, and everyone tried to offer possible alternative scenarios to placate Dian, each guessing and suggesting that Nunkie might be in safe territory on Mount Karisimbi, or high on the far side of Visoke. Dian shook her head bitterly at their words of comfort, shouting, “Oya! Oya!” the Kinyarwanda word for “no.”
After dinner, we moved to the living area where Kanyaragana served coffee. While others occupied the available seating, Dian sat on the grass mat floor and offered a cigarette to me as she lit one for herself. Grateful for any friendly gesture from her, and to acknowledge the only bond we seemed to have, I accepted the cigarette and joined her as the only other smoker in the room.
The burning wood in the fireplace barely threw any heat, but the mood picked up a little and I started to relax and enjoy myself as we talked and joked about the rough road to Ruhengeri and the climb up the mountain in a hailstorm. The camp had a weather station outside of Dian’s cabin that recorded temperature extremes, wind, and precipitation. Judy and Liza had been recording the data in a notebook while Dian was absent. Dian had an agreement to collect and send this information to Benda Lema’s office at ORTPN, written in French.
“What’s the French word for hail?” Judy asked, “I’ve got to write that in the weather log.”
“It’s grêle,” French-speaking Liza said.
The women discussed the spelling with correct placement of the circumflex and wrote it in the logbook, while Carolyn excused herself.
“I am so tired, I think I’ll head
off to bed,” she said. Amid a barrage of “good nights” she collected her lantern and headed out the door and back to her tent cabin. After Carolyn departed, the remaining women commented on how pretty she was.
“Does anyone know how old she is?” Peter asked.
“She’s thirty-four,” Judy said.
“She’s the same age I was when I came here,” Dian added.
“And, as I told her, she’s a young thirty-four.” Judy said.
“You should be happy,” Dian said to Peter, as she pointed in the direction of the tent cabin. “You’ve got a Cheryl Tiegs up here now.”
“Oh yeah?” Peter chimed, “Cheryl Tiegs, eh?”
“Yeah, but you leave her alone,” Dian said, “She’s here for the gorillas.” Peter laughed. I laughed . . . and Dian then turned to me with a cold stare. I felt myself flush in anticipation with the awkwardness it brought.
“One thing I’ve noticed about you . . .” Dian said, pausing with an icy smirk. “You remind me of Peter when he first got here.”
“Oh . . . ?” I muttered nervously in an effort to break the iciness.
“You are selfish, young, and stupid.”
Speechless, I swallowed and tried to force a smile. Was she being funny? I feigned another, weaker laugh, but Dian locked her eyes on me. A cruel grin revealed her enjoyment of my discomfort as I glanced at the faces around the room. I was paying for something, but I didn’t know what. My youth and enthusiasm simply annoyed her. Judy looked at me tilting her head sympathetically, but the room became tense and the conversation died. Even Stuart said nothing to intervene. I froze in the awkwardness, while the mood of the group became strained and uncomfortable.
“Well,” Dian said, as if becoming aware again of the others in the room, “we’re all tired and have a big day ahead of us tomorrow.” With that, she rose to her feet, signaling the end of the evening. “I think everybody needs to get to bed.”
Back in my half of the cabin I would share with Stuart, I lit a candle and brushed my teeth with the tea-colored creek water from one of the corked wine bottles. The porters had placed my items on the floor in the middle of my room. In the dim light, I sorted through the food I had bought in the Ruhengeri market. My eggs were scrambled, shell and all, and dripping from their tattered plastic bag. I found a piece of typing paper in one of the desk’s drawers and slid it underneath the mess to catch the ooze. I wondered how long I could live off my loaf of bread, bananas and cheese.
Stuart opened his door and the light from his pressure lantern flooded into my room.
“Everything okay in here?” he asked.
Looking around for a pot or bowl to set the eggs in, I asked Stuart where he got his utensils.
“Dian had the men bring mine down. Don’t you have any yet?”
“I don’t think so,” I said, pulling another desk drawer open, “I can’t find anything like you’ve got.”
“Ask Dian tomorrow . . . or I’ll ask her.”
“Okay.”
“Dian’s got a lot on her mind,” Stuart said, “and she’s really uptight about leaving to teach at Cornell.”
“Yeah, I know,” I said.
After Stuart closed the door, I set the scrambled egg mess outside into the darkness before unrolling my sleeping bag onto the blankets on my bed. Peeling off my muddy boots, I slid in, clothes and all, as yet too unsettled to fully settle in.
FIVE
A CRUEL CLIMB
The next morning, when I arrived at Dian’s cabin, Judy and Liza were finishing their breakfast. Kanyaragana was in the kitchen cleaning up. He offered me a cup of coffee when I entered.
“Unataka kahawa?” he asked, pointing to a coffee pot over a gas burner. I accepted and he poured a cup of hot, aromatic kahawa with milk. Kahawa is the Swahili word for coffee, and similarly ikawa is the Kinyarwanda word—we would use both interchangeably. Peter stood in the doorway to the dining area chatting with Judy and Liza.
“Dian and Carolyn are outside with Charlie,” Judy said. I could see Carolyn through the window holding the baby, Charlie. Charlie had come a long way, I thought, from being terrified of humans upon her arrival in camp just a couple weeks earlier. Carolyn looked intently at Dian, who stood talking to her with the gorilla graveyard behind her.
Dian soon came inside to say goodbye to Judy and Liza as they gathered their things.
“I really appreciate you guys helping me,” Dian said gushingly, “really and truly.” Dian’s face crinkled with lines as she strained to smile. Judy and Liza said they were happy to help. As they finished breakfast, Peter and I each picked up a large suitcase and headed back through the kitchen. As Judy and Liza gathered their other things and headed out the door, I noticed Kanyaragana washing pots and pans and it reminded me of my empty cabin.
“Dian, Stuart said to ask you about cooking utensils.” I said.
“They’re in your cabin,” Dian said.
“I can’t find any. I’ve looked everywhere.”
“Stop worrying about your goddamn belly,” Dian snapped. “We’ve got more important things to worry about around here. I’m sick of you people worrying about your fucking bellies.” That shut me up. Grabbing a large suitcase, I headed out the door to catch up with Peter, Judy, and Liza. The air was cool and damp, but the sun was beginning to burn through the clouds that enshrouded camp. I was hungry, and as we passed by my cabin I wished I had eaten some of my bread when I got up. I also wondered what the daily routine would be in camp.
Peter, having already lived in camp for a year, led the way as we left the meadow, and entered the surrounding forest. He knew instinctively what grassy clearings to pass through among the trees before grass gave way to the well-trodden path of mud we had traversed the day before.
Judy was just behind Peter, and Liza followed her as I brought up the rear. Our group chatted amiably, and I asked Liza about Switzerland. She told me she was single and from the French-speaking region of her country.
“So you’re a real Swiss miss,” I said.
“I’m a real Swiss mess,” she answered, and I laughed at her surprising American slang à la French accent.
Despite carrying my backpack and Judy’s suitcase, traveling downhill was much easier than the previous day’s uphill climb. I shifted the luggage from left hand to right hand throughout the hike. We soon traversed the small meadow where I had rested with the porters the day before, and Peter told me it was called the “Tourist Spot.” Over time, Dian had given names to many places on Mount Visoke and its surroundings for the purpose of notating gorilla locations. The occasional tourists that climbed the trail up Mount Visoke usually stopped to rest in this spot. Peter pointed to a muddy uphill trail on the left that tourists used, which was called, no big surprise, the “Tourist Trail.”
“That’s where we’ll be going to find Group 5,” Peter said. “I left them up there on the slopes of Visoke yesterday.”
“Is it far?” I asked, suddenly aware that I would again be making yesterday’s climb and then some.
“Yeah,” Peter answered. “They were up high and pretty far off the trail.”
No problem, I thought.
Eventually the tree line changed with the spreading hagenias, yielding to more upright vernonia trees and bamboo as we reached a lower altitude, passing above the tidy little Japanese camp below us on the right. No one was visible there, and we were soon down at the car park. Peter and I loaded the luggage into Judy’s car parked near Dian’s VW. I was a little out of breath as Peter and I waved goodbye while Judy maneuvered her small car onto the rock-strewn road that led away from the base of Mount Visoke.
As Peter and I walked back to the Porter Trail, we encountered a Rwandan in a tattered military-style uniform. He recognized Peter and they shook hands, speaking briefly in Swahili.
“This is Big Nameye,” Peter said. “Nameye who works up at camp is Little Nameye.” Big Nameye shook my hand, smiling broadly, and said “Jambo, karibu,” before heading down the road.
“Big Nameye used to work at Karisoke but Dian fired him,” Peter said. “Now he’s a park guard.”
“Why’d she fire him?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” Peter said. “She’s fired a lot of people, and rehired them too. When she gets mad, she fires them, and rehires them when she needs them again.”
Before we headed up the trail, I asked Peter about the small gray building I had seen on arrival the day before, which stood about fifty yards upslope from the trail entrance. It was about twelve feet in diameter and round like an African hut, but made of galvanized sheet metal.
“That’s Bill and Amy’s gîte,” Peter said. “They used to be up at Karisoke.”
“Oh yeah, I saw Bill in Kigali. He didn’t have much to say.” I asked following Peter up the trail. “What are they doing down here?”
Peter explained that the couple was now working for The Mountain Gorilla Project, habituating gorillas for organized tourism, and educating the public. Amy did most of the gorilla contacts and Bill conducted programs in local communities teaching people about gorillas and conservation. Ecotourism had not yet become a buzzword, but the concept made sense to me, as did the idea of making the Rwandans aware of gorillas and dispelling the myths about them being dangerous and something to fear. I looked forward to meeting them and learning more about their work.
“Dian calls them the ‘V-W couple’.”
“V-W? Because they live near her Volkswagen?” I was beginning to get more winded as the trail become steeper.
“They’re married, but her last name is Vedder and his is Weber. Dian doesn’t like to mention their names and she usually spits on the ground if she has to, especially with Amy.”
“Yeah, she did that last night talking about them, and when she mentioned Benda Lema, at Judy’s house in Kigali.”
