The western rift curves along the backbone of Kenya. Scooping lower than the valleys, over time it filled with water, and became known as the African Great Lakes. To the east, the rift is shorter and, as viewed on a map, is the shape of a wishing bone before it is ceremoniously torn.
If you choose to take the eastern, wishbone route, along the escarpments that rise 2500 metres over the valley, you may find yourself standing on the edge of the rift. Much like the edge where I find myself standing now.
An imposing sky, blue and forever, stretches like a bolt of silk unfurled above. A sheer drop, precarious and rocky, falls to a floor of desert, laid flat like an old dusty carpet. In parts the earth splits, and bare rock juts from the ground like broken bones poking through skin.
Across the desert floor, wind-whipped eddies spin. Devil dust storms. They gather and circle like mini tornadoes, furiously whirling, before collapsing exhausted, falling to the ground, dropping their carriage of sand and stone.
The wind howls up the rocky cliffs bringing gusts of sand and dirt that pelt our face. The gusts rework the side of the cliffs like an artist who is never happy, stopping to view its work, a sliver of silence, before it starts again, furiously carving.
Masai blankets in scarlet red and lined with bold blue hang over wire, flapping in the breeze. Each end hurtles towards the other, letting out an almighty snap, cracking like a whip. A Kenyan man sits on the ground, whittling away, chip chip, creating a rhino from a solid block of wood.
‘You want elephant?’ The toothless man with big eyes laughs. Come. Look. Buy.
‘Maybe later,’ I say, and walk in the opposite direction.
The fence, rickety and rotted, separates us from the sheer drop below. Don’t lean. Sheer heat rises from the trough below, steaming up like we’ve lifted the top off a boiling pan of water and put our face in it.
Down below more dusty devil whirlwinds rise like zombies from the grave, and begin to thrash across the plains. I look eastward over the scorched brown land where nothing grows. Beneath my feet, layers of lives lie upon each other, one after the other. All those stories. All those people. So much force and life under my feet. Under this earth. Right here.
I sit on the edge and dangle my feet over and gravity a hundred miles down, tugs at me. My shoes feel like they have little weights in them.
Who else has stood here? Battled here? Bled here? Died here? Can I feel it – if I close my eyes and try hard – can I feel the sense of others folded together in the soil, all of us coming together?
Here is something I could spend a lifetime considering: the theory of eternalism – that the past, present and future is not real; instead, everything is happening, all at once. Time, some scientists say, doesn’t exist at all. This constructer, that we have carefully plotted our entire lives around, isn’t even real. And if this is to be believed, right now on this place I’m sitting, Lucy, the first primate human, is being dug up and discovered, the rift is emerging, herds of bison are migrating, ancient Mombasan tribes are discovering the land, sowing it with seeds and fruit, and somewhere across the seas Pompeii is going down in flames and lava.
Rumour is this theory will be proven right. That our earth is indeed is one giant time-space dimension. I try to get my head around it – this theory that everything is happening right now.
If this is true, I may stay awhile here, see if I can’t gaze into the distance, let reality become a little hazy. See instead what I can make out. Reach around the edges of things we thought were long out of grasp, and hold them again.
Perhaps we don’t need to worry about the ever-constant beat of time, measuring out the portions of our life. Thoreau said he lived like the Puri Indians, who have one word for today, yesterday and tomorrow. Who do not fret about the ticking of the clock, or the incessant need to fill time. Instead, Thoreau measured moments: wild flowers opening, fluttering of poplar leaves, the grace of mornings, crows flying two or three abreast, heavy thunder-showers that kept him inside – and all of it gave him the feeling of delight.
The wind picks up. Warm like breath. The summer sun, large and grand, pulls closer to the earth, marking mid-day. The man with no teeth starts whistling softly. Ant finds me and sits down silently, letting her legs dangle over the side too.
I wonder, what does she see?
The dust winds. The Arabs arriving. The British colonies during the First World War. I tilt my head to the sky and watch a cluster of crows flocking in a V-shape across the sky.
Maybe anything is not only possible but probable. But more than that – it is happening and happened and is about to happen.
THERE ARE certain roads we can follow through Lake Nakuru. Across the park towards the water buffalo. Under the cloistered trees in the hope of seeing solitary leopards.
It’s a bright afternoon. The grass hasn’t seen rain in years. Bleached yellow tufts, sharp and crunchy like spinifex, have baked too long in earth’s oven. Sweat lingers on everyone’s brow and arms are pushed out of windows hoping for a breeze. On the ground, old leaves are paper thin and sun-curled. Perfect conditions for a bushfire.
Our tyres create large clouds of smoke and dust. Each time we stop it takes minutes to settle, for us to be able to see again, as dust and stone settle into new places. When it does, someone points out the way light is hitting the rocks.
Then a small fleck of ebony down by the lake – could it be a rare black rhino? There are oohs and ahhs and camera clicks just like we are viewing a painting in an art gallery. Matilda rumbles closer. Apparently we’ve scared him, because just as we get close enough, he turns and runs in the opposite direction. Quite daintily too, for something that weighs over 800 kilograms.
We drive further around Lake Nakuru towards the flat fields. These fields could be anywhere in the world, except they also couldn’t because meerkats quickly run past Matilda. We’re going at a snail’s pace, but even so the driver slams on the brakes like we’re a rally car hitting a hidden hairpin curve. The meerkats stand to attention as though we’re about to be introduced. As if there are hands to shake.
For a second they look at us. Frozen. Then, as if forgotten, they run a metre away. Tumble over each other. One stands post like a sentinel – stony and silent. One starts playing with another’s tail like it’s a hot piece of toast, tossing it between each hand before dropping it triumphantly on the ground. A game of tails. They switch roles. More join, wanting to get in on the hot toast tail game. Suddenly they all freeze. Stand up straight. Ears cocked. What is it? Noses twitch, eyes wide. What is it? A few seconds of pause. Nothing happens. Danger forgotten, they return to scampering, jostling in lines. Polishing each other’s fur. When we leave, they don’t even notice.
At the lake’s edge pink flamingos perch silently. Hundreds of them, legs folded or lifted like graceful ballerinas in a delicate pose. Elegantly, one by one, they unfold their bodies, tilting their heads to the ground, sipping water. A group of them take flight, propelling legs so quickly on the lake’s surface they find traction where other animals would fall and splash. Stretching their necks, they lean forward, their wings catch the wind and they lift, with ease, into the air. In flight they glide silently, large pointed wing spans, dove-white on top, galah pink on the bottom.
We round the lake and head off into thick woodland where the shadows are cooling. Someone with amazing vision asks the truck to stop (bang the cabin twice) because they’ve spotted an owl. An owl who should probably be asleep given it’s still early afternoon, but instead is sitting silently on a branch, hooded eyes watching us. It’s hard to see him at first, his soft grey and brown feathers camouflaging him among the tree canopy.
What is life like for something designed to be hidden?
I focus my camera and try to capture him. Instead I take sharp photos of leaves and a greyish owl blob in the background. I try again and this time capture the rounded hood of his eyes, the black beads staring off into the distance, the rim of white feathers on his face. I wonder if I was
to return to this world, if I may enjoy being a hooded eyed owl with a perfect view of Lake Nakuru.
Back into a clearing, a field seems to stretch forever. Only at the last moment, our eyes see the horizon rising sharply into a large peak. Is it a mountain? In Australia, we’d call it a mountain. If we were in Canada or France, they’d take one look at this and likely say it’s a small hill. Emphasis on the small.
White rhinos are everywhere. Dozens of them sitting, lying, eating, breathing, standing. Birds perched on their backs. It feels like I’m watching an episode of Planet Earth but here, in real life, it’s brilliant. All this, this wildness, is mesmerising. I don’t want to move on, but we do.
Off in the distance the creamy, old English toffee rumps of giraffes dot the horizon. Closer, a herd of playful gazelles. They stand together almost in line, rump side facing us, two white half-circles on either rear quarter, joined by a long white tail that flits puppy-like, side to side.
The gazelles raise their heads suddenly. Jerk. Noses twitch. Tails stand stiff and still. There is danger lurking in the grass. We stare into the dense undergrowth. Our eyes make branches into snakes, and mounds of dirt into lurking hyenas. Sun and shade are tricksters; they make things of nothing and just as easily are able to conceal almost everything.
The gazelles retreat quickly, prancing to the left disappearing into undergrowth. Is that a lion? We strain our necks. Without the animal instinct so necessary out here to see what can’t be seen, all I can see are the powerful rays of sunlight breaking through clouds, leaving the rest of the hill shrouded in the shadows of late afternoon.
OUR ITINERARY suggests we camp in Nakuru Park, giving us the thrill of hearing the night sounds of Africa’s famous wild beasts.
When I read this, I imagined a central campsite covered by a canopy of woven African trees, perhaps a fence or three, some barbed wire (only as a barrier) and a raised platform to view the animals as they kept to their area and we kept to ours. What I didn’t imagine was setting up tents in the middle of the park – there are no divides, no us and them areas, and no fences.
Our campsite is a small clearing. Trees shroud one side. Pit toilets at one end, the haze of the lake in the distance, a clove of trees bushy and briared to the far east, places that Sarah our guide tells us we don’t want to walk into either with intent or by accident.
In there, the canopy is so dense that even in the height of day not one ray of sunlight can push through. And at night, well, there are the formidable under-the-bed nightmares awaiting us. Except these things would be very real. A snake in your hair. A dangling hairy spider. A lion or two hungry and roaming. No, these are not places we should go, she warns.
Unmapped and unmarked.
I stare at the thick forest and think it looks rather wonderful.
We’re quickly put to work before we lose the sunlight. Some are tasked with gathering wood and layering it to make a fire across an old shallow pit. I’m on kitchen duty. We peel avocados, slice each of them open, and carve their slippery flesh. We add lemon zest and limes (the last we will see for a while), chopped tomatoes bought this morning from the local markets, and liberal dashes of cumin, both ground and smoked.
Sarah takes to the makeshift kitchen, creating amazing meals out of nothing. She sizzles minced beef with onion and garlic, packets of corn chips toasted slightly on pans above the fire. A can of kidney beans with oil and garlic for the vegetarians. We create a bowl of guacamole for twenty people so big my face could fit in it. The fire roars and the chips are done within seconds. We remove them quickly before they blacken and char.
We eat quickly by the fire, hunched over and spooning mouthfuls of chili con carne, before it gets cold on our plastic plates. Before the sun slips away and I watch the green buds on trees become black. There is a last ribbon of milky white that hovers for a while, a band between the earth and the heavens, as the sun finally loses her hold on the sky. She slides quickly, and we are covered in night.
Once the sky turns a deep indigo and the night is lit by a smattering of stars, it becomes chilly. The glaring hot surface of the world is long forgotten. The animals change and those on night shift – the mosquitos and insects – begin to buzz in our ears, and land on uncovered flesh. Our hands, our fingers, the creamy skin exposed between sweater and pants.
By the fire everyone looks the same, silhouettes huddled in hoodies and beanies, the occasional flicker of firelight on faces. After the brilliance of sunshine, my body quickly feels the deepening cold, low in my stomach. I keep yawning into my palm. When there’s a lull, I slip quietly away from the fire and the stories shared over the lick of flames.
How dark it is out here. I dare not navigate my way to the pit toilets in this nocturnal shade. Even with the help of a head torch, I decide to hold on. Inside the small two-man tent I share with Ant, I undress quickly and slide between the ruffled layers of my sleeping bag. It smells of newness and cold. I choose to lay my head not on a pillow or clothes, but straight on the tent floor. Here, I breathe in dirt and soil and the places lions have trod, and my heart
Only a thin veil separates me from the earth – the place I have come to explore.
HRPHH. HRPHH. Hrphh. The shuffling of giants outside. Hrphh. Giants moving things, like they’re reshaping the world.
When I poke my head through a small portion of unzipped tent, the noise stops. Then starts again. Hrphh. Hrphh.
The world has a slight chill. The breeze brings a honey hay flavour, most likely from the loose tussock grasses. I can still smell smoke from the glowing coals of last night’s fire. No-one else stirs. Matilda’s silhouette looks like an overgrown blue giant, squatting in the yard. I can just make out the peaks of the other tents, clustered in a tight circle.
It takes my eyes a full minute to adjust to the darkness on this moonless night. The stars are the only things lighting the ground, and they do so timidly.
When my eyes begin to make shapes out of the darkness, I notice several hirsute baboons waiting on the camp’s edge. They hold our tents under watchful gaze. One perches on a log in a Buddha squat. Another in table top yoga pose, with rounded fists pounded deep into the earth, the third playing with his foot, his back facing us. The two alert baboons change places, hands fisted and thumping into the earth like they’re playing the whack-a-mole game at a state fair. Hrphh. Hrphh. I lie watching them for a few minutes, my eyes adjusting to the pre-dawn darkness.
I can’t stop looking at the baboons. I wonder too, if they’ve spotted me. The lady with her head horizontally pushed through a tent. But I can’t stay too long like this, or I’ll be walking around with a strange sore neck all day.
We’ve been pre-warned about baboons. They are partial to anything with a fragrance. Perfumes. Lip gloss. Toothpaste. As long as everything has a lid screwed on tight, there’s no need for concern. But accidentally leave the lid just a little askew, and these baboons with amazing noses can sniff it a mile away. Could they smell the toothpaste I used last night? The paw paw ointment I smeared on my lips?
There are stories of baboons who chased people from the bathroom, or tried to join them in the shower. Or unzipped their tents while the owners were at breakfast and on returning found the baboons inside their tent – clothes strewn everywhere, toothpaste lids removed. Tubes squashed and pressed and licked like dessert. Apparently one even had a pair of pink underwear laying across his head like a slanted hat.
The baboons sit still for a moment, as though paused. They sit lumpish and rather like humans. Had I not stared at them well, but rather glimpsed at them, I could have thought them rather hairy campers, taking the time to stare about under the stars. Night walkers like me who can’t sleep until the dawn, even if they wanted to.
Finally they wander off towards the trees and deep undergrowth. First dawn breaks through. Tiny clumps of clouds gather. The early sun tinting them sugar pink, like marshmallows. It’s still early. My watch says 5 am. I close my eyes and wish for more sleep.
Mostly, I want to stand under a shower of strong, hot water. But there is no shower, no trickle of water, no bathrooms. The only way I can get clean is a once-moist baby wipe that’s now old and dry and feels like scrunched paper on my skin.
Changing is another hurdle. I try to put on a singlet top while standing under a plastic roof the height of my bottom rib. I am stooped from the middle like a grandma with osteoporosis. Somehow I manage to find a way to lie on my back and pull on cargo pants, my feet floating in the air like a dead bug. All of this must be completed without a trace of noise, for Ant is deep in slumber just several inches away.
In the grey ashy morning, early risers are huddled round the fire, spearing pieces of bread and holding it over the ashes, making smoked toast. I make a mug of bitter coffee without milk, and throw in several teaspoons of clumpy sugar.
As the sun rises, the colour of the sky changes rapidly. Peach fuzz, a blast of orange. Then bright, lemony and hot, flattening the clouds. By eight, it’s pure daylight, brazen and glaring.
We drive slowly out of the park, leaving dust in our wake. Matilda sways and finds her balance on the uneven track. Beads of sweat glow on each of us.
When I look back, dots of lake water spray everywhere. Tens of thousands of flamingos foraging in the shallow blue waters of the lake, ascend, wings stretched. The sky is a rush of pink. If you look closely, a fish escapes his watery house for a second – discovers the roar of sky, the cluster of wings – dives back in.
OUR FIRST country town. We stop briefly in the bustling centre. A crowd gathers at the truck door; postcards are waved in our faces like fans. Ebony giraffes float against the truck windows like flying unicorns. There is a circle of men at the door yelling Look! Look! Holding up black caps that say KENYA in embroidered red and green. How do we get out?
Some try and grabble with the crowd, or reason with them. I hear one impossibly polite Belgium lady, asking, ‘Could you please let me through, I’d like to use the bathroom.’ Ant and I slip through silently, holding each other’s hand and ducking down, weaving in a sea of legs, like navigating a dense wood. We skip across the street when there’s a break in the traffic.
Ways to Come Home Page 5
