A Rock and a Hard Place

by George Zelt PhD

  Upon our arrival, Patrick visited the Anglo-American Foundation office there, which financially subsidized his studies. He was still their employee. My friend knew a lot about the area.

  “Diamonds were discovered here, in South West Africa in the early 1900s. Not far away. Over there,” he pointed offshore, “is a floating, sand-sucking barge dredging for them. They hope a few diamonds are mixed in with the sand.”

  “We know that feeling,” I said.

  “The diamonds here were thought to be from huge volcanic pipes inland, like the Kimberley pipe in South Africa. They were also carried here by ancient rivers and the ocean currents. They brought a diamond rush of some fifty thousand people from all over South Africa and elsewhere.”

  The coastline to the south of Luderitz, stretching to the Orange River, which is adjacent to the diamond-bearing Prohibited Area, is called the Forbidden or Prohibited Coast. To the north of Luderitz, stretching to the Angola border, the foggy, rocky, sandy coastline is called the Skeleton Coast. All of it is a graveyard for ships. The early Portuguese sailors called the inland Skeleton Coast the “Sands of Hell”—the point being that once a ship is beached and hardship ensues, the crew goes through hell before they die.

  The next morning, we first drove to Dias Point. In 1487, Bartolomeu Dias was the first European to see Luderitz Bay. Staring at the sea and the cold, curling-finger waves that snapped out to ensnarl all who dared to enter, I tried to imagine the brave, inquisitive men who sailed over these treacherous waters in small wooden ships around Africa to India and then to China. Those were the times when some thought the earth was flat and that ships could sail off its edge and be eaten by some monster. Those early sailors had untamed audacity.

  Five miles inland or so from Luderitz, the ghost town Kolmanskop rose from the sand. Similar to many places in this portion of Africa, the now-extinct settlement was built to accommodate a rush of diamond diggers. Its name, like Vioolsdrif’s, was taken from a person—in this case Coleman, whose ox wagon became stuck in the sand there. Simple explanations often stood the test of time.

  Sliding and sinking in the drifting sand, we began examining the remains of the town. A two-story home that belonged to a mine manager stood out. Numerous German-style homes with brightly painted walls, a school, a surprisingly extravagant and well-built ballroom theater, and numerous other buildings popped out of a sea of sand. All were well preserved due to the dry climate, but the pelting wind sandblasted everything as it entered absent windows and doors and then funneled across rooms. One smooth sand drift had swept across children’s desks, burying them. We walked back and forth on the fairly large theater stage; the faded curtains were still hanging, the props still in the wings. Empty seats faced us, reserved for a ghost audience. It was a deceptive representative of what life once was. During the town’s pinnacle in the 1920s, the nearby sands had yielded over five million carats of diamonds in the first six years of its existence. Then the town, with its comparatively small population, had the highest per-capita income in the world. The stark abandonment reminded me of The Oasis and the lopsided swing. Some things in life are so final.

  Kolmanskop was finally abandoned in 1954. Many rushed to another rich deposit of diamonds discovered to the south at Oranjemund on the mouth of the Orange River. Others probably moved to Luderitz. It seemed to me that in Africa memories fade quickly; life is too uncontrolled and chaotic to be burdened with too much memory. Kolmanskop was not only a ghost town but also a tombstone.

  We returned to Luderitz and a day later we drove east some hundred and fifty miles toward Keetmanshoop and Patrick’s field area. There we bought provisions, including a couple of large steaks. We left the tarred road and entered the perimeter of the Kalahari Desert, driving north until dusk. It was time to camp.

  Our frying pan had been lost, so we cooked our meat on a shovel, careful to not burn its handle. Under a clear sky, with cheap red wine in our tin mugs and tender meat on our metal plates, we sat talking. Faraway stars, their names slow in coming, hung like captivating beacons in the unworldly pristine air. The sounds of the desert night stirred our imagination. It is odd how rapidly creatures make their presence known and announce themselves. A lion growled in the far distance and unknown insects screeched around us. Sounds can cast a spell. It was one of those memorable evenings when memories are cemented forever, when sand is better than a mattress.

  The next day we were off, walking up a dry stream channel and looking for rocks we thought were deformed by the north-south event that affected the far coastal region of my study area to the south. If that event extended north into Patrick’s area, it would add to my theory. The stream led us into an open plain. It was an attention-grabbing place, as there were indeed rocks of interest to both of us. Absorbed with the idea of finding more, Patrick and I kept walking for an hour or so, our eyes watching the ground, taking in every rock.

  “What the hell is that?” he said with some urgency, looking up into the distance.

  We stared; it was a mass of black moving in our direction and not so far away. They were animals: well more than a hundred Cape buffalo walking slowly with their heads down, nibbling on whatever they could find. A wall of them, raising clouds of dust. The lion will growl before he charges. The buffalo simply comes forward in a silent charge. Nothing stops him except death.

  “The buffalo is the most dangerous of the big five. They will ambush hunters,” Patrick added.

  “Oh shit.”

  “They’re coming directly at us,” Patrick said. “Look at them, marvelous massive bulls with mountainous bosses of black horn. Some of them must measure thirty-five, forty-five inches or more around the curve from point to point. We should get out of the way.”

  “Brilliant. And where do we go, for Christ’s sake? There are plains all around us.”

  “The tree.”

  He pointed. I looked. An acacia tree stood alone in the plain. It wasn’t very thick, maybe a foot in diameter, but it wasn’t far away either. Perhaps it was just strong enough to hold us about ten feet off the ground?

  “Good Lord,” I mumbled.

  “You can certainly ask Him, as this will take a certain amount of faith. Let’s move slowly. No impulsive movements. No sprinting. If that mass gets excited, we will get horns up our asses.”

  We reached the tree without panic. Being taller, I climbed first, as I could reach up farther since the lower branches were lacking.

  “Ah, shit,” I mumbled as I got pricked by its long thorns. I wrapped myself around a limb and reached down for Patrick. I grunted, trying to lift him.

  “Come on now!” he complained. “They’re getting closer!”

  “If you didn’t eat so fucking many potatoes—”

  “Do it, man!” he said frantically, swinging up his hanging legs, holding on to me.

  “Oh shit,” I groaned as I lifted him up. He clawed his way over me.

  “Well, now,” he proclaimed. “We’ve a good view.”

  Very clearly the phalanx of Cape buffalo was munching its way directly toward our tree. Rooted on stocky legs, the beasts are the size of American buffalo. Closer now, we could see their bent heads—the dimension of champion pumpkins—as they held their massive curved horns close to the ground. From time to time muzzles, swinging back and forth, lifted in our direction. In the thick folds of their throats hung dangling bunches of ticks. One of them drooled a thick string of saliva. Their poor eyesight focused on the available blades of grass. As for not seeing us, it made no difference; the wall was coming our way. They hadn’t smelled us yet, either. It was plain that if they wanted to, they could easily push our tree over and trample us.

  “Oh hell,” Patrick said. “Let’s not do anything to put them in a bad mood.”

  “Good thinking.”

  “Nothing more we can do. We’ve got nowhere to go. As long as they stay calm . . .”

  “Us, too,” I replied, seeing Patrick’s dangling foot tapping the air.

  They kep
t coming. It was captivating and scary. I looked down at the thin limbs we relied on. We watched in silence. Oxpecker birds rode like jockeys on the animals, stuffing themselves with ticks and whatever else infested the buffalo’s thick, dusty hide and fur.

  Closer . . . The wind was in our direction; we smelled their reeking bovine odor made all the worse by the heat. Above us the African sky was seething gold. The buffalo were fewer than one hundred feet away when one of the birds made a sharp sound.

  The whole herd paused, standing massive and black. They were attentive and ready; they froze as one, their noses held high.

  “Don’t move,” Patrick whispered.

  “I don’t think instruction is necessary.” Another tweet sound from the bird. “I wonder what that shit bird is telling them.”

  “Look. They’re turning,” Patrick whispered.

  It was true. Like marching men, they pivoted as one to their right. With a couple of fucking tweet-tweets, the bird had directed them to change course.

  “I’ll bet the buffalo couldn’t see us even this close,” Patrick whispered. “Those birds have better vision. They figured going around us was a better idea, so they could stay away from problems and continue to eat ticks. It was a field-smart decision.”

  We sat in our tree in silence, relieved and waiting until the buffalo ambled off, in no hurry while the birds patrolled their black backs in the warm sun.

  “They could have trampled us into two spots of bones and blood,” Patrick said. “I saw an angry one once.”

  “Let’s get out of here.”

  We climbed down, looked at the parched tree that saved us, and urinated on it.

  I took a piece of sausage from my pocket, cut it in half with my clasp knife, and handed a piece to Patrick.

  “The African bush, it’s fascinating and terrifying,” he said, taking it.

  “Yeah. Let’s look for rocks, Patrick.”

  We crossed the herd’s hoofprints. They were the size of soup plates.

  Chapter 13

  Sacrificed

  Patrick and I drove back to Cape Town with me wondering again about my situation. It was infecting my mind like a disease. I had to face Afrikaner Joost. Why did this geological discrepancy have to happen to my project? It seemed an unjust allocation of responsibility for a student to have to deal with.

  I never wanted to stand out, let alone as the bad guy. I did not want to think about grossly manipulating the data I’d found since I began my project—over the past year and a half—simply so I could agree with a confused professor. I couldn’t get it off my mind. However impossible the idea was, hell—there was no middle ground.

  I’d gone over and over the data since I started questioning Joost’s conclusion some ten months ago and began living with the resulting confusion and anger. I had no choice now but to take the first major step into the fire, even though I unfortunately didn’t have all the electron microprobe data I needed. I’d have to take a chance that I’d be able to explain my findings and be believed. Perhaps I’d delayed too long. But working in the field and building a geological story of what happened to the earth a billion years ago takes time. That’s why four years of total study are advocated to prepare a PhD dissertation.

  I dreaded the confrontation, but the time had come. I presented my current conclusions to Afrikaner Joost.

  He smirked and said—yet again—he was sure he was right. He didn’t even ask to see my evidence. He brushed me off, smiling as if I were a child.

  I spoke to my advisor, Professor NASA. Again, I left no room for exceptions; I showed him on a map what I’d found. From his answer, it seemed he either didn’t understand metamorphic petrology or he didn’t want to get involved.

  How could that be? The whole thing was a fucking circus. He said he would talk to Joost. But it seemed that Joost had already spoken to him and convinced him I was wrong. It didn’t feel like a topic open for discussion. It was scary and confusing.

  My private office was relocated to a large community room. It was a move to degrade me. And it worked: I was dropping down the ladder rung by humiliating rung.

  From whispering to open discussion, everyone in the department became aware of my situation. I was walking the plank. Department personnel stayed visible friends with Afrikaner Joost, who kept a sociable know-all smile on his face. He was the guy with the money; they needed him and Professor NASA supported him. He knew that. What would be their next move?

  “You are to present your findings to the whole department,” my advisor said. “I want you to take this presentation seriously.” Beyond this, he did not offer one scrap of help—not a word of guidance. I reluctantly concluded later that he really didn’t want me to succeed. I was being set up. I listened to him, though, because his academic accomplishments were formidable. He’d been a scientist at NASA, for Pete’s sake, which put him into the legend category. Who wouldn’t listen to him?

  I had never defended something as conflicting and meaningful as this before. I had never presented a scientific lecture that was more than a basic report. The one person who seemed to be willing to help me—Peter F., the only metamorphic petrologist in the department, who had offered to replace NASA as my advisor—suddenly left for a new university position in his homeland of Australia. He was a good man with a conscience. He sympathized with what I was saying and was apparently willing to go against Joost. However, now that he was gone, that option was obsolete, and I didn’t think things could get much worse. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what happened: They got terribly worse.

  I reminded myself that to support my field findings in a manner that would force others to take notice, I needed to subject my mineral specimens to microprobe analysis and then apply certain equations to the resulting chemical analyses. Those methods had been denied me.

  The people who would be in the audience were mostly laboratory and geochemistry men, not field men. They would understand conclusions based on laboratory data; it would sway them. Unfortunately, all I had was field evidence, the ringing of rocks and thin sections, so to speak. In science, if you’re going to make statements, you have to prove them.

  Lecture day came. Deep down, I believed right would conquer. Looking back, I can’t believe I was so naive.

  About thirty people—virtually all the department’s staff—filed into the small room and took their seats in the bleachers. All were invited, I later understood, to witness my downfall. My friends Patrick and Catina were also there. Professor NASA and Joost were in the third raised row—that put them eye-to-eye with me.

  Professor NASA and Afrikaner Joost whispered together and smiled freely while I spoke, as if they were at some cheap movie. I showed slides of thin sections, what rock analysis I had, and discussed relevant metamorphic zonation. But I was unnerved, apparently unable to make my findings clear.

  Faces stared at me in silence. The others listened, trying to follow my presentation, trying to grasp that what I was saying was the opposite of what a well-known professor—who had the support of Professor NASA—had proclaimed as fact. Their faces registered disbelief. How could this student be right? It was as though I was committing some kind of travesty. Although I suspect some of the audience wanted to agree with me, I hadn’t presented enough evidence for them to climb over that enormous wall and come over to my side.

  I felt I’d made an ass of myself. Joost and Professor NASA sat smirking and whispering to the very end. Right did not win; I had been sacrificed. Perhaps I should have acted sooner, but had I confronted Joost earlier, what happened next would have happened sooner—and I would have had even less time to collect evidence supporting my dissertation. I had to painfully play for time to get this far.

  “Your findings don’t prove anything,” Joost said a day later when he passed me in a hall. He spoke in a monotone and wore his smug smile. His eyes, the windows to that man’s soul, were blank. Phony. To me he was sly, a snake—he had no substance. And he was winning. I wondered if anyone really liked him.


  But that wasn’t the point. There he was, and he wasn’t worried. He could be cool, he knew the extent of his power, and, yes, he had won. “You are wasting research money,” he continued, smirking.

  A week later, a Friday afternoon, Professor NASA, my “advisor,” called me into his office and told me my funding would be cut off in two months. I could no longer use the Land Rover. That meant I was tossed out two years into my study. He said this in an understanding, sympathetic way, as he held all the cards and could play magnanimously. He, like Afrikaner Joost, had gotten what he wanted. Professor NASA was used to getting what he wanted.

  Even though the possibility always loomed that I would be told to leave the university, I couldn’t believe it. When it actually happened, I was shocked to the point where I could barely stand. I went home in a daze. When I finally was able to sleep, I dreamed of failure. Following dreams demands a price, no question about that. I told myself that in the end I would be stronger.

  Somewhere I had read that when all is gone, a store of hidden strength and resolve comes forth. Some men call on it; some men do not. What would I do?

  Should I give up?

  No, I decided, once the shock began to wear off. I had to stop being naive. It was time to punch them back—to stop hoping for the best and play it their way. But the clash would be very difficult. Did I want my degree that bad? Yeah, I did.