Those that know me well know I’m not a fearful person. If
quizzed, my friends would probably say I have a high fear threshold, especially
when it comes to the natural world and adventure. However, when I first
travelled into this very rural part of Congo two years ago, even I was remotely
apprehensive. Not scared, just acutely aware that I had little idea of what I
was up against.
In my first week here I crossed the lake to the project area
for the day, but when we went to cross back the boat drivers cautioned that the
wind and waves were too high and we would have to wait for safer waters. As we
stood contemplating our next move a big storm began to pound down around us and
we all ran up the road and around a few corners for the cover of the village
hotel (think old elongated cement shack with a few separate doors). Evening
turned to night time and the storm showed no sign of lifting so our local staff
began to bed down for the night. My coworker, Bryan, and I were shown the “rooms” where our local staff had kindly offered to share their thin
pieces of foam on the floor. Bryan spotted a large spider on the wall in his
room and we looked at each other sideways, raised our eyebrows, and asked about
the tent abandoned in the yard because of the rain. Were we scared of spiders
we were asked? No, we responded, but explained we preferred to not sleep on the
floor knowing they were in the same room.
At this point our level of discomfort and apprehension was raised
slightly, but not unmanageably so.
 |
| The road outside the hotel compound (not during rain). |
We
spent the next few hours co-reading my kindle by headlamp. Determined not to
spend the night, when the rain and wind let up around 9pm we discussed finding
the port to rouse the boat drivers. At this point it’s been
dark and raining for 3 hours and the entire village, including our “compound”
is quiet. Even the crickets aren’t cricketing. Bryan and I aren’t 100% sure
where the water is, as we ran from there to here in the pouring rain, but we
are determined to figure it out, so we set off.
We started off in what
we thought was the most likely direction with my headlamp for our light and
each other for our courage. The road was mud and severely rutted from rain
torrents, we stepped around mounds of debris piled up here and there and our
hearts jumped when a drove of wayward pigs raced across our path. You know that
feeling when you are really nervous or excited but trying not to make a sound?
You kinda feel like doing a cross between a yelp and a laugh. You suck your
breath in and hold it high in your throat. Your eyes are wide. But no one can
see because its pitch black. I remember thinking, “you are in Congo Jenn, you
are walking through a village in the pitch black and you’re not really even
sure where you are going….are you freaking crazy?”
At this point we saw some smoldering embers beside the road.
I stared at the fire for a few moments and went to move towards it, then with a
start I saw the hidden black skin of a man beside it, his face almost
completely obscured in the darkness. My heart leapt to a point somewhere near
my left ear and stayed there for a while.
We found the boat drivers, asleep in their life jackets in
another shack by the beach (that’s how we knew they were our drivers) and
demanded they take us back. They drowsily looked at the lake and said, “too
rough, need to wait more.” When we demanded how long they guessed an hour. So
we trudged back to our hotel waited
an hour and made the journey down to the lake once again. The third time it was
a little less nerve racking, but only a little.
It’s been two and a half years since that first night in the
forests and villages of Congo and I’ve become quite used to walking around by
myself at night. My breath doesn’t catch in my throat and I no longer jump at
the shadows. However, Tristan still keeps a machete by his bedside, just in
case, and every once in a while something goes bump in the night and those
feelings from my first night in the heart of darkness come rushing back.
 |
| Mango tree is the dark green one that towers above the last window |
One of the first nights I slept in this house I was woken in
the wee hours to the sound of a gunshot. I catapulted out of bed and stood in
the darkness naked, feet apart, eyes wide, wondering what the fuck was going
on. Silence. I hovered at the edge of the bed and slowly the realization came
over me, mangos. Our bedroom is located directly below a massive mango tree.
Mangos come in to season twice a year here and we love having an abundance of
their juicy wonderfulness. However, mangos are big, the tree tall, and green
mangos are heavy and hard. We discovered, over various inopportune moments in
the first weeks living in this house, that a mango, falling from a great height
onto a tin roof above your head, makes a sound almost imperceptibly like a
gunshot might in a moment of shock.
 |
| Our guard dogs, Kitoko (Beautiful) & Zamba (Forest). |
By now we don’t flinch when mangos rocket through our night.
However, one night recently I heard something different. I was by myself in the
house and just getting ready for bed. I lay down with our two dogs and was
chatting to my friends on our group What’sApp. We have a generator that we run
in the evenings but we turn it off before we go to bed, so at that time I was
using a candle for light. I said good night to my friends and the dogs, blew
out the candle and closed my eyes in the darkness with the sounds of cicadas
outside my window. Moments later I hear the distinct strumming of a guitar. My
eyes fly open but it’s too dark to see, again I hear it, this time it’s a
proper chord. I turn on my light. Nothing. I hear another strum, this time more
like something has just brushed the strings of the guitar. I text my friends
something along the lines of “o.m.g. Tristan’s guitar just strummed a chord by
itself in the darkness, wtf!!”. My breath catches in my throat, then I hear
rustling inside the guitar and it dawns on me that a creature, a mouse or a gecko
or a cockroach, must be crawling inside and made the strum. I text the girls “I
think it’s a mouse”, and they respond "lets
go with that”. Nonetheless, I get
up and move the guitar to another room to avoid further disturbances.
A few weeks ago Tristan was away for over a week and we were
having problems with our generator. So I spent a series of nights alone in the
dark with just a bad headlamp and some candles for light. I have to say, I
thought more than once that I’m glad we have the dogs. One evening I walked in
to our bedroom and spotted a massive dark brown spider poised on the edge of
the bed frame. I’m not sure how I saw it, because it wasn’t moving, and it was
the colour of the wood. It was almost the size of my hand and I swear it was
eyeing me up, “whadaya gonna do about me, huh?” Now I’m not scared of spiders,
and I have been elected more than once as the group appointed spider-evacuator
by the girls, but this guy, with his antennae gesticulating and eyes sparkling,
was pushing my spider limits.
 |
| Not the spider in my room, and about 1/3 the size. |
Of course, running and screaming wasn’t exactly going to
help, as the spider was on my bed, and unless I planned to pitch a tent, I had
to do something about it. When I was a little girl my mom taught me the handy
technique of putting a glass over a spider, sliding a paper underneath it and
voila you just plop it outside. Now that’s all fine and dandy, but as I looked
at the spider, and walked out of the bedroom and looked at our glasses I
realized that nothing we had was big enough. I grabbed a wine glass. No
pe,
too small. A
narrow
jug?
Nope too small it will cut off his
legs. I contemplated spraying it, but again, those of you that know me know
that it is nearly impossible for me to kill anything intentionally, especially
something that is looking me in the eye. Plus, that very first night with Bryan
and the spider, we were told that no spiders in Congo were poisonous. And spray
in my bedroom is poisonous to me as well as the spider. So I found a tin bowl
that we use for camping, and with a light held between my teeth I slid a paper
under it. Of course the tin didn’t have the same effect as glass because I
couldn’t see if I had succeeded or if the spider had escaped and run under my
bed. In which case, I confess, I would be sleeping in a tent. I ran outside and
threw the cup on the ground, my breath catching in my throat once again. I
leaned down, hoping, please hoping to see the spider…and there he
was…nonplussed in the bowl. Victory!
The next day my gardener asked me why there was a bowl in
the middle of the driveway and I told him. He said, “whew, you are lucky, those
spiders are as poisonous as the snakes, you would have been in hospital.”
As I reread this article the thought has occurred to me that
what is actually catching in my throat is in fact a scream. Fear is defined as an unpleasant emotion caused by the threat
of danger, pain, or harm. Each of the above experiences, however minor or
imagined, have raised a sense of danger or alarm in me, the dark doesn’t help.
However, over time my fear threshold here has increased greatly, I’m becoming bombproof.
In all honesty
I don’t think I have ever been in danger in this tranquil part of Congo (except
for maybe the spider), while there may be unrest in other parts of the country, what
you mainly find here in this peaceful region of Congo is a lot of resting.
True to his look, one minute he was grazing leaves, the next he was on the
move, and I was in his path! Lambert grabbed my backpack and yanked me
backwards out of the silverback’s way as he brushed past me. Just in time. He
lumbered past us and for the first time we could really see his incredible
silverback. No it’s not just a formidable name.
