An Elephant Bull Called Elizabeth and Other Short Stories from Africa

'Once Bitten, Twice Shy'

Once bitten, twice shy; or so the saying goes.  Well perhaps I wasn't actually bitten the first time which might explain why I wasn't shy enough the second time around.  If I were totally honest though I would have to admit to being just plain dumb on both occasions.

It was the holidays and I had dreams of the wilderness beyond the vlei, down the road from us, were my brothers and I used to go to swim in the stream or play clay lackey, a game involving moulding a lump of wet clay on the end of a flexible stick that was then used to launch the aforementioned clay at your opponent, the game normally ended in tears.

Well this holiday was to be different.  I was off to Kariba on a Scripture Union camp.  Whilst not particularly religious I had eagerly signed up given the location.  For those who don't know Kariba is a large man made lake on the northern borders of Zimbabwe, surrounded by National Parks or other sparsely inhabited land that teemed with wildlife.  Just what the doctor ordered.

I was not to be disappointed.  Shortly after arrival a young bull elephant grazed quietly past the camp site following the waters edge, my first ever close up view of one of these gentle giants.  I don't remember a lot else of the trip, my apologies to the enthusiastic and ecclesiastic organisers.  I do however remember the trip to the croc farm.

Crocodile farming was an up and coming business, providing skins for the handbag and various other fashion trades.  Blissfully unaware of any controversy that might have existed I was just excited to be seeing this marvel of biological engineering up close.  Whilst the owner of the farm, or probably one of his employees, droned on up ahead about the various facts and figures surrounding the commercial side of the operation I lagged at the back, fascinated by the view of all these prehistoric reptiles seemingly quiet and at rest.

As I got further behind my mind began to wander and, staring over the low wall at a six foot long croc that, had it not been for the low wall, would have been at my feet, I noticed a couple of bottle tops.  Ideal material for the boy at the back of the class to be flicking at the more studious towards the front.  There was a small problem though, the bottle tops were situated right next to the little croc.

Considering my dilemma I hit upon a bright idea.  Simply put I would ask the croc, politely, to move on so that I could recover the bottle tops.  Stupid as that may seem I did make one decision that was to save the day i.e. use my cap, pity I didn't use the head that this cap protected.  Taking my cap off I lightly tapped the reptile on the back with it a couple of times and waited for it to move.  There was no reaction what-so-ever, it did not even blink.  Maybe it didn't feel the light touch I had used?  Well I determined to try again, tapping a little harder this time, and so I did.

Quicker than you can blink the croc whipped its tail round, swatting at the annoying cap, batting it straight into its open jaws that arced round from the business end at the same time, ready to receive whatever tasty morsel was on offer.  Had I been using my hand there is no way I could ever have moved it out the way in time to avoid those snapping jaws.

The croc made of with its prize which attracted a lot of attention from the other crocs.  Soon enough the staff spotted my cap causing a ruckus amongst the occupants of the pen and one of them waded into the fray with a long pole, separating the combatants and eventually retrieving my cap which, I explained, had blown off my head and landed in the pen.

I held on to that cap with its peak all crushed and broken for a long time thereafter, a proud memento of a moment of stupidity.

Now normally one such lesson is enough to last a life time but, in Zimbabwean terminology, it would appear that I am 'hard of learning', though the second incident was many years on when I had even more reason to know better having qualified as a professional safari guide.

This second incident occurred in Mana Pools National Park.  I was guiding for Ivan Carter Safaris out of one of his mobile tented operations.  We had a couple of nights between one set of guests leaving and the next arriving.  A little bored myself, the one other guide in camp along with the pretty young lady in charge of the kitchens decided to go for an evening drive.  It was a great drive, we didn't see anything spectacular but it was nice just to enjoy this wonderful national park with no pressure to find exceptional sitings for expectant guests.

Towards the end of the drive we came across a pan situated quite a way inland from the Zambezi River.  The pan was drying up, as it did every year during the dry season.  It had by now reached the stage at which the Marabou Storks, Fish Eagles and Yellow Billed Storks were all in attendance.  All of these birds where here due to the easy fishing as the pool of water shrank and the fish had no room for manoeuvre in order to escape jabbing bills or sharp talons.  In fact on this occasion you could actually see movement in the water as the fish moved around.

'Great' I thought.  Time to get a fish for dinner.  My companions were a little skeptical, though to be fair to me they were only skeptical of my ability to catch a fish with my hands and not the wisdom of attempting to do so.  The pan was an elongated shape and in the middle, across its shortest width, it was only 4 or 5 paces wide.  My plan was to wade in at this point and feel around, when I felt a fish brush against my hands I would flick it out the water to land, a short distance away, on dry land.  Easy.

Removing my shoes I proceeded with my cunning plan.  I took two steps into the water, sinking into the glutenous black mud at the bottom.  I let the water settle for a moment and then reached down to stick my hands in the murky water through which it was impossible to see anything given that it was more a liquid mud mixture than actual water.

To this day I don't know if the hard scaly skin that I touched alerted me to the error of my ways or the sudden movement.  Either way I found myself moving as fast as I could as the water at my feet erupted and a pair of jaws made a lunge for me.  I was still stooped over but somehow I moved my mid-section out the way as the jaws snapped closed.  I will never forget that sound, it was as if two hard planks of wood had banged together with some force.  

There was no time to wonder at my narrow escape as I was still sharing this patch of mud with a crocodile and my feet where sunk in nice thick mud that was reluctant to release me.  Reeling back I flailed around pulling my feet out just in time to avoid the second lunge and then it was over.  I was out the pan, lying on my back, laughing with a slightly hysterical energy.  

How I got clean away is anyones guess, but I did, and I can now safely say that I am extremely wary when it comes to our reptilian friends as 'third times the charm', or so the say.