I needed to run an experiment and started the original with a strange beginning. Thank you to those who commented on it and especially those who sent mails questioning the 'bathroom humour' at the start. It is gone and Nganakati is now as it should be.
NOTE: Wasubi does not exist but this is based on happenings at an actual lodge and the events are not quite as farfetched as it may seem....
To give colour and feel to this I used some words from two African languages namely Swazi (siSwati) and Tsonga (Xitsonga) both spoken freely in the area in and around the Kruger National Park. There are other languages but I think two were enough. A list of words are as follows:
Mnumzaan (S)/ Nkulumba (T) = about the same as Mister or Sir
Nganakati (T) = Princess
Hosana (T) = Chief or high commander. There is some theory that it may originate from the Biblical "Hosanna".
Tatana (T) = Father
Muthi or Muti (S) = medicine
Potjie = a meaty stew cooked outside in a cast iron pot over an open fire.
Braai = BBQ but with some unique differences.
Boma = an enclosure made with wood poles and shuttered with straw and clay in which animals used to be kept safe from predators. It evolved into an outside area where friends sit at night, usually for a braai. It may or may not have an area covered with a thatch roof.
Panga = machete.
Veld = A universal word used for the African bush or savannah. Pronounced as 'felt'.
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The African bush.... As unique and diverse as the continent itself, the animals and especially the humans that inhabit it.
'Safari' is a Swahili word and means 'Travel'. Finding yourself at a Safari Lodge can only mean you are travelling in Africa and as such find yourself facing very much the same challenges as playing Russian Roulette. It may be fraught with, let's just call it, surprises. Unbeknown to those who languish in the sun around a pool to the sound of a fish eagle calling somewhere in the distance or maybe even a lion grunting and roaring, there may be very turbulent undercurrents playing out around them. Thankfully most undercurrents do not impact those who visit these lodges, but sometimes, just by accident or brutal coincidence, they do....
There is a misconception about Newton and his laws of gravity with the story going around that it was because he saw an apple falling. It is incorrect, of course. In his words he stated that he was in thought and was happened upon by an apple falling. This did not lead to the laws directly but it seems that it may have started a process of thought.
I was happened upon by an ablution block at a Safari Lodge here in Africa shortly before leaving school. A sewer had blocked, forcing raw sewerage down the paths and over lawns amongst tents, caravans and chalets. My future as a plumber was cemented in my brain right there and it worked out rather well for me. People are prepared to pay good money for working ablutions and also to save them the chore of dealing with their leftovers.
The Lodge in question used to be a very smart private lodge nestling against the world renowned Kruger National Park in South Africa. As a family we often went there and I have many pleasant memories of the place. The post-Apartheid government had to have their nose in it and eventually the owners simply gave up and left, leaving it to the inept to milk and mismanage it into the ground.
This is where I came in. As part owner of a smallish business that specialised in the installation and maintenance of infrastructure for the tourism industry, I saw the request of tender for the repair and expansion of, amongst others, the Lodge's dilapidated plumbing, sewerage and electrical systems. I visited the place for a day along with my senior guys, had a good look around, appalled at the deterioration and we worked out a decent tender, submitted it and promptly forgot about it. Our chances of being awarded the contract was unthinkable. We were a white owned and managed company with no politician in our pockets and the tender was not accompanied by an agreement to share the profits with some 'connected' person. Neither was the envelope stuffed with wads of money.
Our surprise at receiving an e-mail inviting us to the Lodge for a meeting with some stake holders was so great we laughed for almost an hour but on the designated day we were there. The meeting was scheduled for ten in the morning. Just before lunch a cavalcade of very expensive black cars arrived with blue lights flashing and sirens blaring from the Police escort. This, of course, on a twin track in the bush that, due to the surface, prohibits speed in excess of an ambling walk. The occupants got out and left for the restaurant not be seen again until almost sundown.
Those of us who came from nearby left to return the next day while others made the best of a bad situation and spent the night at the Lodge on the Government's dime, or more precisely, the Taxpayer's.
The next morning, once the hangovers had abated somewhat, the meeting started. For an hour we listened to a politician waffling on about a subject he had less knowledge of than a newborn and then we received some strange forms to fill in while the cavalcade left for another appointment promising more groaning tables and brimming glasses. What floored me was the fact that we were told exactly what the budget was. It took me a while to get over the shock. With that kind of money almost the entire Kruger National Park could be upgraded to average four star accommodations throughout. Here we were sitting in a hall on a lodge about one percent the size of the park with a repair budget rivalling that of the Defence Force. Well not really but you get my drift....
We handed in our completed documents and left, never thinking we would be asked to come and do the job. I noticed quite a number of 'connected' faces in the hall. I had dealt with some of them before and from experience I knew that there were more corruption scams running than there were people present. The buzz word being 'Tenderpreneurs'. (Those who do not know what this means are welcome to e-mail me)
A little more than four months later I was working on a medium sized Lodge's plumbing when I got an e-mail informing me that the tender for Wasubi Lodge had been awarded to us and that the date for commencement was in just over two months with a completion date two months hence.
It took the inept almost eleven years to mismanage the Lodge into the ground and now they wanted the place ready to receive royalty in sixty days. I shook my head but answered the mail, confirming that we would be there. I never said we would be starting the job....
I may be a fool but I am an OLD fool. Been there, saw that.
My agreement stated very clearly that work will only start once fifty percent of the contract value was paid into a trust fund, managed by some big names in the investment world. I had seen too many good guys lose everything because payment from the new government was either hopelessly late or never happened. I dislike being a bad statistic. A few days before the commencement date I took my truck, loaded what I may need to start the job and set off to the Lodge. My teams would arrive within hours once I get confirmation of payment and from there things will move fast.
Arriving at the Lodge I found that some entrepreneurial individual had had the bright idea of stripping most of the Lodge of all existing copper plumbing and electrical wiring to be sold as scrap metal. Almost nothing worked.....
I was disgusted and nearly left but shrugged and decided to pitch a tent and camp rather than stay in a chalet where the remnants of the infrastructure was hanging from the roof and walls. Walking around I discovered one ablution block still working after a fashion. A single light hung from the roof and there was water although it was cold. Being high summer in Africa meant that hot water was simply a luxury.
Rummaging around on my truck I came up with enough left-over bits and pieces of plumbing as well as some electrical cabling. As the sun set I had two hand basins, a shower and two toilets working again. An old fluorescent light fitting came in handy to cast some workable light around the ablution and I stood back to admire the result of my abilities. It was almost habitable again....
I don't do glamping but neither do I appreciate having to live like the homeless so I came prepared. Once the ablution was operational I found a camping spot nearby and got that up and running while a hard-wood fire burnt merrily, casting a flickering warm glow around my campsite. My tent was up, bed made and a table with comfortable canvas chair stood waiting for me to open some of the crates I had hauled with me.
Around me, spread around the campsite in haphazard fashion, other fires were burning and from the sound of it, some people were having as pleasant a time as was possible under the current circumstances. From my camping fridge I pulled an ice cold beer and had just sat back to slake a thirst that was making my throat feel like someone had hauled a hedgehog up it wrong way round, when a pleasant voice called out; "Hello the fire?"
Canvas camping chairs can be wonderfully comfortable and mine has been with me for years now. It fitted like an old pair of jeans. Where I had a lump, it had a hollow and vice versa. Getting out of it was an acquired ability bordering on an art form though. Getting it wrong was a bad idea....
A female voice was the last thing I expected to hear at the camp in its current state of disrepair so I was suitably surprised and maybe even a trifle alarmed so I left the chair a touch quick. Rule 1. If you have something in your hand, put it down first. Rule 2. Get your balance right. Rule 3. Watch where your feet are. There were a number of other rules I missed applying but those first three were enough to make all others pale to insignificance.
With beer in hand I jettisoned myself from the chair and took.... No, correct that. I
started
to take a step but the foot that needed to move forward was gently tucked behind a strap that I, the talented 'fixer all', had put between the front legs of a chair I loved like a dog to brace a slightly rickety frame.
There is a message sent to Brain from our ears to tell it that balance has been lost. Let's face it. Every time the human being takes a step, it is teetering on the edge of catastrophe and not much is needed to set a whole calamity in action or motion, depending. Most of this I blame on Brain for sending a panic message to our legs to prevent a simple unflattering sit-down and change it into a sequence of events that sometimes defy description.
With beer in hand I got just over halfway upright, leaning forward to balance my posterior still somewhere behind my centre of gravity and tried to take the step needed to leave the chair. My foot didn't move. Instead of simply falling back into the chair and at the worst, spill some beer and a little ego, I tried to salvage the abortive jettisoning from my chair by, yes you guessed it, trying to get my other foot to move forward. Of course it didn't because it had my weight on it and all I achieved was to move my body past the point of salvageable equilibrium and I started falling, still heeding Brain by pulling harder at the foot stuck behind the strap. The chair, at a fraction of my weight, left the ground and like an angry octopus it wrapped itself around my lower legs, binding them together pretty well and I fell over like a pole.
Of course my hands flew out to break the fall but one had a beer in it. The beer squirted from the little hole at the top of the can as it got squashed under my weight and I felt some of it hit me in the face and on the side of my head a single moment before my face slammed into the ground, raising a cloud of dust that instantly mixed with the beer, creating a muddy goo.
I lay still long enough to make sure I couldn't do more damage and then carefully rolled over looking back the way I had come, trying to disentangle my legs from a chair I hoped was still useable. Faint dust was floating in the air and through it I saw a woman holding her face in her hands staring at me in shock. I did the only thing that came to mind. I breathed a startled "Hi," and lifted my hand in greeting only to pour the remains of the beer onto me once more.
I saw the shocked surprise leave her face. She squinted and moved her hand over her mouth but it was to no avail. I have to give it to her. She tried to smother it but like a sneeze and desperate lunge at a toilet, the harder you hold back, the worse it becomes. To the end of my days I will remember the image of vaporised spittle catching the light from the fire as it blew from between her fingers when she guffawed and then she bent over to lean forward with her hands on her knees, screaming with laughter.
These things pay. It took only a few seconds for her to lean over too far and as she stepped forward to regain her balance her legs gave way. She ended up on her knees and then simply fell forward with her face in her hands, still screaming.
Laughing in sympathy I got my legs out of the chair and carefully got up, beating dust from my clothes and listening to the woman doing her best to stop laughing. Just as she heaved a sigh I intentionally snorted and the poor thing lost it all over again.
I think she was exhausted but at last she gathered herself and sat up straight, staring into the dark. She snickered once and then turned to face me. "I'm sorry."
