10.07.09 Was It Really There?

Was it really there? Had I really seen it?

I had Salon stop at the edge of the road and I got off the bike.
Salon kept riding on and it was just me and them…

But I saw nothing, anymore. The shape that I had seen was now the
long dry bark of the trunk of a tree in the endless grasslands of
Tanzania. There was stillness all around, and the tree trunk was
peculiar because it was slightly at a crooked angle.

Then I looked out across the landscape and I noticed that there were
six other tree trunks dry and crusty light brown on the tan pastures
outside of the Mikumi National Park. That was very peculiar. I had
never seen trees that crooked before and now there were seven of them.

And then I saw it.

But did I really see it? It flicked so quickly that it may have just
been my vivid imagination. It could have been the wind picking off
one of the branches from the tree so that it sung down looking exactly
like a…..

Like a swish of a tail.

But was that really it? Because the shapes were completely still and
and unmoving.

But wait! I saw it again. A split second of movement, but then I had
been to the zoo so many times that I knew the flick of a tail when I
saw it.

And suddenly I heard the approaching sound of a motor. Picipicipicipici…..

It was a picipici. It was Salon on the picipici. It was Salon on the
picipici that we had taken to get to Mikumi. It was the picipici that
I had decided to bargain for at the town at the town roundabout and
which Salon had promised we would be able to take into the park and
which I had asked for a price of $40,000 shillings which was fair for
an entire afternoon of a motorcycle safari ride. However, I had not
realized - and it had not been disclosed - that stringent park agents
would not be willing to allow motorcycles inside because lions and
other giant beasts would happily consume its occupants in one giant
salivating gulp. After driving 110 kilometers to get here underneath
the blazing hot sun of the sub-Saharan dry season, I learned that I
would not be able to see anything because self-walking tours were not
allowed today and no walking tours were being offered. The only other
option was to pay $90 to receive a land cruiser tour after paying $20
to enter. Neither option was at all appealing to a penny-pinching
doctoral student, so Salon and I just set right back out on the road
and counted our losses and headed for home.

As we were driving along within the national park’s highway, I began
wondering at the atrocity that national parks in Africa had become: to
set out on foot was forbidden because you were a dumb mzungu who would
surely get snarfed by a lion or stampeded by a gazelle at the very
least. The entrance fees were exorbitant and the only entry that was
permitted was by carbon-emitting gas guzzlers. Similarly to U.S.
national parks, humanity and the natural environment were completely
segregated which meant that it was assumed that we could not co-exist
and also that humans were not a part of the natural environment
despite us having been part of the Earth’s ecosystem for the last
50,000 years when suddenly around 200 years ago or so we suddenly
self-declared ourselves as the Earth’s dominating elites. All of
this came flooding to my mind as Salon puttered along.

When I saw it.

It was a shape, tall and unquestionably animal-like moving across the
grasslands slowly.

—-

Salon returned with the puttering of his picipici. Suddenly the dark
dry shapes of trees sprang to life. There were brown spots and a dry
yellow coat. Their long necks were arched forward and they stampeded
across the grasslands parallel with the highway….one, then two, then
three….there were nearly 20 of them in a herd and they moved at
breakneck speed.

I was absolutely astonished by the exhilarating rapid movement of
these large mammals after having disguised themselves as dried shapes
of crooked trees. All I could do was to continue observing and I did
so and I respected the sheer beauty of their movement and their life
form and I knew now why the parks required such large fees to protect
these animals before they were completely poached and instinct because
they were in the boiling posts of Tanzanian kitchens.

¨Let’s go, ¨ said Salon impatiently.

Those were the only words he knew in English. Salon was disinterested
with the animals on the horizon and more interested in the $40 waiting
for him that I had in my pocket. I ignored him and watched the shapes
of the giraffes moving across the landscape slowly fading away. I
stared off quietly in a state of respect and awe.

¨Let’s go!¨ shouted Salon. I put my helmet back on and we shot across
the grassland again. As we sped away, I waved to astonished villagers
who stared back at the mzungu on the backseat of the picipici quickly
moving into the distance.