I Am Not Your Slave

by Tupa Tjipombo

  I looked up into my grandfather’s foggy eyes, the backs of my fingers still brushing idly against his cracked skin, and marveled at all the mysterious things the elephants must be saying. What were their discussions like? Did they talk about their day? Did they gossip and chitchat about trivial things the way people did? Did they argue? But I knew how my grandfather, who was never known to give precise answers to anything, could be particularly frustrating when it came to answering my questions about the elephants. “They are speaking in elephant time,” he often said. “It is the middle of a very old conversation. You would not understand.” Sometimes he leaned back and sighed, saying, “The feet do not always get along with the head.” He did not actually say these things in my dreamworld, though; they were simply memories of things he said. In the dreamworld, he was always silent.

  So I continued to watch the Old One, trying to interpret his stony veneer, amazed at all the wonderful elephant secrets he must be privy to: each soft footfall a word, each plodding journey a conversation, the miles upon miles of rambling tracks a thousand books. They always walked with such careful deliberation, I thought. They must be choosing their words very carefully. “I will never understand a single elephant conversation in my lifetime,” I said to myself in my dream. Even so, there was something ancient and familiar about their movements, and it gave me comfort.

  * * *

  I woke up feeling fuzzy, as if the thick tendrils of sleep were still wrapped around me. The dream was one I had had many times before. But now it seemed to take on added weight and significance—it was somehow more relevant. I could sense that change. But its true meaning remained a mystery.

  I still lay in the back of the pickup truck, though it was parked now. I sat up and looked around: I was in a clearing surrounded by a thick stand of large thorn trees. It looked like another compound, the kind I had become familiar with prior to my long detour in southern Sudan. My observation was confirmed when I saw a delivery truck on the opposite side of the clearing with two girls standing beside it. So I am back to this, I thought, this spiderweb of roads and rest stops. I already knew the routine.

  As I struggled to climb out of the truck, a man approached me and said, “Ah, the lost girl from Namibia.” Standing in front of me, he appraised me in a manner that I had become all too familiar with by this point. He shook his head sadly and said, “These people from South Sudan, they are not developed. They just take and take. Now you are skinny and all used up.”

  For me, it was a confirmation of what I had already come to suspect: I was back in the hands of my initial abductors and had now resumed my journey to my original, intended destination, wherever that was.

  I joined the two girls by the delivery truck and discovered that both spoke English. They told me they were from a small town in eastern Kenya. When I asked them about our current location, they said we were somewhere just north of Nairobi.

  “So we are in Kenya now?” I asked.

  “Yes,” they answered in unison.

  “Are we going to Nairobi?”

  The girls looked at one another and laughed. “No,” one responded. “We are going to Dubai.” They explained that Dubai was somewhere in the Middle East, but neither was sure of its exact location. They were to begin work there as domestic servants, they said, adding excitedly that Dubai offered many opportunities to further their education as well. I listened coolly as they speculated about all the wonderful adventures they would have, including how the truck might be taking them to an airport. I wanted to tell them how foolish they sounded, but I did not have the energy. The nausea and dizziness were overpowering now, and I could sense a fever coming on, all of which made me feel like I was somehow caught in a dreamlike state. Everything was coming on like a flood now. I abruptly sat down in the dirt and hugged my knees—ignoring the astonished reactions of the girls—and fixed my gaze on a spot on the ground before me. I wondered if the elephants were guiding me toward death.

  * * *

  The next leg of my journey was a feverish blur. As I grew sicker, reality became interwoven with my dreams, which now stretched into the realm of hallucination, until it was difficult to tell whether I was even conscious or not. Most memories that I thought were real involved staring into the blackness of the truck or lying on the ground beside it at night, looking up at one girl or another who was kind enough to care for me. I recalled a few feeble efforts to give me food and water, but for the most part I could not keep anything down. At one point, I thought I overheard a whispered discussion as to when I was going to die.

  I found myself staring up at the Old One again. As before, his rigid gaze was fixed on the emptiness before him. But now his head was wreathed in a swirling mass of stars and planets. They whooshed about him in wrinkled eddies of perpetual motion, as if he had tapped into some primal state, some secret portal to another way of being. I looked down at his feet, which were planted firmly on the ground before him—the way they were when he was listening to the elephants—and realized that he had managed to tap into some higher level in his quest to understand them. He was far away now, I thought, traveling along a vast network of celestial elephant pathways that I could only dream about. When I looked up again, the elephants were pinwheeling across the starry sky above his head.

  * * *

  The back door of the truck was flung open to a blazing sun. I crawled to the entrance and gasped in shock, tears running down my cheeks as I blinked and marveled at the site before me: water everywhere, water that stretched beyond the horizon. I watched it swell and ripple from a deep blue to an intense emerald green, and I realized that it could only be the ocean that my brother Timo used to talk about. He was right, I thought, it was truly like a second sky between the first sky and the land.

  The water contrasted sharply with a shimmering white beach, where a chaotic scene was taking place before me. Several hundred people were being herded into lines by men wielding large sticks. In front of each line, a long, open boat lay at anchor about twenty meters offshore. One group was already being driven toward their boat; men, women, and children waded cautiously into the water while juggling their belongings above their heads. Adults carried some children, while others were not so lucky and struggled to keep their heads above water. The men with sticks were not afraid to use them and routinely struck people to keep them moving forward. I was so weak that I had to be helped down to the beach by our driver and another man, who placed me at the end of the nearest line. I sat in the warm sand and watched the scene before me.

  Our driver greeted several of the stick-wielding men in a familiar fashion. He conferred with them for several minutes, gesturing toward us before handing over a wad of money, though I did not recognize the currency. When one of the stick men approached us, I feared that he would beat us like everybody else. But he simply lit a cigarette and leered at us. He said something and smiled, revealing a mouth largely devoid of teeth, and proceeded to beat and yell at everybody around us. Why we were spared from the beatings was a mystery.

  When it came time to board the boat, I held on to another girl and we carefully waded into the water together. I did not know how to swim, and in my weakened state I was petrified of fainting or losing my balance. Judging by the actions and expressions of everybody else, I was not alone in my fear. It took some time to fill each boat, but once full each would immediately pull anchor and speed straight out to sea.

  When I reached my boat, I was hauled aboard like a fish and pushed forward. It was general pandemonium as the crew shouted at the frightened passengers and shoved us toward our seats. People tripped and fell over one another as the boat pitched violently. A woman who was simultaneously juggling a baby and several pieces of luggage almost fell overboard when she lost her footing. She dropped a large bag in the water and watched dejectedly as it floated away, joining other pieces of luggage that bobbed up and down beside the boat. The man in charge of seating packed us in as tightly as possible; I was placed next to an older woman who carri
ed something wrapped in a long plastic bag that jabbed me in the ribs and forced me to lean slightly over the side. We were made to sit in an awkward squatting position; everybody was bent forward over their knees and practically balancing on their toes. My legs were already beginning to cramp.

  By the time we got underway, there must have been around fifty passengers aboard. We were packed together so tightly that we had no choice but to endure our half-squatting positions. Every available space that was not taken up by a human body was crammed with small packages and bundles of personal goods, even after people were forced to ditch their largest items. The crew consisted of three men: the driver and his assistant, who sat in the stern, and a third man, who positioned himself on the bow. People tied shirts and towels around their heads in a feeble attempt to protect themselves from the sun and salt spray.

  After only ten minutes, the driver slowed the boat to a crawl. I realized that he was waiting for something, which eventually appeared as a speck on the horizon but reached us within minutes. It was a boat similar in make to our own but only about half the size. It held five men in uniform, three of whom leveled AK-47s directly at us. Across the bow in faded black lettering were the words DJIBOUTI POLICE.

  “We are the police of the Republic of Djibouti,” announced a heavyset man sitting in front. “You must pay the clearance tax when leaving the country or else go to jail.” He held up a stubby finger. “One franc for each person.” The crew members on our boat seemed to know the drill and immediately set upon the passengers, shouting at them to pass their money to the back of the boat. A fair amount of confusion ensued as people scrambled for money while the bowman, stepping awkwardly among us, made certain everybody paid their share. Several passengers had no money, which led to more slapping and kicking but with no real affect. To my relief, I escaped the beatings once again and was simply ignored.

  Eventually, the money was passed back to the driver, who, in turn, gave it to the policeman. This touched off an argument that must have lasted twenty minutes and led to three separate head counts. The matter was finally resolved when additional money was added to the pot from a stash the driver kept hidden under his seat.

  Satisfied, the Djibouti police allowed us to pass, and we set out once again. I covered my head with a stray plastic bag, securing it as well as I could, but I still felt myself getting burned by the sun, especially on my arms and the back of my neck. The salt spray made things even more uncomfortable, and I silently cursed each time the boat kicked up another wave that struck me full in the face. To make matters worse, the wind picked up throughout the afternoon, causing the boat to pitch and roll in long, nauseating undulations. As seasickness set in, passengers tried but frequently failed to vomit overboard. I thanked God that I had been given a seat on the side of the boat.

  It turned out to be a particularly brutal leg of my journey. While I was completely exhausted throughout the boat ride, I found it difficult to sleep. I was still very sick, and the dizziness, which was almost constant, intensified every time I closed my eyes. The awkward squatting positions we were forced to sit in did not help matters; everybody simply had to grit their teeth and endure.

  We drove all day and night, stopping only when the driver needed to switch jerricans of fuel, and once when a woman fell into the water as she was relieving herself over the side. If the driver had not literally run into her after reluctantly turning around, she may never have been found. When we finally managed to drag her back on board, she heaved up seawater in violent convulsions.

  I struck up a conversation with the woman sitting beside me, who told me that she was from a small village in rural Somalia, where Al-Shabaab had established a strong presence. She described how the group had put a stranglehold on almost every aspect of daily life, even stoning to death several local women accused of adultery. Fearing for her life, she had fled to Mogadishu, only to discover that it was completely ravaged by fighting between Al-Shabaab and soldiers from the transitional government. Government forces were supported by well-armed troops from neighboring countries, this time as part of a “peacekeeping mission” backed by the African Union. After so many years of violence, Mogadishu was a wreck, and its weary residents viewed the two sides, each of which were sharply divided into a bewildering array of factions, with a mixture of disdain and jaded indifference. By 2007, the fighting had been going on for decades and people no longer viewed any group in a particularly positive light. The current crop of peacekeeping forces, most of whom were from Ethiopia, had lost all credibility when, in the name of ferreting out suspected Islamists, they indiscriminately shelled civilian neighborhoods and shot whole groups of neighborhood men on the spot.

  The woman sighed and shook her head. “I would rather be killed by my own people,” she said. “It is less shameful.” She described how she had fled Mogadishu and spent several months moving from one makeshift camp to another before deciding to join her sister, who operated a textile shop in Dubai’s central marketplace. The idea to try her luck in Dubai had come to her in a dream. Revealing a slight glimmer of hope, she told me how Somali women were leaving for the city every day. “Perhaps the stories are true,” she speculated, “and Dubai is a place where a woman like myself can finally live in peace and even make a little money.” She was silent for a few seconds before adding, “And I have faith in my dreams.”

  Interested in what she might have to say about my own dreams, I described the recurring images I had been having of my grandfather and the elephants.

  “These are important things,” the woman said very seriously, after listening carefully to my descriptions. “You should not take them lightly.”

  “But I do not understand the message,” I responded. “I do not understand the elephants.”

  “Why do you think there is a meaning that you must discover?” the woman asked. As I considered the question, the woman continued, “My dear, dreams are not like gold that you dig up from the ground. They are what you make them to be. They are like this boat. The boat can go anywhere. If you are the driver of the boat, you decide where it will take you.”

  * * *

  Later that night, the dreams came to me once again. But the restless, fitful nature of sleep made it impossible for me to find any coherence or meaning in them. My grandfather was nowhere to be found, and in his absence the elephants were an indecipherable presence on the horizon. But even at that distance, I could see that they were mingling among one another or else standing and swaying back and forth, as if deliberating exactly where to go. Maybe they did not know what to say, I thought, or perhaps they were debating the matter. Or, more likely, I simply could not understand them. I sat on a rock and carefully planted my feet on the ground, but I heard nothing.

  * * *

  We spotted land around noon the following day, a barren desert dune scape that hovered on the horizon like smoke. Its strange, almost mystical appearance reinforced for me what I had already come to realize during the crossing: we were no longer in Africa. It was a terrifying thought, but at that point I was just looking forward to being back on dry land.

  We were still about a hundred meters offshore when the driver suddenly cut the engine. The crew huddled together in the stern and spoke to one another in hushed voices, every so often scanning the shoreline with troubled looks. For some reason, they seemed uncertain of what to do. The passengers grew increasingly restless and a low, troubled murmur rose from the boat.

  Surveying the coastline myself, I saw nothing out of the ordinary at first. But after I allowed my eyes to adjust to the sun’s glare, a group of men in long white robes materialized on the beach. After a few more minutes, I noticed that not only were they dressed similarly but also each carried a long black stick. “Are they carrying guns?” I asked the Somali woman beside me. But before she could answer, three loud pops echoed across the water. They seemed to be signaling the boat to come ashore.

  The effect on the crew was just the opposite, however, and for reasons I never under
stood, they grew increasingly agitated. Without warning, they began tossing bags overboard. The passengers immediately erupted in protest, and a shouting match ensued as the boat pitched back and forth dangerously. The captain produced a handgun from somewhere and held it at his side while his nervous crew continued to fling bags into the sea. The sight of the gun was the only thing preventing the angry passengers from charging forward and overwhelming the crew.

  And then one of the crew members pushed a passenger overboard. Whether it was an accident or not was hard to say. But it was an older woman who fell clumsily into the water with a loud splash. She thrashed about wildly with her arms—it was clear that she could not swim. Frozen in horror, people watched as she tried desperately to grab on to a large bag of clothes floating beside her. But the bag twirled about uselessly until the woman, after one final lunge, disappeared below the surface. In the clear water, I watched her shimmering yellow dress fade and finally flicker out of sight like a brilliant fish. In the chaos that followed, several more people either fell or were pushed overboard. Other passengers jumped into the water on their own and started swimming toward shore. I was desperate to join them but knew I would sink just as easily as the woman in the yellow dress. Waving his gun about wildly now, the captain shouted in broken English that people who could not swim should grab on to the floating luggage and kick their way to shore. But I could see that most passengers were just as terrified of the water as I was.