Africa, My Passion

by Corinne Hofmann

  The closer we get to our destination the more individual huts or little settlements we find along the way. In one of them we even come across a little shop and indulge in our first soft drink in weeks. Everywhere we go the people stare at us and a few call out to me, though I can’t understand what they are saying. I ask Lucas to translate for me and he says, ‘They’re telling you to watch out for the leopards living in the hills around here.’ I thank my lucky stars I haven’t come across one.

  We don’t come across many cars but I still have the impression that they get more tourists here, if only because the Himba are more reticent about talking to us. Out in the savannah I spot two little coloured roofs and a metal fence next to a tree. These turn out to be the first graves we have seen. It would appear that these are the graves of Himba converted by missionaries because each has an inscription and a cross on it. People have left cow horns next to them. After the empty wasteland we’ve spent weeks trekking through this all seems out of place to me.

  We’re about to set up camp one evening after yet another long trek along a dried-up riverbed when all of a sudden a host of baboons leaps, screeching and howling, out of the water and up on to some nearby rocks. It’s incredibly impressive to see so many of them all at once, but it can be dangerous too. But luckily for us they throw the little ones on to their backs or under their bellies and run off, leaving behind them however a huge mess of dung.

  The area is particularly picturesque and there is cool shade beneath the high rocks. I lie down outside my tent, as I often do when we’ve pitched camp for the night, and my thoughts drift back to my home in Switzerland. Not having mobile phones, music or seeing the news allows me to enjoy being where I am. Once a week I make a satellite call to my daughter, just to let her know I’m still alive. She worries so much about me.

  She will be twenty in five days’ time and I rather regret that I can’t be with her to drink a toast on such an important occasion. But at least I can speak to her on the sat phone. I’m still trying to work out what I’m going to do with myself once this great adventure is over. The one thing clear to me is that I’m not going to get over my obsession with Africa, no matter whereabouts in the world I find myself. Africa is in my heart and I feel totally at home among the people here, especially the herders and other nomads. The fascination they exert over me shows yet again just how important my time living with the Samburu was to me, and how lucky I was to have been able to share their primitive lifestyle for four long years alongside my husband, the Samburu warrior Lketinga.

  Next morning, however, my mind is back on the day’s long march. We set off very early and pass a little village where everything is silent and there’s nobody to be seen. Even the goats and cattle are just lying there dozing. Only the dogs wake up and bark at us. But by midday we’re surrounded by curious onlookers, including lots of children who wear nothing but a chain slung around their waists and below their plump little tummies, and an amulet around their necks. Usually the children hide behind the women and peek out at us. One of the women reaches out her arm and walks cautiously towards the camels. A man tells her off, but she pays no heed to him and starts gently stroking the underside of the camel’s neck. Another Himba woman, with huge breasts the size of watermelons hanging down over her belly, copies her. Once again I’m impressed by the older women who still paint themselves from top to tail with the ochre colouring used by the young women. It gives them a sort of magic aura.

  It’s time for us to move on, so we say our goodbyes. The road heads gently uphill from here on, into giraffe country. It’s a beautiful landscape, remarkably green, with clumps of bushes all over the place. One herder comes towards us with his goats and his daughter, a pretty young girl, riding on a donkey next to him. Her face is almost completely hidden by the thick braided plaits hanging down over her eyes. She’s wearing the traditional Himba silver neckband and an ornate white belt around her waist. I’ve seen such a belt before, on little girls as young as seven years old. It’s a sign to indicate she is spoken for. Often, because they are betrothed so young, they end up wearing the belt until they are old enough to be married. But then sometimes they are married as young as ten, although it is not to be consummated until they begin menstruating. At least, thank God, they don’t undergo female genital mutilation, which the Samburu and Masai still inflict on their women. And even though they are married off so young, most of them seem happy enough.

  The sight of all these goats reminds us that it’s been a while since we’ve eaten any meat. But this herder will not sell any of his animals. The next day, however, we have a bit more luck. We get to a village where all the goats are penned next to the houses. As usual, all the women and children come out to see us and, after we’ve exchanged greetings and a bit of chat, Lucas asks about buying one of the goats. There’s a bit of a discussion and then a man in a T-shirt, long trousers and a hat appears. It would appear the animals belong to him. He points out two that he is willing to sell.

  After a bit of haggling we buy one of them and decide to camp for a couple of days by the riverbed not far from the village. Lucas has a hard time trying to get the goat to leave the rest of the herd and come with us, and I’m starting to feel guilty. But the animal’s former owner lends him a hand to drag the animal away from the others and slaughter it with a machete. We’ve promised him he can hold on to the pelt and innards. Lucas makes a good job of butchering the carcass and within an hour there are chunks of meat hanging from higher tree branches where the dogs can’t get at them. I start chopping one of the hunks into smaller pieces, which I throw into a big pot on the fire. Fresh goat meat can be tough, something we discover when we try to roast and eat one of its hind legs.

  Before long a few women from the village come over and sit slightly away from our tents and watch us. A few of them go down to the riverbed and fill a canister with water before coming over to us. Nearly all of them have a baby in their arms or at their breast. A few boys and girls play around in the bushes, chasing off monkeys looking for nuts. There’s a log of giggling and tittering and a lot of very obvious staring at our meat hanging on the branches. They spend a couple of hours with us, chatting away with Lucas. There’s laughter and earnest discussion. I ask Lucas what they’re talking about and he says, ‘I shouldn’t really tell you, but they’re crazy for meat and would do anything to have some of it.’ I’m ready to cut some down and give it to them, but the expedition leader won’t have it.

  Gradually it gets dark and the men come to fetch their women. To our surprise the women shoo them away. I can’t help being impressed by the way the women stand up for one another, laughing together as they do so. Eventually, however, they realise that our expedition leader won’t change his mind and slope off with disappointed expressions. I sympathise with them. A few of them go to refill their water canisters before they load the children on to their backs, the canisters on to their heads and set off back to the village.

  Next day a few of the girls and women come out again to see us. Once again they sit down and start trying to persuade us to give them some meat. Eventually our expedition leader reluctantly gives them the hind leg that we’re not going to eat anyhow. Obviously there isn’t enough to go round and in the end he chops up a bit more and shares it out. At last the women are satisfied and do a dance for us that gradually gets more and more frenetic. They form a circle and one by one take it in turns to stand in the middle of it, the woman in the centre spinning round and stomping her feet while the others clap and sing. After a few twirls another one takes her place in the middle, and all the time they’re laughing, screaming, chanting and clapping and stamping faster and faster. After a while there’s a cloud of dust spinning around them and their red braids are spinning around their heads, and their little skirts flying high, though they manage to take care to cover their private parts, even if their bare bottoms are exposed. I ask the expedition leader if this is a normal part of the dance, or if they’re trying to encourage him to hand out a bit
more meat.

  Lucas is enjoying it all, laughing out loud and describing the flashing parade or rear ends as ‘crazy’.

  ‘They’re not really human beings at all,’ he says.

  I ask him what he means by that and he says, ‘Just look at them. They don’t act like human beings, running around half-naked, covering their bodies with that red fat, never washing their hair. And then you know it’s one of their traditions to knock out their front four teeth and then laugh at us and call us dogs, because we have “mouths full of teeth”.’

  I can’t help laughing at the nonsense he comes out with, and yet I have to acknowledge that the local customs vary hugely from tribe to tribe.

  By now the women are tired out from the dancing, with beads of sweat rolling down their faces. They sit down and tuck into the chunks of meat, finishing it all off before going home. They obviously fear their menfolk would take it off them. Gradually, they drift off one by one, wrapping the little children in the goatskin backpacks and disappearing towards the village. The expedition leader and Lucas take the camels down to the river so that they can stock up on water before we set out the next morning on the final stage of our trek.

  I’m sitting there outside my tent looking at the photos I’ve taken when all of a sudden three big male apes charge into the campsite. Two of them leap over my head to climb the tree where our meat is hanging, while the other smashes into the tent. I leap up in shock, grab my trekking poles and wave them towards them. They shout and scream but make no move to run off. They snarl at me, showing their teeth and staring at me with their yellowy-brown eyes as if challenging me. I’m not sure if it’s the meat they want or something else. I’m standing there wondering what to do when a Himba man comes up from the river, carrying his machete. One look at him and the apes swing up into the trees and flee. They obviously weren’t as worried about a female, despite the sticks I was waving at them. It was only the sight of a male human that scared them off. I thank my rescuer and give him a little bag of tobacco, which he accepts with thanks. I look round and can now see the whole troop of apes sitting on the ground or hanging from the palm trees watching us. Yet even though there have been signs of apes or baboons around ever since we got here, within the hour every one of them has vanished.

  Our trek is coming to its end. We’re only fifty kilometres from Opuwo and, as we plod on, I’m gradually beginning to look forward to getting back to ‘civilisation’. Even Lucas is starting to get excited. The end of the tour means it’s holiday time for him and he can go back to his family in the Damara region with the money he’s earned. But the expedition leader has one more stop planned. Our final campsite is in a savannah landscape not far from a waterhole. I take the opportunity to walk down to it to wash my hair and clothes so that I’m not too grubby by the time we get back to Opuwo.

  Today is my daughter’s birthday and I’ve been looking forward to talking to her on the sat phone. But I’m devastated to find that the battery’s dead. I have solar cells to recharge it, but it’ll take hours. Just sitting there doing nothing waiting for the battery to charge leaves me feeling rather melancholy.

  It’s also twenty years since I was living out there in northern Kenya far from civilisation, just like right now. Except at that moment I was in a rustic hospital up in Wamba waiting for my child to be born. I knew nothing about childbirth. Before coming to Africa I hadn’t even thought about it. My mother-in-law spoke only the local Maa language and my husband wasn’t up to telling me anything about the process of giving birth: that was women’s stuff. I had no pre-natal course, knew nothing about exercising during pregnancy, never had an ultrasound. I could only wait, hope and pray that, despite the circumstances, my child would be born alive and healthy. Twenty years ago today, despite having three bouts of malaria while I was pregnant, I managed to give birth to a healthy little girl.

  All of this is running through my head as I sit waiting and waiting with nothing else to do. Finally there is enough charge in the battery to make a call and I try to ring my little girl and wish her a happy birthday. At last I get through to her in Zurich and I could jump for joy, even if she tells me she can’t talk for long as things are hectic back there and she has to be off to work.

  I spend the rest of the day coming to terms with the end of my adventure. We only have two more days to go and I’m both happy and sad to be coming to the end. There is still a long hard trek before then, and so I finally apply the last of my sticking plasters to the huge blisters on my feet.

  The final part of our journey is on a broad but hard track that’s not very pleasant to walk on. I set off alone early, walking as fast as I can. Now there are more and more cars along the way. Some of the drivers are locals who wave at me in astonishment, some tourists who slow down and stop and ask if I’m in difficulty. I just smile and tell them no, and point back at the camels coming along behind me. They’re usually astounded and want to know where we’ve been. Some of them even get out of their vehicles to be photographed alongside me. The one thing I hear more often than most is, ‘You have to be Swiss to do something that daft!’

  There are more and more signs of civilisation now along the way. For the last couple of weeks we’ve seen electricity poles indicating that Opuwo, capital of the Kaoko Veldt, is not far away. Funnily enough, in the Himba language Opuwo means ‘end’, which makes it a fitting place to finish our 720km trek.

  I’m exhausted but proud and almost light-headed as people crowd round me and the two men and two camels as we trudge into this tiny town of just five thousand people. We fell like we’ve finally reached civilisation, even if for those in the national capital, Windhoek, Opuwo really is the end of the world!

  A NEW CHALLENGE BACK IN KENYA

  Mid-July 2009, much enriched by my experiences, and twelve kilograms lighter, I arrive back in Ticino Canton, Switzerland. After eight weeks in a landscape that’s been either wild or barren, the sight of the lush green meadows adorning the mountains as I take the train from Zurich back to my home in Lugano is one for sore eyes. The next day, without even unpacking my suitcase, I pack up a little rucksack and head up into the mountains, reaching 2,200 metres, where I find myself among the last remnants of the winter snows. The contrast with the trek I’ve just completed is almost unbelievable: all around me are meadows full of wild flowers, the alpenroses red against the grey rocks and the blue sky. My recent experience makes me appreciate all this more than ever. The perfume of the flowers is so sweet, it almost makes me lightheaded. Yesterday I was in Namibia; today I’m back home in the Alps. Our world has so much to offer.

  Over the next few months I do a lot of mountain walking, just letting my thoughts run wild. At one moment I’m back in the Namibian desert with the unique Himba, the next I’m back in Kenya with my family there. Napirai has finally said she would like to meet them, although I’m not sure she is really ready. It’s six years since I was last there and I’d love to go again, but I can’t go back without taking my daughter with me. There would be no way I could explain her absence to her father or grandmother who long to see her again.

  At the same time I’ve been knocked out of my old routine by my trip to Namibia and my curiosity about Kenya has been reawakened. I would really love to find out just what it is about Africa that sparks this sense of energy in me every time I set foot on the continent. It is a sensation that goes against virtually everything we are told about Africa here in Europe. Most of the people I know who have been to Kenya or any other African country just want to understand how the people there manage to survive.

  There is also the fact that if I were to get the chance to meet as many people as possible and hear their life stories then I might have something of interest to share with my readers. I’ve had so many letters and emails telling me how much their lives have been influenced by reading my story. Surely hearing more about people who have to struggle against the worst conditions and still not lose their love of life would give them even more strength and confidence?


  The only question is, how am I going to find such stories? By happy coincidence Klaus, the cameraman who went with me when I returned to Barsaloi six years ago, is planning to fly out to Nairobi for several weeks with his Kenyan wife and their daughter. When I tell him what I’m thinking about, he suggests I join them, and tells me he can introduce me to all the people he’s got to know in Nairobi over the intervening years. He can put me in touch with people who have struggled to get by against incredible odds. Immediately I’m fired up with enthusiasm and accept the offer gratefully.

  By the end of February I’m off to Africa again, this time to Nairobi, capital of Kenya. It’s not exactly my favourite city in the world, but I have the feeling it’s the right place to go to. I have no idea as yet that the fascinating tales I am going to bring back will finally overcome Napirai’s uncertainty and give her the courage and inspiration she needs to go back to Barsaloi with me just a few months later.

  The centre of Nairobi is very modern and smart, with luxury apartment buildings everywhere and rents that are almost as high as they are in Germany. There are new supermarkets on every corner, and even the modern automotive industry has finally made its presence felt. I’m amazed to see how many expensive top-end, brand-new cars there are on the busy streets of Nairobi. Only a few years ago there was a beggar in rags on every corner cadging money off tourists. Not any more. I can’t help wondering what they’ve done with them all. There’s no rubbish on the streets and it looks as if everybody has stopped smoking. It’s hard to believe how much the city centre has changed.