Jackal's Dance

by Beverley Harper

  The mind of a three-year-old boy is a place filled with wonder. Three-year-old boys feel morally obliged to take things apart, find out what makes them tick. A further must is to thoroughly explore the contents of any container to which access has previously been denied. The only trouble is, three-year-old boys don’t know how to put things back together again, nor do they necessarily remember where they put all the bits. Helmut’s son was an angelic-faced, blond, blue-eyed, three year old.

  Willem loved car-rides. He flourished in the vast sandpit that was Kaokoland. Day three into the trip saw the family camped well off any track, somewhere south of the Steilrang Mountains. They might have been the only people on earth, such was their isolation.

  Helmut had been pleased with the way Willem had adapted to the bush. The boy was able to amuse himself for hours on end. He seemed particularly content this evening, absorbed, Helmut thought, with his colouring-in book. But young Willem had actually discovered that his normally prudent daddy had left the lid of his toolbox open. The interior was an Aladdin’s cave of spanners, screwdrivers, pliers, hammers, and a myriad of mysteries which Willem simply had to investigate.

  Probably aware that he was doing something he shouldn’t, Willem methodically buried any evidence in soft sand just outside the tent. Willem’s grandmother, who doted on the boy and was not particularly fond of her son-in-law, discovered the child elbow deep in his new-found fun. Aware that Helmut would not be amused, she picked up and replaced the few obvious bits and pieces before closing and latching the lid. She said nothing about it. When Helmut put his toolbox back into the Land Rover next morning, Willem begged to be picked up too. Distracted, Helmut did not notice that it was considerably lighter than it should have been.

  It was later that very same day that a problem, in the form of a fuel blockage, reared its ugly head. Finding not one single screwdriver in the toolkit, Helmut discovered what must have happened. There was no going back. They were in deep trouble. It was a good one hundred and fifty kilometres to Opuwo, the administrative capital of Kaokoland. They’d been travelling on tracks which only concession holders – tour guides mainly – were supposed to use. Having seen no-one else in the last four days, the chances of another vehicle appearing out of the blue seemed remote. They had enough food and water for ten more days, which was six days after they were supposed to be back in Windhoek. Their only problem was that nobody knew where they were. Helmut, to hide the fact that they were heading for Kaokoland, had told friends they intended camping in the Namib. If panic buttons were pushed, any search would be conducted some eight-hundred kilometres south of where they might be found.

  Helmut knew he’d never reach Opuwo on foot, even assuming he didn’t get lost. Their only chance was to stay with the vehicle and hope somebody came along.

  Nobody did. In fact, nothing stirred out there. The silence became deafening. To make matters worse, Willem developed a high temperature and diarrhoea. Very quickly he began to dehydrate. At the end of his wits, Helmut had just made the desperate decision to try and reach Opuwo on foot when salvation, in the form of an eight-year-old Himba cattleherd called Chester Erasmus, appeared from nowhere. Chester did not speak English, German, Afrikaans, nor the African dialect commonly used in Windhoek. Helmut could not understand Herero. But Chester had seen that these strangers were in trouble. He led them to where his people had their camp, some six kilometres away. Several of the men spoke a mixture of German and Afrikaans, so Helmut was able to explain his plight.

  The Himba, using tribal methods, cured Willem’s illness within twenty-four hours. Two men set off on foot to alert the police at Opuwo and summon assistance. Five days later, the grateful, though thoroughly reprimanded group of intrepid explorers was back home. With them was one Chester Erasmus, who Helmut had promised to educate, house, feed and generally treat as his own son.

  He’d been as good as his word. Chester grew up as one of the Weiderman family. His future looked assured. Exceptionally bright, he sailed through school and was then accepted into a journalism course at the Academy.

  At first, Chester did not appreciate how unusual his circumstances were. Several times he’d seen young boys from his tribe sold off to help alleviate a family’s poverty. He had no idea what became of them – simply watched the terror and betrayal in their eyes as they were taken away. He had been no different, even though his father had tried to explain that it was for his own benefit, not that of his family, that he was being sent away. Chester had gone back to Windhoek with the Weidermans convinced he had been, at best, sold into slavery.

  It took incredible patience to first convince the boy he was safe and then train him to acceptable standards of behaviour. The cultural differences were many. Some things, like the importance of cleaning his teeth, wearing his shirt buttoned up and tucked in, keeping his hands clean at all times and the necessity of daily showers, Chester picked up and quickly accepted because they were enjoyable and he could see how his compliance pleased the Weidermans.

  Other matters took longer. Chester could not understand how the family could go to the toilet and foul such clean water. He persisted in squatting in the garden for several months before he could bring himself to do the same as them. Blowing his nose, African style, one nostril blocked by a finger while the other was free to eject mucus onto the ground, was repugnant to Helmut and his wife. The trouble was, blowing into a piece of cloth and then, horror of horrors, putting the handkerchief back into his pocket, was equally disgusting to Chester.

  Compromise in some areas was needed. Table manners were an issue which took time. Chester had always eaten with his hands. Knives and forks did not immediately respond to his clumsy attempts to copy the family. Much to young Willem’s outrage that he was not allowed to do the same, the Weidermans turned a blind eye to Chester using his fingers provided he demonstrated a willingness to at least try utensils. He mastered the spoon quite quickly, but it was a long time before he was considered to be socially acceptable at the table.

  Then there were difficulties over which neither his host family nor Chester had any control. Diet caused problems. His digestive system could not process spicy sausages and many of the vegetables and salads he was given to eat. Anything containing sugar brought Chester out in a rash. The trouble was, having been introduced to sweet food, he developed such a love for it that his skin was perpetually peppered with spots. That problem lasted several years but Chester didn’t care. Cakes, biscuits and chocolate became his passion. Fortunately, his system eventually accepted the unfamiliar and the irritating skin condition went away.

  Chester didn’t win many contentious issues but there was one he steadfastly persisted with. Sleeping in a bed instead of on a mat on the floor became a battle of wills. He’d be neatly tucked up for the night but, inevitably, each morning he’d be found on the floor. The Weidermans gave in eventually. Chester only accepted a bed when the family dog was allowed in it with him. As a result, the animal became thoroughly spoiled and Chester had fleas. But as Helmut said, ‘At least he doesn’t insist on a goat too.’

  With gradual understanding of the German spoken in the Weiderman home came acceptance of their ways. He was not a slave. They did not plan to eat him. Their customs were strange but he could live with that. And school, once he started to understand the language, was an absolute joy.

  After a full year with them, he was taken back to Kaokoland to see his family. Chester was overjoyed at the prospect. Within half a day he wanted to leave. They seemed like strangers. His father cuffed him when he voiced an opinion during the meal, something he was encouraged to do in Windhoek. He felt awkward eating with his hands. The family shelter was lice-ridden and uncomfortable. Chester could not understand how Uncle Helmut, as he had been told to address his benefactor, who had taken him there and was staying as an honoured guest, could calmly accept his family’s ways when all Chester felt was shame.

  He continued to return home, once a year, at Helmut’s insistence. The longer he liv
ed with the Weidermans the more alien his real family felt. Aware of this, Helmut would never allow Chester to forget his origins, telling him many times, ‘You are a Himba. You must remain proud of your traditions.’

  ‘But, Uncle Helmut, I am more German than Himba.’

  ‘No, son. You are a member of my family and we love you, but your true parents are in Kaokoland and they sacrificed their own happiness by losing you so that you could have a future. Never forget them.’

  At sixteen, Chester went through a reverse rebellion and began to resent being taken from his family. The Weidermans treated this eight-month crisis with the same patience they’d shown when he first lived with them. By the time he was seventeen, Chester had come to accept that while he could never be a traditional Himba, he could at least be true to the values his earlier upbringing instilled in him. It was the best he could do.

  Helmut was as proud as any father when Chester won a place at the Academy, making plans to fetch the boy’s parents so that they too could share in the glory of his first day. By then, Chester had so little feelings left for his family that he begged Helmut not to do it. ‘Please, Helmut,’ – he’d been asked to drop the ‘uncle’ on his eighteenth birthday – ‘they will hate it. They have never been out of Kaokoland. I know you mean well but believe me, they would feel only fear.’

  Helmut saw the shame on Chester’s face. ‘Oh, my son, what have we done to you?’ The German had tears in his eyes.

  ‘You have done what you set out to do and given me a future. Without you, I would be herding goats.’

  ‘Without me you’d have been happy doing just that.’

  ‘It is too late to look backwards.’

  ‘I thought I was doing the right thing. I honestly believed that.’

  ‘Who can say now if it was right or wrong? It’s done. I am no longer a simple peasant but a man with a future. For that, I thank you.’

  ‘But I have stolen your past.’

  Chester shrugged. ‘Nothing comes free.’

  Helmut shook his head. ‘Don’t say that. It’s not too late.’

  Chester knew that Helmut wanted reassurance but, in his heart, probably realised that anything comforting he might hear would have a hollow ring. But why should Chester lie just to make Helmut feel better? The German had always stressed the importance of telling the truth. Let him hear it.

  ‘You played God with me, Helmut. You stepped in and changed my destiny. Who knows? Maybe it was meant to happen. Why else would your vehicle break down just where I was tending the cattle? And you haven’t stolen my past. Sure, you changed it, but I still have one. I don’t resent your interference. In fact, I’m glad it happened. But don’t expect me to cling to something I have all but forgotten. Don’t ask for loyalties where none exist. My parents are strangers. That’s the bottom line here. If they were dead I couldn’t feel further removed from them than I already do. Nothing calls me back to that life. It is gone from my heart.’

  The enormity of the consequences of his misguided generosity hit home. ‘Forgive me.’ Helmut bowed his head and wept.

  Chester could not find it within himself to truly forgive the man. He was grateful, he supposed, though in his case his betterment came at the high cost of not really knowing just who he was or where he belonged. He owed Helmut his bright future but blamed him for his loss of identity.

  Confused, Chester entered the Academy ripe for something or someone to latch onto. The inevitable happened. Mixing with sometimes radical students and intellectual professors waylaid Chester’s focus on his future.

  If ever a person is going to adopt a cause, chances are it will be while they are at university. Before then most are too preoccupied with their maturing bodies. Beyond, the realities of life turn black and white perceptions of youth into shades of grey experience.

  Angola was a natural diversion for young, inexperienced and easily influenced minds. South-West Africa as it still was, lay slap bang in the middle of two opposing governments – white-dominated South Africa to the south, and a predominantly communist Angola to the north. By the time Chester arrived at the Academy, the Angolans had been actively seeking independence from Portugal for something like twenty years. In South-West the people also wanted to break free of South Africa and sever thirty years of administration. Chester had always been aware of these facts but, as he quickly was now discovering, nothing is that simple.

  The whole Angolan issue was wonderfully complicated, providing endless hours of student discussion and debate on just about every argument imaginable. Support groups with a variety of political leanings formed within the Academy. And what a choice they had!

  The FNLA, or National Front for the Liberation of Angola, had been formed back in 1961 by one Holden Roberto, a bloodthirsty hereditary king of the northern Bakongo tribe. Assistance for the FNLA, largely in the form of military hardware, flowed from Zaire where Roberto’s brother-in-law, Mobuto Sese Seko, was State President. Further help originated from the Chinese and a number of Arab states in north Africa. Open support was not for the faint-hearted. Holden Roberto took no pains to deny that his troops, in the course of liberating Angola from the Portuguese, had murdered around seven hundred whites and more than four thousand of their black supporters. Many had died in unspeakable agony. One favoured method involved tying victims to a board and feeding them through the local sawmill.

  Further south was the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola, UNITA, led by the anti-communist Dr Jonas Savimbi. Backing came mainly from Zambia but, because of his stand against communism, something the western world noted with approval but did nothing tangible to assist, most African countries distanced themselves from Dr Savimbi and UNITA. Compared to support for the FNLA, Savimbi was a poor relation.

  To further confuse matters, yet another group, this time from central Angola, followed Dr Agostinho Neto. The Marxist Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola, or MPLA, drew its numbers from a large cross-section of Angolans and was backed financially by the Soviets and Warsaw Pact countries. Cuban soldiers arrived to advise the MPLA. With them came a flood of communist arms and ammunition. They became the dominant independence movement.

  As with most colonial powers, the Portuguese were reluctant to relinquish control of their mineral-rich territory. In this case it was diamonds. What changed their mind was the systematic slaughter of seven hundred Portuguese nationals and the threat of more violence to come. They finally bowed to the inevitable, declaring that Angola would become independent by the end of 1975. That was all very well, but who would take control? The MPLA seemed more likely than the other two factions, something that was worryingly obvious to South Africa. The last thing in the world they wanted was a communist country practically on their doorstep.

  The FNLA was undergoing an interesting spot of bother resulting in the formation of a breakaway faction. Bloodthirsty as they might have been, and despite Peking’s support, South Africa quickly set up a training camp for this splinter group. To hedge their bets, and because of Savimbi’s stand against communism, they also established a similar facility for UNITA. But they’d left their support too late. The MPLA had gone on a power-seizing rampage.

  By September 1975, the MPLA had taken control of many towns in central and southern Angola. Alarmed by this success, South Africa finally took positive action and launched a direct attack. Task Force Zulu, comprising a battalion of Caprivi bushmen, one thousand of the breakaway FNLA troops and with South African officers, and support from the South African army, was outstandingly successful. Other South African troops joined with UNITA and saw action assisting Holden Roberto’s by now regrouping forces. The United States, through undercover CIA support, was also propping up the FNLA.

  The wonderful world of politics being predominantly a vote-seeking business, international disapproval of South Africa’s apartheid policy had a knock-on effect to their efforts in Angola. Covert approval was given but, lest the public think bad thoughts about those men and women d
emocratically elected to keep the peace, politicians around the world fell over themselves in a vocal rush to distance their foreign policy from open support.

  America did a complete about-face and suddenly didn’t want to know. Black African countries which had cautiously approved of opposition to the Soviets began to back off. The rest of the world yelled ‘foul’. South Africa, conspicuous by its solitary stance against communism, did the only thing possible. It withdrew, leaving a significant military presence in its neighbouring protectorate of South-West Africa. Over the next decade numerous skirmishes occurred, border clashes that grabbed world headlines and did nothing to enhance South Africa’s international reputation. Apart from a contingent of fifteen thousand Cubans who were still supporting the MPLA, the three warring groups within Angola were left to their own devices. Civil war had erupted.

  Over ensuing years the United States played a peek-a-boo game with great political expediency. Support came and went. The FNLA were abandoned in favour of UNITA, who were far better organised than Holden Roberto’s forces.

  Enter SWAPO, the South-West Africa Peoples Organisation, who with Soviet backing had established a main base camp in Angola. The aim of SWAPO was to free South-West Africa of protection by Pretoria. The aim of Russia was to spread communism until it pressed tight up against South Africa.

  Chester Erasmus, after graduating from the Academy, joined UNITA. Although determined to see Angola and his own country achieve independence, the communists, he believed, were not to be trusted. He spent seven years in war-torn Angola, fighting for a cause which he’d become obsessed by as a student. But seven years is a long time and Chester grew sick at heart by what he had come to realise was more than a fight of good against evil. The suffering, death, brutality, rape, mutilation, starvation, sickness and fear of innocent people which went hand-in-hand with a supposedly noble cause had nothing to do with any desire for independence. It had nothing to do with ideals. It was about power, innate cruelty and financial gain. Disillusioned, Chester rekindled his one-time dream to become a journalist.