by Tahir Shah
Oswaldo had become instantly chummy with an assortment of villainous-looking men on the veranda. They lounged about on broken chairs smoking home-made cigars. The old Swiss man had passed out and was lying on a mattress on the ground, an empty bottle of whisky at his side. A man called Olivier introduced himself to me. He was a French Senegalese priest who, he said, was an expert in both yoga and karate.
An infant boy weaved between the clouds of cigar smoke and mosquitos, selling bubble gum and matches. It was easy to imagine Graham Greene lounging back on a broken wicker chair on the veranda of the City Hotel.
I tried to reach Max on an antique telephone. The dial had lost its spring and only the digit “1” worked properly. I banged the disc with my palm, but it still did not work. At that moment Oswaldo burst in and grabbed me by the shoulder.
“What’s the matter?”
“Caramba! Dere’s dieemonds and goold... we gooing now!”
We charged out onto the veranda. Oswaldo whispered that I was not to show much interest, as the men suspected we were there to gain from their secret wealth. The giant held up a flaming torch. He, the gold-toothed man, Olivier, Oswaldo and I climbed into the back of a jeep.
We drove out of the town into the night. I looked upwards into the night sky and saw the Big Dipper beginning to turn silently above us. The sound of bats and the chirping of crickets echoed all around as the bald tires of the jeep spun along a muddy track. Oswaldo glanced at me nervously. Putting a fist on his left boot, he felt the stiletto, and nodded at me. We were both prepared to be robbed and left: but the opportunity to go on a midnight gold and diamond run was too great to miss.
The jeep pulled onto a side track about ten miles from Freetown. The glinting lights of the city were no longer visible; just two flares burning on the jeep. The dense undergrowth seethed with life of all types. Mosquitoes and all manner of insects buzzed around the flares and headlights. In the distance I could make out a wooden hut. The jeep pulled up at the front door and we descended. A man inside began yelling in Creole when he saw Oswaldo and me. The giant calmed him and we were all ushered into the shack.
A bottle of locally-brewed alcohol was passed around. It burnt into the Patagonian’s throat, making his eyes bulge as he choked aloud. Three pouches were fetched by the old inhabitant of the hut, who brought a flashlight closer to illuminate their contents. The pouches were upturned on a packing crate.
What looked like small pieces of ground glass sparkled in a pile. They were of irregular shapes and only some of the surfaces shone. In another heap, gold — perhaps eight to ten ounces — was admired by all. Oswaldo’s and my eyes widened with avarice. The shadows of greedy men danced about the dark walls. Oswaldo pulled at Olivier’s arm and asked where the diamonds and gold were from. The priest narrowed his eyes and whispered:
“They come from the mountains. Diamonds and gold are in the village paths and when it rains they are washed up. People come out and dig them from the ground with knives.”
A session of animated negotiating followed, lubricated with a seemingly endless supply of firewater. Some money changed hands in the untrusting candlelight and we left for Freetown with the smugglers.
As the jeep fish-tailed towards the City Hotel I thought of treasure. It was deserved far more by this sort of men. I myself no longer had a grasping fascination for such instant wealth. It was as if the appeal had been treasure for the sake of treasure: as if I had been driven by its romance, its mystique, and by its awe alone. India, Pakistan and now Africa seemed to have exorcized the lust: though not the quest.
Early the next morning I managed to contact Max. He arranged to come to the City Hotel and take us to lunch. Oswaldo and I sat in the bar waiting for him. The night had been very uncomfortable.
Oswaldo had put a little beer in one of the baobab bowls, and left it on the floor. In the morning the bowl was full of cockroaches. Some survivors were crawling over the dead, their tiny antlers poking around the corpses. He gave the black insect carcasses to the boy who had been selling bubble gum the night before. The child was thrilled and plodded off to dissect the remains.
A procession of school children paraded past the hotel as we waited for Max. Dressed in neat green and yellow uniforms, some played instruments, others clapped their hands, as banners were waved from side to side.
The old owner made one of the smugglers get down from the bar where he was sleeping. There was no more beer, he informed me gravely: but appearances had to be maintained.
Max arrived. It was odd to meet the man to whom I had been writing for so many years.
Oswaldo and Max glanced at each other like different species of animal. Oswaldo, whose hair was smoothed with brilliantine, wore his brown trilby and well polished cowboy boots. Max’s appearance integrated him neatly with the City Hotel. His hair was long, greasy and very black, and his face — which was dark with dirt — was peppered with infected sores. A pair of tattered sneakers were rotting about his ankles and a cluster of leather pouches hung around his neck.
We, all three, snaked our way about the silent town. Almost nothing moved. A sense of utter despondency prevailed as if Freetown was not advancing or even attempting to progress. Max pointed out the giant cotton tree which is a landmark in the centre of town. Nearby, at the American Embassy, we were given glasses of sterilized water and allowed to see newsreels two months old. Max had adapted here as I had done in Mumbai. Freetown had become his life, his very existence.
Outside the embassy came the sound of sirens. Flashing red and blue lights blinked from a motorcade and five jeeps with outriding motorbikes sped past. The few people about stood still and lowered their heads. Oswaldo gasped, “Khey meng, what’s dat?”
“That’s the President going to work!” said Max.
Like many African nations, Sierra Leone’s leadership had gained power by coup d’état. Indeed, as soon as one group gets control, another is scheming secretly how they may take over. But Captain Valentine Strasser’s coup of Spring 1992 was exceptional, even for Africa: for Captain Strasser was just twenty-seven, and his deputy — Solomon Musa — was a mere twenty-four years of age.
We were each presented with a bowl of boiled seaweed. It had been partially fermented and then covered in a watery meat sauce. I suspected that the meat was cow’s brains. Max had ordered this delicacy for us all at his favourite restaurant. He picked up lumps of the green sludge in his nicotine-stained fingers, tossed his head back, and dropped the morsels down his throat one handful at a time. Oswaldo and I stared at each other blankly.
“Don’t you like it?” huffed Max in surprise.
“Slightly too much salt for me,” I grunted.
“I’m plenty eat Okhey!” squeaked Oswaldo sadly at his full plate. Max finished the three portions. Then he sucked the ends of his fingers, which had become splayed from extensive nail-biting.
The café was behind an abattoir on the second floor, somewhere on the outskirts of the town, past the Cuban Embassy. There were no windows, but on one wall was a faded photograph of the Prince and Princess of Wales on their wedding day.
When Max had finished the seaweed he rubbed his hands in his hair to clean them off. Then he lit a cigarette and removed the filter. We had written about many things in our letters, such as music, our friends, and places in which we had lived. Max was an avid fan of the Grateful Dead, an American rock band. But his extreme fascination for ju-ju was of most interest to me.
Sinister ceremonies take place at night around the darkest corners of Freetown. A number of societies, most secret in their operations, participate in ominous rituals. Max spoke of his involvement with these groups.
He had become the pupil of a Babalawo — a medicine-man — one who practices ju-ju. Although, technically-speaking, ju-ju refers to a fetish or image used in a magical rite, today its use is much wider. Ju-ju can be something that causes a change in the natural and supernatural worlds. It may be a potion, an ointment, a talisman, a sign, or even a magical w
ord or phrase.
“It wasn’t easy gaining the trust of my teacher,” said Max. “He knows that I appreciate the honour. I have immersed myself in this science: I must become one with it.”
Max paused, and I frowned, wondering exactly what he meant. Staring deeply into my eyes, he pushed up the right sleeve of his shirt. A series of dots and Unes had been tattooed into his copper-colored skin.
“What is it for?” I asked.
“This is ju-ju to protect. There is evil here.” “Vat evils?” Oswaldo asked.
“Alé,” said Max. “That is ju-ju, or medicine, that puts harm on someone else.”
“You mean black magic?” I said.
“Yes, black magic,” said Max. “Alé is my real interest but my teacher won’t let me even think about that for years to come.”
What of the secret societies? Max had studied their history but was very unwilling to share what he knew.
“Many things,” he said, “are better ignoring. These matters are taken very serious around here.”
Having read about the Alligator Societies and the Leopard Societies in Sierra Leone, I asked Max if such accounts could have been true.
“The Human-Alligators, as they are known,” he said, “were at first thought to be people who were turned into reptiles by magic. They would kill someone — often eating the victim’s corpse — before reappearing as humans again. Later it was found that people were just dressing up in alligator and leopard skins to kill people. That stuff has been forced deep underground following persecution by the authorities.”
“But does it really still go on?” I asked.
Max nodded slowly, “The various societies have become more crossbred and have taken influences from new sources recently; each sect affects the practices of the next, even my Babalawo uses a Borfima,” he said.
“Borfima, what’s that?”
It’s a symbol, a source of power, and a centre for magical activity,” replied Max.
“What is it?” I persisted, trying to find out more.
“I’ve just told you,” said Max.
“No, I mean what is it made from?”
The cook came to collect our plastic dishes; he seemed suspicious of our conversation. When he had left, Max continued in a low voice:
“I have made Borfimas my special study,” he began. “The most likely origin for many of the societies’ cannibalistic activity seems to have started in order to feed the Borfima.”
“Feed?” I asked.
“Feed,” replied Max. “To keep the Borfima bag as an effective medicinal tool, it must be supplied with newly killed or extracted human fat or blood. It will gain the strengths of all that is fed to it.”
I was still rather confused by what Max was saying; he saw my uncertainty and continued:
“I was just reading of a mysterious society in Angola, the Butwa sect who keep a Borfima.” He pulled a worn sheet of yellowing paper from his back pocket, and said:
“This is what the Englishman Butt-Thompson wrote of the Butwa Society’s Borfima:
“The duiker horn is said to contain human flesh, hair, nails, bone and sinew. In the larger horn are animal claws, bits of lion and leopard heart, of feet of elephants, hide of hippopotamus, shell of tortoise, bird bills, eye of osprey, eyebrow of vulture, head of the “ngweshi” snake, heart of python, head of puff-adder, nose of crocodile, brow of hyena, head of dogfish, and human and lizard gall, a tooth of a field rat, a scorpion, a burned honey bee, a baby’s head, a human caul, some soldier ants, some powdered meteorites, some sand from the footprint of the founder of the Society, a head from a dead chief, a piece of tree upon which an official of the Society committed suicide.”
When Max had finished reading, he closed his eyes and grasped one of the leather pouches which was strung around his unshaven neck. There was a tense silence. Oswaldo shifted nervously in his broken chair, then he gave me a tortured look as I addressed Max:
“Can we meet your teacher? I think that it is important,” I said in a wheedling tone.
“That’d be quite impossible,” he replied. “Getting him to have anything to do with me was accomplishing the impossible.”
“Then Max,” I said, “can’t you make the impossible happen again?”
* * *
At two the next morning we crept from the City Hotel. A cat was stalking a giant toad on the veranda next to the sleeping Swiss owner.
Enticing his master with a bottle of local whisky, Max had managed to persuade the Babalawo to meet us. As we stumbled behind him into the darkness towards the rendezvous, Max kept on repeating how difficult it had been to arrange. Understanding the gravity of the meeting, I thanked him.
Freetown seemed more alive in the hours of darkness than during the day. We left the city, walking past the abattoir and the restaurant to which Max had taken us.
A few of the shacks housed shadowy figures who could be heard talking and laughing. Insects buzzed in the undergrowth into which we walked.
Max explained that traditionally secret societies were located deep in the bush, and only the initiated had known of their whereabouts. A revival of the societies in Freetown had taken place, and men such as his Babalawo now practiced very close to the city, or at times actually in it.
Initiation, Max said, was fundamental in gaining membership of a sect. The Societies native to West Africa are often formed from the people of several tribes, even of different nations. Boys would traditionally be taken into the bush to be initiated, a process that was known to last for weeks, even months. They would be instructed in hunting, defence, and in the secret qualities of the jungle’s plants. But of the greatest importance to them were their studies in the magical and occult arts.
Max explained that, as such initiates respected the force of the Babalawo’s incantations, we must also do so. We agreed that we would abide by the ways of the cult.
Oswaldo was very quiet and trudged along less than enthusiastically. I sensed that he was trembling. Reluctant to have anything to do with such dark matters, he had had conventional Catholic beliefs instilled in him as a child. Max led us into the forest as if he knew each step of the path.
After half an hour of walking I smelt burning meat. This was followed by the sound of someone whistling. Flames could be seen through the trees and, as Oswaldo and I trod softly behind Max, he also began to whistle. He led us into a clearing, illuminated by three burning torches. Between them sat a figure who poked at the embers of a dying fire. Max greeted the man in Creole. It was his Babalawo.
The mentor ignored Oswaldo and me, and continued to poke rhythmically, almost as if he were in a trance. Max told us to remove our shoes and socks, as he did the same. The ground was warm and damp underfoot, and covered in dead leaves.
I tried to make out the contours of the Babalawo’s face. It was hard to tell his age, perhaps forty, perhaps sixty. His head had lost much of its hair. A striped tee-shirt covered his chest: the lines of it ran from his neck to his navel. He poked away at the fire as we sat and watched. I peered up at the sky, the stars looked down and I felt a little more secure.
Max had closed his eyes and sat cross-legged in silence. The Babalawo dropped a handful of herbs onto the embers. An asphyxiating, sweet-smelling cloud ascended from the fire as the leaves ignited and were consumed in flame.
The master began to chant in Creole. I nudged Max, hoping that we could learn of the significance of the words, but he did not translate. Instead, taking some bluish-gray dust from the fire’s edge, he rubbed it across his face and over the backs of his hands. Oswaldo and I did the same. The ash smelt aromatic and soothing as I pressed it over the bridge of my nose and onto my cheeks. Was this the sort of ceremony that Blake had mentioned? I wondered how my mentor might have reacted if he were in my position. Such a rite as this must have influenced the Brazilian Macumba of which Blake, my own teacher, had told me. Of that magical system, which took its roots from many lands, I longed to know more.
The Babalawo beg
an to squeal like a tortured pig. Then, panting, he thrust his arms high above his head, shouting out what must have been the names of spirits.
Max seemed to know precisely what was going on. He stood up and made his way over to a very low-roofed hut. After a few moments he returned with something in his hands. The master took the object and, in return, passed Max some more leaves. Max motioned to us what to do.
Copying him, Oswaldo and I each pressed a broad leaf onto the roof of our mouths. My mouth was numbed by a bitter taste. And, on trying to move my tongue, I realized that it was paralyzed. I glanced in horror at the Patagonian, who winced miserably as if he, too, had fallen prey to the Babalawo’s magic.
Max handed Oswaldo, and then me, an egg. As before, we did exactly what Max did. He broke the shell and gulped down its contents. We did the same, despite the handicap of our oral anaesthetic. Then, Max put the actual shell in his mouth, crunched it up, and swallowed it. Oswaldo looked very miserable, but we both copied Max in silence. My stomach seemed to twist as it was presented with the raw egg, followed by the shell. Oswaldo’s stomach also gurgled in surprise at what it had just ingested. Max looked pleased with us.
The Babalawo stood up, clasping the object that Max had brought from the shack. The size and color of a haggis, it smelt, as it passed by me, of something which had died quite some time before. A rusty razor blade was produced by the Babalawo. He held it between his thumb and forefinger with dexterity, leading me to believe that he had handled it on many such occasions. At that moment it became apparent that the razor was not just intended for show. It was no mere symbol, for the Babalawo wiped it, and readied it for use.
Oswaldo and I glared at Max through the orange lamplight with expressions that called for an explanation. The egg had not been pleasant, but we had swallowed it, together with shell, in the interests of magical science. But what was the blade’s purpose? Max seemed a little concerned and he spoke for the first time. His words struck Oswaldo and me with horror. He said simply:
“The Borfima is ready to be fed.”