Rules of the Wild

by Francesca Marciano

  “Translate? Yes, of course. No problem.”

  “Great.”

  There was a pause. Obviously he wasn’t in a loquacious mood. So I hastily tried to reach a conclusion.

  “Okay then, how shall we…I mean, what’s the plan, then?”

  “Come to my place tomorrow. You know where it is?”

  “No.”

  “Colobus Lane? Second driveway on the left. There’s a little sign which says Wilkinson—that’s me; I never bothered to change it. Eight o’clock too early?” He really sounded like a journalist now. On the case, and no time for bullshit.

  I tried to sound just as efficient.

  “Not at all. Wilkinson. See you at eight tomorrow.”

  “Great. See you tomorrow.”

  “Ciao,” I said, and immediately regretted it.

  “A job with Hunter Reed?” Adam was shaving, getting ready to go to his office in town. He turned around, surprised. “What kind of a job?”

  “Oh, just translating. He has to interview this Italian missionary who doesn’t speak English.”

  “You mean he’s paying you to do it?”

  “Paying? Well…no…I don’t think so, he didn’t mention anything like that.”

  “Oh, okay.” He went back to his reflection in the mirror, lifting his chin. “Then it sounds more like a favour to me.”

  “Yes, I guess you’re right.”

  I paused; then, as if to find an excuse for my enthusiasm:

  “But I think it should be interesting. No?”

  I watched him as he ran tapwater over the blade.

  I love to watch men shave. There is something so attractive about the sequence of perfectly identical movements in which they all engage with lather and razor. The way they tilt their heads, looking sideways, how they splash their faces and sigh with satisfaction. How fresh and good they smell afterwards.

  “It should be interesting to meet this man,” I insisted, since I wasn’t getting enough of a response. “He lives in the slums. Extraordinary, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah,” Adam said, unimpressed, wiping his face with a towel. “Those missionaries can be pretty amazing guys.”

  He walked briskly past me and into the bedroom, opening the closet to choose a clean shirt.

  “You know, I was wondering if you could go to the industrial area today and pick up those paints I need for the car and the pickup. Wilson has the list.”

  “Yes, no problem,” I said meekly.

  The honest-to-God truth being that what actually sounded interesting to me was to spend a whole day in the company of Hunter Reed.

  Lonely men live like wolves.

  Their houses are only a place to come back to at night, to collapse on the forever-unmade bed and lose consciousness. There’s nothing for them to do inside those rooms during the day: there’s never any food in the fridge, not even fresh milk for a cup of coffee; no comfortable sofa, no soft light filtering through a lampshade, no wood for fire.

  Only the smell of stale food and unwashed socks.

  The bathroom is bare: a tiny piece of cheap soap yellowing on the sink; an old toothbrush, its bristles spread open; a half-empty bottle of shampoo. What else would a man need to get clean? The stark emptiness of their houses haunts them at times. It’s not clear how, in which way, but things around them could be arranged differently in order to produce some comfort. They know what it should feel like—they see it all the time in other people’s houses. The smell of fire, meat sizzling in the oven, soft music in the background, children running around before going to bed. One can feel the entire household breathe, exude warmth. It’s just a matter—they sometimes think—of filling up the fridge, replacing the lightbulb, changing the sheets. And in fact every once in a while they attempt to recreate the same warmth they have seen elsewhere and which they secretly long to obtain by fulfilling these small tasks, but the result is always cold, almost inert, as if it had no life of its own. None of the objects gently blend with the others to generate that same secret harmony, not the lampshade with the pillow, nor the books with the shelf, nor the carpet with the floor. Not even the milk with the coffee. Each molecule of these separate bodies obstinately stiffens and rejects the others. Nothing mates or remotely suggests the idea of an internal rhythm, of a spark of life.

  It’s only a matter of days before the dirty clothes pile up again on the floor, along with muddy boots, empty glasses and overflowing ashtrays. It will feel cold and uncomfortable as ever. Everything will have either been flung, thrown or crushed, as if nothing, absolutely nothing, deserved any care.

  This was how Hunter’s place looked to me the first time I saw it. The empty den of a wolf.

  There I was, at eight o’clock sharp, taking mental notes like a diligent detective checking out what this place could further disclose about him.

  Its barrenness didn’t scare me away; actually it looked familiar. I recognized the same distrust Ferdinando had in the seduction of comfort and the same excitement for what lured him out into the streets.

  But I was now beginning to recognize a pattern in Hunter Reed’s behaviour—which I not only found puzzling but was starting to resent: he seemed to have obliterated what had occurred between us in our previous encounters. Each time I saw him he acted as if he were meeting me for the first time. He showed absolutely no recollection of our earlier exchanges.

  I wasn’t expecting a declaration of love, but after all, not so long ago we had spent what I considered an incredibly emotional few hours together. He had unloaded on me some heartbreaking, harrowing tales, while I had been sobbing in his arms. He had fallen asleep on my sofa holding me close to his chest and had left me what I would call a rather intense note. That’s pretty intimate stuff, at least in my book.

  Yet to my astonishment, as he walked towards me offering me a cup of lukewarm Nescafé, none of that memory seemed to transpire in the way he acknowledged my presence.

  “Ready to go?” he said with the same affection a cameraman would show a new assistant.

  “Ready.” I promptly put down the coffee I had just received from his hand.

  He took a thorough look at my outfit, a soft flowery dress which I had painstakingly selected in front of the mirror while Adam was still asleep. I’d done my best to look sexy without giving away that intention.

  “I should have warned you to wear something less…”

  “Less what?” I asked defensively.

  “Well, less stylish.”

  “Oh, it doesn’t matter,” I brushed the hem of my very expensive Belgian designer dress, “this is just a rag, really.”

  “We’re going to the city’s main garbage dump. I mean, it’s seriously disgusting.”

  “Oh. I thought we were going to the slums,” I said, as if “slum” meant somewhere posh.

  “That’s where the slum is. Right on the edge of the garbage dump,” he specified with a hint of impatience. “We’re both going to smell pretty bad, let me tell you.”

  “Okay, then lend me a pair of jeans and a shirt,” I said, shaking off my docility and using a more resolute tone. I was tired of acting so lame in his presence.

  “And a belt, too,” I added forcefully, lighting a cigarette and shuffling my feet.

  Fifteen minutes later I was sitting beside him in the car looking like a plumber in my oversize outfit. But I liked being inside his clothes: it felt intimate and naughty.

  “So what have you been up to?” I asked casually, like someone politely starting a conversation.

  “Oh, you don’t want to know.”

  “No, I do want to know.”

  “I was in Rwanda, most of the time. Watching more bodies rot and more hacks lose their sanity. That’s why the paper agreed to let me come back for a few days and do this slightly more optimistic story in Nairobi. They have to give us a break every now and then or we’ll stop functioning. You tell me what you’ve been up to; I’d rather listen to that.”

  I could feel that this time he really
didn’t want to talk about it and was keeping himself at a safe emotional distance from me. I felt disappointed, like I had lost ground. But I tried to overcome his aloofness by telling him about my safari with Adam, how we had had to physically rebuild part of the tracks which had been washed out long ago. I longed to grab his attention by making my life sound interesting and adventurous.

  “We camped in sites where nobody’s been for a very very long time, it was incredible. From the top of the mountain you could spot a campfire a hundred kilometres away. And seeing it made quite a difference. Suddenly you know you are not alone.”

  “Amazing,” he said, shaking his head with a smile.

  “Yes, so amazing.” I was eager to get to the dead elephant bit; I thought that might impress him.

  “I mean that it’s amazing how for the majority of people here, whites, I mean,” he stressed, “the whole point of living in this country is to avoid the sight of other human beings.”

  “How so?”

  “If we could press a button and pulverize the humans who happen to spoil the view, we’d happily press it. That’s the whole point of going on safari, isn’t it? Not to meet a single soul.”

  “Well, yes,” I admitted cautiously, “I guess that’s part of the reason why one goes through that much trouble. In order to find areas which are really remote and…”

  “Not even a Masai herdsman, God forbid. I bet you hate it, in fact, when Masai show up at your camp with their cattle. Overgrazing the land and destroying the bush. Right?”

  He was referring to Adam. I could feel it in his voice.

  “Which is a fantastic paradox, if you think about it, since this country happens to be one of the fastest-growing in the world. Kenya has one of the highest birthrates; and in fact what this country is really about is not wildlife, but overpopulation.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “But everyone,” he interrupted, “absolutely everyone writes about and celebrates and describes East Africa as this virgin paradise, this Garden of Eden. Every bookstore in the first world is inundated with pretty books on Kenya, tales of man and wilderness and shit like that. I guess nobody bothers to read the figures or to take a look at places like the one where we’re going now.”

  I hadn’t read the figures, nor had I ever been to the slums before, so I had no argument, as usual. That was how Hunter Reed had always made me feel: pushed against the wall, with nothing to fight back with.

  “I guess you’re right,” I admitted, to negotiate some breathing space. “On the other hand, that’s why Kenya sells well over the counter in the West.”

  “Sure. But what amazes me is the people who live here. Nobody, but nobody here gives a fuck about Africans, let me tell you.” He shook his head and patted his pocket in search of a Rooster. He lit it and went on lecturing me.

  “After all, the only reason why white people came to live here, apart from making money off the land and the cheap African labour, is the scenery and the wild animals. And today still all they’re concerned about is how to preserve the bush and the wildlife. You’ve heard them: at every dinner party in this town someone complains that where their father used to go hunting in the good old days it has turned into endless shambas. They go berserk if anyone dares to plant a potato to feed their family. I mean, how on earth do we expect these people to eat?”

  I wished I had never mentioned my safari in the wilderness and the dim fire in the distance. I wished I had never chosen to wear that silly dress and I wished I had read something definitive about overpopulation versus wildlife in East Africa.

  “I don’t know,” was all I could say, surrendering.

  I already felt tired, and we had barely gotten started. I leaned back in my seat and looked at him as he kept his eyes on the road. His profile reminded me of those heads you see on Roman coins. A young consul. I had to close my eyes. Why was Hunter Reed always such hard work?

  Father Marco, the Italian missionary priest, was waiting for us outside the church in Kariobangi, on the outskirts of town. He was a good-looking man in his early fifties, small and muscular, with the energic gait most Italian mountaineers have. Deep blue eyes sunk in a bony face, round glasses, flowing grey beard and long hair. He wore a faded T-shirt and chinos and carried a small rucksack on his back which gave him an odd, schoolboy-like air.

  “Marco,” he said, extending his hand and gazing at me from behind his lenses with the shy look of a man not used to women. Still, he looked nothing like a priest. Rather like an aging hippie. His fingernails were filthy, as were his feet. He smelled, too.

  His English was basic but rather fluent, so it turned out that I didn’t need to translate much. Marco had lived in East Africa for the past twenty-five years and spoke fluent Swahili.

  “That’s all one needs to speak if one wants to be close to the people here,” he said with a shrug—“and to say Mass in their language, of course.”

  The slum, Korokocho, started just beyond the church of Kariobangi, and stretched all the way to the garbage dump, a mountain of toxic waste and poisonous fumes. Marco said it would be safer to drive there than to walk, even though it was a short distance from the church. As he stepped into the car, he added shyly:

  “Better lock the doors”—he smiled—“one never knows.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Not many cars come into Korokocho. Not many whites,” he said, as if apologising for even naming the risk that might be involved. As we slowly drove into the slum on the main road, my feet went cold. I felt every stare and every gaze registering white skin. We drove in silence, negotiating our right-of-way with the people who clogged the road. The faces inspecting our car were not the same faces one would see in downtown Nairobi. These said “What are you doing in this neighborhood? How much do you have in your wallet?” As we advanced I felt further and further distant from what I thought I knew about the city. This place felt totally different, hostile, out of control.

  Someone, as we slowed down over a pothole, banged on the hood. Suddenly we were surrounded by a mob. Faces and hands pushing on the windows, grins and sneers, blows on the sides of the car. Neither Hunter nor I flinched. I was paralysed, drenched in cold sweat. Marco kept still, as if nothing special was happening, until someone in the crowd recognized him and waved. We were free again. I held my breath until we reached Marco’s place. When we finally got out of the car my legs felt weak.

  Marco lived in a shed made of mabati and plywood, like the rest of the shantytown. It overlooked the valley which had become the city’s garbage dump. There was no electricity or running water; open sewers ran all around. The air was filled with acrid fumes drifting from the perpetually burning garbage heaps. Children in filthy rags, skinny women in tattered clothes gathered around to see the wazungu who had come to see the Father. Everything looked sad, as if someone had painted a grey film over the bright colours of Africa. Inside the shed there was only a small cot, kitchen utensils hanging from nails on the walls, a couple of pots and pans, books piled on the floor and on top of the only table. Marco’s few clothes hung on the back of the door. He pulled out a folding chair for Hunter; he sat on a low stool and I sat on the edge of the bed.

  Hunter took out his cigarettes and offered him one.

  “No thank you,” said Marco, putting a hand on his chest. “I had to stop when I came to live here. You know, the fumes… we all suffer from lung infections.”

  He had a terrible cough, like the children who had sneaked in and were now giggling in the dark. And the women outside. All of Korokocho were coughing into each other’s faces the most disgusting viruses from the burning waste.

  Marco had been living in this shack for five years. He had decided to leave the mission in the rural area near Mount Meru and come to share the life of the real poor.

  “Because you see,” he said politely in his thick Italian accent, “this is the future, this unfortunately is what Africa is going to look like in a few years. Not the village life, not the witch doctor, or th
e cattle grazing. Urbanization is the big problem we have to face. All these people come to the big city, expecting to find a job, to get rich. But there is no job, there is no money. Not even to go back to the village. So they end up staying here because they have nowhere to go. And here they lose their identity, their tribal ties. They become scavengers. There is more need of God here than in the villages. There is more need of God in places where there is less hope, right?”

  I nodded. He had a radiant smile.

  “So men become criminals, women become prostitutes. Most of them have AIDS. This is what is going to happen to all of them.” He pointed out, towards the dump which filled the valley. “When they have no money at all they turn to the garbage. They go hunting for food there and compete with the vultures. That’s the lowest stage. Otherwise they pick up scrap metal, or paper which can be recycled, and I help them sell it. We have a small cooperative, as you know.”

  Hunter was jotting down notes. He wanted to hear about the cooperative, how much it made, how many people it managed to feed. The figures were still very low.

  “But it will get better,” said Marco. “The people are only beginning to understand what it means to work for the community, to join forces. You see, these people have all been traumatized; as I said, they have lost all sense of identity. These children”—he pointed at the ragged kids giggling in the dark room—“they never had a family. How can you instill principles—not only religious principles, but basic ethical principles—when there is so much damage, so much trauma?”

  We sat in silence, not knowing how to answer.

  Marco stood up.

  “Come, you have to see where we work to understand what I mean.”

  We followed him outside and down the filthy alleys which led to the valley. The fumes from the mountain of burning garbage thickened the air; grey ash burned my eyes. Drenching my clothes, insinuating itself into my throat and lungs, was the sticky smell of death and putrefaction. We waded down into the steep slope of garbage, our feet deep in the filth. The marabou storks flew low, clapping their heavy wings, and gathered in groups on the heaps of waste.