But their awareness of another life outside their own, the life experienced by relatives in the large towns, had introduced a sense of uneasiness into the consciousness of these boys. A knowledge of schools, lorries, radio, aeroplanes, and news of the outside world had begun to erode the confidence of their convictions, making them restless for things about which they could only dream. I felt that their way of life was far more satisfying than that of their contemporaries in places such as Khartoum, though I did not express this.
Like most tribesmen in Kordofan, ’Ali and Osman were strong Muslims. They prayed five times a day: at sunrise, noon, afternoon, sunset, and in the evening. If we were travelling, they would halt their camels and hobble them, then lay out prayer-mats of many colours on the sand. They had an old army water-bottle, which they would fill with water, and perform the ritual ablutions, washing the body’s extremities in a certain sequence. Then they would face east, towaids Mecca, and begin their prayers, murmuring verses from the Koran, bending forwards in submission, then kneeling and bowing so that their foreheads touched the ground. The number of ritual bows or raka’ varied according to the time of day, but the boys generally only performed two, a special ‘allowance’ for travellers, for all except the sunset prayer, when three raka’ were performed.
As I watched them, I could sense the power of their belief, the brotherhood of unity and equality which is at the core of Islam. It seemed in many ways a logical religion, requiring no great leaps of the imagination, but merely the acceptance that there is no God but God, and Mohammed is His Prophet. It was easy to surrender to the idea of God’s omnipotence in this giant wilderness, and I realised that the submission to this all-embracing belief both reflected and arose from the desert genesis of the Arab people: it was a factor which had been of positive survival value to the Hamar’s Juhayna ancestors, whose resilience had allowed them to cross one of the world’s harshest environments. If anything could ensure the coherent survival of these peoples through the inevitable hazards of the twenty-first century, I felt that it would be Islam.
On the morning of the third day we passed the village of Khewei and out of the dar of the Bederiyya into dar Hamar. There seemed to be very little difference in the way the tribes lived, despite their different origins. The houses in which we rested were of similar construction, usually a compound of grass or cane which enclosed three other compounds, one for the men, another for the women, and a third for the animals. In the men’s yard there would be two or three huts, and often a flat-roofed shelter or rakuba. One of the huts was the khalwa dyuuf, the ‘guests’ retreat’, where we sometimes stayed, and another the bayt kibiir or ‘big house’, which was used by the head of the family.
Most of the younger men slept outside under the rakuba, as the nights were still warm, and the smaller children slept in the women’s quarters. The huts were very solid, built on eleven props of wood bound with strips of bark. The roof was supported by thirty-two smaller beams which were attached to a square frame of wood below the apex. Overlapping layers of grass were then bound over the roof framework with thin strips of bark. The houses had to resist two long months of pounding rain in the autumn, and they did so successfully. They were admirably adapted to their environment, and I felt sure that the Arabs had adopted them from the earlier indigenous inhabitants. Indeed, throughout this section of my journey, I had the constant impression that I was travelling on a demarcation line between two spheres. Here on the marches of the Libyan Desert was the place where Arab North Africa and the Negro interior met. This was the outer limit of Arabdom and these Bush Arabs, with their half-Arab, half-African way of life, were the border tribes of their domain.
As we moved west, the belts of baobab trees grew more common, and often we passed through spinneys of gum-producing acacia and flat fields of grey earth ripe with watermelons. Often, in the distance, we would see flocks of sheep and herds of cows being watched by wizened old women wearing nothing but loincloths of coarse blue cotton. I saw few camels, and no village seemed to have more than a dozen. Osman talked to me about his tribe’s cultivation, telling me that they relied upon rainy-season crops such as sorghum, millet, and groundnuts. Melons, he said, were an unreliable crop, since they were too sensitive to rainfall and difficult to transport, however, they were used for feeding animals. Certainly I noticed that the camels loved them, biting off great chunks and chewing them with obvious relish: it was only with great difficulty that one could wrest them from a melon field once they had the taste for the succulent fruit. I was curious about the baobab trees, which the Hamar called Hamari, after their own tribe. The boys told me that the trees were an important means of water storage, and I was incredulous at first. One day, however, we halted under the spiky canopy of a giant specimen, and Osman pointed out to me the square opening high up amongst the boughs, where the water was poured inside.
‘The water collects around the tree in the rainy season,’ Osman explained. ‘Then someone climbs up the trunk and hoists up the water in buckets. Of course, the inside of the tree is hollow: some can hold thousands of jowloon of water.’
‘But there’s been great dryness,’ continued ’Ali. ‘So now many of the people rely on dawanki for water.’ Dawanki, I learned, was the Arabicised plural of the word donki, which in the local dialect had come to mean an artesian well, so called after the European ‘donkey-engines’ which powered them. Lack of water had been a serious problem in this area for several years, as the rains had been slight. I had already noticed how careful people here were with water, as compared with the north. In houses it was stored in large porous jars, the evaporation from which kept it cool.
In Dongola, when drinking from the jar, it had been the custom to give each drinker a fresh cup, throwing away the leftover amount; in Kordofan, the cup was passed around and not a drop wasted.
We spent the evening of the third day at the village of Mirkab. I noticed that the boys seemed much more at ease with their own kinsmen, who welcomed them like long-lost brothers. To me the Hamar seemed indistinguishable from the tribes I had encountered previously, but ’Ali and Osman assured me that they could tell a Hamari immediately from a Bederi or Jawa’ami, by his appearance, dress, and accent. They looked down on these tribes, which were of the Ja’aliyyin family, the second great division of Arabs in the Sudan, whilst the Hamar considered themselves to be Ashraf, or noble Arabs, connected with the family of the Prophet Mohammed.
It was on the fourth day that the most memorable incident of the journey took place. It was late afternoon, and we had not been travelling for long when a cluster of camels broke light over a ridge to the south of us. They were moving very fast, and as they came nearer, I saw that there were two mounted men driving four unsaddled animals before them. The men were fair-skinned and dressed in tattered Arab shirts, and they trotted one on each side of the free camels, keeping them in a tight huddle. They moved north across our path, not more than two hundred yards distant. Suddenly, Osman and ’Ali halted their camels.
A moment later, I noticed what they had already seen: both riders were carrying what appeared to be old service rifles, slung from their shoulders.
‘Who are they?’ ’Ali said.
‘They look like Kawahla,’ replied Osman. ‘They’re not Hamar.’
‘But those are Hamar camels, by God!’
I had no idea how he was able to tell this, for although I knew that most camels had a brand-mark, this group was too far away for the marks to be distinguished.
Osman strained his eyes towards the rapidly moving figures.
‘Yes, what are they doing with Hamar camels?’
‘And carrying rifles like that in Hamar country! By God, they’re bandits!’
‘Now just a minute,’ broke in Osman. ‘Maybe they bought them.’
The boys began to speak very quickly, and I could not catch all the words. They seemed to be having a heated argument which lasted several minutes, b
y which time the camel-drivers had disappeared into qoz.
Finally Osman said: ‘We must go on.’
‘They’re bandits!’ muttered ’Ali as we set off.
Less than an hour later another group of men appeared on the skyline, seven camel riders sweeping over the qoz from the direction of En Nahud. They were a magnificent sight, riding at a fast trot, the necks of their mounts stretched out like those of flying swans. They made directly for us, and as they came near I got an impression of a mass of grizzled faces, expensive saddlery of wood and leather, and the snapping of camels as they slowed down to meet us. I noticed with some consternation that these men too were carrying rifles and shotguns slung from their saddle horns. The group greeted us with the usual as salaam ’alaykum, ‘peace be upon you’, and one of them, an oldish man with a fringe of white beard, spoke rapidly to Osman. Again I was not able to grasp all that was being said, but the riders seemed agitated and eyed me with unmasked suspicion.
‘He’s English—khawaja,’ I heard Osman say.
‘He’s a teacher travelling to En Nahud … No, he’s been with us for four days.’
I began to feel very self-conscious and wished I could understand what was happening, but again the man broke into a flood of rapid talk which I could not follow.
‘We saw two men … back towards Mirkab … going the way of the wind … we couldn’t tell … we come with you … maybe …’ I picked out from Osman’s words.
‘No, go on! We’ll find the sons of dogs!’ The old man suddenly wheeled around and gestured to the others. ‘Peace be on you!’ he said.
‘And on you,’ we replied, and stood watching as the seven riders headed off to become dots on the vast plain.
Now it was my turn to ask: ‘Who were they?’
‘They were Hamar,’ said Osman.
‘Shaykh Hassan Mohammed from near En Nahud. They say that some raiders took six of their camels this morning. They blame the Kawahla. They’ve been following tracks all day, but lost them in the qoz.’
‘And the men we saw, are they the ones?’
‘Only God knows,’ Osman shrugged.
‘Perhaps, but it is a wide country—and those we saw had only four camels with them.’
‘Perhaps there were two groups,’ said ’Ali.
‘Why were those men looking at me?’ I asked.
‘They said that you were a “red” man like the Kawahla. They were suspicious. I told them you were a teacher, a khawafa.’
‘Will they catch the raiders?’
‘It will be difficult. Sunset is not far away, and when the Kawahla get further north nothing can stop them. Anyway, it may be nothing to do with the men we saw.’
I was amazed by the sudden series of events. Quickly all my ideas about ‘bandits’ had come into sharp focus. This, at least, was reality, though it might be a far cry from some of the tall stories I had heard.
That night we spent with some Hamar near the village of Dawiana. News of the theft had spread quickly, and as we sat around the fire in the lee of the khalwa, we were asked repeatedly to tell of what we had seen. More and more Arabs came to join the conversation, which boiled over into a heated argument about weapons.
One lean-faced Hamari began to bang his stick on the sand, shouting, ‘By the life of the Prophet, how long will this go on! They take our animals and we can do nothing!’
A young man’s voice rose to meet the other’s: ‘We have no weapons to fight them, the government take some, the others we must hide in the ground!’
Everyone began to talk at once, and a babble of incoherent voices filled the night. It seemed that the Kababish and Kawahla, who lived on the borders of the Libyan Desert, found it easy to make incursions into Hamar country, making off with cows and camels into the desert where the less mobile Hamar could not follow. These two tribes were nomadic and because of their parched surroundings, very isolated.
Here, beyond the effective jurisdiction of the government, they enjoyed an autonomy which compensated for the harshness of their environment. Although I sympathised with the Hamar, all I heard of these tribes fascinated me: they seemed to be as wild and free of outside influence as their ancestors had been, centuries ago. I was determined at some later time to find out more about them.
Suddenly a camel roared in the darkness beyond the grass walls, and a voice greeted the company. The discussion stopped abruptly, and we saw two dim figures framed in the doorway.
‘Come closer, near to the fire,’ called out one of the Hamar.
As the men moved into the firelight and began to shake hands, I saw that they were dressed in the olive-green uniform of the shorta, the police Camel Corps, and carried automatic rifles. They sat down by the fire, a thickset man with a bulging black face and a slim youth who looked no older than Osman. There was silence, a brooding, resentful silence, which hung in the air like a coming storm. The thickset man gazed about him, looking self-conscious, trying to find some way of breaking the deadlock. Then his eyes fixed upon me.
‘Where’s this person from?’ he asked the assembled company.
Osman began to explain that we had travelled together from near El Obeid. He looked at me with what was intended to be an intimidating stare.
‘You have permission from security to be here?’ I shook my head, and replied that I hadn’t.
‘No one is allowed in this area unless they have permission from security. You understand? You must come to En Nahud tomorrow and report to the secret police.’
I nodded, and he sat back, looking satisfied and self-important. Just then the lean-faced old Hamari said, ‘Never mind khawajas, what about these Kawahla bandits, when will you stop them?’
‘Yes,’ someone broke in.
‘When are you going to give us back our weapons?’
The babble of voices began again, reaching a new level of decibels. The shorta looked nervous, and began to shift, cradling their weapons protectively in their arms. A few moments later, they got up and left, having been made to swallow a rather large dose of public opinion.
The next day I entered En Nahud alone. I had already said goodbye to ’Ali and Osman, who were heading off to a village outside the town. I was genuinely sorry to see them go, for they had lightened my way and taught me a great deal. Under their tutelage I had begun to understand that alternative world that I had been seeking. Now, after only ten days of travelling, I felt totally committed to this quest: it had already become the most interesting and fulfilling experience of my life.
5. CLOSE ENCOUNTERS
ALFRED MOBILE’S OFFICE WAS EQUIPPED with an ancient fan which had probably stood motionless for decades, and shafts of heat throbbed in at the windows, lacing our brows with beads of sweat. The walls of the room were visibly crumbling, spotted with the red mud of old hornet nests and the streaky trails of termites. Alfred was a security man, tall and trim, with a rounded head scar which betrayed his origin amongst the Dinka, a tribe from the tropical lands of the Southern Sudan. He leaned over his desk and fixed me with the official stare.
‘Who gave you permission to enter Kordofan by camel?’ he asked.
I had to suppress a laugh: his near-perfect Oxford English seemed so incongruous.
‘No one,’ I answered. ‘I just came.’
‘Just came! You don’t seem to understand the serious trouble you could have been in. Personally, I’m surprised the Hamar didn’t attack you. Do you know how many reports we’ve had recently of camel thefts? With violence!’
I replied that I did not, but that I could guess.
‘And now you intend to enter Darfur? They’ll eat you! You must give up this idea at once. The way is lonely and dangerous. You can go by lorry.’ I explained that I wanted to meet the people in the remote villages and settlements, not merely to see the towns, which would not be possible if I travelled by lorry. I also told him of my idea
of travelling north along the Forty Days Road. As I talked, I saw a glitter of interest in his eyes, and noticed that the official mask was slipping. When I had finished, he sat back, grinned and said, ‘Are you a Protestant?’
‘I was brought up as one, yes.’
‘So am I. But they’re all Muslims here. Nearly all of them. I have some friends—they are Syrians, Copts—we stick together, because we’re Christians. You must come to dinner with us.’
‘Thanks. But what about the journey into the desert?’
‘Well, if you really insist on going, I’m not going to forbid you, but it’s really up to the governor; you must speak to him.’ As we went out, Alfred chatted about his upbringing amongst the missionaries in the south. Like most southerners, he found the Muslim, Arabic-speaking northerners staid and clannish. He seemed delighted to have discovered another Christian in Kordofan, and welcomed the opportunity to speak English, which he had learned before Arabic.
Later we dined with his Coptic friends, who were wealthy merchants in the town, and afterwards I met a local government official, Mohammed Osman, a Shaygi from the Northern Province. He invited me to stay in the government rest house and arranged for the Camel Corps to look after my camel in their barracks. He sent his two Hamar servants, Yusuf and Siraj, to bring me food and water.
The next two days were a busy round of visits and interviews. I was treated with unstinting hospitality, though almost everyone with whom I came into contact was from that educated class of Sudanese society which aspired to a western lifestyle. They felt a constant need to apologise for the poorness of everything, and I found this embarrassing since I was very much attracted by this town with its squares of mudbrick shops, its rows of leathersmiths and tailors, its clumps of wells and its tiny coffeehouses.
Most of these men were adminstrators from Khartoum or the Gezira, and considered that En Nahud was the very outpost of the known world. Almost all of them tried to persuade me to give up the idea of travelling by camel. I guessed that this was partly because the camel represented to them the economic backwardness of their country, something which they would rather have left behind in their movement towards ‘civilisation’. I found it difficult to explain that ‘civilisation’, in my view, was not merely a matter of communications and high-rise blocks, but also a measure of man’s treatment of his fellows. It seemed to me that many of the Sudanese I met, both simple tribesmen and more educated townsmen, were far more ‘civilised’ than many people I had met in Europe. I felt myself to be on a quest for an alternative to the materialistic civilisation of my own culture, while these men were pursuing a vision of the very culture which I was rejecting. It was as if we were travellers meeting at a crossroads, the destination of each of us the starting-point of the other.
In Search of the Forty Days Road Page 6