A Desert Dies

by Michael Asher

  The ’Awajda glared back at us venomously, then the Arab said, ‘Come, let’s go. These men are but servants!’ They rose slowly and with dignity, then turned and stalked away. Juma’ remained where he was until they had gone, then he jumped up saying, ‘They will be back! Let us get the camels in, quickly!’ In a few moments, all the camels had been gathered and hobbled around the camp in a tight semicircle. Juma’ brought the disputed animal up close to him. I saw that it was none other than the she-camel that had run off the previous day. She squalled loudly as Juma’ couched her by his bed space. ‘Like her owners!’ Juma’ commented. ‘Plenty of noise! I should be glad to get rid of her, but it would be a disgrace to give in to such as these!’

  Juma’ lay down on his sheepskin with his ·303 next to him. Adam settled down a few feet away with his shotgun. I broke my weapon and pushed a cartridge into the breech. Hamid had no weapon but a curved club, so I gave him my ·22 revolver, which he put into his pocket. We lay there drowsily for two hours as darkness fell across the desert. Around us, the camels shifted, groaning and belching. Beyond them, the campfires of the ’Atawiyya flickered in the shadows, and there were murmurs of talk and the cries of children from the direction of their tents.

  My eyes closed involuntarily and I was walking on the borders of sleep, floating off to some distant place and time, when Juma’ hissed, ‘They are coming!’ I was awake in an instant, and my weapon was in my hand. Juma’ was sitting up holding his rifle. Three shadowy forms were hovering in the shadows on the perimeter of the camp, like malevolent grey ghosts. ‘Stop! Do not come any closer!’ Juma’ snapped.

  ‘We come to bargain with you,’ a voice came back. ‘Give us our camel and we will bring you another in exchange tomorrow.’

  ‘Who owns this wretched camel?’ Juma’ shouted.

  ‘She belongs to our uncle. He is not here,’ came the reply.

  ‘You bring him at dawn tomorrow and then we will talk about it,’ Juma’ said. ‘But we do not work in the middle of the night.’

  For a second the figures stood there, unwilling to move. I saw that Adam was kneeling with his shotgun ready, covered by the wall of camels. ‘One blast from his weapon would probably knock all three of them down at this range,’ I thought instinctively. Then they turned abruptly and disappeared into the fold of the night.

  ‘They are scoundrels!’ Juma’ declared. ‘They thought that we were fools and would not do anything without the Sheikh. The Arabs of the desert are donkeys sometimes!’

  We lay awake for a long time afterwards, hearing nothing but the steady breathing of the camels and occasional human sounds from the encampments beyond. I rolled over on to my back and looked at the sky. The Milky Way cut across the darkness directly above us, a mysterious gossamer path to the outer ends of the galaxy.

  Not long after dawn, the three men returned, bringing with them an older Arab with rheumy eyes, wearing a tattered shirt. The situation seemed to have been defused by the long night. The figures that had seemed so menacing in the darkness were stark and ordinary in the clear light of day. The old man said that the camel was his, and Juma’ and Adam agreed to return her, providing the man remained with us until At Tom arrived from the desert. After a while, the Arabs gave in and drove the beast away. When they had gone, Juma’ told me quietly, ‘Thank God they took her! That has saved us plenty of trouble!’

  The ’Atawiyya had already packed their tents and belongings, and the herds and flocks were winding across the landscape in a great serpent. We saddled up and drove our camels out to join the timeless migration to the south.

  A few days later, we made contact with the nuggara herd near the pool of Shigil. There were more than five hundred animals divided into groups of one hundred or one hundred and fifty. A score of Nurab tribesmen were riding with them, some of them slaves and herdsmen and others from the nazir’s family. The camels were the best to be found in dar Kababish, magnificent beasts descended from the herds of Sir Ali Wad at Tom. There were no women and no litters, for, like the Nas Wad Haydar, the Sheikh’s people left camel herding to the men.

  We found the taya of the chief herdsman, Sa’ad Wad Ahmad, on the rocky slopes above the pool and made camp nearby. Sa’ad was a brawny black man with swept-back hair; Juma’ was his distant relation. He welcomed us like lost brothers, embracing each of us and slapping us on the back, crying, ‘Your return is blessed! Welcome in peace! Thank God for your safe coming!’ With him was another ghaffir, a tall sinewy figure with a friendly face, called Juma’ Wad Tarabish. He was the nazir’s court baillif, and I had heard often of his escapades with bandits. The Arabs made us tea, strong and black, and brought us a bowl of sour milk. ‘Drink!’ Wad Tarabish told us. ‘The camels are in milk. There is plenty of that, by God!’ As we drank, a bouncy little man with a tough-looking face came up to greet us. He wore a woollen cap that was pulled down over his ears, giving him a clownish appearance. I learned that he was Ali at Tom, the son of the late Sheikh al Murr.

  The men brought us kisri drenched with gravy made from the meat of gazelles they had shot. After we had eaten, Ali at Tom asked us about the grazing in the north and the progress of the Requisition. He laughed freely at the stories Juma’ told about the Awlad Sulayman and the ’Awajda, interjecting, ‘No God but God!’ and ‘God protect us from the devil!’ at intervals. Adam inquired about the grazing in the south and whether Salim had returned from Darfur. ‘He came back with nothing!’ Ali told us. They lost the tracks of the bandits and returned empty-handed. Now he has ridden off to the jizzu with the scouts, looking for pasture.’

  ‘God willing, he will find it,’ Adam said. ‘For there will be no pasture in the dar this year!’ Then the old man asked about the health of the nazir and the people who had remained in the dikka.

  Ali said that Sheikh Hassan was seriously ill again and had been moved to Omdurman.

  Soon after dawn the next morning, Juma’ and I rode down to the pool to choose a place for watering the herd. The water was almost finished and lay in the centre of a shallow depression surrounded by flats of scarlet mud. There was a margin of thorn trees around it, a few of them in leaf. We unsaddled our camels under the trees and tied them up. Juma’ took a bowl, kicked off his shoes, and waded through the mud to the water. He came back grinning and held out the bowl to me, saying, ‘Drink! The water is good!’ It was red and very muddy, and as I raised it to my lips, I saw that there were millions of mosquito larvae squirming about in it. ‘Drink!’ he repeated. ‘Those insects will not harm you!’ Realising this was a small test, I suppressed a shudder and drank the stuff down, dimly aware of the little creatures writhing in my throat.

  These annual pools were ideal breeding grounds for the malarial mosquito, anopheles gambiae. Despite the aridity of this area in summer, a few females of the species managed to survive, hiding in cracks in the trees and living on the blood of passing animals. When the rains came, they laid eggs by the million in any place where the rainwater might collect for a few weeks. Malaria was endemic at this time of year and many children died from it. The adults, however, were resistant to the disease, and although I knew this was a genetic immunity, I wondered sometimes if I could have acquired it. I had suffered from malaria badly until 1982, when the frequent attacks abruptly ceased.

  ‘Come on,’ Juma’ said. ‘Let us get to work!’ We stripped off our shirts and headcloths and stepped up to our calves in the mud. Juma’ explained that the camels were unable to wade out to the water, and that we would have to build a reservoir on the harder ground around the edge of the pool and construct a series of channels to feed into it. We picked up handfuls of the wet slime and began to fashion a circular basin where the solid ground met the mudflats. When it was done, Juma’ cut out an intricate system of small channels that directed the water into our small reservoir. Then we built a second basin near to the first. Juma’ lined it with a canvas sheet and placed on it lumps of reddish rock salt that he produced from his saddlebag. ‘It is a long time since th
e camels had salt,’ he told me. ‘They need to have it often if they are not eating fresh grasses.’ He transferred water from the reservoir to the drinking basin with a bowl and stirred the liquid with his hand. ‘Tell Adam to release the first two camels,’ he said. In a moment, two of our herd were trotting loosely through the trees, pursued by Hamid brandishing a mukhayyit branch. The camels began to suck up the water with incredible speed, and it was all we could do to keep the basin filled. As they drank, Juma’ made the familiar noises of encouragement. ‘Aw chack! Aw chack! Aw chack!’ and I joined him in a kind of two-part harmony, repeating, ‘Aw chack! Aw chack! Aw! Aw! Aw!’ The beasts were thirsty and drank without stopping. I watched in fascination as the muscles in their necks contracted, pumping up the liquid like steam engines, and their bellies slowly distended.

  All morning, we watered our animals, filling the basin again and again until our arms ached from the pouring and our legs from the strain of balancing in the mud. It was hot and thirsty work, but often the camels dropped water from their mouths that fell on our shoulders with a pleasant, cold sensation. As I watched the great square heads dip into the trough, heard the satisfied sucking, and saw them trot away replete, I felt strangely fulfilled. I understood more than ever why the Arabs took such pride in their animals.

  It was noon by the time all the animals had been watered, and we were very hungry. We made camp in the shade of the trees, and Hamid cooked a bowl of kisri. As we sat there, Adam pointed to the fringe of bush at the brow of the hill from which the nuggara herd was emerging like a brigade of cavalry, in magnificent array. They were being pushed on by many herdsmen intent on the watering place, and I wondered idly how long it would take to water the whole herd. Suddenly, two pairs of camel riders separated from the mass, one on the right and the other on the left. I saw them raise their whips, shouting wildly. ‘It’s a race!’ Juma’ declared, and stood up to watch. The four camels were bounding across the gravel in enormous strides, stretching out their necks and lifting their feet like horses. Instead of leaning forwards, the riders leaned back, perching dangerously on their backsides with their arms in the air, shouting, ‘Absha! Absha!’ The two pairs of riders were so close to each other that I felt sure they would collide. I watched in amazement as two of them began to push at each other with their elbows. One of the men wobbled perilously, but managed to regain his balance as his camel slowed down to a trot. The other pair shot past him, coming in through the screen of trees. As the men strained on their headropes with both hands, I saw the laughing features of Wad Tarabish and heard him shout, ‘Best camels in the herd, but you cannot beat uncle Juma.’

  That night, after we had moved back to our camp on the high ground, I asked Wad Tarabish about the race. ‘We call it the race of the muhawwadin,’ he explained. ‘It is the tradition amongst the Kababish at this time of year. The water in the depression is nearly finished and every herdsman wants to get the best place to build his hawd—his drinking trough.’ He explained that this was one of the few occasions on which the tribesmen tested their camels to the full. A camel that won such races became famous and was celebrated in song and poetry. ‘When a camel like that dies, the women weep as if it were a person,’ he said. ‘We never eat it; we just leave it for the vultures.’ He went on to say that there were many famous camels amongst the nuggara herd. One of them was the nazir’s mount, Kalash, which had once been stolen by bandits and shot in the rump by a Kalashnikov. Another famous camel was At Tom’s animal, Wad as Sihar. The riding camel of Salim Wad Ali, Wad al Jaddi, was also renowned for racing. All these camels were the sons of a camel called Al Ingleez. ‘Al Ingleez was the most famous camel belonging to Sheikh al Murr,’ Wad Tarabish said. ‘It was brought from the east with a she-camel and given to him as a present by a British inspector, Mr Read. The best camels in the dar are the descendants of that pair. We call them Awlad al lngleez—“the sons of the English”.’

  We stayed with the nuggara herd for more than a week in the region of Shigil. Each night after supper, the men would talk for hours about the camels and their qualities. The herdsmen knew every camel by name and its ancestry for two or three generations. Often they would dispute hotly about the relative merits of the different breeds.

  One night, Juma’ Wad Siniin said that there was nothing to equal an ashab, while Sa’ad shouted that ’anafis were always better. Wad Tarabish ended the argument by saying, ‘At the races they held in Hamrat ash Sheikh a few years ago, an ’arabi beat all the rest. You would have said he was a very ordinary camel, nothing to distinguish him at all. But he won all the same.’

  The herds had found good grazing near Shigil, and by day, we rarely moved far. Instead, I would ride about with Wad Tarabish, learning all I could of the lore of camels. He would point out the leaders of the herds, the magnificent bulls that the Arabs called fahal. Each one could serve a hundred females or more during the time of rutting, which was usually in winter or the rainy season. At this time, the bull’s neck would swell and he would blow out the pink mouth bladder that was a sign of his dominance.

  We often watched the antics of the fahal with great amusement. The bull would saunter arrogantly around the females, raising his head and rolling his eyes, blowing out his bladder and burbling. He would bump the mate he had chosen on the neck, trying to force her down into a kneeling position. Usually, she would run away, bursting into a full gallop and racing across the desert. The bull would give chase, turning and zigzagging as she changed direction, desperately trying to slow her down. Sometimes, the male would even thrust his head between her legs and lift her back feet off the ground, and the female would flick her tail and bleat ineffectually. When he had her under his control, the bull would bump her on the neck and body until she sat down, then straddle her awkwardly with both front feet over her shoulders. The whole process would be accompanied by much growling and grunting, but despite the ferocious sounds, the male was often unable to perform without the assistance of the herdsman. If his determination wavered, the female would give him a hard time, lurching to her feet suddenly, so that his legs were hooked helplessly around her neck. Then he was stuck, balancing pathetically on two rear limbs while the others were caught, unable to do anything but wail plaintively until the herdsman freed him. The nomads would often hobble the she-camel to prevent this happening. We would laugh at these tricks until the tears came, but Wad Tarabish would remind me afterwards that the bull-camel in season was a highly dangerous beast and not to be taken lightly.

  Juma’ Wad Siniin told me how, when he was a boy, a bull-camel had picked him up by the back of the head, and would have killed him had another herdsman not come to his rescue. Luckily, he had been saved from serious injury by his thick headcloth. Wad Tarabish said that a relation of his had been killed when a bull-camel he had been riding had rolled over on him and crushed him to death with his chest pad. The worst injury I ever saw from a mating rahat was in Abu Za’ima in 1985. A Barara boy of about seventeen had been picked up by the arm and shaken like a puppet. The arm was completely shattered, a bloody mass of crushed bone and dead blood vessels, smelling badly of gangrene. He had been carried by camel for six days to Hamrat ash Sheikh, where he had found the hospital closed. It had, in fact, never been opened.

  The gestation period for a camel was about twelve months, and the females would drop their calves in autumn or winter. Several were born amongst the herd while I was at Shigil. The baby was deposited in a membrane of grey material, and was not able to move at once. The mother would lick away the material, and in a few hours, a fluffy calf would emerge, a delicate creature standing about four feet high, ungainly on its newfound legs.

  The calf would be fed on its mother’s milk for a year, though if the Arabs wanted to preserve some of the milk for themselves, they would seal up the female’s teats with a knot of cloth secured by a stick. The she-camel could not become pregnant again for the weaning period, which made the entire cycle a two-year one. The Kababish never used she-camels for riding,
though if a camel were slaughtered for food, it would always be a barren female.

  A male riding camel was selected for training when it was three or four years old. Wad Tarabish was training one of the herd camels and showed me how it was done. The first thing was to separate him from the herd, hobbling both legs and tying the headrope tight around the neck so that the animal was only just able to breathe.

  One morning, he showed me a camel that had been left like this overnight. The animal’s lips were badly swollen by the choking rope; he was spluttering and drooling at the mouth, trying to roll over, scraping his head along the ground. The Arab released him from the hobbles, holding the rope tight. Once the camel had found his feet again, he jerked sharply on the rope only to find that it strangled him more tightly. After he had been pacified a little, Wad Tarabish began to pull the headrope downwards, shouting, ‘Khyaa! Khyaa!’ The camel tried to strain against him again, but eventually plumped down on his knees. Wad Tarabish told me that this would be repeated for several days until the beast had learned to kneel. Afterwards he would be fitted with a saddle, and while a herdsman led him by the headrope, another would ride on his back. When the camel became accustomed to the weight, the rider would take the headrope and teach him to trot. The entire training took only three or four weeks.

  Wad Tarabish told me, however, that few camels were really well trained. ‘It needs an expert to train a camel well,’ he said. ‘The best trainers are those who make a habit of raiding. They make sure the camel learns to make little noise and will stay in one place when he is hobbled.’ I asked if he thought the camel an intelligent animal. ‘He is cunning,’ the Arab answered. ‘But he has no real sense. His brain is full of worms. You can never trust a camel completely, no matter how long you keep him.’

  I was still worried about Wad al ’Atiga. The swelling on his withers had become septic. Juma’ Wad Siniin inspected him one day and told me, ‘You will not ride him again, not soon anyway.’ He drew his dagger and cut into the wound until the blood flowed, peeling away the infected flesh. ‘At Tom or Salim will give you another camel,’ he said. ‘They have plenty.’