Monkeys in My Garden

by Valerie Pixley

  The German was called Uwe Heitkamp and his hair was long and pulled back from his head in a ponytail. He was a journalist, he told O’D, and owned a small yacht that he intended to use to take tourists on boating trips along the Algarvean coast.

  A legal contract was drawn up for the rental of Arrojela. It was a contract that had to be renewed every year and when O’D warned Uwe that Arrojela might have to be sold and that he wasn’t interested in renting to people who became ‘sitting tenants’, Uwe gave O’D his word that we didn’t have to worry about this sort of thing because he wasn’t one of these people.

  It was already going on for May when O’D arrived in Mossel Bay. Unlike me, he had to apply for a Work Permit and not being one to enjoy sitting around idle while he was waiting for permission to work, he decided to travel to Zimbabwe to visit his cousins, the Browns.

  As O’D’s proposed visit would have to be done on a shoestring, he decided to travel economically to Zimbabwe on a long distance bus, breaking up the more than 2,000 kilometre journey with a short rest in Johannesburg. Paula, my brother David’s first wife, lived in Roodepoort with her husband Menno and she offered to put O’D up for a few days.

  The bus O’D travelled on stopped at Johannesburg Railway Station and it was here, in the cavernous Station’s murky gloom, that he received a welcome from the local residents in the traditional South African way.

  Wandering from dimly lit platform to dimly lit platform in his search for the train to Roodepoort, O’D lost his way and ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Six sharp dark eyes had been following his progress and when they judged that the time was right, three men appeared out of the murk and surrounded him.

  “Give us your wallet,” one of the muggers hissed viciously at O’D, waving a glinting knife at the outline of his old crocodile skin wallet they could see in his buttoned up shirt pocket.

  Instead of obeying, O’D crossed his arms firmly across his chest, standing his ground and staring at the men in silence. This course of passive resistance wasn’t because O’D had nerves of steel and was preparing to overcome his attackers with a karate kick or two, it was a course he embarked on through necessity. His passport and driver’s licence were in the same pocket with his wallet and the wallet contained the only money he possessed in the world. If the muggers had their way, he would be stranded in Johannesburg without any identity or travel documents and completely penniless, without even the means to make a phone call for help.

  O’D’s behaviour in the face of attack didn’t deter the muggers. The moment he crossed his arms, the men went through his trouser pockets as quick as a flash and divested him of his penknife and all his change. Then they closed in and the mugger wielding the knife raised his weapon.

  Still keeping one hand protectively clamped over his shirt pocket, O’D tried to grab at the man’s arm with his free hand in an attempt to force him to drop the knife, and in the struggle the man slashed and ripped away at O’D’s shirt.

  O’D was never sure what saved him or caused the muggers to give up - perhaps they lost their nerve because his continued resistance was prolonging the attack - but all of a sudden, and quite inexplicably, they turned tail and slipped away back into the gloom.

  Hardly able to believe his luck, O’D drew in a deep breath to steady himself and then, with legs that trembled, he began to walk back the way he had come. An African man stopped him. “I saw what happened to you,” he told O’D. “Are you okay, man?”

  “Yes,” O’D said. “Yes.”

  He must have looked an odd sight as he sat in the train while it clanked its way towards Roodepoort. A white man, dishevelled and wearing a blue and white checked shirt that had once looked good but now hung in tatters around his body, with one torn sleeve dangling by a thread from his shoulder.

  On the short walk from Roodepoort Station to Paula’s house, he got some looks. A white man, walking around the neighbourhood in a shredded shirt. Was he a down-and-out? A tramp?

  When O’D finally arrived at Paula’s house, she was naturally concerned but not surprised. After all, this was Johannesburg where everyone got mugged sooner or later.

  “You were lucky, O’D!” she exclaimed. “Your guardian angel must have been looking after you!”

  “I have the feeling the muggers were amateurs,” O’D replied. “Just starting out on their careers.”

  “Well, you can’t walk around looking like that,” Paula told him. “Take off your shirt and I’ll sew it up for you.”

  The stress of the day finally overcame O’D. His shaky legs gave way and he collapsed wearily down onto the sofa. “I’d rather have a beer, if you don’t mind,” he said.

  Apart from a brief phone call telling me he’d arrived safely in Harare, I knew nothing of O’D’s adventures until he phoned one evening about three weeks after he’d left South Africa.

  I was sitting on the verandah, eating a supper of crispy roast chicken wings with my family, when the phone rang. Paul answered it with a loud ‘HOWZIT O’D!” and handed the receiver over to me.

  Although the line was faint and crackly, I was able to make out that O’D was now employed as an Administration Manager on a tobacco farm ... in MOZAMBIQUE!

  “How … how did this happen?” I asked O’D. Although South Africa wasn’t an ideal country in which to live, Mozambique was even further down my list.

  “While I was staying with John Brown, Kath Gamble asked me if I’d like to drive down to Beira with her. She’s got a sawmill there. We’d just arrived in Beira, when someone told us that Tabex, a tobacco company in Chimoio, about an hour’s drive from the Zimbabwe border, was looking for an Administration Manager. So I applied for the job and they asked me to start right away.” There was silence on the line and then O’D added modestly, “I think this was only because I spoke fluent Portuguese.”

  “But you always told me you never liked this kind of work,” I exclaimed. “You said you detested being cooped up in an office, sitting behind a desk and shuffling papers around!”

  “Actually, this isn’t too bad,” O’D went on, sounding surprisingly enthusiastic. “My work often takes me out of the office and Mozambique’s quite an interesting country. Much more interesting than South Africa. Or Zimbabwe.”

  When I put the phone down, my mother asked, “How is O’D enjoying himself with the Browns?”

  “He went fishing in Kariba with them,” I told her, “and then he went horse-riding with cousin Jeffrey at Nyanga. Now he’s working on a tobacco farm as an Administration Manager.”

  “Oh, that’s nice,” my mother said, pleased to hear O’D had found a job. “And when are you going to Zimbabwe?”

  “I’m not going to Zimbabwe. He’s working in Mozambique.”

  As Mozambique was a country still at war in 1992, my family’s reactions to the last piece of my news were predictable.

  “MO ZAM BIQUE!” my mother cried, appalled. “There’s a war going on there! Why is O’D working in a country where there’s a war when he could be working in South Africa, where it’s safe?”

  Considering that O’D had just told me he’d almost been mugged and knifed in Johannesburg I thought this was going a bit far. “Mom,” I said, “more people die from violence every day right here in South Africa than anywhere else in the world – and this country isn’t even at war!”

  “I read in the paper the other day that everyone in Mozambique is starving and eating roots,” my father said. “Did O’D tell you what he’s eating?”

  I helped myself to another chicken wing. This might just be the last chicken I would be eating for a while. “Dad,” I replied, in an attempt to reassure myself as well as to reassure my father, “you know that O’D is not only a gourmet but a gourmand as well. I’m quite sure that someone like him would never live in a country where he hasn’t got access to food.”

  Paul stopped crunching on a chicken wing for a second. “Bandits all over the place in Mozambique,” he drawled. “I’ve heard that the r
oad to Maputo is full of the wrecks of burnt-out cars with the charred skeletons of the drivers still propped up against the steering wheels.”

  “Oh, thanks, Paul,” I said.

  I arrived in Zimbabwe in June. It had been cold and stormy in Mossel Bay and freezing in Johannesburg and so I’d dressed in jeans and a thick, hand-knitted Algarvean sweater. June was winter in Africa but you wouldn’t have thought so when I stepped off the plane at Harare airport. It was hot, as hot as a sweltering October day and I just couldn’t wait to open my suitcase, rip off my sweater and put on something cooler. The terrible 1992 drought had Southern Africa in its grip.

  Although he’d been out of my care and on his own for about a month, O’D looked surprisingly well and fit, proving that he was either more than capable of looking after himself - or that someone else had been taking on that responsibility. He was also obviously not suffering any ill effects from living in a war-torn, drought-stricken country where everyone was living on a diet of roots.

  During the four-hour drive to the border, I questioned O’D closely about what to expect in Mozambique. The phone line between Mozambique and South Africa had been so bad, we had never been able to talk for long.

  Now I asked, “How many people live on this farm with you and what do you do for food?”

  There were three white farmers, O’D told me, and a white mechanic. Maciel, one of the farmers, was originally from Angola while Clive and Tim were both from Zimbabwe. The mechanic was called Jake Jackson and he was Zimbabwean too.

  As it was quite true that there was nothing to eat in the country, the farmers working for Tabex drove across the Zimbabwean border to the small town of Mutare to stock up their larders. Fresh vegetables weren’t a problem, though, as Maciel grew them. Despite the drought, water was plentiful because the farm had several good boreholes.

  O’D had also heard that the road to Maputo was littered with charred skeletons still sitting in their charred vehicles but Maputo was a long way away and there really wasn’t much to worry about in Manica Province. The Tabex farm was very safe and very comfortable and he was sure I would enjoy living there …

  The drive from Harare to the border was boring and monotonous and the few little towns we passed were nothing to get excited about. To while away some time, I opened a copy of ‘The Herald’, Zimbabwe’s government newspaper. Its scanty pages were filled with bad news – all about the worst drought in decades Southern Africa was experiencing. Oblivious of incongruity, the headlines cried, “We are starving!” not far from a bad photograph of the 200 kg dark bulk of Moven Mahachi, the Minister of Home Affairs. Apart from the whites of his eyes and a white smile in the shape of a slice of watermelon, the Minister’s face was a featureless dark blob. The Government photographer had forgotten the most basic aspect of photography - illumination.

  After reading a few pages about the ravages the drought was also having on the wildlife, where hippo and elephant were dying around waterless dams, pans and rivers, I folded the newspaper and put it down on the seat again and turned my attention back to the road.

  For most of the journey, we had the road to ourselves except for the ancient buses that roared past us, breaking the speed and safety limits and belching out thick clouds of foul smelling and sulphurous black smoke. They were overloaded with passengers and top-heavy with bundles, baskets, bicycles, chickens and the occasional goat. Trapped for a while behind one of these buses as we crossed the bridge over the dry Odzi riverbed, I idly wandered how the chickens and goats felt about being tied by a leg to the roof rack of a speeding bus, but then, these were African chickens and goats and were, no doubt, probably used to travelling on buses. Perhaps they even enjoyed the wind that roared through their feathers and hair at 120 kilometres an hour.

  At last we began our steep ascent up Christmas Pass and when we reached the top and looked down, the lovely little town of Mutare lay below us, nestling amongst trees and flowers. On our way down, we passed the large “Welcome to Mutare” sign, with its words planted out in flowers and took the road into the town. A beauty of a place, Mutare was forgotten and neglected by the rest of the country and probably, because of this, life was still lived at a deliciously slow pace and everyone still had time for a smile and a chat.

  We took the turning at the Beira signpost and drove down the narrow, winding road to Forbes Border Post. The road was in a bad state of repair and riddled with potholes. A few cars travelled towards us slowly, swerving and weaving all over the road to avoid the holes, as if their drivers had spent too much time at a pub and were staggeringly drunk in charge of their vehicles.

  And then, just as we were approaching the sign by the side of the road that warned of landmines, something happened which neither O’D nor I expected to happen on the Zimbabwean side of the border and it disorientated me completely.

  Suddenly, and out of nowhere, there was the dry, loud crack of rifle shots. O’D braked sharply, whiplashing our necks a little and brought our car to a standstill just as several people burst out of the bush and ran wildly across the road right in front of us. They were barefoot and dressed in rags, the colourless and dirty remnants of what had once been shirts and trousers hanging in tatters on their bodies and they were pursued hotly and closely by two men wearing dark blue uniforms and armed with rifles.

  Taken aback by the violence being acted out in front of our eyes, we watched with astonishment as one of the uniformed men dropped down onto one knee right in front of our car bonnet and took aim. He fired more shots at the fleeing band of people and then jumped up and pounded after them.

  For a while, O’D and I sat still and listened to the crashing sounds of people running through the bush. There were still more rifle shots and then the sounds of flight and pursuit faded.

  I’d expected to see this sort of thing in Mozambique, not in Zimbabwe, and now the incident muddled me up. My mind went completely blank and for a moment I didn’t have a clue where I was!

  “Are we in Mozambique now?” I asked O’D.

  He gave me a surprised look. “Of course not. We haven’t gone through the border yet.”

  “Oh. Who do you think those people were?”

  “Probably Mozambican border jumpers. They come looking for jobs. Or food. They use a path through the mountains. The Zimbabweans don’t want them over here.”

  Shooting at people who were jobless and starving seemed a rather harsh way of dealing with border jumpers. I ruminated on this for a while until another thought entered my mind. Imagine shooting at people ACROSS A PUBLIC ROAD!

  “How irresponsible, how careless!” I fumed to O’D. “They could have shot us. They could even have KILLED us with a stray bullet by mistake!”

  O’D turned on the ignition. “I never think of things like that,” he said.

  At Forbes Border Post, we parked the car under trees that were filled with black-faced Vervet monkeys and walked inside the small white building. Here, too, the Zimbabwean Immigration and Customs officials didn’t seem to be suffering much from lack of food. Dressed in smart white shirts and navy blue trousers or skirts, teamed with navy blue jackets, their clothes strained at the seams. As they dealt with us plumply and efficiently, I looked out through the windows and watched the Vervets. Several were busy rummaging among the pile of empty potato crisp packets, Coca-Cola cans and the other rubbish littering the ground under the trees. One Vervet, more daring than the others, cheekily jumped into the open back of our vehicle and tried to prise open a cardboard box with its tiny black hands.

  I walked out through the open doorway, towards the car. “Hey! What do you think you’re doing?”

  Caught in the act, the Vervet looked guiltily at me with its bright, brown, round eyes and then scampered up into the trees again.

  Back in the car, we drove down the steep hill and across the bridge over the empty Munene River that separated Forbes Border Post from Machipanda Border Post.

  Compared to Forbes, Machipanda was decidedly rundown and shabby. With
nothing to do, three Mozambican officials lounged at a counter in the empty room and I felt a pang of compassion for them when I noticed how threadbare their brown uniforms were and saw how terribly thin they were. This feeling of compassion didn’t last long, though. As O’D and I approached the counter, the officials quickly straightened up and vanished through a doorway!

  Their disappearance surprised me, especially as it lasted for more than twenty long minutes.

  “What can they be doing?” I asked O’D irritably. After all, we were the only people at Machipanda.

  “Heaven knows,” he replied. “They often do this. I think it’s something to do with showing us who is in charge. A type of power play.”

  While we waited, I stared out of the windows. They were smeared with dust and there weren’t any little monkeys here. There was no rubbish either. Without thinking, I began to drum my fingers to the tune of’ ‘chopsticks’ on the wooden counter top.

  “You’d better stop doing that,” O’D warned me. “If they hear you they’ll make us wait even longer.”

  I stopped drumming immediately. “Don’t they like chopsticks?”

  Eventually, the door opened and the officials came over to us.

  “Boa tarde,” O’D said politely.

  “Boa tarde,” they replied.

  When our passports were stamped and all the paperwork was done, we climbed back into our car and drove towards the exit. A thin guard in a frayed uniform raised the barrier - a long, rough wooden pole – that was blocking the road and we went through.

  I was now in Mozambique - a country still at war - in June 1992.

  Bob Dylan wrote a song about Mozambique in the 1970’s. It had a fast, rolling rhythm and I’d liked it a lot. I’d played it over and over again until my mother had come into the sitting room and had told me that if I didn’t stop, she was going to smash my Dylan LP into hundreds of little pieces.