It Waza(n) Adventure!

Not all good, not all bad, I can definitely say that my two-day trip to Waza National Park was exciting.  That morning, dressed in brown linen pants, a white button-up with a green tank under it, and a round khaki hat, I was sufficiently safari-chic and 100% ready to see some wildlife.  I rolled up to my friend’s compound crammed onto the back of a motorcycle that for the last hour had held me, another volunteer, our two bags, and the driver. (Cramped muscles and clacking helmets aside, at least we had saved the two extra dollars to each have our own moto.) We were to meet at her place, then head to Waza National Park, a few hours north, where I hoped to be be dazzled by all kinds of animals.  But the one I wanted to see the most (and the one for which I’d secretly believed that my giraffe-print underwear would be the charm I needed for its sighting) was the lion.

As soon as the engine stopped, I jumped off as fast as my achy knees would allow.  Just as I did, I noticed a sudden commotion happening about 50 feet in front of me.  There was a noise above and then a dark figure flew off the rooftop onto the ground before us, pounding into the dust with a heavy landing, and then loping away like a fugitive with an armful of mangoes from a nearby tree. Baboon! I realized.  Then a short chase seen gave way. From behind, the buzz of another moto approached us, and a middle-aged soldier dressed in his green fatigues was yelling in Fulfulde, (for humor’s sake - what I could only hope was “thief!”)  Then another smaller baboon dropped to the ground with more stolen mangoes and scampered across the street, following his friend.  The soldier trailed after them briefly, but recognizing his defeat, he stopped and looked helplessly into the distance as they made their escape into a wooded area.  I was laughing. Our trip to Waza was off to a great start!

Then we saw the car:  a silver 1987 French Feugeut.  This was the car that was supposed to be able to maneuver dirt roads with rocks as big as boulders, cracks that looked like fault lines, and elephant tracks that were giant potholes with a pattern.  A four by four would have difficulty; our old-fashioned sedan was an even weaker match.  Nevertheless, we set out with optimism, four women in the back seat, the guide and driver up front.   Soon, the uncertainty of the car was forgotten as we happily stuck our heads out its windows into the 120 degree heat and (despite park rules, which were ignored by our guide) got in and out of it to see animals.  We oohed and awed at the diverse birdlife, gazelles and antelope, and herds of giraffe at the waterholes.  Although the closest we’d come to seeing a lion was its tracks in the dirt, we were still pretty darn satisfied that evening when our heads hit the pillow. 

But, the second day things went a bit awry.  At dawn, we made an overzealous decision to visit a waterhole 40 kilometers distant.   After the guide’s tantalizing promise of “beaucoup des animaux” “lot of animals” we had nodded and said “uh-huh, why wouldn’t we go there?” hushing the sedan’s creaky complaints. Sometime after the first hour of wobbling forward at a snail’s pace through the desert savannah, we had only seen buzzards.  Sometime at about the 38th k, we encountered the wrong kind of excitement: the car broke down.  Some five hours later, in the merciless heat, we were hot, thirsty, and hungry.  We were out of water (even after rationing it to one drink every half hour) and having skipped breakfast, all we had had the entire day was a couple bites of a shared Nut Roll (which by the way are a delicious peanut-caramel goodness that I just discovered!)   Luckily, before we had to trek back on foot (the plan was to leave at sunset) some French nationals found us and sent help in the form of water and a mechanic.

We were almost instantly revived and our spirits were back up as we drove back toward the exit.  The sun was lowering, our thirst had been quenched, and we saw a jackal, more giraffes, and ostriches.  Our interest in the animals had not been diminished by our troubles.   Then, as we passed by the last few waterholes, once again replete with giraffes, we noticed a big animal on all fours, climbing the embankment. It took a moment to register.  Lion!

We crept forward and soon we were close to two adolescent male lions.  One wandered off towards the giraffes, but the other stared at us curiously, stopping no more than ten feet from the trunk of the Feugeut.  As we examined each other, I was torn between taking photos, finding the detached window handle so that I could roll it up in case the lion took too much interest in us, and simply admiring its beauty.  But photographs could not capture its vitality and the guide yelled at us to leave the windows down, so I chose the latter, staring at the beast in amazement in the background of a pink, orange and purple sky.  Right then all of us agreed that the entire day’s suffering had been worth these few tantalizing moments. After all, life is like that. It is a package deal, with both good and the bad, ups and downs. And in the end you can’t always tell these two apart, but one thing is for sure: it’s interesting!