Hunting Elephant With The Nduna On My Birthday

26 February 2021, 07:51

Michael Robinson

Just like all of us, I need to go hunting again, soon. This pandemic is killing me.

I was told once, or read once, I can’t remember, that if you don’t write it down, it may as well have never happened.

Well, that was enough to make me write things down. Since I can’t go hunting, I’ve been reading my hunting notes of past hunts. I thought I would share this story of one day of elephant hunting, about fifteen years ago, on my birthday.

Twice in my life I have hunted elephant on my birthday. The first time was with Vaughan Fulton in the Caprivi Strip. Just elephant hunting. All day long for two weeks. Every day. Lots of trekking. Miles and miles.

In the course of our hunting, during the time before my birthday, we had come upon a local Nduna (sub-chief), called Dr. Makanwa, and his wife. They were helpful to us, or at least tried to be. Dr. Makanwa was at least 70 years old, but he was as spry as a teenager, and his attractive wife must have been 30-40 years younger than he was.

Dr. Makanwa knew the habits of the local elephants fairly well. He once took us to a water hole and told us in which direction the elephant herd liked to travel in the mornings, and also in the evenings. These were opposite directions. My wife, Lindy, and I watched as Vaughan and Martin, our game scout, examined the spoor and confirmed that the Nduna was indeed correct. The Nduna also knew of a thick forest where we had seen a huge elephant herd a few days earlier, and told us that the elephant frequently congregated there during the dry season.

On the morning of my birthday, we stopped by the Nduna’s thatched house, which was surrounded by a thatched fence six feet high, and met him out front. The Nduna had volunteered to be our guide that day, and led us off into the bush, toward a place he knew, where he said there were big elephant.

We marched for several miles and several hours through and over the viscous, sandy ground, until by using our binoculars, we finally saw elephant ahead. I thought to myself, “This guy is good!”

Sure enough, there was a large bodied bull in the group. We observed and stalked them. The wind was right and we approached with great care to within the usual twenty yards or so. Finally, the big bull turned broadside. Damn! Not quite big enough. His teeth were amazingly white, and fairly thick, but just not long enough.

Vaughan turned to the Nduna and sadly shook his head. The Nduna gave him an incredulous look as though to say, “Are you nuts? That’s a huge elephant!” With no effort to disguise his pique, the Nduna then stalked off to a nearby downed log, sat on it and pouted.

We continued to look over the small herd, but there were no other big bulls in the group. As we had done so many times before, we backed slowly away from the giant beasts and made a silent retreat.

When we had got some distance away, Vaughan asked Martin to tell the Nduna that we appreciated his help, but we were hunting only very old bulls, with very large tusks.

Martin explained.

The Nduna responded that he was very unhappy, as he had found us a big elephant and we had not shot it. Very unhappy. Martin told the Nduna that, although the elephant he had found was huge, his tusks were just not big enough for us to shoot him. The Nduna rolled his eyes in only thinly disguised disgust and insisted that he was still very unhappy.

Vaughan smiled and remarked to me in a low voice that the Nduna was worried he would not get a tip for his day’s work. (The Nduna did not speak English, but he could understand at least some of it.)

So, Vaughan asked Martin to assure the Nduna, once again, that we very much appreciated his efforts. Then Vaughan took the Nduna aside and gave him fifty Namibian dollars. The Nduna smiled a big smile and responded with a heartfelt “Twali tumeyla,” (“Thank you”), which he uttered while gently clapping his hands, as is the custom.

But as soon as his thanks had been uttered and clapped, the Nduna once again frowned and indignantly declaimed that a mere fifty dollars was not enough! When Martin translated that, both Vaughan and I laughed out loud.

Vaughan, always the provocateur, told Martin to ask the Nduna why he thought he deserved more. The Nduna replied, with a sly smile on his lips, that he had saved his strength, and had not had sexual relations with his lovely wife the previous night, in order that he might have the energy to lead us to this big elephant today.

He said this with great animation and hand waving, as Martin translated.

Again we all laughed, and this time the Nduna laughed with us. I reached in my pocket and gave him another fifty dollars, which seemed to ease his pain and frustration quite a bit. Martin, at Vaughan’s urging, told the Nduna to make up for his sexual abstinence with extra efforts this evening, and the Nduna assured us that he would, indeed.

The Nduna then led us on a grueling march back to his humble thatched house. I say grueling advisedly. It was the middle of the afternoon, and the temperature was well up into the 120s Fahrenheit. Yet the Nduna marched with a will. I’m not sure if he was consciously trying to wear down the picky white folks, but he was sure as hell doing it. Still, Lindy and I kept up, as did Vaughan of course, and we arrived, dead on our feet, at the Nduna’s homestead.

Soon, the Nduna’s young wife, a good-natured and lovely woman, came over to us with a big bucket of cool water and a ladle. She ladled the water over our heads, and it was wonderfully refreshing. Amazing. Like jumping into a cool lake on the hottest day of summer. All the while, she and the Nduna traded admiring glances, embraced, and talked and laughed together.

This caused Martin to declare, dourly and to no one at all, “The Nduna loves his wife too much.”

Vaughan, Lindy and I, as well as the Nduna and his wife, looked at each other in astonishment, and nearly collapsed laughing. We laughed, and protested, and shook our heads at Martin, yet Martin stubbornly smiled and shook his head right back at us, with great conviction.

To this day, I’m not quite sure what was going on there, but I have always thought that Martin, himself rumored to be a formidable ladies’ man, may have been more than a little bit jealous.

Shortly afterwards, we climbed into Vaughan’s Toyota, waved and said our good-byes to the Nduna and his wife, and headed back to our camp by the Chobe.

Not a bad way to spend a birthday, all things considered.