15/10/2018
Clair Cholajda
Extract from "The Last Stop Safari Shop“
"Evelyn looked at the map and decided to turn right, taking a long way around to the water-hole. It was a lovely time of day, with shafts of early evening light falling across the road, and she had the bush to herself. When she reached the water-hole, she noticed a few hides scattered around the pan. She walked towards the nearest one, not wanting to venture too far away from the vehicle. She sat on a wooden bench and took in her surroundings. The sky was a gentle wash of pastel pink. The bush chorus was warming up with the trill and chirp of crickets. She loved identifying the birds by their familiar calls, bringing back her childhood – the grey loerie crying, “go away, go away”, the emerald-spotted wood dove, “my mother’s dead, my father’s dead, my heart goes poo, poo, poo.” Could she hear a scops owl? She listened keenly but wasn’t sure. Then a fish eagle on a nearby branch gave its haunting call, giving her goosebumps. Hippos grunted in the water.
What a sight to behold, Evelyn thought. The migratory birds were in full breeding plumage. Carmine bee-eaters, turquoise and salmon pink, en masse, digging their nesting holes in the river bank nearby. Kingfishers the colour of lapis lazuli diving for fish. Jacana with their pencil line thin legs walking on lilies. Pond skaters skittered across the water surface, dragonflies hovered. Impala, sable and kudu drank at the water’s edge.
A sudden sound of rustling in the bush startled Evelyn out of her reverie. A mother warthog trotted out, followed by three babies, their tails up straight in the air. They stopped at the water’s edge to drink. Three perfect, miniature carbon copies of their mother. Evelyn leant further forward and could almost hear the gentle lapping of water as they drank, generating ripples across the water.
Evelyn breathed in all that she saw. When it became darker, she reluctantly tore herself away and returned to the Land Rover. Driving from the pan, the gently washed sky began to change colour and to rip itself to shreds – streaks of burnt sienna, Alizarin crimson, indigo, Payne’s grey and cadmium orange, bleeding into one another, a mass of colour gone awry."
