Under the African Sky: A True Story

By Rebecca Redford

Under the African Sky provides you with the history of a family following their dream against the backdrop of a stunning and often surprising continent, which is Africa. Their travels take you on a breathtaking journey of peril, hardship, and love into the heart of Africa.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Africa
• Release date: May 25, 2018
• ISBN: 9781482878479

Rebecca Redford

A born Namibian, and a keen photographer with a lifelong love and understanding of African culture, landscapes, and complexities translate all this through many striking images of Africa into this amazing life story. After 35 years abroad since having left Africa the last time, Rebecca now returned to Namibia to write, teach and live. The incidents described in this book are all real however, the names used are fictional.

Book preview

1

The Rain

R ain was pelting down on the red dusty road in soaking hatfuls, and within minutes the water was gushing down the footpaths. She hurriedly attached the canvas over the piles of dried animal hides to avoid them getting drenched. It happens every year with the start of the rain season. It only takes seconds, and you are dealing with a deluge. Before you know it, the river swells up, and the current sweeps away everything in its path. She entered the sheltered area of the kitchen, throwing off her sodden jacket and hanging the shotgun on the wall next to the handbasin. Gathering a handful of freshly baked cookies from the baking tray in passing, she hung the rain-darkened jacket on a nail next to the stove so it could dry out. Joseph was at the kitchen table, up to his elbows in flour.

‘Hello, ma’am, was it a good hunt?’

‘Yes, Joseph, we nearly had a chance for a third buffalo, but luckily for him, he got away in time. We will start slaughtering when the rain subsides,’ she said, depositing the contents of her pockets on the kitchen table.

‘The rain in May will bring us good crops, and the fishing will start early! Where are the kids?’

Joseph shook his head and, without looking up, said, ‘They left with Domingo long before the rain started. Do not know where they went, nobody ever tells me anything!’ He kept mumbling while stoking the fire and checking the heat of the oven. She knew it was best not to probe any further. She brought Joseph along with her when she initially came to Kaouadja. He came with impeccable credentials after having worked for a major safari company for ten years. Joseph left a wife and three children in Bangui, the capital. He had a wonderful sense of humour but his biggest attribute was his knowledge of food. Whenever he produced his piping-hot ratatouille or his mouth-watering bouillabaisse (fish soup), everyone walked around with a big smile for days.

Rebecca pinched some more cookies and helped herself to a mug of steaming-hot black coffee. She made a dash for the house. While sipping her coffee, she promised herself to spend some of her few extra hard-come-by dollars from the last crop of peanuts and invest in a sat phone. The sparsely-populated area was so remote, far away from everything, with the closest village approximately 80 km away. When getting there involves a whole day’s driving, treacherous road conditions, and timing the time of the year right so you don’t get stuck in fast-flowing rivers, the word remote seems applicable.

2

I  n 1985, Rebecca and her husband Jan came to Central Africa, where they were allocated a hunting concession right up in the north-east of the country, an area called Kaouadja, a few hundred kilometres from the border between the Republic of Central Africa and Sudan and 600 km from Bangui, the capital city. Jan used his vast network of acquaintances and contacts from previous visits to the country to acquire the concession. He had travelled extensively through Eastern and Central Africa as a young man. In fact, he joined the French Foreign Legion when he was only twenty-four. After only one year with them, he decided to join Moïse Tshombe’s army. Tshombe was a Congolese businessman and politician and served as the president of the State of Katanga from 1960 to 1963. He later became the prime minister of the Democratic Republic of the Congo until 1965. Jan joined his forces while Tshombe was in exile in Northern Rhodesia.

Rebecca met and fell in love with Jan in 1970 when they both worked and lived in South West Africa, now called Namibia. She often thought about how little she knew of her husband’s previous life. She loved him, so it never crossed her mind to question him about his past and the time before she and the boys became part of his life. They spent the next twelve years travelling and working in Angola and Kenya, and in 1980, they ended up in France, where they built their home and the two boys went to school.

Kaouadja was unspoiled and beautiful, where nature unites the richness and diversity of all that is extraordinary in Africa. The Bushveld in this vast land presented a pleasing view of nature in the grey-green attire of shrubs; the coloured flowers, verdant meadows, and luxurious fields of yellow grass; and the impressive mountains and rivers. Many of the riverbeds were dry in the winter but gushing with muddy water during the rainy season. It was so beautiful it was unreal. Encounters with wildlife were frequent and one of the first thoughts that hit Rebecca was, How could you want to kill any of the animals? Jan got them a hunting concession, which meant they would entertain hunters from Europe. The mere thought of that made her shudder.

They arrived in Kaouadja during August 1985, on a stifling-hot summer’s evening after a long and arduous seven-month voyage, by road, from France.

The bush camp of Kaouadja was magical. If anyone ever wanted to experience the magic of Africa, this was it—magnificent nature that teemed with wildlife.

The camp was situated on the banks of the Kaouadja River, hence the name Kaouadja. Nearly dry in the winter and gushing with red-brown muddy water during the rainy season. The river was full of crocodiles and great big catfish. Not only did the river provide them with fresh fish on the menu every day, it became Rebecca’s soulmate. She would spend many an hour of reflection sitting on the bank of the river watching nature. It helped her to completely unplug. The riverbank became her area of solitude in the middle of nowhere. It gave her time to ignore what went on elsewhere in the camp. At times, she felt like sharing her thoughts, getting guidance, talking about how she felt—lost, scared, abandoned. She couldn’t show her uneasiness to the children, but she could share it with the river.

When they arrived in August 1985, the camp had two existing wooden chalets on stilts—one of which they occupied as their home, while the other they kept for the eventual ‘important’ guest. These three-room bungalows were built by previous adventurers or hunters who had the same concession. Both buildings were in remarkably good condition, with all the window and door frames in situ but no doors or windows. There was even a smaller open alcove in one of the rooms which they presumed was used as a bathroom—however, it had no WC, shower or hand basin. Jan had to have known the previous occupants and had also visited them at the time when they operated in the area. It was difficult for Rebecca to know how he knew about the place. Jan never talked about that time of his life. It was as if it never took place. She never queried it either. There was just never time. Frankly, the trip through the Sahara to just get them there was so harrowing and exhausting that arriving in such a breath-taking area was like a new lease of life. All Rebecca could think of was a new start, a time for reflection, a time to patch up the relationship which had been on the brink of collapse due to the excruciating trip that lay behind them.

They immediately set themselves to the task of planning the construction of five additional thatched-roof bungalows, an open restaurant overlooking the river, and a vast kitchen. The tourist season was upon them, and everything had to be ready in anticipation of the tourists willing to pay a substantial amount of money for the right to come and hunt and take photographs as well as just visit for pleasure.

The next few days and weeks were a blur. The heat made a halo of moisture radiate around her head while she tried to manage the construction plans. Jan left with several trackers to scout out the area and understand the lay of the land. He planned the bush tracks that had to be made and familiarized himself with the flora and fauna. After about three weeks on-site, Jan announced that he was leaving for Bangui to pick up the first tourists, two Danish gentlemen.

Rebecca was beside herself. ‘What about getting the camp ready? You never told me they were arriving already now! Why is it that I’m always the last to get the information? None of us have any experience in construction, and we have no building material.’ It was as if she was talking to herself. Jan wasn’t interested in listening to what cannot be done. He was already on the next chapter, and that was all he wanted to talk about. In his view, the houses were built and the roads were done. He was not interested in how it was going to be done. This déjà vu situation was all too familiar to her. When they were busy with the construction of the family home back in France, the same thing happened. Halfway through the construction, Jan decided he was going on a trip to Asia for three months and left her to complete the project. Here they were, five years down the line, and it was happening again. She thought about the law of inertia. Was that what it was? Projects and creative ideas never finished—was it because he was afraid of being evaluated?

Early one morning a few days later, he left for Bangui without saying goodbye. They had been at the camp for exactly three weeks.

Rebecca—as always, mind over matter—got to work. Everything else, including her own thoughts, took a back seat as the workers (five of them, all locals who lived in a nearby village) cleared the land around the camp. They discovered the remnants of previous constructions, concrete slabs that served as foundations for buildings. The discovery was a blessing in disguise, because Rebecca then planned the bungalows using the existing foundations, slabs of about 10 sq. m, some round and others square. She discovered that one of the workers, Matias, had worked on roof building. She instructed all five workers to start making mud bricks. The clay from the riverbank was clearly a good source. They used some of the cement which they brought with them from Bangui to give the bricks rigidity.

‘Bring me some of those dry brick, Domingo. Don’t just stand there!’ She could feel the irritation in her voice, and deep down she knew it was the anger against Jan and it had nothing to do with the workers. They did their best, and even they hadn’t done this work before. How could he just assume that I would get it done? This was back-breaking work. They had no protective gear, not even a pair of garden gloves, so her hands became cracked and dry from working with the sand and cement. She often gulped down a bottle of water, but it didn’t allay her thirst. The bungalows were not very big, which meant that after a week, they had completed three of them roof high. The riverbank mud turned out to be the perfect medium to plaster the walls. It came in different colours of brown, red, and yellow; and with some artistic flair, the kids helped to finish off the interiors. So now two of the bungalows were roof high.

Rebecca was up on the wall, fixing a rafter. She yelled at Matias to bring the hammer. And then it happened—although Matias was used to this type of work, he slipped while walking on one of the rafters. He fell off the roof and was badly injured; a couple of broken ribs, she suspected. At least no broken limbs. For three days, she tried to do all she could to ease his suffering, but there were no painkillers left. Unable to bear his pain and her own agony of helplessness, Rebecca decided to use some expired injectable painkiller and pinned her hope on easing the pain. It worked, Matias woke a day or so later and smiled when she visited him in his hut. He had no pain. She instructed him to stay at home and in bed for at least two weeks in the hope that the suspected broken ribs were in fact just a bad bruise.

To finish off the roofs, they planned to use the tall river grass. This was already familiar to the locals because they used it for their own houses. Through trial and error, they eventually got it right. Rebecca was amazed. She was running on adrenaline and pure determination. Willpower—she understood that this willpower was largely driven by an unconscious force beyond her control. Her instinct gave her self-control. She didn’t know where it came from. She was at the mercy of her own mental strength. She decided they would finish the roofs after the first tourists had left. She could house them in the second wooden house. After all, they were coming there for the experience of the bush and not luxury living.

During the day, the temperature could rise to a stifling and humid 30° whereas the nights could get as cold as +2° or 3°. The soil was very rich, and their diet consisted of lots of fresh vegetables from the garden and game meat which they hunted themselves as well as some delicious fish from the river. The staff consisted of five workers and their wives plus a cook and a carpenter from Bangui, the latter two belonging to a different tribe. Then there were the two trackers, of paramount importance to the team because they knew the bush country like the backs of their hands.

With the help of a generator, water was pumped to a large 1,000 l tank, and from there they laid a pipe-drip irrigation system to the vegetable garden. They grew tomatoes, beautiful plum