The Last Witch Doctor

     Finally, I was there.  Deepest, darkest Africa.  The cradle of civilization.  The Dark Continent.  Since I was a child reading tales of safaris and hunting big game on the yellow, sun-scorched savannah, I had dreamed of seeing this place.  My mind had always danced with mythologized visions of exotic flora and fauna, brightly colored birds, and savages leaping through glowing, orange fires in deep, cool jungles during primitive rituals.

     I wasn’t interested in expensive tour packages or spending time with other tourists.  I didn’t wait so many years to see Africa to see it through the window of a bus or to waste precious time sitting in an air-conditioned bar.  I wanted to see the “real” Africa.  I had researched this trip for years and purposely selected the most treacherous, dense and unexplored section of jungle left.  Most of it had been destroyed in the never-ending march of progress, but some was left.  Some was still pristine.  I envisioned a modern day Garden of Eden with a crystal clear river flowing through its heart and phosphorescent, blue-green butterflies warming themselves in dappled sunlight on the leaves of giant ferns.

     A tribesman who had moved to the city arranged a meeting between me and the “witch doctor” of his tribe, who still lived thirty miles into the jungle.  Of course, he called him the elder and medicine man, but to me, he was a witch doctor.  All I had to do was make it through the jungle.

     The next day found me slashing my way through the jungle with my machete.  The same old native in the village had also warned me, “Many men have entered the jungle to never be seen or heard from again.  The jungle can eat you as surely as any animal can.  It just does it slower.” 

     He was right.  Though I was wearing many layers of clothing and I had tied my pants and shirt off at the ends, my skin was covered with bumps and seething pustules after only two days in.  The air was teeming with insects, especially at night, and most of them seemed hellbent on entering my nostrils, ears and eyes.  It was maddening, and the itching was almost unbearable.  The vast variety of flying insects, some frighteningly large, managed to suck my blood right through my many layers of clothing like thousands of tiny vampires.  But insects were not all I had to worry about.  I walked through a shallow river and didn’t notice until fifteen minutes later that I was covered with leeches.  They inject a kind of anesthesia before they bite so that the host won’t notice them until they’ve had their fill.  I tore them from my skin and crushed them.  I know it was childish for they were only doing what comes naturally to them, but the repulsion and pain made me vengeful.

     The first few hours out, I had felt like a hearty adventurer, with images from old Tarzan movies and Richard Halliburton novels filling my mind.  But by the first evening, I realized that I was not some great white hunter in this jungle.  I was lunch.  I could die here and nobody would ever find me.  The bugs and animals would just finish eating me until I was stripped to the bone.  I began to long for the comfort and safety of the city sidewalks but told myself that discomfort is always the price of adventure.  Funny how we never include the small and large miseries in the wistful travel fantasies we engage in from the comfort of our homes.

     Besides, as I said, I wanted to see the “real” Africa.  I just didn’t think it would be so painful.  I also wanted to be one of the last people in the modern world to see a completely pure culture, untainted by western influences. 

     On one hand, the only cure for racism might be the eventual mingling of all the races.  After all, how can one be a bigot if he himself has a little bit of every race coursing through his own veins?  On the other hand, when I go to Denmark, I want to see blonde people wearing wooden shoes.  When I go to Hawaii, I want to see Polynesian beauties hula dancing in grass skirts.  In short, I want to see the people and customs that every particular place is famous for, not a jumbled up blend of cultures.  For isn’t the experiencing of other unique cultures and customs what makes traveling so enchanting?

     To make matters worse, immigrants often flee their own country for a better one, then start insisting that the new country start altering or eliminating its customs and traditions for them!  Since their own country was so miserable they had to leave it, one would think they would have nothing to complain about in the country that gave them a better life.  Some customs need to be changed – cannibalism, for instance - but harmless traditions are what give each culture its individuality (and why the It's a Small World ride at Disneyland is so much fun.)

     I had expressed this philosophy to my native friend in the village, as well as my excitement about meeting the witch doctor and seeing a pure culture, untouched by all the simultaneous blessings and curses of modernity, and found it odd that he chuckled slightly in response.  I dismissed it, however, assuming that he was still trying to figure out why a pampered westerner like me would voluntarily walk into the jungle with only a machete just to see something that he, as a former member of the tribe and now permanent resident of the village, was very familiar with and perhaps somewhat contemptuous toward.  He had left his own people because he wanted to enjoy the fruits of westernization, too, so I was not going to convince him that it was not an entirely positive change.  When we met, he was even wearing a complimentary t-shirt he had received at the grand opening of the areas first, and hopefully last, McDonald's restaurant.  I thought the contrast between his strong African face and the t-shirt was ridiculous - like a party hat on a lion - but he thought nothing of it.  He would have fit in perfectly on the street of Los Angeles.

     Three days in, it seemed the insects were starting to lose interest in me, or perhaps I had sweated out the scent that had attracted them to me in the first place; the scent acquired from my western fast food diet.  They must have been sending radar far and wide to each other, screaming in bug language, “Hey, do you guys smell that?  A rare delicacy!  Come and get it!  Come and get it!” complete with my exact coordinates.  But they were finally laying off. 

     My inner dialogue was bordering on maniacal after 72 solitary hours of fighting the dense jungle.  I began to speculate on why the bugs had lost interest in me.  I thought that perhaps they had become bored with my blood, or maybe they were all full, or maybe they had finally taken pity on me, or maybe I simply didn’t have enough blood left for them to get a good swig.  Whatever the reason, I thanked God that the bugs were finally giving my ravaged skin a break.

     The more miles I knocked off, the more I started to feel like a real denizen of the jungle.  It was the middle of the fourth day when I consulted my step monitor and calculated that I had been doing about eight miles a day, which put me at about twenty-eight miles!  I had to be close to the tribe. 

     It was getting dark so I decided to make camp.  I found a beautiful clearing next to a river with a lagoon at its head, fed by a small waterfall, exactly the kind of lagoon that Tarzan would have loved swimming in.  I remembered how he would put his knife in his mouth and dive into the lagoon from a nearby rock.  I looked around and saw a small rock near the waterfall that might be good for diving.

     “What the heck,” I thought.  My journey had been all work and no play for too long.  Besides it would give me a good chance to wash my clothes, which were starting to smell like an old dumpster behind a greasy spoon diner.  I started peeling off the layers of clothing.  When I got to the final layer, I had a moment of nervousness about being discovered parading around in my birthday suit, but since I hadn’t seen or heard another human being for days, I brushed away the thought and took off my t-shirt and the sweaty, dirt-caked rag that used to be my underwear.  I took the whole mess to the water’s edge, dunked them into the clear water, sloshed them around, rang them out, and hung them on a branch to dry in the warm jungle air.

     I then jumped into the water myself and reveled in the sensation of all that jungle, sweat and dried blood being washed away.  The river was clear and flowing, so I was thankful to see that there were no leeches.  I swam and splashed around as happily as a child at his local swimming hole.  Then I walked back to the bank, picked up my machete, swam out to the diving rock, climbed up, put the machete in my mouth Tarzan-style, and jumped in.  Okay, it wasn’t a buckknife like Tarzan's, but it was the next best thing.  Another fantasy fulfilled.  I imagined Arthur Conan Doyle smiling benignly from a writer’s café in heaven.  I silently sent him a thank you for contributing to the motivation that brought me to this place.

     I heard a rustling coming from the bank and looked over.  A wild bore was sniffing at my pack.  I had seen several of them in the jungle but a good yell always made them run away.  I had also seen the tracks of a big cat, perhaps a black panther.  Thankfully, I did not meet the owner of the tracks.  My adventurous streak runs only so deep.

     I fell asleep until the chill of evening woke me.  The nocturnal bugs were starting to come out and I saw a few vampire bats with wings at least two feet wide flying in and out of a small opening on a nearby cliff, so I put on my dry clothes, pitched my tent and settled in for the night.  I couldn’t sleep so I went outside to collect some wood to build a fire and do some reading.  I had brought along a copy of Tarzan the Magnificent (what else?) but had been too uncomfortable until now to read it.  

     I discovered a fallen tree downriver with many small branches that were easy to break off, so I put a bushel together and carried it back to camp.  I had a raging fire going in no time.  As I sat reading, I had what I call a “wow, I’m really here” moment, the same feeling travelers have always had when they suddenly realize with absolute clarity that they’re actually walking through a pyramid in Egypt, or exploring the catacombs of the Colosseum in Rome, or climbing the Matterhorn.  It’s very much like what Neil Armstrong must have felt when he first stepped out of his space capsule, looked down at his feet in the lunar soil, and said, “Wow, I’m actually standing on the moon!”  I looked up from my book and into the hypnotic flames of the fire and thought, “Look at me!  I’m in Africa reading Tarzan by a campfire!” 

The moment inspired me. 
“Time to fulfill another fantasy,” I thought. 
I walked back into the jungle and looked for the key prop to every Tarzan movie, a hanging vine.  I had noticed a few while traveling through the jungle but I was so determined to get through it without all 200 pounds of me becoming mosquito poop, I had no time to play.  Finally, I spotted one.  It was remarkably similar to the vines in the movies, which of course were just ropes with fake ivy tied to them.  I took the vine, walked to the nearest tree, climbed up it to the first branch, then the second.  I measured the distance between where I was holding the vine and the ground and felt that I had enough clearance.
“Well, here goes nothin’,” I thought.
I took a deep breath, closed my eyes tight and threw myself off the branch.  I sailed through the air beautifully and was halfway through my Tarzan yell – “Aaaaaaaaaeeeyaaeeyaaeeyaaee . . . when the vine snapped and I landed on my back with a thud, the wind completely knocked out of me.

“Oh, that’s better," I thought.  "Feeling real good now.”
Oh, well.  I had completed my boyhood fantasy, even if it didn’t end in a very Tarzanish way.

     I returned to the campfire, laughing at my own miserable attempt at vine swinging, and returned to my Tarzan book.  After several hours, my eyelids were getting heavy so I crawled into my tent to sleep and recharge for the next day.  I consoled myself with the thought that all my fighting to clear a path through the jungle was almost over.  The tribe had to be nearby. 

     I had just begun to drift off when I heard a faint and familiar sound in the distance.  Drums.  I sat up and listened more intently.  Yes!  It was!  My God, I was closer than I thought.  My heart raced with excitement.  I remembered an old line from a Tarzan movie.  The archetypal evil white hunter stood listening to the drums beating somewhere in the dark, mysterious jungle and said, “The natives are restless tonight.”

     I marked the direction the sound was coming from in my mind and resolved to find the tribe the next morning, but for now, I needed sleep.  However, after writhing around in my sleeping bag for an hour, listening to the exotic sound of the drums and the occasional screams that would tear through the humid night air, I concluded that sleep was impossible.  I just had to see the tribal ritual raging somewhere in the distance.  I didn't come all this way to sleep.  I put my jacket on, packed up my tent, picked up my pack and machete, and started heading in the direction of the drums.

     I knew it was dangerous and stupid to travel at night because that’s when the big cats did their hunting, but I couldn’t help myself.  I had not traveled halfway around the world to hide in my tent.  I walked more lightly than ever and parted the ferns and other vegetation whenever possible rather than slashing at it noisily.  At any moment, a panther or tiger could pounce on me from out of the darkness, but I didn’t care.  This was it – the high adventure I had always craved.

     The drums grew steadily louder and louder until I thought they must be just beyond the next clearing, the next tree, but they filled the jungle so much, it was hard to locate them.  Finally, I saw an orange glow just beyond a row of ferns.  I walked even more softly and slowly until I reached it.  I parted the leaves and . . . there they were, just as Doyle had described them - natives dancing around a fire wearing animal skins, bones through their noses, large plates in their lips, and horrifying tribal masks.  I couldn’t believe my eyes.

     They danced in a circle around the fire, kicking their knees high, while the women danced, chanting incantations to their god or gods, their eyes rolling madly in their sockets as if they were in some kind of trance.  I remained quiet, afraid to move lest I be discovered.  I feared what ghastly end I might meet if I disturbed them during this sacred ritual.  I sat behind the ferns, unmoving and utterly silent, until the dancing ended, each of the natives left for their huts one by one, and the fire went out.

     Worried about the noise I might make if I tried to pitch my tent, I lied down quietly and fell asleep in that same spot.  I awoke there the next morning, but not of my own accord.  Something or someone was poking me with something sharp.  I turned and saw the fiercest looking man I have ever seen.  He was holding a spear and his eyes were fixed on me in an angry glare.  He said something in a tongue I could not hope to understand, but from his tone, I guessed he was ordering me to stand up.  I did so and, panicking, put my hands together in the posture of prayer and bowed to him.  I don’t know what possessed me to do that.  I was not a Buddhist monk, nor was I in the habit of bowing to anyone for any reason.  The combination of his powerful stature and my desire to continue breathing just seemed to demand that some kind of universal gesture of respect be paid.  He grunted, grabbed me with his free hand, pulled me toward him, then pushed me in the direction of the camp.

“Well, this is it,” I thought.  “I’m done.  Finished.  Curtains.”  I wasn’t even sure if this was the tribe my friend in the village had told me about, the tribe that was supposed to know I was coming, the tribe he said would welcome me with open arms.  This official greeter sure wasn’t giving me the impression that I was in the right place.

     He pushed me into the village, which was full of huts made of a combination of earth, branches and grass.  He let out a yell that I interpreted as “Fresh meat!”  The entire tribe flooded out of the huts until I was completely surrounded.  I swallowed my fear and forced a smile, which I hoped they would appreciate as a gesture of goodwill.  Then the thought occurred to me that gestures of goodwill only work if one has some modicum of power.  If they wanted to put me on a skewer and eat my spleen, goodwill on my part would be meaningless to them.

     My smile was answered by being hoisted into the air by ten of the men, then thrown onto the ground and stripped of all my clothing and belongings by everyone in the tribe.  I didn’t resist because I knew it would be interpreted as aggression, which would only seal my fate sooner.  For the first time, I really wished I was back in California.  What the hell was I thinking volunteering for this?

     Once I was stripped naked, I was picked up again and the big savage that had woken me up earlier started poking my bare rear end with his spear.  I started walking - hopping really, and yelping with each poke of the spear - in the general direction that he was poking me, which elicited uproarious laughter from the rest of the tribe.  I finally reached a table made of bamboo.  With hand gestures and more incomprehensible language, he ordered me to lay down on it.  I did so, all the while imagining the table to be their version of a kitchen counter, where I would be cut into sections – flank, rump, shank, etc.  I wondered which one of them would be enjoying my baby back ribs that night.

     The women walked away as the men tied me to the table.  I assumed they were going to the supply hut to get the African version of ginsu knives and a meat cleaver.  Half a minute later, which felt like an hour to me, they returned with buckets and . . . brushes.  One of the women picked up a bucket.  Everyone stepped out of the way, and she threw it on me.  It was filled with thick, yellow liquid.  Then everyone grabbed a brush, even the children, and they all started painting me every color of the rainbow.  When they were finished, they all walked away laughing, leaving me in the sun to dry like some kind of sculpture in a crazy ceramics class. 

     About thirty minutes later, they all returned and adorned me from head to toe in native garb, complete with a lip plate.  However, since my lip had not been stretched out over the course of my lifetime by the wearing of increasingly larger plates, they just stuck what must have been a small “starter” plate under my upper and lower lips until I looked like I had a cue ball in my mouth.

      They then untied me and carried me back across the village and up a small hill to the largest and most impressive hut I had seen yet.  Except for the six men who were carrying me, all the villagers stopped fifty feet from this hut and fell to their knees in apparent supplication.  They bent low to carry me through the door.  Having just come in from the bright daylight outside, I could see nothing inside the hut.  The men dropped me unceremoniously on the floor and exited, slamming the bamboo door behind them. 

    As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I gradually started to make out the shape of a large figure at the far corner of the room.  He was wearing some sort of feather headdress which fanned out for three feet in every direction. 
“This must be the witch doctor,” I thought. 
But still, I was not sure which tribe this was, or if this was the witch doctor that my friend in the village had told me about.  It couldn’t be.  After all, he had told them I would be coming and he promised they would welcome me cheerfully.  I was glad to still be in one piece but what I had just experienced was not what I would normally call “cheerful”.

     I could dimly see the whites of his eyes glowing in the dark gloom of the hut, as if calculating my fate.  Perhaps he was the god of this tribe and I was just some kind of offering.  After what seemed an eternity, he rose and walked toward me.  I gritted my teeth and closed my eyes, waiting to be run through by a spear, or for a club to come crashing down on my head from out of the darkness.  Instead, all I heard was a soft click.

     I opened my eyes to see the “witch doctor” standing there in the glow of a lamp that I remembered seeing in an IKEA catalog.  In addition to his glorious headdress, he was wearing Calvin Klein jeans, a Polo shirt, and Eddie Bauer hiking boots.  There was a five-foot plasma TV in the corner.

“Sorry about all that,” he said.  “That’s just what we do for tourists who make it all the way here.  Would you like a Coke?”

I was flabbergasted.
"My God, man!" I screamed, "Do you have any idea what I've been through the last few days?  I was almost eaten alive in that jungle!  This is outrageous!"

The witch doctor laughed and said, "Do you mean to tell me you came all the way here through the jungle?"

"Well, of course I did!" I answered.

"Follow me, you silly man" he said. 

He opened the door of his hut.  I walked through and saw the villagers no longer kneeling but standing in groups.  One of them was drinking a Yoo-Hoo.  They all burst into laughter and I again realized that I was stark naked.  In my earlier panic, I had not noticed that someone had painted my most private part bright red.

The witch doctor led me to a small hillside behind his hut.  I saw a parking lot with several dozen cars and a road leading to it.

"That is the road from the village.  You were only a few miles away from it the whole time!  Boy, are you dumb."