Cocktail Hour Under the Tree of Forgetfulness - Alexandra Fuller [84]
Mr. Zulu staked his claim on a small hill where he would be lord and master of all he surveyed and could see any unsuspecting, promising young woman coming from a mile off. Meanwhile, my mother made her way to a tree slightly tucked away at the sloping edge of Mr. Zulu’s hill. It was a tree of modest height, with a rounded spreading crown of leathery dark leaves and drooping branches. She thumped her walking stick on the ground under the tree. “Here,” she said. She stared up into the tree’s branches, “so full of birds,” and announced, “I want my house right here.”
Mr. Zulu came down from his hill and stood with my mother under the tree. He lit a cigarette and stared up at the tree’s canopy. Then he reached up and pulled at the leaves. “Do you know what this tree is?” he asked.
My mother frowned. “Maybe a false marula?” she tried.
Mr. Zulu shook his head, “No, Madam. This is the Tree of Forgetfulness. All the headmen here plant one of these trees in their village.” Mr. Zulu held his forearm steady as if to demonstrate the power of the tree. “You can plant it just like that, from one stick, and it is so strong it will become a tree. They say ancestors stay inside it. If there is some sickness or if you are troubled by spirits, then you sit under the Tree of Forget-fulness and your ancestors will assist you with whatever is wrong.” He nodded and took another drag of his cigarette. “It is true—all your troubles and arguments will be resolved.”
“Do you believe that?” Mum asked, but before Mr. Zulu could reply she waved her own question away. “I believe it’s true,” she said. “I believe it two million percent.”
Mum looked up into the branches of the tree again and she smiled. “Please bring me my camp chair, Mr. Zulu,” she said. “I think I will have my tea here today.” So Mr. Zulu went back to the truck to get Mum her chair. Dad, still weak from malaria, was lying under the tarpaulin watching the kettle boil over a mopane fire. “The madam has found the place for her house,” Mr. Zulu reported. Dad propped himself up on an elbow and squinted in the direction of the river. Backlit against the fierce afternoon sun, hands planted on her walking stick, was Mum—Nicola Fuller of Central Africa—mildly victorious under her Tree of Forgetfulness.
Nicola Fuller of Central Africa at Home
Mum and Dad, cocktail hour under the Tree of Forgetfulness. Zambia, 2010.
When I step off the airplane and into the Immigration and Customs Hall at Lusaka International Airport, Mum and Dad are waiting to greet me. They are standing in front of everyone else, pinned right up against the glass. Dad is in a blue town shirt, a pair of baggy Bermuda shorts, a pipe in his mouth. Mum is tipsy with excitement, in a pinstripe shirt and khaki pedal pushers. As soon as she sees me, she starts jumping up and down, and flashing her V for Victoria sign as if I am the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic. “Whoo-hoo!” she hoots. “Whoo-hoo!”
But the closer I get to her, the less sure Mum is of what to do; she envelops me in a brief, uncomfortable embrace and tolerates a peck on the cheek. “Did they give you lots of yummy wine on the plane?” she asks. Dad—who has been looking mildly surprised since first glimpsing me (I have changed my hair color since the last time he saw me and while he can’t put his finger on the difference, he knows there is one)—pummels my shoulders affectionately and takes my suitcase. “Bloody hell, Bobo,” Dad says, and I know what he is about to say next—“How many pairs of shoes do you have in here?”—a persistent hangover from the time Mum took nothing but winklepickers and high-heel boots on their honeymoon to Tsavo National Park.
I am put in the bed of the pickup with an oil-bleeding generator, bags of fish food and my suitcase. “Are you sure you’ll be okay back there, Bobo?” Mum asks, although she knows it’s my preference.
“Fine,” I say.
“Yes, it’ll do her good after all that limousine treatment she’s