Getting Stoned With Savages - J. Maarten Troost [49]
“Rose-Marie,” I panted. “How often do you climb up to Botko?”
“Every day,” she said.
You are fucking joking, I thought. I felt that I was reasonably fit, perhaps not quite in peak form, but not the sort of person who withers in a typical hike. Compared to Rose-Marie I was a sack of potatoes. To do such a hike, each and every day, without even breaking a sweat when it’s ninety-some degrees with humidity to match, is a remarkable feat of athleticism. Before I had a chance to feel old, however, we emerged through a clump of trees and I beheld a most welcome sight: a village. Not just any village, but a remarkably neat and tidy village surrounded by numerous fruit trees.
I was welcomed by Chief Jamino, an imposing man wearing a faded and stained pink oxford shirt with a white collar, a discard, no doubt from the Gordon Gecko era of Wall Street. He guided me to a mat, where I more or less collapsed into an unceremonious heap, panting and sweating without shame. I must have made quite an impression, for no sooner had I taken my place on the mat than the village women appeared with coconuts, sugarcane, and grapefruit. My empty water bottles were filled with rainwater, and it wasn’t long before I began to feel restored.
Chief Jamino, speaking through a translator, explained that this was a village of seven brothers, of whom he was the eldest. Forty-nine people lived here, the families of the seven brothers. They were the guardians of Botko. It was a very pleasant village. The homes were well-constructed with wood and thatch and obviously cared for. There was a rainwater tank. The grass was kept low. The air was much cooler than on the coast. And the villagers, I was gratified to see, appeared in blooming health.
Chief Jamino went off to tend to something, and his place on the mat was taken by Elise, a vivacious woman in her twenties who spoke English. “When the chief is here,” she said, “I must be someplace else. When I am in my home, he cannot come in. When he is on the mat, I must be someplace else. I am his daughter-in-law. It is the custom. I wanted to explain why I did not greet you at first.”
This seemed rather rigorous for such a small village, until I saw Chief Jamino rejoin us on the adjoining mat, which apparently was a satisfactory arrangement. For lunch, we had laplap, a mush of manioc and coconut cream wrapped in taro leaves and cooked in an earth oven over heated rocks. This particular laplap came with freshwater prawns, which pleased me, because, frankly, I hate laplap. It looks like vomit and the taste is insipidly sweet, but I ate it with gratitude, because at least it was something other than corned beef.
“What is that spear for?” I asked the chief’s son-in-law, pointing to an enormous spear leaning against a tree.
“We use it for killing wild pigs.”
“And how big are the pigs?”
“About this big,” he said, drawing a length on the ground, suggesting that these were gargantuan pigs.
“And they have tusks?”
“Yes, they have tusks.”
“And are they dangerous?” I asked, wondering what else I had to look forward to on the hike back down to Wala Bay.
“Only when you are trying to kill them. Then they are very dangerous.”
“Well, if I see one,” I said, “I think I’ll climb a tree.”
“But you must choose the right tree and climb very high,” Elise added, “because the pig will stand on his legs and jump after you.”
Great, I thought. Giant jumping pigs.
But before heading down, I still had,