A small dismal swamp. The end

Previously on “A small dismal swamp”: The narrator recounts his parachuting days in Gabon, Africa. One day, after all have jumped safely, or so it seems, one stick, a group of three, is missing. Apparently they fell inside a swamp east of the drop zone. Two search parties are set up to enter the swamp from two different directions. The author’s search party has been waddling inside the swamp for a while…

If you haven’t read the first part, click here:

A small dismal swamp

…We’d spent about an hour struggling with the mud, the roots, the ever thickening trees. Not to mention unidentified movements on or below the surface of the murky waters. Until we came to a clearing in the mangrove. A vague muddy beach by a narrow, vague muddy river… And! And! Lo and behold! There was a pirogue pulled up on the beach. A pirogue is a long canoe carved out of a single trunk. The vehicle of choice then for fishermen in Africa. They’re often used at sea, why was there one in the middle of the bl..dy swamp? Don’t ask me. Didn’t seem to have a lot of fish around.

Not sure who came up with the brilliant idea to pull the pirogue into the river, hop in and paddle our way up north to where our missing friends might be. The river seemed to be flowing in the right direction… We pulled the canoe into the water. We thought we’d only use it for a while and drop it on another beach, with a few muddy banknotes to express our gratitude. We hopped in with the dog. Grabbed the oars, or paddles or whatever they’re called in English, that had been left inside, and off we went. This was technically Grand theft canoe, but we hoped for the fishermen’s understanding. Human lives were at stake. The dog sat at the prow of course. He felt it was his duty to guide us stupid humans in the right direction.

Damn canoe weighed a ton. Not what you see in the movies, where the rowers paddle happily along, singing songs dedicated to the gods of the bloody forest or the bloody swamp. Nope. Heavy. Very heavy. When you think about it, it was a trunk. A hollowed trunk, yet a trunk. Heavy. We had a hard time keeping it in course. Then gradually, the swamp river grew wider. And wider. And faster. After what seemed an eternity, we realized us crazy wazungu* (see below), could not handle the damn thing. We managed to steer it to some sort of a shore.

By Joko’s calculations – Didn’t wear no watch either – we’d been inside the swamp for close to two hours. Time to get back. Hopefully the other party would have found Joël and his “mates”.

Giselle’s dog took us back to the drop zone in less than half an hour. Good dog!

Diego and the other search party had just come back. With Joël and his buddies. All safe and sound. Not even a scratch. Parachutes were lost though. Jean-Claude was on Joël’s stick. After drinking a whole beer in one single gulp, he told us:

“Damn pilot miscalculated. Dropped us way too early. When we realized we were falling right into the swamp, all we could think of was: “pick a spot with the least trees if possible, cross your arms over your face, and cross you legs… you know, for your…”

“Balls,” Joko said. (Author’s note: pardon my French. I’ve already mentioned this gender-biased safety procedure for men jumping in parachutes and landing on a branch. See ‘Fly, fly’)

“Good.” Joko went on. “That’s what we trained you for. You don’t want to land on a branch on your…”

“Nope,” Jean-Claude said, “you don’t. Me? I was all right. Ended up in a small clearing. Still tore my ‘chute on a sticking out limb, but Joël…”

“What about Joël?” We all turned to Joël who was busy downing his second beer, and waved Jean-Claude to go on.   

“Joël’s chute was caught on a bunch of branches projecting above a small river… You guys have probably seen those small rivers…”

We all nodded. Our jump suits had turned from standard second-hand Army green to caking muddy grey.

“Come on Jean-Claude! Don’t leave us hanging!”

“Hanging is the right word. While we were trying to salvage what we could of the equipment, Joël was hanging from the tree above the water. After a while he said:

‘I don’t care. I’m unstrapping.’

Joël nodded approval of the story. Jean-Claude went on:

“So Joël took his helmet off, threw it on the ground where we were, unstrapped his emergency ‘chute. The altimeter. All that could be salvaged. Threw all the stuff on the ground. Didn’t unlace his boots. Who knew what could be sticking up in the muddy water. Then he unstrapped his harness. Dropped into the dark water of the small river. A few seconds, more seconds… Almost a minute. We knew he was Special Forces, combat swimmer, frogman and all that shit, could hold two-three minutes under water, yet we were already shouting, as if he could hear us: ‘Joël! Come up!’”

We all turned to Joël. Jean-Claude extended a hand to Joël, giving him the floor. The buggers must have rehearsed the story on their way back.

“I thought the river would be only a couple of meters deep,” Joël said. “No! It was at least 5 or 6 deep. (15-18 ft for the non-metric savvy). With the jump suit and boots and all, I went down straight to the bottom. Muddy. Sticky. Plus the current. It took me a little while to get back up. But it’s all right. We’re all here. Anybody got another beer?”

*

Author’s note. This is a true story. Fortunately, no-one was harmed. The search parties were a good idea. At least the others found them. And we got to handle a true African pirogue. We did leave a few muddy banknotes in the canoe where we left it. To this day the owner of the pirogue must be wondering what happened. I was very pleased with myself taking Ginette’s dog along with us. I’m not sure we would have made it back so quickly.

After that incident, we bought flares. The stick leader always carried a couple. Just in case.

When I got home I took a first shower with the jumpsuit and the boots on. Then took the boots off. Threw them away, put the jumpsuit into the washing machine. And took a second shower. Even so, I still had mud in my ears for a week…

Claude fooling around on another occasion. He’d landed in that tree at the edge of the swamp. See the white sail in the upper right corner? The swamp starts on the right.

*Part of the Mzungu chronicles. Mzungu, plural: wazungu. Mzungu is a Bantu (Swahili) word used throughout East Africa from Uganda to Kenya to Tanzania to Zambia and in the great lakes region, from Rwanda, Burundi, to Congo Kinshasa. It means “white man”, or woman. The origin of the name dates back to the 18th-19th century, when European explorers came to East Africa searching for the source of the Nile, the gold mines of Solomon, or the Mountains of the moon, what have you. It literally means traveller or wanderer. Africans then, could not understand why Europeans could not stay in place, why they had to move all the time.  They thought Europeans were a tad crazy. Mimi na mzungu!

(c) Martin-Onraët & Equinoxio