Meetings with Mothers

by Carol Mitchell (United States of America)

I didn't expect to find Tanzania

In 2010, my husband, my two children-aged seven and nine at the time, and I visited Tanzania, and by the time we set off on our safari to the Serengeti, I was convinced that if there was a God, she lived there. Our guide was Leon, young and reassuringly well-informed. I let myself relax into the long days of peaceful watchfulness that characterize a nature safari. We experienced moments that felt like something close to dangerous. On our first day we begged Leon to stop so we could peer at a lioness skulking in the underbrush, only to hurtle away, frantically closing the retractable hardtop, when the animal made as if to leap at us. Later, we swerved to avoid an angry young elephant in the midst of what seemed like a temper tantrum. But it was only when we arrived at our hotel, beautifully rustic with cavernous ceilings reminiscent of the outdoors, and I was asked to sign a form indemnifying the hotel from blame if my children or I were attacked, that I recognized how slim the line was between adventure and life-threatening danger. That night, when the darkness settled and the generators were shut down, I looked outside into the blackest black I had ever experienced and felt intensely fearful. The roars and grunts of the animals who belonged surrounded us, reminding me that we were interlopers in this landscape. An old worry—whether I could be decisive if faced with a life-or-death situation requiring a split-second decision—returned, never before quite as real. I wondered what I would do to protect my children out there. We rose early the next day, the morning still cool, as the sun had not yet risen above the horizon. Just before sunset the evening before, we had watched two leopard cubs play fighting, engrossed in their preparation for the real world while their mother watched us. Her gaze was languorous but I had no doubt that if we made a wrong move, she would strike without hesitation. When night threatened to descend, Leon had promised that if we arose early, we could return and possibly find the cubs again. And so we returned. My husband sat in the front with Leon. The children and I rode in the rear cabin. I faced backwards while the children sat opposite me, their backs to the open road. “How cute,” they exclaimed, spotting a troop of baboons in a clearing, cleaning each other’s dark olive-green fur. Leon exhaled sharply. He despised the animals. “Petty thieves,” he had called them. “Can we stop?” the children begged and Leon pulled over, slowly approaching the animals who had noticed us. The smaller baboons bounded into the underbrush, but the older ones, presumably the mothers stood their ground. They only waited a few beats before moving towards us. One, two, then three leapt on to the vehicle’s hood, caressing it, enjoying its warmth. I watched one in particular. She was large, about the size of our German Shepherd back in the U.S., her eyes intelligent, or perhaps just curious. As I looked, she ventured closer, peeping over the passenger side mirror. My husband leaned back and rolled up his window, but the animal was not perturbed by the movement. In a surprisingly swift move, she came to the open back of the jeep, face-to-face with me and too close to my children. She screamed, her mouth open wide. Fangs hung long and sharp alongside an even row of upper teeth. Her tongue was pink with a black fallopian-shaped mark in the center. My husband told me that I snarled back at the animal, uttering a guttural sound that more than compensated for my lack of elongated incisors. He said I grabbed my son who had long since outgrown piggy-back rides, and my daughter, yanked them out of our seats, and pulled them behind me. I only recall sounds, the baboon snarling, the children screaming, and my husband laughing, as he often did in times of tension. She held my stare for a moment, deep-set orange-brown eyes contemplating her next move. She broke the gaze and I swear she nodded before taking off into the wilderness empty-handed.