Sihle Khumalo - Heart of Africa

Published by Umuzi 2009

an imprint of Random House Struik (Pty) Ltd

Company Reg No. 1966/003153/07

80 McKenzie Street, Cape Town 8001, South Africa

PO Box 1144, Cape Town 8000, South Africa

www.randomstruik.co.za

2009 Sihle Khumalo

Sihle Khumalo hereby asserts his right to be identified as the author of this work.

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical or electronic, including photocopying and recording, or be stored in any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher.

ISBN 978-1-4152-0081-0 (Print)

ISBN 978-1-4152-0260-9 (ePub)

ISBN 978-1-4152-0261-6 ( PDF )

Cover design by mr design

Cover image based on an etching from David and Charles Livingstones Zambesi Expedition, 1865, and on a photograph supplied by Sihle Khumalo

Map by John Hall

Text design by William Dicey

This book is dedicated to Sifiso Bru Sibisi,

a confidant who almost was my best man

To be independent of public opinion is the first

formal education in achieving anything great.

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

German philosopher, 17701831

One of the greatest mysteries of the nineteenth century, geographically speaking, was the mystery of the source of the River Nile. It was something that had intrigued people for a very long time. The ancient Greeks and Romans, not to mention the Egyptian pharaohs, all wondered where the mighty river that ended in the Mediterranean Sea near the ancient city of Alexandria where my first trip through Africa also happened to terminate sprang from. By the middle of the nineteenth century it was very much on the agenda of the European explorers. The interior of the dark continent was still an enigma to the rest of the world (not that Mama Africa is an open book now!) and explorers were competing to see who could find what first. They disagreed about many things, except that finding the source of the Nile would be first prize.

The source of the Blue Nile, the main tributary of the Nile, had been discovered in 1770 by a Scotsman, James Bruce, who traced it all the way to Lake Tana in Ethiopia. But where did the White Nile spring from?

Another Scotsman, the well-known medical missionary David Livingstone, who had been beating about the bush in Africa since 1840, became so obsessed about finding the source of the White Nile that he completely disappeared from sight for over four years. Sixteen years before he was found, in 1871, by a Welsh-raised American journalist-turned-explorer named Henry Morton Stanley, hed discovered, among other wonders, the Victoria Falls, which he named after the reigning British monarch, Queen Victoria.

In 1854, on their first expedition, two British explorers, John Hanning Speke and Richard Francis Burton, managed to discover a few things about the course of the Nile before Speke was stabbed several times by locals in present-day Somalia. He managed to free himself and got away; Burton escaped with a spear imbedded in his bum (both cheeks pierced).

After recovering in England they were back for more, two years later. Luckily for them the local tribes were not as hostile this time round, but the two encountered endless problems. Speke became deaf at one stage after a beetle crawled into his ear and had to be removed with a knife. Another time he turned partially blind due to some disease. But their persistence paid off: it was on this expedition, in February 1858, that they discovered Lake Tanganyika (which Speke couldnt see properly because of his partial blindness).

Later that year it was Burtons turn. He became so sick that he couldnt travel. So Speke left him behind and went on to discover the biggest lake in Africa, which he also named after Queen Victoria. When he returned to England (without Burton), he claimed that he had discovered the source of the Nile.

Burton, however, did not accept his former travelling companions claim, so Speke had to go on a third expedition in 1862, after which he insisted that he had found conclusive proof that Lake Victoria was indeed the source of the Nile, one of the longest rivers on planet Earth.

The controversy was finally put to rest by Henry Morton Stanley, who had been sent to look for the lost Livingstone. By the time Stanley confirmed Spekes claim in 1874, both Speke and Livingstone were dead.

To cut this long story short: it is fair to say that, despite some further discoveries, the source of the Nile was found by Speke in 1858. I was aware, however, of contesting claims as to the rivers real source. After all, Lake Victoria is itself fed by several rivers and lakes.

In 2008, exactly 150 years after Speke, I decided to commemorate the discovery of the source of the Nile and head for Central Africa to see for myself what the fuss was all about.

My job in the Exploration Division of a global mining company based in Johannesburg involves a lot of travelling, and the only preparation I could manage to make for my intended trip was to phone my wife from Namibia a week before I was supposed to leave and ask her to book a seat on the JohannesburgBulawayo Greyhound bus for me. My intention was to travel northwards from there by road and rail.

Once back in South Africa with less than three days to go, I phoned my companys travel clinic to enquire which malaria prophylaxis to take. I was informed that Mefliam, which you must start taking a week before you get to a malaria area, continue to take once a week while in the malaria area and for four weeks after youve left, is ideal. This posed a small problem: I had to leave in three days time. So Doxytab was recommended, which must be taken daily while in a malaria area, plus for twenty-eight days after your return. Taking daily medication on a full stomach, especially when doing a trip of this nature, is almost impossible. I therefore settled for Mefliam, even though I was four days late. That meant that I would arrive in Zambia the first malarial country on my itinerary not properly protected against omiyane (as mosquitoes are called in Zulu).

The aim of my trip was to see a few key places visited by some early European explorers, but it did not have a real destination. All I really wanted to do was travel through Central Africa and along the way do six things:

take a ride on a ferry on Lake Tanganyika;

stand on the equator in Uganda;

bungee jump at the official source of the Nile in Jinja, Uganda;

get up close and personal with some mountain gorillas in Rwanda;

visit the remote source of the Nile at Nyungwe forest in Rwanda;

visit the Kigali Memorial Centre in Rwanda.

Travel is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of the familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it.

Cesare Pavese

Italian poet and novelist, 19081950

On the day of my departure, Friday, 3 October 2008, I did not go to work since I had spent the previous weekend away from home in Namibia. So I decided to do some running around, accompanied by my wife and four-year-old daughter Nala.