A small plane over Eastern Congo, ALbert Russo [readict TXT] 📗

A SMALL PLANE OVER EASTERN CONGO (before the wars)
a travel story by Albert Russo (3600 words)
exerpted from his novel THE BLACK ANCESTOR
Imago Press, Arizona, 2009 (Amazon, Barnes & Nobles, etc)


If I had relished every minute of my previous journey in the comfort of a civil aircraft aboard the DC3, despite those ghastly air pockets over the equator and the lack of pressurization inside the cabin, whose recycled air smelled like wilted fl owers mixed with souring toilet perfumes and cold perspiration, an odor I fi lled my lungs with and inhaled as if it were pure mountain air, the small plane Rupert was piloting looked, in comparison, like a magnifi cent, albeit sophisticated toy, reminding me of the fully motorized model car that the brother of a schoolmate had gotten for his birthday present,
and which he so proudly drove about his garden to the dazzled admiration of his young guests.
An indescribable feeling of elation gripped me the moment the single-engined aircraft started to roll across the grass field, ready for takeoff. This was so very different from my maiden voyage. Here, I could feel every jolt under the wheels—stone after stone, every pothole, small or large—almost as if I had trod beforehand on that very same ground in my shoes. The engine’s vibrations echoed in me like those of a second metal skin, making me feel part and parcel of the plane, as if I had been grafted to it. I felt nothing like the aggressive thrust of the Dakota lifting off the tarmac, when I had the impression of having been swallowed whole, like a worm by a hungry bird.
With the Cessna, my imagination took a more fantastic turn: I was suddenly flying on a magic carpet, headed towards the land of a Thousand and One Marvels. After a while, I got so used to the engine’s muffled roar, it sounded as if the noise came from inside me, and I was actually purring like a cat. But the purring reverberated so incessantly in my ears that it was difficult for me to hold a conversation with my two fellow travelers, though I was dying to talk to them and bombarded Rupert with questions.
Not even ten minutes had elapsed when we sighted the Virunga mountain range, girdling the twin cities of Goma and Kisenyi like an amphitheater of impressive proportions. It was breathtaking. From the air, the two cities formed one single agglomeration, and it was hard to imagine that a border separated them.
Arnaud, who until now had barely shown any sign of sympathy in my regard, lost some of his reserve before the splendor unfurling around us and began to speak to me. Thus I learned that the word ‘Virunga’ meant ‘volcano’ in the local dialect. “This is where Parc Albert really starts,” he went on, almost cordially, pointing down.
We flew over Nyiragongo at such low altitude that I let out a shriek of terror mixed with fascination. While I was still panting and shaking, Rupert pressed the throttle to rev the engine, then moments later decelerated so we might contemplate the scenery close up and drew a loop above neighboring Nyamulagira, where jets of lava surged in columns of incandescent fluid. Inside the crater, the magma foamed in thick clusters of mucus. You’d have sworn it originated in a pitless abyss, for it kept spewing in neverending, enormous quantities. It whirled slowly, diabolically, sending out balls of fire that exploded in erratic fashion, as if mislaunched by some drunken fireworks engineer; these fireballs collided with a muffled crash, now mated, now drowned in unison, sucked in by even larger fl ames that, twisting this way and that, looked like the dragons’ tongues I had seen in an art book illustrated with ancient Chinese prints. And in the midst of all that rabid activity, where bubbles the size of tree trunks swelled, then popped almost instantaneously, and rocks of various caliber were being hurled in the air, there flowed what appeared to be continuous streams of blood. At a certain point amid all the hurtling debris, I thought I recognized, first, a giant octopus wriggling madly as if each one of its tentacles had a life of its own, and then the head of an insect, enlarged a millionfold, fl ashing its globose eyes. A moment later, against the crater’s opposite wall, the bust of a woman suddenly materialized, dwarfing everything else. It eerily reminded me of the beheaded Venus de Milo. You’d have thought you were witnessing a carnival of ghosts, who, tired of their lackluster aspect, had swapped their diaphanous garb for
billowing clothes in the brilliant colors of the rainbow.
Suddenly, I felt terribly hot; frightened, I imagined that the flames were going to invade the cabin and draw our Cessna inexorably into the vortex. Beads of sweat trickled along my temples, mixed with tears, for I was sure now that it was only a matter of seconds before the volcano would gulp us. I heard myself scream at Rupert, “Take us away! Take us away! I don’t want to die.” His face, ruddy by nature, turned a vivid purple, as if licked by a treacherous fl ame lashing out of the magma. I saw his mouth tighten into a devilish grin.
At this point of the story I draw a blank, for I must have fallen into a semi-coma. When I opened my eyes again, a totally different landscape unfolded beneath me. Hills of tender green alternated with darker clumps of trees. Then I saw—miracle of miracles—pastures, where cows grazed and a few stray horses frolicked. Had we left Africa? I wondered in disbelief. But before I could fix my gaze, the scenery had changed again. The savannah once more spread out before me, ubiquitous, unappeasable, like some galloping swell that would stop for no barrier and that might even roll beyond the horizon. It was dotted with cacti of various sizes and shapes, some ferociously spiked like knotty fists clenched towards an imaginary enemy. Then there were the isolated clusters of shrubs that would sometimes get drawn into a dense thicket, and the gallery-forests that resembled clumps of bonsai with, here and there, euphorbias pointing skyward. It was a strange symphony of hues in faded greens, sapped ochres, and pale yellows, as if some divine hand had dropped an acid drizzle every night while we humans and most of the animal world slept, washing away all of the original colors.
We soon caught sight of a big herd of buffaloes, all trotting in the direction of the same waterhole. This is how I had pictured nature in the tropics: somewhat more savage than the Katanga brush (yet without its scarring termite hills that could look either
rachitic or else bloated like the paunch of a mastodon, visible the moment you left the suburbs of Elisabethville) and peopled with feral wild beasts that you would encounter in flocks and that could, at times, reach several hundreds of individuals, if not more.
Rupert gradually lost altitude so we could admire the scenery and, for a while, we skimmed over the savannah. A swarm of pelicans had just installed themselves in two acacia trees, their immaculate white plumage lending an air of festivity. They appeared so innocuous in spite of their large numbers. Minutes later, the huts of a native village skittered under our wing. “We’re approaching Rutshuru, our first stop,” announced
Rupert with glee.
We readied ourselves to land on a narrow track of grass the size of a postage stamp. A dirt road, flanked by a few banana shrubs alternating with a scattering of kapok trees, was now leading to the tiny aerodrome waiting to receive us.
Rutshuru was a small town, almost a hamlet, rimmed by a forest of eucalyptus trees from which emanated that heady, almost violent odor already familiar to me, but which, here, was even more pregnant since the temperature was somewhat cooler
than in Goma. Now and then, you could detect the subtle waft of mimosa or frangipani fl ower. As in all the other towns and villages of Kivu, the gardens here were lush with a variety of plants and fl owers. Strelitzias, the so aptly named ‘birds of paradise’, hyacinths, Cape marigolds, and lilies of the Nile, fl aunting their dazzling white and blue
corollas, vied with hydrangeas and orchids, the noblest of them all, but also with streams of dahlias in a stupendous range of colors, with tulips, carnations, rosebushes, as well as with the impressive, albeit odorless, carmin arums. There was also the ubiquitous, yet always splendid, bougainvillea, embracing the whole gamut of hues from pale pink to mauve interspersed with flaming reds, oranges, and purples. This orgy of shapes, colors, and perfumes, to which I was totally unaccustomed, made my head reel and my teeth gnash.
In the old grey Dodge that served as our taxi, with its threadbare seats, rusty metallic smell, and recently washed windows, I felt somewhat claustrophobic, as if I had suddenly fallen into a moving bunker onto which, through some quirky circumstance,
wheels had been grafted. That oppressiveness was accentuated by the slightly musky odor emanating from the three men. It was like opening an ancient pharmacy, one neglected for years, and whose contact with your own body struck a new alchemy.
Since it was still daytime, Rupert suggested that we leave our luggage at the hotel and start exploring the town and its surroundings immediately, always in the company of our driver, Christostome, who would be our guide during our short stay in
the region. The latter asked us whether we would be attending the Mwami’s fête—Mwami being the name given to a Tutsi chief or king—that was going to take place in a couple of days, with lots of merry-making, eating, and dancing. The Tutsi were presumed to descend from a Nilotic tribe. And, indeed, with their dark, lustrous skin and refi ned features, they bore a striking resemblance to the inhabitants of Ancient Egypt. What’s more, being long-limbed and usually quite slender, they were a very tall folk—apparently the tallest of our planet—often reaching six feet in height.
Talking of the Mwami, Chrisostome said, as if on cue, that we absolutely must meet with Ndeze, the ‘Sage of Rutshuru’, or that we ought at least to honor him with a brief visit, since he was the town’s dean. All who came here and spent time in this part of Kivu, whether famous or not, made a point of paying the man their respects. This long list included the governor of the province, the chiefs of the neighboring tribes, businessmen from both the colony and the mother country, and especially the Belgian royalty, who happened to pass through here during their offi cial visits. Thus had Ndeze been greeted by King Albert the First, later on by his son, King Léopold the Third, and their respective wives, the revered Queen Elisabeth and the lovely Queen Astrid. He had also known the young and very shy Prince Baudouin, whom the natives affectionately called ‘Bwana Kitoko’, meaning the ‘handsome bachelor’ in Kiswahili. Among the honored guests, there had also been the dashing Karim, who would become the future Aga Khan, head of the Ismaelites, a large community in East Africa. With the passing of time, the Sage of Rutshuru had gained an almost mythical reputation. Did he not encapsulate, within his person, the ancestral memory