Page 13 - IFV Issue 5 May 2024

Humour

SURVIVAL WITHOUT A CAKE FORK

BY JAMES CLARKE
he invitation, in green ink, was I realised he was using the “royal we” safari lodge for the night; and how to
on recycled paper made from because he then disappeared – rushing prepare warthog liver garnished with
Tpreviously recycled paper which off, I suspect, to the nearest French dung beetle larvae and a side plate of
had originally been made from elephant restaurant – to reappear, burping, only bladderwort and hoof scrapings.
dung. Environmentally terribly friendly when the course ended. The wilds, he said, were like a
though it was, I instructed Threnody We were left facing his subaltern supermarket stacked with good things.
Higginbottom (she’s my secretary – a lean man who looked us over You just help yourself. The lions, of
y’know. I call her Miss Smith) to decline it. sympathetically. Some participants, course, feel the same way and also
The invitation was to spend a week separated from their cigarette lighters metaphorically push their trolleys along
in the bush on one of those survival for the first time since they were looking for the meat counter.
courses where one goes without cake 12, stood with trembling lower lips. Our guide knew his stuff – like how to
forks. Nowadays a lot of people, including beat off mosquitoes and elephants. He
I went on one once and survived. They grown men, whimper when parting knew how to find his way by the stars or
give you your money back if you fail. with their cell phones. the sun and how to suck pebbles when
A dozen people paid good folding I recall it was growing dark and little one is dying of thirst. We learned to
money to spend a week learning how to night sounds were intruding, like the find water by observing the direction in
survive on food from the veld. This saves grunt of a (hungry) lion. which doves and sandgrouse flew in the
the organisers a great deal on catering. Somebody, reasonably, asked about late afternoon when they seek water. We
On arrival in the bush we shuffled our a fire. Somebody else observed, “You’ve made fishing lines out of bark and hooks
feet like recruits on their first day in the taken all our lighters!” Somebody else from thorns. And caught fish that tasted
French Foreign Legion. We were forced said: “I think you should know I am a like industrial sludge.
to dump our shaving kits and underarm lawyer and so is my cousin.” “Oh goody!” said somebody who
deodorants, half-jacks, cell phones, jelly Our guide was unmoved. He said claimed his cousin was Angela Day,
babies, worry beads, All Bran and bottles fast food was available – fast food like “caterpillar soup again!”
of Pinotage which all went into storage impala. The trick was to catch them. As Meals ended with coffee from the
until the end of the course. for fire... he scouted around for suitable witgat. Witgat coffee is as different from
The proprietor said: “We have all just sticks to rub together. It transpired he Nescafé as wildebeest droppings are
survived a plane crash in a remote part used to teach army commandos how to different from hot cross buns.
of Africa. That’s our situation. All we have survive by eating each other. I declined the invitation to do the
is what we stand in. For the next week, He was to show us how to make fire course again because I am no good at
we will survive on what we get from the as well as, by using twigs and grass, this survival thing. I can’t even suck a
bush.” we could build a five star thatched pebble for long without chewing it.

The Villager • Issue 5 2024 • 11