Javier Salazar Calle - Ndura. Son Of The Forest

I must have slept about two hours in small intervals of fifteen or twenty minutes. The noises harassed me from all directions, I couldn't stop hearing footsteps, voices, cries, squawks, acute shrieks, humming sounds, whispers, and a constant murmur that increased and decreased incessantly. I even thought I heard the agonized cries of a child several times and elephants trumpeting. I didn't know if it could all be true or if it simply was all in my head. From time to time I heard a disquieting roar that made me imagine that some wild beast was devouring me in my sleep. At times, the anguish prevented me from breathing, I felt a pinching sensation in my heart until it almost hurt for real. Each sound, each movement, each thing that happened around me was like torture, a sensation of immediate suffocation. As soon as I managed to fall asleep, something occurred, forcing me to wake up scared. Sometimes I saw eyes shining in the gloomy night and, in an effort to cheer myself, I imagined that it was only an owl or something from that family of birds that could be found in this area, but those attempts to try and maintain a positive attitude only lasted a little while, then I always ended up seeing felines with unscrupulous intentions or some dangerous hunting serpent. Other times, I heard shots nearby, intermittent bursts, but if I listened carefully, I wasn't able to hear a thing.

“Javier” I heard Alex calling me.

“Yes, where are you?” I said waking up startled.

“Javier” I heard again.

I looked in all directions, distressed, eager, and anxious to see my friend. Until I realized that Alex was dead and that I was alone and without any help, in the middle of the forest. That scared me, not to be able to count on anybody for help, someone with whom I could share my current pain, my desperation. I couldn't let panic take over, I had to expel the bad thoughts from my head to be able to survive, but I was incapable. A suffocating sensation of loneliness forced me to be even more overcome by fear.

“Javier, Javier.”

All during the night his call was constant, inquisitive, inviting. I would have gone with him, if I had known where to go.

HOW I DISCOVERED THE WONDERS OF THE FOREST

“No, don't kill him!” I shouted, convulsively shaking which made me fall off the tree and hit the ground with a thud.

I shook myself from one side to the other, fleeing from my own ghosts, ignoring the pain caused by the fall. I looked all around me totally disoriented and I remained momentarily still, crouched, moaning like a wounded animal. While I rubbed my sore back I realized that it was only a nightmare, a very real nightmare, since I had dreamed that I was reliving Juan's death, the airplane crash, and again I held Alex's inert body in my hands. Drops of sweat fell from my forehead, my hands were shaking. I took deep breaths for a while then I decided to move on. I only wished to move as far away from the airplane as I could, where I had lost a part of my life. My past was terrible and my future looked grim.

My back hurt a lot probably because of the position I had slept in, or the fall or both at once and I felt a little under the weather. I climbed back up the tree while I was still whining, to get the backpacks and I realized that the backpack that had the food was missing. The jolt from the surprise almost knocked me off the tree again. Without that backpack there was nothing to do. I was scared, I looked for it between the branches and, when I thought that I would never find it, I saw that it had fallen on the ground with all its content sprawled around. I had probably thrown it myself, dragging it in my fall or when I moved at night. I got down carefully with the other backpack on my shoulder and gathered everything that I was able to locate: three soft drink cans, a cold cut sandwich, and some half eaten cookies, full of ants, a box with packets of salt to use in salads and the two boxes, which turned out to be quince. The rest had disappeared, I supposed that the animals had taken them. I came to a conclusion that it had fallen during the night.

I decided to make an inventory of everything I had, to see what could be useful and throw away the things that weren't. It made no sense to be carrying useless weight and I needed to know what means I had at my disposal. In my backpack, apart from the food, I found the knife that I had bought my father, all the wood figurines, a travel guide of Central Africa, a pack of tissues, 8x30 binocular, a khaki cloth cap and an "I love Namibia" t-shirt. From the medicine kit I still had a half-empty aspirin box, a whole box of anti-diarrheal, a bandage, three band-aids and a few anti-motion-sickness pills. And documentation of course. In Juan's backpack, there was also his documentation and, in addition, the three airplane blankets and one pillow, a small book with Swahili sentences, his sunglasses, a hat, chocolate bars, an almost empty one liter plastic bottle of water, a fork, a big wood figurine of an elephant and several smaller ones, an almost full pack of cigarettes and a lighter.

I couldn't take the two backpacks, so I put everything in mine, which was in better shape, except one of the blankets, the pillow that occupied a lot of space and all the wood figurines, useless in this place; I buried and covered them with trash. While I was throwing some of the things, I remembered the people who they belonged to; to Elena, to my family, my friends, Alex, Juan, it didn't take me much to start crying again, I would never see them anymore, none of them. Well I would see Alex and Juan soon, in heaven or wherever one goes after death.

The chocolate bars were completely melted by the heat, I ate them at once, cleaning the wrapper with my tongue until there was no trace of it left. They tasted like heaven. I also drank what little water was left in the bottle. At that moment, I realized that I had to stop for a minute to think about what my next step would be. Some questions arose in my mind: Do the rebels know I survived? Where do I have to go now?

I had no answer for my first question. Perhaps they had obtained a confession from one of the passengers who had seen me, maybe they checked the area and found my trail or the can that I threw on the ground after drinking it (that had been a huge mistake, even though at that moment I was only thinking about running away), perhaps they were on all sides and they would find me anyway, or maybe they didn't know a thing. Anyway, from now on, I had to try to be more careful and to leave the least possible trails anywhere I went.

Regarding the direction where I was headed, I seemed to recall that from the airplane, during the vertiginous landing, I saw that there was a town in the horizon, in a huge clearing in the woods. What I didn't know was if it was the rebels’ base or what, but it was very probable that it would be, since it was very close to where they had attacked us from. Since we were going from the South of Africa toward the North, I reasoned that if I kept going North, I would arrive at the end of the forest, to another country, and I would have more possibilities of finding help. I really missed my friends a lot right now! Alex's overflowing enthusiasm, optimism and joy would have come in handy just about now, and Juan's cold analytical capacity, his serenity and his decision making skills when confronted with a situation. Oh how I needed their company right now, to give me enough courage to confront this unavoidable unsought challenge that presented itself to me! This would have been much easier with them, even an adventure that I would tell upon my return; but they were dead, assassinated, exterminated without mercy, like annoying flies, annihilated in the best years of their lives... and I had to survive despite everything. Assholes, sons of...! Relax, Javier, relax, I had to try to keep calm, it was my only option to have some chance. Alright, the Sun is supposed to rise in the East and set in the West, so if it had risen more or less from this side... it would have to set in that direction. If with that system of orientation I arrived somewhere, it would not be through ability, but a miracle. Anyway, to be sure, I carefully climbed up one of the highest trees I could see.