Iringa, Tanzania February 2016
I am up early but already a slim young man is waiting for me by the reception. He introduces himself as Isam, Modest’s brother. We set off on foot to Gangilonga (the Talking Rock), where Chief Makwawa meditated. It’s not a long walk through the leafy suburbs and then up a hillside path. Birds are stirring and starting to sing and Isam identifies them by song, including a Yellow-breasted Apalis, a new one for me. We see it, a colourful little warbler hopping around in a tree. I am impressed and Isam is delighted. Tiny colourful finches fly up as we walk on – Cordon-bleus, Mannikins and Firefinches. We meet a tortoise and then we are at the rock. The ticket booth is abandoned so we climb on up and soon are sitting on the lovely granite surface enjoying the panorama. Below us is a chequer board of houses, gardens and fields; further off we can see the town center and all around the larger rocky slopes of the mountains.
Isam is a keen ornithologist and has fallen in love with my binoculars, so we take turns using them to look at birds and to spy on the town below us. A small Falcon, a Kestrel, floats past and sinks down to the fields and houses below ; Red-throated Widowbirds are making display flights off a Mango tree in a garden far below. It’s a lovely place to just hang out and we do so for about an hour. Isam is at the start of his career as a guide and is very keen to learn more about birds, so we stop on the way back at marshy pond and do some “proper” birding. We see quite a few species, but then a pale morph Booted Eagle steals the show, hunting low along the hillside. Isam has never seen one before so I explain how to identify it and that there is a dark morph too.
Back at the hotel my favorite manageress informs me that she has managed things so I can stay on (they had been fully booked); I tell her she is wonderful, Tanzania is wonderful. Isam and I are waiting outside for a car to pick us up when a dark morph Booted Eagle circles overhead! The bird-watching spirits are smiling on us today.
A van picks us up and we drive to Kalenga, Makwawa’s fortified capital during the Wahehe war against the Germans in the 19th century, now the site of a small museum and the resting place of his much-travelled skull. The Germans had removed the heroic chief’s severed head and kept it in the Bremen Anthropological Museum. In spite of a clause in the Versailles Treaty stipulating its return, it was not until 1954 that it was finally recovered.
The museum is a pretty little building in a much cared for garden. The curator and (of course) a yellow dog meet us at the entrance. There is a single room, with a lot of things inside. The walls are covered with copies of old photographs and documents. Sadly, there are no photos of Makwawa himself or of the dramatic events of the rebellion he led; nobody was around with a camera at that time. There are old guns and spears, a splendid cow-hide shield and two special boxes used to transport the skull. A stool and a wicker bowl used by the great man and a copy of the 4 cornered medicine pot used for divining the enemy’s intentions. And, of course, in place of honour, the skull.
Suitably humbled we leave, not before admiring a truly lovely patchwork tapestry of traditional village life. Back in town I ask the driver to drop me off near the market . I head for a bookshop I had seen the other day, in search of reading material for my planned lazy day tomorrow. I am hoping to find some African novel or a scholarly treatise on Tanzania; alas, there are shelves and shelves of text books, from Oxford Dictionaries to Tanzanian Tax Law (parts 1-6), but only a few abridged plays by Ibsen for “literature”; But I am in luck. I find a single volume that stands out from the shiny schoolbooks. It has a bright red rooster on the cover and is titled:”Human Sacrifice and the Supernatural in African History”. Not exactly what I had in mind but irresistible; I purchase it and go off to have some lunch.
In the afternoon Isam, the driver and I head North on the Dodoma road and turn off at a sign reading “Igeleke Ancient Rock Paintings” . We pass through maize and vegetable patches leading to a small village shaded by tall Eucalyptus trees. Children in blue and white uniforms are just out from school and are hanging around and playing along the track, in no big hurry to get home.
We drive on out in to the open country beyond the village and stop by a hill with a large boulder on top. After a brief discussion with the driver Isam explains to me that neither of them have been here before, we could go back to the village and get a guide or figure it out on our own. I like the idea of the guide, so far these have always been nice people; going local has worked well for me. So we turn back not before enjoying some good views of a handsome Augur Buzzard perched on the big boulder (which later turned out to be the Rock-painting site). Back at the village we sit in the shade while Isam calls the guide and receives instructions to proceed to the site where he will meet us shortly. 
We drive back to where we were before, find the path and Isam and I make our way up the hill to the huge overhanging rock at its summit. To my (slight) embarrassment and (great) relief Isam has not only appropriated my binoculars but also carries my backpack . We meet a couple of workers laying foundations for a fence to protect the site and after discovering a large leech in one of their water buckets (I pick it up, much to their amusement), we pass through the fence and reach the huge overhanging rock. And there are the paintings : giraffes, Elephants, Maize plants, a Buffalo and all sorts of shapes and patterns in red and black. A rock Martin has a nest just above and higher up in a crack are Swift’s nests. We sit under a tree and wait.
We have almost forgotten what we are doing here when a short, middle-aged man in an immaculate green safari-suit pops out of the bush. Hardly pausing for breath he announces “My name is Ngulinzira” and launches into a lengthy explanation of the subtle meanings of this name. I don’t quite understand the explanation, but am captivated by Mr.Ngulinzira’s enthusiasm . I’m not even puzzled by his outfit (he is also wearing very shiny city shoes). Only later we discover that he is the chairman of the local NGO that cares for this site and the small nature reserve surrounding it; when he received our call he was in the middle of a board meeting and he came straight over, climbed the hill and here he his.
We get an explanation about the paintings and Mr.N mischievously points out a copy they made in modern oil-paint a few years ago – it is almost totally washed away while the ancient iron-oxide pigments, bonded with the rock look almost new . We go for a walk around the 56 acre reserve barely keeping up with the bubbly Mr.N as he skips up and down boulders and steep paths. We come to a stunning view over the surrounding countryside; “Do you have places like this in your country?” he asks. I can’t really explain that I don’t really have a country, but say that where I live, in Belgium, we would see a lot more roads, cars, buildings and it would probably be raining. How can I explain what this landscape does to me? I gush a bit about what a beautiful land this is and how wonderful what people like him are doing is etc. I get a big smile, “Karibu”.
We walk on and seeing me taking picture of flowers he gets on to the subject of bees; the rest of our walk is a tour of the multi-function bee-hives he has set up around the perimeter of the reserve: they keep cattle out and generate an income for the reserve. They are the apple of Mr.N’s Ecological eye. Really a remarkable (and very entertaining!) man.
Back at the car he sells me a ticket (equivalent of 5$ to which I add substantially, resisting the urge to dump the entire contents of my wallet into his hands) and I sign the guest book which is what he has been carrying around the whole time in his little green bag. Grass-roots conservation at its best!
