To Follow Drums in the Dark
At 11PM the drumming began from a distance and immediately I left off boiling water and impulsed my urge to the front door and out. Walking over the deserted, unlit school grounds, the dimmest moonbeams the sole additional sentry, I paused for minutes I know not how many listening to the drum. Alive, crests and troughs like the beat of a distant heart that was now near, now far, in stark opposition to my stock still stance. This pause, irresolute but leaning, finally gave way. I toppled down the valley path, lone sentry dimly lighting a rutted path which led in the direction of the home of the doctor of local medicine I had met week before.
Visions of African tribesmen guarding a sacred event, widely known to locals but unknown to me, provided the perfect adrenaline rush. Heightened sense only assisted as I crossed the valley’s river, momentarily losing the beat, slowly plodding but somewhat comforted by the drum’s disguise for my clumsy feet when, climbing higher, it’s pulse resumed. No flashlight, secrecy at a premium. Sound bouncing all around- individual voices now audible- still, thick darkness- several false hopes dashed, firefly fueled as their light hints at a glimpse through the darkness but crashes down at odd angles too quick and erratic to become stray light from that primordial scene.
Would it be a dart in the neck? A sudden, unexpected death blow in the back of the head? Perhaps a net in which I would be immobilized and carried by 6 war-painted standard bearers, struggling helplessly while carried to the heart. None yet, I continued unperturbed. Arriving at the open entrance to the doctor’s compound, I stood stock still. Truly unobserved? So it seemed. At least pausing here posed no harm, I had crossed no brink. But then I entered, drawn deep away from that lone entrance and enclosed by tall brick walls on all sides. Yet, unseen! Deep into the compound I traveled, passing two buildings, entering an abandoned courtyard framed by single family homes. Through the alley between two came a flickering light and the pulse. Would I wait by the edge of the fire, slowly emerging, like the uncouth dancer of junior high, slowly inching away from comfort towards that enigmatic event? Or would offense be taken at my intrusion, harsh words, unremittable once spoken by that man, be spoken, ostracizing me, or worse. For surely, though told that “Tanzanians are a friendly people” this was a tribal practice, done under cover of darkness.
The witch doctor whose compound I entered seemed to have no formal medical training.  From what I only might have caught in Swahili, he had stopped attending the equivalent of a technical training school because of unbearable migraines, and now saw “20-30” villagers each day regarding their various illnesses. I was now stumbling over, now brushing up against the very plants he had explained to me in broken and therefore all the less convincing English, were use to “make more blood: if you get cut and lose a lot” and “headaches.” Ought I turn back now, possibly unseen, and subtly ask on another such sane, sunlit visit, about the drumming? Then, with a prophetic assurance surely lost upon him given the language barrier but reaffirming my own natural affinity for such rites, let drop, “I’m drawn to them as an insect to light” and hope for an invitation. Another lengthy pause, dead still, not so much looking about to know that I was unobserved as feeling it. Another head first plunge. Around the single brick building and now a hut comes in view, thatch roof, the fire of a lantern striping the scene as some failed to escape while others were caught up to glow in the thin reeds of its wall. The sound now deafening, I passed dangerously close to line of site through the hut’s doorway but successfully edged my way around the hut. Now a mere foot from its walls, the flailing voices unintelligible yet bespeaking the mysteries of an ancient tongue for their confident rhythms, small moving scenes, far too small to complete the puzzle, presented themselves through the gaps in the reeds. Scrambled, but unable to be pieced together, and now me, scrambling, low to the ground, moving, confident, suddenly, certain, I ought not be here.
To boldly enter and be welcomed or slayed in open sight on the threshold, that was one matter. To enter the man’s compound and be spotted peeping in like some perverse Victorian anthropologist, spotted through the reeds, glasses glinting giving glare, how inglorious! So, squatting on haunches, suddenly and hideously horrified by this sudden knowledge, paralyzed, I merely looked on. Never having been convinced of stories wherein the protagonist plays the prominent role hidden by a mere tapestry, or watches unbeknownst with a single beady greedy eye through knot-hole, chink, or cranny, certain that anyone clever enough to speak would eventually, probably sooner, expand his field of vision to note even that single, small, greedy little eye, especially as for the plot to be interesting the observed must be hatching some nefarious plot which would warrant inspection of the environment for stray eye balls.
So I sat, crouched, unwilling to risk, nay, condemn myself to being caught by cleverly repositioning so as to observe, yet uncertain that retreat would be possible, successful. Man of Action as ever, I went for it, walking straight away, feet muffled and timed to the tumultuous voice and drum. Crossing line of sight with my own back turned, I continued on, as though, if the music had ceased at that moment, the drum beat a sour note, an indignant cry arise among those present, I would merely continue on my path, oblivious to their business, until they caught up with me, tapped me on the shoulder, and I might say, turning, “What? Me? Yes, yes, I’m just out for a stroll. What, what? This notebook and these pens? No, no I wasn’t watching uninvited. How ridiculous that would be!” Which would certainly need to occur in Swahili, or, worse for me, in some tribal language, either way rendering it fantasy, abject speculation, but, as so often happens in situations where one turns one’s back on the feelings and impulses of those one may have offended, unnoticed, this putative offense remained unpunished. Unhasty retreat, apparently unseen, in fact, for the entire hour and a half journey, was made, and I remain whole, intact, and ready to address any beady greedy eyes that may have seen me squatting in the bushes, blinked in disbelief about this stranger lurking about at a time when everyone ought to be asleep.

Feeling Very White

Riding by homes on the twisting dirt road, up and down hills, through valleys, and over wood planked bridges the men and women he passes look up from tilling the fields to stare as the white man on the bike passes their home. If he can do it safely, given the dilapidated, seat-less, borrowed, unloved bicycle he pedals and its single semi-functional brake, he adjusts the habitually starboard leaning helmet his overly concerned organization forces upon his head, and attempts to maintain balance while thrusting one arm in the air, quickly, by way of greeting. Their flock of small children, typically no less than four to a man, but sometimes as many as ten (though in such cases, he would point out that such quantity typically indicates several wives, who may work the same farm), stare in dumbfounded amazement, jaw dropping. If able to recover in time they offer the respectful greeting “Shikamoo” to which he invariably replies, “Marahaba.” And though he begins the word on a high note, by the time he has covered its multisyllabic length, his strength has already waned, his voice takes on a tired quality. Perhaps the oft-spoken word has already lost its novelty. Perhaps he believes that a respectful greeting should not force him to play tired games, repeating the same response to each individual’s “Shikamoo,” no less than four but sometimes as many as ten times.
He greets everyone he passes here, at minimum the lifted arm as he whips down a steep hill with clenched teeth, sometimes even a full wave, if safety permits and the peasants have paused in their work, looking on from rows of crops with particular curiosity. Invariably they wave back. He may truly be the first white person some of the children have seen, and sighting him likely would not put some of the adults in double digits. Sometimes his presence seems unremarkable. Sometimes it causes a bit of a stir. At the first village soccer game he attended in a nearby village, poorly disguised surprise lit his face when, turning around from his position on the sideline, his eyes met no less than 80, gathered in pairs and gazing intently. They were so curious! But what they are thinking, what goes through their minds, remains an intriguing mystery to him.
One afternoon the situation forced him to walk the 10 km (harder it seems, given the landscape) to visit the nearest white person. Passing through one village, the road widened out and was lined by small buildings and shops one deep on both sides. The dusty dirt road, tightly shuttered and shackled shops (most likely the owners were working their land, as such small shops are insufficient in themselves to make a living), flight of children, and their gaze through crevices after reaching fortified positions; the way in which every eye fell to staring at him; made him feel as though he had entered a Western and ought to have had pistols on each hip, ready for a showdown.