Horror Has A Face

"We went with this crazy hippy guy. He was working for the Dian Fossey Fund. We were trying to find this mine, and we needed him because apparently there are soldiers. And... basically he's Dennis Hopper out of Apocalypse Now! And I thought, oh what are we doing? Eventually, yes, we ran out of water.”

- Steve McQueen CBE 

I can’t sleep. But, as I toss and turn, it’s not the usual nocturnal hubbub keeping me awake. I survey my surroundings, which lack the traditional safari lodge trappings. No hot-water bottle between the sheets here. No rainfall shower with rainforest view. No cricket-serenaded verandah, lit only by flickering hurricane lamps. My sleeping arrangement is a Yucatan hammock suspended beneath a thatch-roofed hut to which mud has yet to be applied.

I’m in the middle of the jungle, but the sound of the forest is completely imperceptible. It's being drowned out by the din of a dozen transistor radios playing half a dozen different rhumbas, over the chatter of young men bragging and old men haranguing, and the shrill laughter of prostitutes resounding through the high canopy, like the cries of mating tree hyraxes. Smoke pervades everything; there's no shortage of fuelwood.

I’m guiding a British film crew through the jungle to shoot 35mm film of a coltan mine. And we’re spending the night in a remote mining camp, a hamlet of ragtag thatch huts and lean-to’s spread out across a two-acre forest clearing, about 35 kilometers southeast of Walikale in Congo’s South Kivu province. 

As a gorilla safari guide, my usual stomping ground is the Albertine Rift, a massive longitudinal cluster of volcanoes, lakes and forests that forms Congo’s eastern border with Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania. Lush, mountainous, and rich in biodiversity, this dangling string of emeralds and pearls is where most of the primate habitats in East and Central Africa are situated. No less than ten Albertine national parks and reserves offer permits to track chimpanzees and gorillas.  

Hence, I’m feeling somewhat anxious in this dissonant corner of the Congo River Basin. It’s not my usual habitat. And, despite the racket, there are no other people for miles in any direction beyond our camp. People we know about, that is. It’s easy to imagine unseen forces moving through the tangled darkness, taking up positions, planning their next move.

The director, camera operator and cinematographer are all fast asleep now, each in their own pup tent, having been zipped up since dusk. Not me. I’m wide awake in the midnight hour, eyes darting in every direction. And, as the restless miners move around their camp, casting phantasmagoric shadows about my wooden cage with their torchlights, I begin to wonder if maybe I really am Denis Hopper out of Apocalypse Now!!

----

There is probably a company of rebel soldiers nearby, remnants of the Interahamwe perhaps, or Congolese Mai Mai rebels. I know they’re out there somewhere. Before we set out on our expedition, we visited a UN peacekeeping base on a hillside above Walikale, and met the base commander, a Brahmin wearing his tennis whites who’s name I've forgotten. “Things are really going well here now,” he told us, “we patrol the Kisangani Highway on a daily basis.”  The paved bit, which is barely 50 kilometers long, in a jungle as vast as Afghanistan. 

Much preparation had gone into the trip. As the director of a gorilla conservation organisation, with an office in Goma, I was able to start in poll position. Two decades of traveling through the region, and a childhood spent living in various African countries also helped keep things on track. Nonetheless, one can never know enough about the next safari destination.

To understand Congo’s current problems, I read about its colonial history, in particular the period of King Leopold’s Congo Free State, 1885-1908. No one recounts this time more concisely than Thomas Pakenham in his seminal tome, The Scramble for Africa. Dogeared copies turn up in the libraries of some of the remotest lodges, and anyone who’s travelled through Africa will have likely read a chapter or two. It's a dizzying account of the period of rapid colonisation, between 1884 and 1904, when European powers jostled to carve up Africa for themselves.  

In the chapter entitled “An Ivory War,” Pakenham chronicles the little-known military campaign between the Belgians and Arabs, involving “cannibal armies,” which was fought on Congo’s Lualaba and Lomami rivers, not far from our present location.

Arthur Hodister, an eccentric Belgian trader in the Congo, emerges as the chapter’s most colourful character. He’s believed to be one of the real-life personalities on whom Joseph Conrad based his villain Mr Kurtz, in Heart of Darkness, which is set in turn-of-the-century Congo. Hodister, who was known for his sybaritic tastes and compassion for the natives, was a remarkably successful ivory trader. “He did not bully or beat the stuff out of the natives, like most of the international riff-raff employed as traders on the Congo,” writes Pakenham, “He charmed the ivory out of them.”

Charm couldn’t save him in the end though when, like so many foreigners who tried to make their fortunes in the Congo, he came to a grisly end:

“He was shot or speared with his companions, and the four heads were sent Nserara. Their bodies were eaten. Then the same fate was dealt out to the last of Hodister’s agents in the field, Pierret, at his base in Lomo, on the upper Lomami. The survivors fled down the Lualaba in a nightmare flight back towards the Falls, losing two more men from fever. Another agent went mad and drowned himself. By the end of May, nothing was left of Hodisgter’s expedition but his prancing Arab horse and some scattered human bones.”

The site of Hodister’s assassination, on 15 May 1890, an act that triggered the Belgian Arab War, is about two hundred and fifty kilometres south west of our mining camp. Four hundred kilometres south east of us is Kigali, where a little over a century later, on 6 April 1994, the plane carrying Rwandese President Habyarimana was shot down, triggering the Rwandan Genocide, which led to the current instabilities in the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

“Can we meet a rebel group?” asked Steve McQueen, sipping his tea. He is a large, buttoned-down man, in his late-thirties, with boyish charm and a preference for a Brideshead style that somewhat belies his West Indian heritage. We met to discuss the filming expedition on a cold January morning over breakfast at the American Hotel, near his home in Amsterdam.

“It would be risky,” I replied, “but we may encounter Mai Mai rebels whether we like it or not. A Channel 4 crew were recently held hostage by an errant general in South Kivu for three days. I think it would be better if we try to set something up on the hop, rather than alert anyone to our imminent arrival. ”

It was while researching his next film that McQueen came across a reference to me, as I had been leading a campaign to mitigate the impact coltan mining was having on the endangered Eastern lowland gorillas in South Kivu. I was contacted by his assistant Pinky Ghundale, who arranged our meeting in Amsterdam.

With this next film, the Turner prize-winning film director said he wanted to show the striking parallels between the 21^st Century “coltan rush,” fueled by increased demand for consumer electronics, and the 19^th Century rubber boom, when the Congo was similarly exploited to feed industrial demand in Europe and America, by forcing destitute Congolese to work under brutal conditions and in primordial surroundings. This was the stuff that inspired Joseph Conrad to write Heart of Darkness.

In Apocalypse Now!, Francis Ford Coppola’s movie about the Vietnam War based on Conrad’s Heart of Darkness, a brooding Captain Willard (Martin Sheen), having just accepted his mission to assassinate Colonel Kurtz (Marlin Brando), rasps, “Shit... charging a man with murder in this place was like handing out speeding tickets in the Indy 500.”

The same could be said of the arrest warrants issued to Congolese warlords by the International Criminal Court in The Hague. It's difficult to find a military officer from any of the many sides of this conflict who hasn't at some point recruited child soldiers, intimidated the innocent, or been involved in dodgy mineral dealings.  

Like Kurtz, the warlords’ methods may be unsound, but their modus operandi is hardly original. Central African warfare has always been brutal. The Jagas, a band ferocious 16^th Century mercenary warriors who attacked the Kingdom of Kongo during the reign of Alvaro I, actively sought people to capture and sell into slavery. And the 19^th Century warlord Ngongo Lutete led an army of cannibals who devoured the entire battlefield, not only the dead but the wounded too.

Ngongo Lutete was himself a slave, having fallen into the hands of the Arabs as a child. But, impressed by his bravado during raiding expeditions, the Arab slaver Tippu Tip granted him his freedom when he was eighteen. Soon afterward Lutete amassed himself an army of brigands, whom he ruled with an iron fist. Establishing himself on the Lomami River, he steadily extended his influence westward. This brought him into constant conflict with the Belgians, compelling him to eventually switch sides and fight against his former Arab masters.

I came across a description of Lutete in The Fall of the Congo Arabs by Dr Sydney Hinde, a British military medical officer and captain in the Congo Free State forces: “He was a well-built intelligent- looking man of about 5 ft. 9 in. in height, with a brown skin, large brown eyes with very long lashes, a small mouth with thin lips, and a straight, comparatively narrow nose. His hands were his most remarkable characteristic; they were curiously supple, with long narrow fingers, which when outstretched had always the top joint slightly turned back.”

Hinde’s book reads like a contemporary account of jungle warfare. And for anyone in doubt about how long Congo’s children have been caught up in its conflicts, his description of how the Belgians enlisted boy-soldiers is quite telling: 

“The Commandant instituted a very good system which we afterwards often felt the benefit of, namely, the supplying of every white man, at the State expense, with as many boy-servants as he chose to employ. These were generally savage little rascals, lately -freed slaves, and either the children of prisoners of war, or presents sent from native chiefs. Their business being to attend to the personal comfort of the whites, they rapidly acquired a certain amount of civilisation, and an absolute confidence in white men. While still quite small, they acted as interpreters in the ordinary business with natives. As soon as they were old enough and sufficiently strong— often, with good feeding, a matter of only a few months — they were given guns, and taught how to use them; thus forming a sort of bodyguard for their masters when visiting friendly native chiefs. Very quickly after having arms in their hands they asked to be allowed to become soldiers, and were then drafted into the regular force. Eventually, what was called a "boy company" was formed, and it became the smartest set of soldiers we had. ” 

Seven months and one postponement later Steve McQueen and I finally reunited in the jungle, at Walikale. Accompanying him was director of photography Sean Bobbit, and camera assistant Gordon Segrove. I brought along Henri Cirhuza to be my fixer and keep the rest of the expedition on point.

Henri’s first job when we arrived in Walikale was to organise letters of permission from the local administrator, armed guards, porters, a cook, and a priest. We needed the priest to negotiate a spot where we might pitch our tents at the end of each day, and provisions of poultry, meat and vegetables. 

Our last night of civilization was spent in the Walikale Guest House, a spartan, raw-cement, six-roomed house, with a bent nail in the doorframe of every room for security. It’s odd how the standard of sleeping arrangements, which decline the farther into the jungle you go, seem so much more luxurious on the way back. From where I’m lying, in my unfinished thatch hut, the Walikale Guest House is the bloody Hilton. 

The next morning, after a hearty breakfast of Spanish omelets and boiled potatoes, we all piled into the back of a pick-up truck and drove out of Walikale Town. No one knew quite what to expect. But we didn't think our first surprise would come so soon. After just twelve kilometers, the road completely disintegrated, forcing us to abandon our vehicle. In the confines of the equatorial forest the temperature was a sultry 35º Celsius, and it was stifling and windless.

As our human caravan of twenty-one continued on foot, the path ahead looked unpromising. Though little more than a mud track now, our route had once been the main highway between Kisangani on the banks of the Congo River, and Bukavu on the shores of Lake Kivu. The German road builders had cleared enough jungle that there was scant shelter from the oppressive, mid-morning sun. But we had little choice but to stick to this “road,” despite impassable swathes of mud and hobbling deep ruts, as the jungle beyond it was otherwise impenetrable. 

The porters ran shifts carrying the two 35mm cameras, and kept their spirits up with a medley of marching songs that they sang throughout the day. Every one we met along the way was courteous and good-natured. Children cried, “Monique! Monique!” because the only other outsiders they had ever encountered were UN peacekeepers, known locally by their mission acronym, MONUC. In every village we passed we were greeted like liberators. 

The priest did his thing and the cook his, and each day ended with a generous meal, of goat or chicken stew, potatoes, and the chef’s special: tuna fish mixed with mayonnaise and tinned spaghetti. 

I have been somewhat disappointed by the lack of chums to share my bottle of Johnny Walker Green Label, although last night Steve joined me for a wee dram. 

Every morning, as soon as we unzipped our tents, we looked upon dozens of childish faces, eagerly awaiting their chance to catch a first glimpse of the bazungu who spent the night in their village. 

It’s taken us three days, walking an average of ten kilometers a day, to reach this mining village in the middle of the jungle. We’re not in very good shape, though all our problems are self-inflicted. The cinematographer has developed a raft of horrifying blisters on his feet, the result of trudging through swamps in boots that aren’t waterproof. And we’re already down to a third of our water supply. Believing the three cubic metres that flew in with us from Goma would be enough for this expedition, I hadn’t banked on the film crew practically bathing themselves in the stuff for the first couple of days. 

I suspect Steve thinks I’m out of my depth. And truth be told, he’s not wrong. This is not my patch. Still, he came to me, and I did everything I could to prepare for this trip. Now that I find myself in these strange and unnerving surroundings, I’m beginning to have doubts. Nonetheless, I’m keen to turn the experience into a safari I can market to more conventional clients. 

A 10-DAY journey through THE CONGO BASIN JUNGLE - includes AIR CHARTERS, PERMIT FEES, ACCOMMODATION, SUPPLIES, EXPERT GUIDE, PORTERS, COOK, and PRIEST... Here you can find some of the largest swathes of undisturbed tropical rainforest on the planet. The shrill resonance of it is unrelenting and it stinks of rot and decay, but there’s no where else like it on Earth. As we progress through the jungle we will seek permission in villages to pitch our tents in their locality, and camp for the night, as well as barter for chickens and goats (all other supplies will be brought with us from Goma). All our hydration needs must be shipped in with us, as the rivers and streams we cross are by no means potable. 

A good safari is always about ease of access, coupled with the thrill of the experience. Whatever the mode of transport, be it pirogue, motorcycle, or on foot, the important thing is to ensure that the client is always comfortable. If the journey is relaxed the experience will be enjoyable, regardless of whether or not they spot that rare, endemic species they wish to shoot. If they have to fly on an Antanov sitting on sacks of potatoes, light a couple of joss sticks and toss a few throw cousins around the cabin. And stay away from the horror stories, let them find out those for themselves. 

I begin to wonder whether guiding safaris is really what I want to do for the rest of my life. Having already invested two decades in a career in gorilla conservation, I feel I’ve paid my debt to nature. I always wanted to try my hand at writing novels, but never found a decent enough storyline. Lately though, I’d been meeting some pretty strange characters and unearthing their malicious plots. Ideas were beginning to form in my head.

Day 1: Transfer (2 hrs) by chartered aircraft to Walikale. This is your first glimpse of the real jungle, and it goes on for ever. After arriving at the airport (which doubles as the main road), transfer (30 min) by car to Walikale Town. The Kisangani Highway is among only a handful of roads surviving in this vast jungle, and only patches of it remain intact. When the Belgians ruled the Congo, there were more than 100,000 kilometres of paved road. Today, there are less than 300 km. This unexpected stretch, from nowhere to nowhere, holds back a wall of ravenous vegetation ready to reclaim it in an instant. Overnight at the Walikale Guest House.

I see Henri approaching, and ask “Vipi?,” (Swahili for “What’s up?”).

“Isn’t this a bizarre place?” he answers in French. He is surprisingly quiet and unassuming for a Congolese, though a stalwart in the campaign to save Africa’s endangered gorillas. And he’s always been a reliable barometer for the security of any given destination in the Kivus. A Bashi, born and raised on the shores of Lake Kivu, he knows the territory well. Every expedition into the Congo should have its own Henri. Still, I suspect he too feels a little out of his depth.

“We should do this kind of safari more often,” I tell him.

Henri smiles. “You think you can convince others to come?”

“Probably only adventuresome types. But you don’t need to be a soldier to stay this course. Sure, you will have to endure wading through swamps, trudging through mud, plenty of bush-whacking, and swarms of insects. Portable mosquito nets and waterproof footwear are a must. There’ll be nowhere to plug in your gadgets. Everything will be basic, just as it is now. On this circuit there’ll be no safari chic, only the thrill of knowing you’re the first one to follow it.”

“The Kivus could certainly use some tourist dollars,” sighed Henri. "Right now, it's only minerals, minerals, minerals."

“Of course we’ll need some interesting activities for them do...” I throw a few ideas at him.

Day 6: Transfer (3 hrs) by inflatable raft to Amasunga, where the river drops 22 meters over 60 kilometers, for a spot of white water rafting on the Luhuho. The thrills and spills of half a dozen cataracts, in such a remote wilderness, will make this a river run to remember. Overnight in Amasunga village.

Day 7: Transfer (4 hrs) on foot, to the village of Bikule, then (2 hrs) by car to Lobutu, a crossroads in the jungle. This is your chance to connect with the primordial forests. Over millions of years, dry and wet periods have alternated in the Congo River Basin, leading to the containment of several species in very specific habitats with distinct climates. The basin contains a major share of Africa’s biodiversity, and some of the world’s most spectacular and endangered wildlife. The high number of plant species found nowhere else on Earth makes these forests vital repositories of biodiversity. 11,000 forest plant species have been described in the Congo Basin, of which over 1,100 are found nowhere else, and about 70 species are threatened. Overnight in Lobutu town.

Day 8: Transfer (3 hrs) by motorcycle up Axe Maiko, leading north to Maiko National Park, for gorilla and chimpanzee trekking in this vast park. Maiko is one of the most remote forest areas of the Congo, covering 10,900 square kilometres and spanning the Oso and Lindi rivers. Dense equatorial forest characterizes the park, and three of the country's spectacular endemic animals occur here: the Eastern Lowland Gorilla, the Okapi, and the Congo Peacock. We will trek for 4 hours. Transfer (3 hrs) by motorcycle down Axe Maiko to Lobutu. Overnight in Lobutu town.

“It’s a safi itinerary,” says Henri, using the Swahili word for “proper”, while nodding his his head in approval. “Do you think insecurity will allow? Things are calm now. But you know the situation in the Kivus.”

“Security issues are always screwing with my safari plans," I gasp, kissing my teeth. "People think I have a jones for war zones, but it's these damn apes. They tend to live in scary places. Do you know the number of clients who have canceled their trips because of insecurity, or worse, Ebola?”

“These are problems we live with every day.” In the first light of day, Henri's furrowed brow resembles a Rift Valley escarpment.

“I need a drink, and another line of work.” I look east to try and coax the first rays of sunlight through the trees. And then one strikes me between the eyes, like a molten golden spear. I begin to break it down in my head. Steve’s only here because I helped him find the way. And the only reason he could afford to hire someone like me is that he owns original content, which has earned him a tidy sum. And being in an unlikely location with a powerful story to tell, he's about to create more original content, and earn more money. It’s a smooth racket. 

----------

In the end Steve McQueen shot only twenty minutes of footage in the coltan mine. Plans to go elsewhere were scrapped, and we returned to Walikale forthwith. Sean Bobbitt’s blisters were becoming worse and worse, opening up like rift valleys in his heel and between his toes. He needed immediate medical attention. 

When we reached Walikale Town, we rushed him to the local hospital, run by Medicine Sans Frontier (MSF), a non-governmental organisation (NGO) with farther penetration into these sorts of red zones than any other. The doctor told Sean he needed to be airlifted out straight away. At the same time I learned the Antanov I’d chartered had been held up in Bukavu with a flat tire.

Being that Walikale airport was the only place with telephone network, we decamped there to see if we could hitch a ride on one of the many daily flights flying supplies in and flew minerals out. When I say airport, I mean a short stretch of the Kisangani Highway that gets cordoned off to allow the planes to land. Sean could no longer walk, so we sat in the departures lounge, a pokey wooden gazebo on the soft shoulder of the highway, and waited. 

The first plane to land was an Antanov 12-seater, its wings nearly clipping our lounge as it raced down the runway. It came to a standstill only a few metres from where the barrier had been lowered to keep travelers off the road. Using a tiller which they fastened to the plane's front tire, the ground crew of quickly rotated the aircraft one hundred and eighty degrees, then unloaded and loaded again. We explained our predicament to the Russian pilot, who just shrugged and said, "I've maxed my load already with minerals." 

"We'll pay you $2,000 to take the four of us and our equipment to Goma," I pleaded. 

"I couldn't even take one of you," he replied, adding with a chuckle, "You'll never get those cameras out of here." As he started up his engines, my heart sank. I began to wonder if we would ever leave the jungle.

An hour later a white 4x4, festooned with MSF logos and flags and towing an empty trailer, pulled up to the airport. It had obviously come to pick up a load from an in-coming flight. I figured it was unlikely these people would be flying any minerals out. As the plane approached the runway another MSF 4x4 pulled up, and a white woman got out. I accosted her in the hope I might appeal to her better nature. "My client is in a bad way, and needs immediate medical attention," I said. "May we please hitch a ride on your plane?"

"I don't know who you are," she snapped. "You could be anyone. There are all kinds of negative forces operating in this area." 

"I'm a Canadian safari guide," I said, calmly handing her my card, "and gorilla conservationist." 

She told me her name was Dr Leslie Shanks and that she was also Canadian. "I am currently acting head of MSF in the Congo," she added. "And our policy is to never give lifts to strangers. Why don't I have a look at your client's wounds."

"We've already seen a doctor," I explained in exasperation, "this morning, in your hospital, and he told us to airlift the hell out of here as fast as we could."

As she deliberated, the MSF plane pulled up behind her, and the ground crew began unloading boxes of medical supplies. It was then I noticed the co-pilot was someone I knew, another fellow-Canadian. We had met some months earlier in Butembo. He greeted me warmly, and promised to have a word with the Belgian pilot. But shortly after he returned to the cockpit, the propellers began to whine. This was not a good sign. 

"I suppose I could call head office," said Leslie, looking at her mobile phone. "Let me see if I can reach..." But her words were drowned out by the sound of her plane taking off, empty. She looked up in astonishment. Then, realising she had been trumped by the pilot, simply turned on her heals and began to walk away.

Steve McQueen, a mountain of a man, rose up to follow her. “Shame!” he cried. The sight of him striding loftily down the runway after her, while thrusting an indignant hand in the air, is one I shall never forget. "Shame, madam! Shame on you!" Spoken like a true gentleman. She hurried to her car and quickly drove away. It was indeed shameful behaviour for a person in her position. 

Later that afternoon our own plane arrived, and we were able to get Sean the medical attention he so urgently needed. Steve's film Gravesend was released a year later, to mixed reviews.

Day 9: Transfer (2 hrs) by chartered aircraft back to Goma, then (1 ½ hrs, incl. border crossing) by safari vehicle to Gisenyi, Rwanda. Relax by the lake, and enjoy a beachfront barbeque with sundowners, as you reflect upon your once-in-a-lifetime experience in the Congo Basin. Overnight at Lake Kivu Serena Hotel.

Day 10:  Transfer (3 hrs) by safari vehicle to Kigali Airport, and head for home, with the timeless memories of your safari of a lifetime.

You can follow this expedition on Panaromio

My Continuing Journey into the Belly of Africa

It’s 5 a.m. I’ve been awakened by an avian chorus outside my window. Resistance is futile, even in darkness. In no time I’m wide awake, back on expedition, climbing mount improbable. There’s no stopping this forward march.

I hesitate before getting up. Kigongo is asleep next to me but she doesn’t stir. It’s not her I’m concerned about. Four keen-eared creatures are curled up on our living room couch, eagerly awaiting the first waking footfall. But I must have coffee - Ugandan coffee.

I rise, wrap myself in a turquoise kanga, slip into a pair of flip-flops, and slowly open my bedroom door. So far so good. But I am given up by the compound cock. The ensuing canine assault brings all four dogs lapping at my heels in a blur of white fur.

It's both suffocating and irresistible. Each one vies for my attention with a display of dancing skills, as though auditioning for the circus. Amadeus, a Schnoodle (Schnauzer-Poodle mix) with a sweet disposition but absolutely no manners, bounces repeatedly as he tries to lick my face. He’s the unlikely leader of the pack.

Cleopatra, his mate, a silky white Yorkie, stands on her hind legs, clawing frenetically at an imaginary door. Her bitch puppies, Aldebran and Biafra, are a confusion of youth and breed, with none of her finesse. All together they make up the Schnorkydoodle Gang.

The moment my cup of Joe is brewed I retreat with it to my bedroom, shutting the door quietly behind me. Cleo’s the only one allowed in here, as she tends to conduct herself in a lady-like fashion, and always hunts for mice.

My computer boots up automatically at six every morning, but there are some minutes to go, so I turn to my iPad. It does everything the Mac mini does but in a fraction of the time. I launch BBC World Service radio, and listen for news that may impact my work, either as inspiration, research or a travel advisory.


At the moment I am struggling between careers in wildlife conservation and publishing, having abandoned the former too soon. Consequently, the first thing I do every morning is try to think up new ways to earn a living.

My changeover career as a safari guide has been disastrous. I can't imagine a more gratifying job but I’ve yet to attract enough patrons or profits to earn a living out of it. Some clients don’t pay on time, others demand refunds, and the company remains perpetually in the red. Truth be told, I don't have an entrepreneurial bone in my body.

Thankfully, a new career in publishing looms, though it has yet to materialise. It’s now a year and a half since I completed my manuscript for Gorillaland, but I still haven’t earned a penny from it. Who knows if or when copies will sell. Nevertheless, I must triumph, as anyone trying to cross a deadly wasteland must. Surrender’s not an option.

I switch from the Beeb to vintage radio, replacing ethnically-diverse broadcasters with hardboiled private dicks. Listening to Raymond Chandler or Dashiell Hammett convey a mood, in just a few choice words, spoken through characters like Philip Marlow or Sam Spade, is a lesson in clarity.

Detective series are followed by darker mysteries: "tales well calculated to keep you in… suspense." Two vintage radio shows that really know how to work frightening twists into their half-hour episodes are "The Whistler" and "Suspense." After a double-header of each I'm inspired, and ready to start writing.

We live in the Najera district of Kampala. The satellite image on Google Earth looks like a picture of an alcoholic's dissected liver. Giving directions can be a chore. "After Zanzi pork joint, take a series of left turns, signposted by obvious landmarks: a mango tree, some chickens... You'll find it." 

By now Kigongo is awake, seated on the bed with her back against the wall, tapping away on her Blackberry. I watch her elegant fingers roll nimbly across the tiny black keyboard. She deserves better than this, and its for her that I keep going. Kigongo is my muse, the love of my life, and finest woman I’ve ever known.

The well-being of our Schnorkydoodles is another motivating factor. I can picture them on the Swahili Coast, chasing seabirds and crabs on the fine white sand. We'll own our own beach house. I'll write for a living, Kigongo will enjoy the fruits of my labours, and the dogs will be free. Free, I tell you, free!

Kigongo has transferred to the kitchen where she's preparing my breakfast - something I would gladly prepare myself if I knew what to do with the strange ingredients in there. For the rest of the day I'm happy with what's put in front of me. But local morning dishes are just too stodgy for my tastes. Consequently, a great deal of effort goes into finding me a palatable "muzungu breakfast."

Morning ablutions are fun. Before I can bathe, the water must first be heated on a charcoal stove which takes a couple of hours. Entire forests get felled to provide me with my daily wash. When it’s ready I enter a shower room and, after filling a basin with a mix cold and piping hot water, use a plastic cup to pour the contents over my body.

After my bath I dress, splash on some cologne and drag a brush through my unruly mane. Shaving is a challenge. I find it best to use my electric razor for as many days as possible, and only a straight razor when it's absolutely necessary. In this way, I make myself presentable for the African day, come what may.


I'm writing like a whirling dervish now, but the prospect of having a drink with my mates keeps invading my trains of thought like a gang of football hooligans. I'm not one to suffer writer's block, and can keep working as long as time and concentration allow. But writing is a lonely game, and before long I'm craving company.

Kigongo’s in the next room with her BFF, Fatuma, and they're ripping each other up in Luganda. Those two are inseparable, and have been since they were young teenagers. It’s an unlikely relationship. Kigongo’s a converted Catholic, Fatuma a Muslim. Kigongo's heritage is Bugandan and English, and she comes from a middle-class family. Fatuma’s heritage is Somali and Swahili Coast, and she comes from a refugee family. Kigongo possesses an energetic intellect, and can hold her own in a heated political discussion. Fatuma is just energetic, and can hold her own arm-wrestling soldiers.

Fatuma and Kigongo on Eid

I could listen to their wicked laughter for hours but I decide to go out. Having saved my work to iCloud where it will forever be, I slip the iPad into my leather satchel. A backup wireless keyboard is already packed in there, as well as an Apple power cord. Ostensibly I magic my entire office into a small leather bag, which I then sling over my shoulder as I say goodbye to Kigongo and Fatuma.

On my way through the living room, I spot Amadeus gnawing on a plastic bag. When I try to take it away from him, he snarls at me, for which I buffet him soundly on his nose. He runs off with his tail between his legs and hides under a bed. But this is a dog who truly understands the game, always giving back enough love and gratitude to get what he wants: food, attention and forgiveness. He can never be in trouble for too long. And I can’t leave without bigging up my boy.




At dusk, I’m Billy No-mates, seated at the bar in Iguana, a second-storey establishment in Kampala’s Kamwokya district. I’ve spent the last hour watching a new mall get built across the road. The DJ’s playing a string of 80s hits to an empty dance floor. The entire venue is empty, which suits me. It will soon fill up.

With its steep thatched roof suspended by blackened eucalyptus beams, the place has the look of a safari lodge, if not the ambiance of one. I feel at home here. But it’s crunch time. After dark, transport to Najera is difficult to find and more expensive. I must decide: should I stay or should I go. Kigongo and Fatuma are at a wedding reception at the Sheraton. So, there’s no one at home to keep the Schnorkydoodles company.

Everywhere are posters encouraging me to stay: “Happy Hour From 6 till 8 pm. Buy 2 Beers Get 1 Free,” “Party Till You’re Homeless!” There's a speedy wireless connection, and I remember it’s been months since I last backed up my device to iCloud. I order another Club beer, plug into a socket at the bar, and start working.

How quickly the light of the day gets replaced by the light of my screen. And after several bottles of beer the alcohol has ultimately drowned my inventiveness. Accordingly I put away my gear, secure my satchel, sit up and adjust to the vibe in the room. It’s close to midnight and the Iguana is heaving.

There is a gaggle of malayas by the door, grinding up against each other to a throbbing Swahili hip-hop beat. An outlier decides to get in on the act, and sort of dance-walks with her drink in her hand to join the party and grind with the others. The DJ never lets up.

Predictably, as a muzungu seated by himself at the bar, I get approached by a girl half my age. “How old are you?” she asks.

“Much too old for you,” I laugh.

“No. Tell me how old you are?”

“Fifty,” I say.

“Really? I thought you were older." I smile. "Listen," she continues, "my father-in-law is coming from Britain next week, and he’s sixty two. Maybe you could show him around.”

Half an hour later she’s French-kissing the Frenchman she only just met. Shortly thereafter he’s taking her home. It doesn’t matter that she's collapsed on the floor, he knows a good thing when he sees it. I wanted to intervene on her behalf but I don’t think I could have done much good for that girl. She was determined to go home with someone.

Home-ways is best-ways for me too now. But getting there is going to be tough. Alas, I’m pleasantly surprised to find a boda who knows where Najera is, parked right outside Iguana. The price is right so I hop on the back, spark up, and don my pimpin’ white Marshall headphones. “We go?” he asks. I nod, and we’re off.

With the wind in my hair, Nas’s “You Wouldn’t Understand” in my ears, and feeling every pothole where it counts, I am contented. That was a day well spent. With any luck tomorrow will be a day well earned.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Najera, Kampala, Uganda

The Old Man and the Seafood Restaurant at the End of the Universe

This is the ultimate in right brain crafting. I can just lie here, reclined on a day bed in my coastal room, with my head against the pillow, gazing anywhere I choose, while typing on the wireless keyboard on my lap. I don't even have to look over at the iPad to see what I'm writing. It just flows directly from my thoughts to my finger tips, then on to some kind of digital paper that then floats up into something called an iCloud.

Hurray for technology, and for Mrs Larson, for teaching me to copy type. This is a mad skill that has served me in so many ways during these digital times. Yet she taught us when we knew nothing of the future. The most spectacular piece of consumer electronics any of us had seen at that time was a Texas Instruments calculator.

Now, thanks to her, I can lay back on the Swahili Coast and write my manuscripts seemingly into thin air, while reclining on a sedan chair, listening to Miles and Coltrane, and smoking a joint. The Black Label has been consumed, though I tried not drink too much tonight.

There's been a blustery offshore breeze blowing through the Blue Marlin all afternoon and evening, in that way a full moon raises the tides then strengthens the wind, though it seems to have died down now. Sandra's been up in Mombasa visiting Fatuma's relatives all day, while I've been working on the Hartley itinerary.

Propped up at the bar this afternoon, putting the finishing touches to my next safari, while watching the women's 100 metre qualifiers in the Olympics and the kite surfers, who numbered a dozen at one point, carve up the surf between the beach and the reef, I found myself asking, "Is there anywhere better I could situate the office?"


I'm nearer Gorillaland now than at any time in the past six years, and by that I mean the lifestyle I set out to make for myself when I began writing the novel. This is close, very close. This idyllic beachfront hideaway is only a two hour flight from Entebbe. Once I get it all worked out, I'll not know where I want to be. The choice of superb retreats I've set up for me and Sandra, and our sphere of influence, will serve us very well in years to come. It's important to plan for one's future. Hell, I'm still only 50!

There is something about watching the lovely young things milling around on this beach in their skimpy bikinis that reminds me of my age and wisdom. You go, girls! Greta Scaatchi in White Mischief comes to mind, or maybe that's just wishful thinking... Presently four buxom asses have just lined up at the bar, and I'm trying not to get


distracted. What I actually wanted to write about was the ten kite surfers out there cutting up the gleaming turquoise reef, butt...


This has been an extraordinary year, from day one, when I walked out into the waves of the Sea of Cortez and sated my soul with the fragrance and glow of a place and a time that really made me happy. I was missing was my baby, my dogs, my home, but glad of the gulp of fresh air. In the following months I traveled through a myriad of towns and places, across three continents, hung out with some of the solid people in my life - old and new friends - spending quality time with them that I'll always cherish. I was nourished with such stimulation and inspiration as I might have been a character in a story book. It's a book I've yet to write.

But nothing feels better than being a heartbeat away from home - not home, but on the fringes of the homestead, close enough to call Ol' Yeller out from the yard. In such a place, the heart grows fonder. And to be here with my baby, chillin' in the glow of the Swahili Coast, where the vibe is just right, makes me feel gelebt.

This is what I've sought all my liife: sun, sea, sand, satisfaction, freedom, all the while being with my baby-baby, at last. Just gotta figure out how to get the dogs down here and make this a permanent thing.


Blessings from the heart of an old soul, who is currently residing where strength rolls in on every curling wind-blown crest of a wave. The old man and the seafood restaurant at the end of the Universe, says "Karibuni." Life begins at fifty.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Diani Beach, Kenya

The Fire That Consumes

Out here in remotest rural France, seated beside a roaring fire, I feel the warmth of all the good vibes that have been bestowed on me this year - the generosity, support and encouragement from my friends and family. Yet I'm

happy to let their kindness burn up in the wood stove of my ambition. This is my conceit, to be the fire that consumes rather than warms.

I leveled that harsh criticism at a very dear friend of mine recently, someone who's done more to support me these past few years than any other person. At the time, harsh criticism seemed the only way to express my gratitude. But now I'm one dear friend poorer.

That's why I'm determined to get it right this tim e, and pay proper tribute to Martin and Sally for the loan of their cottage in Capelle-lès-Hesdin. Martin, my publisher, is a good friend whom I've known for years. He keeps a steady course and always manages to sail through rough seas with an even keel. Two years ago he rescued me from the clutches of hell, with the offer of a publishing deal for GORILLALAND, and has helped steer me between careers in wildlife conservation and publishing.

Sally's an extraordinary woman, a solicitor who chooses to put her formidable powers of persuasion to rescuing battered women when she could be making a fortune elsewhere. That's why her friendship means so much to me. If it weren't for the two of them - not just their generosity but their understanding - I'd be sizing up the beams.

The idea was to set me up somewhere secluded where I could concentrate on completing the manuscript for PIRATES, my next novel. So, here I am, alone in their 17th Century house in northern France, filling the hours, as I have been doing for the past three weeks, with everything it is possible to do in a place like this, except write my manuscript.

It's not often I experience such solitude. There was the time in 1981 when I spent a few weeks on an island in Lake Ontario, trying to write a play. Then in 1986 at The Quarry at Tuesley Manor in Surrey, and as recently as December 2009 when I spent two weeks alone in a cabin upstate New York. Each occasion was an act of faith and kindness on the part of a friend who believed in my talents. And each time I trusted the results would prove their generosity. But thirty years later and I'm still unable to make isolation work for my writing.


"There were all the technical problems. But the fire and the night and the stars made them all seem small."
- Ernest Hemingway


I just put down Hemingway's True at First Light, and I'm feeling his style. Long sentences that repeat words, sometimes with just one jaded word between them, meandering descriptions of African mornings, hunting prowess, and seemingly harmless conversations with local safari guides. No one comes closer to describing the Africa I know than Papa Hemingway.

Coincidently, the thing that has occupied more of my time than anything else while in Hesdin is my effort to set up a couple of gorilla safaris for some Hollywood clients. They're prepared to pay top dollar but they've just not given me enough time. Communications has been a big challenge. I bought a useful device made by Hwayei, an elegant little white tablet that fits into the palm of your hand. It uses a micro SIM to generate a wireless Internet hub that connects all the computers within range. Bandwidth is seriously lacking though. There's virtually no fast network in this little backwater - not for Orange customers that is. Add the hassle of topping up credit when it runs out, as it just has, when the nearest shop's a half-hour bike ride away, downhill.

It's as peaceful as an ashram here. But for birdsong, lowing and the wind through trees, all is quiet, though my heart pounds like a native drum in the forest. Why such anxiety in so tranquil a place? Is the house haunted? Yes, there are ghosts here, but they're all ones I brought with me. That's just it... I'm never alone.

From time to time I receive curious visitors: the lean and elusive hunting dog that scampers on to the lawn for a shit, the birds that chatter from every branch, and

a family of rabbits straight out of Enid Blyton. But I have never seen any people, not even from the busy farm next door. I hear machines and cows all day and night but, even when I go a roaming with my wireless hub in one hand and my iPad in the other like some lost prophet with asymmetrical laws, no one ever materializes. No need to worry about making impressions then.

I no longer try to make a good impression anywhere but in my novels. I've been conducting myself with dignity, as Kigongo suggested, which is new for me, but I don't give a damn what anyone thinks. All I really want is to retreat to the African wilderness where, like Papa, I'll need do nothing more than listen to wood pigeons and wind in dry grass, and write novels. It's where I feel most at home.


To anyone who has spent a lifetime traveling to the far ends of the earth, as I have, home is an abstract idea. For me, any sense of belonging is always fleeting. Not that I don't crave it. I do, with all the fibre in my heart, body and soul. But I'll throw my hat anywhere I'm allowed to spend the night, and call it home.

This little cottage in Capelle-lès-Hesdin feels like home. There's a simpler vibe here. I'm inconspicuous. Live and let live; love and let love... It's another reason I am so grateful to Martin and Sally, they've given me a home these past three weeks.

It's a peculiar house. The angled windowsills and steep roofing all warn of heavy winter storms. Yet its age and isolation tell another story. It was built around the time Queen Nzinga was on the throne in Angola, pitting the Dutch against the Portuguese, and destroying the Kingdom of Kongo. Thank you France for taking a back seat for the first three hundred years of European colonialism. You were busy fighting the English, I know, and building little houses for your peeps to live in. I understand
.
It's sometime later and I find myself again cozied up to a blazing fire, sitting with my wireless keyboard on my lap and my iPad on the coffee table next to a half-finished bottle of Black Label, the current issue of The Economist, my moleskin note pad, two phones - one for France, one for Britain - my reading glasses, a small pipe and small stash to burn therein.
There's no better soundtrack for this setting than Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 5, Fourth Movement. Nothing soothes a homeless heart like sentimental Teutonic strings. Yet the beat goes on.

I'll be leaving in a day's time. Pity. Thank you Martin and Sally for lending me your ancient cottage to write my book. I wish I could have made more of the opportunity, though it has been a balm to this tortured soul, even if I didn't manage to complete my manuscript. I will soon.

How strange the fire recalls the African bush: the last few embers steadily dwindling, along with the contents of a bottle of Scotch, and a sense that other creatures are out there hunting, staying up much later than is sensible - early rise creeping up with the dawn - but reluctant to sleep until the last flames have burned down. And after all the wood is consumed, there is still warmth.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Rue de l'Obled, Capelle-lès-Hesdin, France

The Silverback of LA

When drinking Harvey Wallbangers and smoking bongs, alone on a terrace in the Hollywood Hills, always check what you lift to your lips and for what purpose. It gets confusing after a while. The consequences can be rather unpleasant.

I suddenly find myself in an empty house, sheltered from the Santa Ana winds by the steep slopes of a weather-beaten canyon, watching lizards scurry out of shadows into fleeting warmth, and listening for the loosening sands of another gofer avalanche. With the sun rising from one ridge mid-morning and setting on the next mid-afternoon, it's like Alaskan winter time in this place. 

Sound too travels in strange ways. I hear conversations that bounce off the irregular contours of the canyon walls, disguising their location - malicious machinations that their perpetrators think no one else hears. Boiling cauldrons of pulp simmer in the canyons late until the night, like festival candles...

At last I'm in bed with the entertainment industry, having sex with a seductive screen idol who can't remember my name. At least I can testify that at this point in the negotiations, one doesn't believe one's selling one's soul to Mephistopheles. 

You soon see the warning signs: the producer who wears an impossibly trim goatee and laughs a lot, the director of development who moves uncomfortably around in his plush leather chair, the rotund company partner who flashes you an imperceptibly brief glare, during which you think you hear extraneous voices. You leave wondering whether or not, unbeknownst to you, your sleeping orifices were just surreptitiously probed by the Forces of Darkness. 

How far will it take me, this affair with the Black Dahlia? If the sex is good, good things will come. How long before I have my own line of safari apparel..? Maybe I don't last the afternoon, as the entire side of Nicholas Canyon breaks loose and crumbles on top of me. I hear little land slides sidling gravity's way. There is nothing up there, I checked. It's just foreshadow and verisimilitude in allegiance with the Fate Clowns. This after all is the stuff of entertainment.

Gorilla Goes to Hollywood

It was 1991, on a cold November afternoon in London, when I sat down to watch Gorillas in the Mist for the very first time. My heart was pounding, even before the title sequence began. I could hardly contain myself. 

Nominated for five oscars and well received by the critics, no doubt it was a great movie, but I had other reasons to be excited about the Dian Fossey biopic. I’d just received a phone call inviting me to interview for the position of UK director of the Digit Fund, the organisation she founded.

Not many positions offer a feature-length Hollywood motion picture as a guide for interview. But, in spite of the fact that I had grown up in Africa, I’d never met a wild gorilla nor visited Rwanda, so this film, shot on location, was my introduction.

The silver hairs on my back stood on end as I watched the opening scene, which faded in to the strains of Maurice Jarre’s sumptuous score. A DC 3 carrying Dian Fossey, played by Sigourney Weaver, descends between the majestic Virunga volcanoes, and lands in an airfield next to the mountains.

I could not have known then that I was watching scenes from my future life, a life that would be quite unlike the one I led then, and that years later I would arrive at that same airfield, aboard movie mogul Barry Diller’s helicopter.

SILVERBACKS ON THE SILVER SCREEN

Hollywood and gorillas : the two could not be farther apart. One showcases the culmination of human imagination, the other, the complete lack of it. Yet there has always been a symbiosis between them.

Since Hollywood’s Golden Age, movie makers have pitted beast against beauty and turned the gorilla into a box office sensation. Ingagi released in 1930, was the first to trade heavily on the suggestion of sex between a woman and a gorilla, and it’s success spawned the mother of all gorilla movies, King Kong, which earned $2 million during its initial release in 1933, putting RKO Radio Pictures in the black for the first time since they started making movies. It ranks among the greatest motion pictures of all time.

Hollywood has been kind to the gorilla. Unlike chimpanzees and orangutans whose screen exploits have attracted scorn from animal rights advocates, gorillas themselves have largely been left out of the picture. Instead, they’re usually played by long-armed actors in an ersatz gorilla getups, known as gorilla men, people like Steve Calvert, Ray Corrigan, and Bob Burns (the most beloved).

In later years as production standards improved, ape actors like Dan Richter and Peter Elliot perfected their craft to match the ever more sophisticated suits they were being asked to climb into.

Some of the best make up and effects artists have made their reputations crafting believable movie gorillas. Willis O’Brien and Ray Harryhausen are among those from the Golden Age, while in recent years Rick Baker and Stan Winston are credited with many of the modern silverbacks on the silver screen.

Nowadays, CGI and motion capture technology gives gorilla men like Andy Serkis, star of the 2005 remake of Kong, the freedom to give more convincing performances. Still, who isn’t moved when Peter Elliot, playing Tarzan’s adopted chimp father, gets shot in Greystoke, ("C'est mon père!") or when Dan Richter throws the bone in 2001: A Space Odyssey?

Other blogs have adequately dealt with the subjects of gorilla movies and gorilla men, which I won’t go into, except to say, thanks Hollywood for turning the gorilla into a screen idol. It made my job saving them a whole lot easier.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My personal association with the movie business began one sunny summer morning, shortly after I started my job as director of the Digit Fund. I received a call from Warner Brothers in London. “I believe you wrote to Sigourney Weaver requesting a meeting,” said a young woman, which I confirmed. “Well, she can see you this afternoon, at the Barkley Hotel.” I quickly jotted down the address then examined my scruffy attire: jeans and a t-shirt. They might have at least been given enough notice to dress for the occasion.

A couple of hours later I was inside the second floor suite I’d been instructed to go to. It was plush, decorated in a classical style, and overrun with assistants catering to the needs of a queue of journalists waiting to see Ms Weaver. I spotted her through the crowd, seated in front of a large Alien 3 poster, answering questions from the British entertainment press about her latest movie.

A pretty, young assistant ushered me into an adjacent room and told me I could use the phone while I waited. “You’ll never guess where I am...” is clearly the call she thought I’d make, but I was cooler than that. The next time the door opened, I expected it to be her again, but it was the movie star herself, unescorted.

“Hello,,” said Sigourney, shaking my hand, “I’m sorry I’m late.” She looked stunning, dressed in a bright orange 1960s top, with large, strategically-cut holes arranged around it. Her hair was quite short - as she hadn’t had much of a chance to grow it since playing a bald Ripley - and it was done in tight brunette curls that accentuated her diamond-cut features.

We talked for twenty five minutes about her role as honorary chair of the charity, and my fundraising and awareness raising activities. I told her we had recently changed the name to the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund. “I will have to work harder now,” she said, smiling. ”People identify me closely with Dian.” I was startled by her loyalty to the cause. She was determined not to let Gorillas in the Mist become “an unwitting memorial to an extinct species.”

That was the first of many celebrity appointments I kept in my twenty-year career as a conservationist, including many more with Sigourney, but I will always cherish that first face-to-face encounter I had with a genuine Hollywood movie star.


DAWN OF MAN

Science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke, who co-wrote 2001: A Space Odyssey with Stanley Kubrick, and with whom I had been friends for years, opened up a world of possibilities for the gorillas. He also gave me my most cherished contact in the movie business.

"I think Roger Caras who was Stanley's VP at the time would be happy to be interviewed, explaining how the ape sequence was arranged in 2001," Clarke wrote in a fax to me. Clarke, who rarely left Sri Lanka, introduced me to Caras by fax. We met for lunch at a posh London restaurant. Caras struck me as one of the last true gentlemen in the movie business. As one time vice president of Hawk Films, Kubrick’s production company, in due course he gave me and introduction to the great filmmaker himself.

Though we never actually met, Stanley Kubrick subsequently made two financial donations to the Fund, both in response to editions of our newsletter, Digit News. Then, on March 6th 1999, I sent him a fax, as I had done to many other high-profile supporters that day, informing him of an impending air strike by the Zimbabwean air force on the town of Goma, and the collateral damage it might cause to the gorilla habitat. Not that my fax had anything to do with it, but the next day, Kubrick died in his sleep of a heart attack.

On a happier note, my association with Clarke also led me to Dan Richter, who played the ape Moonwatcher in the “Dawn of Man” sequence in 2001. He arrived one day at the London office saying Clarke had recommended us to him. A few months later I would take him and his son, Will, to meet the real gorillas in Rwanda. It was to be the start of a lasting friendship.

In a thank-you letter that she wrote to Arthur Clarke, Sigourney said, “You probably don’t recall meeting me at my parents, Pat and Liz Weaver’s when I was eleven. I took a ‘Playboy’ magazine out of your briefcase and read it. I’d never seen a ‘Playboy’ before so your visit is indelibly recorded in my memory!”

Her gratitude was in response to Clarke’s sterling efforts, through his contacts in the Space industry, to acquire imagery of the gorilla habitat from NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which had been taken on two Space shuttle missions in 1994. It is a story I’ve reported elsewhere in this blog, but I mention here because it was pivotal to the Fund’s next encounter with Tinsel Town.

One day, another ape actor, Peter Elliot (pictured above), also turned up unannounced. As the foremost ape actor of his day, he was compelled to run rampage through my office, climbing on to my desk, ripping up my cigarettes, and throwing stationery against the walls. He gave a surprisingly convincing performance as a chimpanzee, even without a suit. Lucky for him considering the mess he made.

Peter had come with an urgent message: Paramount Picture was making an ape movie, to be based on Michael Crichton’s adventure novel, Congo, and if we got in early enough, we might be able to secure their support for the cause.

After rushing out and buying the paperback, I quickly discovered something quite serendipitous about Congo. It involved detailed satellite imagery of the gorilla habitat in central Africa, the same as we'd just acquired from NASA/JPL. I called producer Sam Mercer and offered him a bit of verisimilitude for his movie.

“WHERE YOU ARE THE ENDANGERED SPECIES”

My first visit to Hollywood, in the Spring of 1994, followed on the heels of that call. I can remember the feeling of elation that came over me as my co-director Jillian Miller and I drove up Melrose Avenue to the Paramount lot in a convertible, with the sound of big band swing playing on the car radio. Thanks to Peter Elliot’s timely heads-up, the Fund was in at the ground level with Kennedy/Marshal’s production of Congo. And, in the course a few short days, we would be subjected to every manner of Hollywood schmooze.

On one occasion, while we were seated in a restaurant on Rodeo and Wiltshire, having lunch with Congo associate producer Michael Backes, and his publicist Beverly Magid of Guttman Associates, Dick Guttman himself arrived at our table, with a female friend in tow. “I was wondering if you could give a ride to my client,” he said, “She’s staying close to your hotel. May I introduce you to Patricia Hearst. ” Low and behold it was Patty Hearst, aka Tania, the famous newspaper heiress, who in 1974 was kidnapped by Symbionese Liberation Army. 

Ten minutes later were were driving up Wilshire Boulevard together, with Patty warning the consequences of breathing too much LA air, and insisting we close all the windows and turn on the air conditioning. Never one to miss a fundraising opportunity, I asked her about making an appeal to her family foundation. “Oh, you won’t get any money from them,“ she laughed. “Campaigners are always on their ass. They own half the Californian coast, you know.”

It’s important to be assertive in Hollywood. The industry expects nothing less of it’s solicitors. It wasn’t easy convincing Paramount that we were the cause on which to pin Congo. At one point, while Kennedy/Marshall were prevaricating over a plush gorilla doll, I asked Sigourney to phone Kathleen Kennedy and urge them along. “We'd appreciate not being blindsided like that,” said producer Sam Mercer.

But gorillas are not generally polite, and when their situation gets desperate, yes, I get pushy. The big bohunkases needed a champion. Hence being called an “asshole” by Michael Crichton, and a “hustler” by Dave Gilmour, were to me badges of honour. My intentions are good. What's your excuse?

Paramount Pictures eventually paid for $10,000 for our space images, even though NASA/JPL had given them to us for free. We also ended up with all the box office returns from Congo's London premier at the Odeon Leicester Square, and an on-pack promotion to adopt a gorilla that went out with the video, raising nearly $150,000 for gorilla conservation on the back of the movie.

However, despite it's success at the box office, the critics panned Congo. I’ll never forget Douglas Adams stomping out of the cinema after the film had ended, and bellowing at the top of his voice, “WHAT A LOAD OF SHIT!” Roger Ebert was the only critic to give Congo a thumbs up, citing it as “a splendid example of the jungle adventure story,” a quality that was not lost on me.

GORILLA MAKERS

Hollywood legend Ray Harryhausen is someone who knows the jungle adventure story better than most. I first met the special effects guru at an event in Paris in 1999, where he was being honoured with a Jules Verne Lifetime Achievement Award. We discovered we shared a passion for hairy apes and immediately hit it off.

On my return to London, he invited me to dinner with his wife Diana at their home in Holland Park. Diana Harryhousen, I learned, was a descendent of David Livingstone, which was evident from the many water colours displayed on the walls of their Georgian house, painted during the great explorer’s Zambesi Expedition. 

Ray led me up the stairs to his attic where he kept scores of stop-frame animation characters from The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, and Clash of the Titans, films that made his name in special effects. It was a rare privilege that left me at a loss for words. Ray couldn't say enough about how much he loved the gorillas. He recalled his early days in the business, and how thrilled he was when they hired him to work on Mighty Joe Young, alongside Willis O’Brien, who was responsible for the special effects in the original 1933 King Kong. "Willis wasn't there much. And by doing most of the miniature set wizardry myself, I saved lots of money."

After dinner, I showed off my new Palm Pilot. At that time digital hand-held technology was still largely unknown to the world. While seated around the coffee table, I demonstrated how I could look up Ray’s work on the IMDB database. “I'll tell you who to look up,” he laughed, “Gustav von Seyffertitz.”

Within a few seconds I’d found him, a German actor of the silent era, who’d lived to the ripe old age of 80. “He’s sure been in alot of movies,” I said scrolling down the page. “Over a hundred, going all the way back to 1917.”

“And he didn’t even start until he was middle aged,” said Ray.

“Shall I fax this page to you?”

“Go ahead,” he chuckled. Suddenly his fax machine began spouting yards of paper, and Ray just stood there laughing and shaking his head at my absurd use of the technology. That evening was one the most memorable in my career.

Like many of the Hollywood legends I’ve met over the years, Ray became a regular donor to the cause. Gorillas owe much to the movie business for their survival. Gorillas in the Mist created public enthusiasm that snowballed into a global campaign. Congo galvanized that support. And later appeals allowed me to work with the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio and Daryl Hannah. Suffice to say the big bohunkases have benefited enormously from their iconic screen image.

I’ve also benefited personally, attracting celebrities and movie executives to my safaris. Barry Diller (pictured), Diane von Furstenberg, Bryan Lourd and Christian Louboutine were among those on just one gorilla trek I led on New Years Day 2005. That was the time I flew in Diller’s helicopter. The following year I took Tom Brokaw, who invited me to join him on the Today Show in return, and the year after that, Tony Robbins, who also flew in by helicopter. "Hollywood people are carnies with good teeth," my good friend Michael Backes used to say. I say bright, erudite, talented people are the best to show around places you love.

But, while all these exploits provided a touchstone for show business philanthropy, one thing I’ve learned in my twenty years working there, is that in Tinsel Town, content is king. There’s nothing quite like owning your own content. It was that crucial realisation which would lead me into the next phase of my gorilla career.

800lb GORILLA! 

In a flip to the usual script, six years ago Turner-prize winning director Steve McQueen hired me to lead him and a film crew into the heart of the Congo jungle. He wanted to make a movie about coltan, the valuable ore used to create a plethora of electronic goods. On this occasion it was the filmmaker who took me to the subject matter, as I was to make my first visit to the jungle proper, the primordial cathedral where I would received the flame to a new career.

Toting two 35 mm cameras and bags of gear, we enlisted the services of twenty one porters, a chef and a priest, and set off on the expedition on foot into the forest. During the many hours spent drudging through the mud and the steaming heat, the idea for my debut novel was born. 

It took me another five years to write Gorillaland, but using the knowledge I had gleaned from my exposure to the movie industry, I attempted to evoke the bygone era of the jungle adventure story, and write a bestseller that was destined to be a box office hit. 

“In the best tradition of Wilbur Smith and Clive Cussler, Cummings sets his adventure in the strife-ridden Congolese jungle. Blood diamonds, kidnap, inter-tribal warfare and natural disasters form the background for a cast of adventurers, NGO campaigners, warlords, boy-soldiers, UN Peacekeepers and one of the most wicked villainesses readers will ever encounter. Gorillaland with its story based on fact is set to be a global bestseller.” 


I'm headed back to Hollywood next week, my first visit in over five years. This time I’m going armed with something more powerful than King Kong. This time I’m bringing my own 800lb gorilla. Gorillaland's going to Hollywood!