Hoofstuk 1

 Three .308 bullets looked like seeds in the right hand of Stoffel. His are the biggest hands I have ever seen. Fingers thicker than Wildebeest sausages and hands rougher then sandpaper.  He was the only man on the reserve that could wrangle the hippos and lift an Eland by himself on to the back of his bucky. Stoffel’s thick Afrikaans accent never made sense to me. I always replayed his words in my head to makes sense of his directions. His dedicated workers tell stories of how he was caught by the rioters in Soweto. He was held down and forced to swallow hot shrapnel during Apartheid, when he was a cop, on the wrong side.  I have been training for three weeks with Stoffel for this day. Three long weeks of shooting at a small 1-inch-thick metal disk, lodged into the side of an undulating quartzite sandstone hill at the far eastern ridge of the reserve. The first two times I shot the rifle I bruised my right eye with the scope.

“Ey-bow, look here little Boer-a. You only have three shots, otherwise pack your kit, and be gone.” Stoffel pulled out a pack of Marlboro’s, and a beaten pack of matches from his breast pocket on his dirty sweaty shirt. I could tell he wasn’t done giving me instructions because he didn’t mention what I was suppose to bring back. He lifted the tab on the match book and bent a single match back, pressing his thumb against the match head and with one motion flicked it along the coarse surface on the exterior and lit his cigarette. With his exhale, he lifted his chin and looked upward so that the hot African sun filtered through the smoke and onto his face. He took his left hand and removed his hat and wiped the sweaty Karoo dust from his forehead.

“Bring me a Blessbok, three to five years of age, nothing else!”. He put his hat back on, took a quick thought, exhaled a third of the cigarette and dumped the three .308 bullets in my hand. “You have a knife, Little boer-a?” I nodded yes with much excitement. “Good, clean the carcass and carry it back to the farm”.  Stoffel exhaled the last of his cigarette and slipped the rimless bottlenecked Winchester rifle off of his shoulder and into my hands.

I walked for two dusty miles through the Karoo. Spotting three different herds of Blessbok. I sat in the shade under a mature green acacia tree and observed their behavior, studied their route, and anticipated their future direction. I slowly walked towards them, keep a distance of more than a hundred yards.

I found my spot against the edge of a tall bundle of spear grass. I took off my shirt to place it under the gun to give me more stability for the shot. I laid down against the earth, pulled back the bolt and loaded my first bullet. Pushed the bolt forward and closed the carriage, placed the butt of the rifle against my right shoulder. I took a deep breath and pulled the trigger.

Chapter 1

Three weeks of training to hunt, training to shoot a .308 caliber Winchester, learning to gut and cut a carcass on the spot, was finally at and end. It was time to put my training to the test. Stoffel wasn’t thrilled when Mr. Forsyth gave him the instruction to train me. It had become apparent in the three weeks of training that I never grew on Stoffel. His demanding nature and frustration with me culminated in the bruising of my right eye, from lack of proper instruction and guidance. In the first week it felt as if he didn’t care that I was handling a loaded rifle, I could have carelessly fired it in his direction. I had come a long way since the first week.

We stood at the edge of his farm at the back of the reserve, it was a furiously hot South African summer’s day. Well above 32 degrees Celsius. Sweat dripped from our brows, and down our backs. He was proud of his heritage and he wore his Boer hunting hat, as a symbol of his peoples legacy. He had the dark death weapon hanging across his right shoulder and three bullets in his hand. Stoffel was never a man of words, I hear that he had a horrible encounter in Soweto during apartheid when he was a cop and that this horrific attack left his throat mangled and his voice distorted. Still Stoffel pulled a cigarette from his blue and green lined shirt, and lit it with one motion, with a small but powerful flick of his monstrous thumb.

He told me quickly, that all I have is three bullets to kill an adolescent Blessbok no more than five years old. That I was to clean the carcass on the spot and carry it back to the farm. He had finished his cigarette in three exhales, and on the last he lifted his head towards the sky, paused, watched the sun beam through the smoke and onto his face. His eyes I could tell were expecting me not to succeed. He handed me the bullets first then the rifle.

I walked through the reserve towards a grove of acacia trees. The grove itself was usually teeming with wildlife, and was at an elevation for a vantage point. I sat there fearing failure, having to pack up and head home after months of hard work and isolation. I decided it was not going to be an option for me. I wanted nothing more than to prove Stoffel wrong. I spotted a herd of Blessbok a klick away. I started to filter through my memory of how to accurately measure the age of a Blessbok. That each ring around the horns was a sign of two years. I slowly approached the heard, not gazing in their direction making sure to avoid eye contact. I kept my body language very minute, and found a spot at the tail end of a long line of spear grass. I positioned myself, and patiently sized up each Blessbok until I found the right one. Without hesitation I pulled the trigger.

Isahluko 1

One bullet. Maybe two. Not three. I looked down into the wooden bowls that are Stoffel’s hands. The exploding African sun shimmered off of the three .308 caliber bullets in his clammy palm. I could barley understand his voice, and I had to replay his voice in my head to make out him saying something about only getting three bullets to kill a young Blessbok. He made sure that I heard him say that this was my only chance to prove myself to him, that if I couldn’t accomplish this feat, that I was not cut out for this job, and I would be sent home.

December 9th, 2012. I walked for more then two hours tailing a herd of Blessbok to arrive at this spot. The day was infinite, the sun never moved and I was dripping in adrenaline. I took of my shirt, which was caked in red Karoo dust and wet from sweat. I wondered if the Blessbok could smell my excitement as I stripped. A curious horned bill lurked near in sky above.

I laid down half naked against the hot Karoo and placed the gun over my bundled shirt. The herd of Blessbok was in a moderately dense bush savanna, feeding on large Red-bushwillow fruit, and Silver cluster-leaf. I was positioned towards the opening of the savanna along a footslope covered in Magic guarri, Fever trees, and Skukuza thickets.

I observed the herd through the scope of my Winchester, watching each individual Blessbok and took note of the age by counting the rings on their horns. I took a series of deep breaths, while saying the Gantri Mantra three times. I loaded my first bullet and without hesitation I pulled the trigger. I could hear my heart beat in my fingertips. My ears were hot from the sound of the shot.

The Blessbok fell on her side. A moment later she stood back up. I grabbed a second bullet off of my bundled shirt, loaded it and targeted the bullet through her heart. The herd scattered across the savanna in all directions. I gathered the gun, the extra bullet, and my shirt. I counted my steps to her, a solid one hundred and forty meters. I pulled my knife from my sheath, grabbed her warm snout and sticky nose. Put the knife to her throat and made a large slit to drain the blood from her being. Just as Stoffel taught me. I then decapitated her, gutted her entrails and de-limbed her. I slung the gun around the front of my chest, put the extra bullet in my pocket, picked her up by her shoulders where I de-limbed her and piggy-backed her to Stoffel’s farm.

When I arrived, Stoffel smiled. I have never seen him smile. He then covered me in her blood, instructed me find and cut out the liver, and eat it raw. It tasted of grass, and was still tepid. He chanted something in Afrikaans with his eyes closed.  He turned to me and told me that he wasn’t expecting my success. I was invited into his home for a beer, and he offered me a cigarette.