October 2011
Pereira Amauga Charles... a living legend
Ask
anyone who has had the privilege of bumping into Mr Pereira (a.k.a. Old
Man P) during a visit to Gorongosa and you will be hard-pressed to find
a negative comment amongst all the absolute rave reviews of this
remarkable man.
Pereira comes from the Nhamatanda district,
which borders the park on the southern bank of the Pungwe river from
Chitengo. He has worked in the park since he was "14 or 15" in 1972.
This means he has worked for the Portuguese colonial authority, through
the Independence War years, into independent Mozambique, through the
civil conflict years, and finally into the peaceful times since 1994.
He has over 38 years experience in Gorongosa National Park and is an
absolute treasure chest of old stories, history lessons, anecdotes, and
character sketches.
His
first job in the park was as a boma assistant for the (at that time)
newly re-introduced white rhinos. There were a handful of these animals
brought in from South Africa in 1972 and they were kept in a log-pole
boma which was situated near the mopane forests near the Baobab Hill.
Pereira's job was to cut grass and throw it over the walls for these
large herbivores to feed on. He was also put on night duty many
evenings to protect the rhinos against lions, elephants and poaching.
One afternoon he heard not-too-distant gunshots and thought that it was
poachers coming for "his" rhinos. It turned out to be an attack on
Chitengo camp by Frelimo forces in 1973 which led to the Portuguese
temporarily closing the camp. (There is a memorial wall in the current
Chitengo which bears the bullet holes of that casualty-free attack, a
key moment in the fight for independence in Mozambique.) Pereira, the
trembling teenager, was left in charge of the rhino bomas whilst the vet
and his sidekicks went to investigate. Needless to say, the rhinos all
were abandoned when the Portuguese left the park and their whereabouts
were never discovered when the park re-opened after Independence in
1975.
During the civil conflict, Pereira was contracted as a
scout for the government forces and often led troops into the park area,
knowing it as well as he did. He was one of the lucky ones who escaped
Chitengo in the early 1980s when it was raided by the rebels. He and a
few of the others who had escaped hid out in the Pungwe valley until
the follwoing morning when he led a recce back to Chitengo to check out
the damage. They found many of the camp staff and others sitting in the
emptied swimming pool, petrified from the events of the previous
evening. Apparently the rebels had come and gone after a brief raid on
the stores and the bar, and had made off with the park tractor and other
vehicles. The tractor was recovered parked rather unceremoniously into
the park gates head first, something which still makes Pereira smile
every time we pass through these gates together.
After the
horrific years, after the election of 1994, Pereira and some of the
other old scouts from the park, made their way back into the park to
start the long process of re-opening roads and camps and airstrips.
These dozen or so brave men were the first to kick off the park
restoration project that has since gathered steam under the Carr
Foundation and Mozambique Government support. But in 1995, when Pereira
and co had to dodge landmined tracks and booby-trapped buildings as
they tried to make some sense of the shell that Gorongosa had become,
the thought of the park returning to anything like its former self was a
long-distant pipedream. How happy he and his mates mst be now that the
park is starting to hit its straps again - thanks in no small part to
their efforts all of 16 years ago.
There are only four scouts
left in the park who have been there since pre-Independence. All four
have libraries worth of stories to share on the history and tragedy of
the park. Pereira is no exception. He has kept many a staff member,
guide and guest captivated by stories of human bravery, wild animals,
devastating fires, Biblical floods, and much much more. He has filled
in a number of blanks in terms of the human history of the park, since
its early days as a cotton farm in the 1940s through its hunting years
to its being proclaimed a national park in 1960. He is also very serious
about the importance of spiritual blessing ceremonies in the park and
its surrounds. He has great respect for the spiritual realm, and is
always the first to initiate ceremonial bessings (not to mention the
first to knock back the customary cup of ceremonial wine!)
Jos
& I first met Pereira in 2008 when we were in the park to do a
2-week recce of it, looking for opportunities for developing private
tourism. The Head of Conservation, Carlos Lopes Pereira, quickly
recommended Pereira as our go-to man for the recce and so began a long
and very fulfilling friendship with this legendary man. I clearly
remember him dragging us all over the park during those 2 weeks, despite
the fact it was mid-October with temperatures in the mid 40s, and one
of us had sleeing sickness at the time...
He was the one who
suggested we camp on the Msicadzi river for the best combination of
access, water, shade, animals and birds. He was the one who showed us
the Baobab Hill with its ancient baobabs and pottery shards. He was the
one who has walked us into elephants and lions numerous times, without a
sign of fear anywhere on his ever-smiling face. He has chased lions
out of camp with nothing but a torch and his renowned hack cough. He has
led us into the limestone gorges and out again - a feat that was barely
manageable by some thirty something fitness freaks, let alone a
fifty-something survivor of two wars and many decades in the bush. More
importantly I guess, he has constantly been a mentor to the camp staff
who we have hired from the local communities, always enforcing a rule of
respect for eachother and respect for the wild things that surround
us.
He has been the face of our personal Gorongosa story,
probably without even knowing it. WIthout him, we would never have
achieved what has been achieved in developing private tourism in the
park. Without him, Jos would probably have a nice set of warthog tusks
buried in her calves. Without him, I would almost certainly be dead (a
few times really). And without him, the world would be a really poorer
place for sure. Old Man P is a living legend, who despite some chesty
issues in winter and some arthritis issues in the wet season, still
amazes us with his vitality and zest for life. He is always the first
to jump off the vehicle and open the boom gate and always the last one
up at night making sure the camp is safe for all its inhabitants.
He
is now the honorary great grand-godfather to our little Lula Blue and
hopefully she will gain some of his wisdom and love of life as she grows
up. For a man to smile as much as Old Man P does, after the life he
has lived, must surely be the best example for any young child to
follow, especially in this day and age.
This is not a normal
bush blog entry, but that is because Pereira is not a normal bush man.
We are super chuffed to call him a friend and look so forward to many
more evenings around the fire talking rubbish with this great man...
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An exciting new online publication from Africa Geographic is out featuring Gorongosa... check out more by clicking the link below 
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