©1998 Elizabeth Gebhardt "In The Center of Hell There Is A Garden"

In the Center of Hell There is a Garden

Written May‐July 1998
©1998 Elizabeth Gebhardt
Email: egebhardt@egebhardt.com
Twitter: twitter.com/egebhardt

Three hours had wilted by since we had parked our packs at what passed for
the customs house on the Congolese side of the Uganda‐Congo border. With visas,
gorilla permits, government letters of endorsement, and cash in hand, we waited for
approval to cross. As the cool of the morning melted into the humidity of midday,
the crooked grin of nearby Mt. Sabinyo, our final destination, turned into a grimace
before my eyes. Had I traveled 40 hours by plane and several days by back‐jarring
four wheel drive to be denied access at the final moment? Were all the stories I had
heard about African bureaucratic inefficiency true? Were the truly awesome natural
forces of the continent combining with the pitiful pettiness of men in some kind of
masterful conspiracy? At that moment, it was clear to me that if truth could be
found in the midst of the incomprehensible, then surely, on this trip to track the
endangered mountain gorilla in Congo’s Virunga Mountains, I was owed an
enlightenment of epic proportions.

The six members of our group, traveling under the auspices of the DFGF
(Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund UK), had rendezvoued in Entebbe just two days earlier,
and now after a suicide drive to the southwest of Uganda, we were in our sleeping
cells in the cement block Kisoro Guest House, a few miles from the Congolese
border. Each of us had our own reasons for wanting to find mountain gorillas living
in the middle of what was undeniably one of the greatest human and environmental
tragedies of our time. This was a part of the world that had seen the fastest, most
intense massacre of people in recorded modern history. Between April 6 and July
14, 1994, up to 1 million people had been killed ‐‐‐ surpassed in total numbers only
by the slaughter of the Armenians at the turn of the century, of the Jews by the Nazis
during WWII, and of Pol Pot’s killing fields in Cambodia. And through this slaughter
and the ensuing destruction of habitat lived several hundred mountain gorillas, a
mile and a half above sea level in the mists of a dense damp forest jungle.

Prior to the outbreak and escalation of civil war in Rwanda in 1994 and in
Congo (formerly Zaire) in 1997, there had been 10 habituated (willing to accept
human observation) mountain gorilla groups in central Africa. This was their only
habitat in the world. Three groups roamed in the Congo in Parc Nationals des
Virungas; one had settled in the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in Uganda; a
wandering group moved unpredictably across the high mountain border between
Uganda and Congo; and five groups had been established in Rwanda, largely under
the pervue of the observers at Karisoke, the famed research station founded in 1967
by Dian Fossey. However, since 1997, no conservation officials had been able to
©1998 Elizabeth Gebhardt “In the Center of Hell There Is a Garden” 1
egebhardt@egebhardt.com

observe and assess the Rwandan groups, which meant they were most likely no
longer habituated ‐‐ a process which required patient, ongoing connection and
tracking by the native park rangers ‐‐ tasks which had been made impossible given
the ongoing military activity of Rwandan troops and skirmishes with the rebel Hutu
Interahamwe in the high Virunga jungles.

All of the members of our group had visited Africa before except myself. I had
flown in from a week in Tanzania photographing wildlife in the Serengetti and
Ngorongoro Crater with a photographer friend from California on her sixth trip to
the continent. We were joined in Uganda by two environmentalists ‐ a writer and
photographer from Jackson Hole Wyoming, a video editor from New York City, and
our leader from the DFGF, Greg Cummings.

For our trek, Greg, the passionate wild‐haired Canadian/Tanzanian ex‐pat
director of the DFGF UK, had targeted the purportedly gentler Congo side of Mt
Sabinyo, one of the 6 extinct volcanoes that make up the northern portion of the
Virunga volcanic range. (Nyamlagira and Nyiragongo further to the southwest are
still active with the last eruptions taking place in 1994.) Sabinyo marks the spot
where Congo, Rwanda, and Uganda meet and sits in the center of the Virungas, a 200
sq km region often referred to as the breadbasket of central Africa. It is an oasis of
rich brick‐black volcanic soil nourished by plentiful rain and tropical sun, with
hillsides buzzcut into patchworks of terraced farms of banana, beans and maize
butting up against an unharnessed jungle. Throughout history this veritable Garden
of Eden has been surrounded on all sides by vast tracts of savannah and non‐arable
land ‐‐ making it the covetous focus of residents and invaders alike. And now in the
last decade of the 20th century, a new barrier had been added, a battle zone filled
with government and rebel forces from two countries in the midst of violent unrest
and political maneuverings, and hundreds of thousands of displaced refugees ‐‐
resulting in massive deforestation and unprecedented pressure on the natural
habitat’s infrastructure.

*****

The morning of the first trek was announced at 5 am by ritual gonging in the
Ugandan town of Kisoro, a place which one could have easily mistaken for an
abandoned set from an old Sergio Leone western movie if not for the surrounding
volcanic peaks and legions of bicycles in all phases of operation and repair. Heavy
wooden carts pulled by struggling cattle or people lumbered by in front of makeshift
repair shops displaying a meager supply of parts on squat tables. Faded pastel
storefronts with hand‐painted signs promised a variety of goods and services, but
upon closer examination, delivered little or nothing of the purported goods.

Kisoro sits in the foothills of the Virungas, a few miles from the Congo border
in a part of Uganda that prior to WWI was northern Rwanda. Djombe, the base of
departure for our trek was some 15km away on the Congo side of the border. And

another 15km on the Rwandan side of the mountains were the ashes of Fossey’s
Karisoko research station, destroyed during the various conflicts of the war.

In the uncertainty of the morning, the six of us had no idea what we might
face at the border or if we would be able to cross into the park. Upon arrival the day
before, word had reached us that the park was closed ‐‐ with various stories pegging
the reasons ranging from unspecified and mysterious military patrols to stories
about “that crazy Italian, Pablo,” having his license revoked after claiming a
monopoly concession on gorillas visits and swearing that no one else would get in to
see gorillas if he were to have his way. We knew that anything was possible, this
was central Africa in the ‘90s.

Somehow I felt we would get in. We did after all have a couple of aces in our
deck: Greg had worked tirelessly for months to secure our admission into the area ,
and Norbert Mushenzi, the Regional Director for National Parks in North Kivu
Province, Congo, was to meet us across the border and accompany our trek. Surely
the two of them would insure us with means to circumnavigate any man‐made
blockades.

*****

This was not the first time that I had attempted to enter Congo to see the
mountain gorillas. A previous trip which had been scheduled for September, was
canceled less than 36 hours before myself and traveling companion Jody Boyman
were to fly from the West Coast of the US to London, for connections to Entebbe,
Uganda and then to Goma, Congo on Lake Kivu. Late on the night of the 10th, we
began to receive ominous emails with attachments of AP press releases of new
fighting around Goma, mixed with warnings from our ground liaison in the area, a
hardened Belgian who had lived in central Africa for 30 years stating: “ I would not
come if I were not already here.”

Subj: All is not well
Date: 10/09/97 14:21:21 GMT

All,

As you will read in the attached Associated Press report, a situation has arisen in Goma
in the past few days which may jeopardize our trip. The problem is centred in Goma
and points northwest. We will be going northeast of Goma but will have to arrive at
the airport and pass through the town. I should add that this is an escalation of the
security situation of which I was aware when I visited Goma. Because, by all accounts,
the problem was going on 40kms in the opposite direction from where we were going, I
believed it was a situation we could avoid ... Our Regional Coordinator will travel from
Kigali, Rwanda by road to Goma tomorrow morning and return the same day ... please

stand by until Thursday evening (London time) when we will make a final decision
about the trip.

Best regards,
Greg

Attached was an AP report describing Interahamwe incursions, Mai Mai
raids, the burning of 50 villages since Congo’s ‘liberation’ a few months earlier, and
the death of the military commander and his aid at Bukavu airport ‐ north of Goma
and near the site of one of the massive relocation camps that had housed hundreds
of thousands of Rwandan refugees.

Twelve hours later the trip was canceled.

*****

The morning of the trek, the light was golden in the small dining area ‐‐ not
as a result of some magic photographer’s morning light, but because nearly every
room and the outside of the house had been painted a bright mustard yellow. It
reminded me of the Frank Black house on ‘Millennium’ ‐‐‐ an icon of safety in the
midst of ever encroaching darkness. In the TV show’s case ‐‐ the darkness of the
unknown evils of the millennium, and in out case, I was not yet certain of protection
from what. A quick breakfast of bread and dry cereal, topped off with my Africa trip
ritual of garlic, echinacea, ginger, Vitamins C and E, and a package of EmergenC, and
I piled in with everyone else into the midnight blue stretch Defender for the 50
minute drive to the border. Bulging back and fanny packs were loaded with
carefully selected photographic and video gear. I thought about the hassle of
endless paperwork for insurance claims if we were to roll the truck or have our
equipment confiscated as ‘gifts’ at the border.

At 7am we arrived at the Ugandan side of the border, and left our driver to
cross the no man’s land between the two countries on foot. On the Uganda sid, cars
drove on the left, and I was told that in Congo, it was on the right ‐‐‐ but there were
none to be seen to verify this. In fact, there were very few people at this hour, with
the exception of 4 teenage Congolese soldiers in camouflaged rain ponchos
squatting under a bamboo lean‐to topped with a blue plastic UN tarp. This
structure, along with an unenthusiastically constructed barricade made up of two
enormous semi‐truck tires and piles of jagged volcanic rock, marked the official
border.

The soldiers were less interested in our camera backpacks and more so in
Greg’s cigarettes, although they did make us place packs on the ground, unzip the
various pockets, and present the contents. I didn’t make eye contact. The thought of
a 15 year old kid with a South African semiautomatic weapon was particularly
unnerving at this hour, and besides, I am not a morning person. They held out their

hands, snapping fingers and demanding “Fire” and Greg provided cigarettes, a
lighter, and some Swahili small talk. Raised in Tanzania, he spoke the language,
although a different dialect than what was common in Central Africa. The soldiers
found this amusing and commented on his ‘Tanzanian Swahili”, a more
sophisticated form, but switched to French when they wanted to talk amongst
themselves. French was almost as common here as Swahili as a result of the years
during which the area had been a Belgian colony, and the number of French troops
stationed there during various conflicts in the early 1990s.

A hundred yards from the border crossing stood the building that served as
the customs office, a nondescript concrete structure, etched with bullet holes and
toasted black at the edges from a recent altercation. Local political graffiti was
scrawled and tucked away in its corners. This was where our Visas were to be
cleared and where we would meet Mushenzi and transport to take us to the staging
point for the climb up Sabinyo to find gorillas. Instead, we found the local Tutsi
official uninterested in, and rather annoyed at our arrival, telling us that the park
was closed and that we should go away. Regardless, he took our passports and
disappeared back into the building. We dropped our packs and sat on the cold
concrete steps and waited and watched.

Traffic began to appear on the road ‐‐ all human; especially women with
enormous bundles on their heads and, almost all regardless of age, carrying silent
babies strapped to their backs via large swatches of brightly colored Indonesian
fabric. Load size did not seem to matter ‐‐‐ logs, kindling, bound cut grasses,
enormous containers of water were all fair game for their head balancing skills ‐‐
and resulted in an amazing posture and fluid, measured gait.

Young men passed by pushing asymmetric wood scooters, gogolos, a form of
Central African mountain bike made entirely, including the wheels, out of wood –
generally raw tree branches, with a car shock absorber as part of the front fork. If
you crossed a tricked out long fork Harley Davidson with a Main County mountain
bike, and had Fred Flintstone build it – you would have a gogolo. Towering loads of
goods were stacked on those contraptions and pushed down roads and inevitably
up hills, as all points of delivery in Africa seemed to be uphill via means of rain
carved roads. And then they would ride them down, empty, at breakneck speed, in a
straddled crouch with one foot place on the back breaking pedal – the other in front,
bent at the knee to help absorb the violent bumps which the auto shock absorber
could not. To park, the nearest dead branch was used as a kickstand. It seemed the
perfect, appropriate use of technology and materials.

Several women walked by with large fluorescent colored plastic containers
balanced on their heads, 5 liters or larger ‐‐‐ carrying the local distilled gin, ‘waragi’,
or banana beer, and began dispensing samples to the four border guards to facilitate
their passing. If earlier I had found boys with guns unnerving, I found adding liquor

to that equation even more so.

A battered white Peugeot sedan coughed up in front of the customs office, a
perfect foil for the building, with its rusted and burned finish a metallic mirror of the
marked facade of the building. A long legged Tutsi in a bright blue Adidas warmup
suit unfolded himself out of the front seat. I expected him to pull out a tennis racket
and head off to the nearest court. Instead, he casually selected the nearest
substantial chunk of volcanic rock and placed it behind the left front tire as a
parking brake. Our elusive Tutsi customs official appeared mysteriously outside,
and together they removed the car battery from the Peugeot and put in another one
which they brought from inside the building. From the customs office, we heard the
whine of the radio click in ‐‐ the Peugeot served as the battery recharger for the
office. There was not an electric line in sight.

Nearly three hours after our arrival at the border, a flawless sparkling white
Toyota pickup flew down the road, throwing plumes of red volcanic dust behind the
two impeccably uniformed Congolese soldiers who stood in its flatbed riding
shotgun, AKs strapped across their chests and at the ready. It was Mushenzi. To me,
it might as well have been the cavalry. Mushenzi would get us across and in to find
the gorillas. Upon his arrival, the Tutsi officials who had been so uncooperative
began to smile and salute. The Adidas‐clad one carried Mushenzi’s briefcase, head
slightly lowered, answering questions by nodding and with a few mumbled words. I
later found out that this was one of the military men in charge. Often those not in
uniform were the ones in command. They carried no visible weapon, but they
wielded the unquestionable power of the word ‘commander’.

I was surprised by the display of firepower with Mushenzi and asked Greg
about this.

“Does Mushenzi fear for his life? Have here been assassination attempts on
conservation officials?”

“No. But he is concerned about a stray bullet.”

I wondered how armed guards would stop a stray. It all seemed rather after
the fact.

*****

Within a half hour, our transport arrived ‐ a white Toyota van, marked IGCP
(International Gorilla Conservation Program) , with a Yemenese used car sticker on
the back window. Like the Peugeot, the burns on the doors indicated that it had

seen some action. As an IGCP vehicle, it carried a large red “no guns” logo on the
side, a mark designed to keep troops from firing on it, as it was meant to carry only
non‐military personnel ‐‐ presumably aid and conservation workers. After we have
piled in with our gear, a Congolese soldier jumped in and sat in the back with his
South African semi, two magazines strapped on. He couldn’t have be more than 18
years old. His presence did not make me feel safer. I thought about Mushenzi and
stray bullets and I leaned slightly forward in my seat. Every inch could help. You
never knew.

At last we were off, or so we thought. The road to Djombe was lined with
large eucalyptus tree stumps. In the 1930s, trees had been planted along the
roadside so the roots would grow under the road and prevent erosion. In the
summer of 1994, during the refugee surge across the border from Rwanda and the
creation of camps that housed hundreds of thousands of people, one of the
European aid groups participated with a local military commander in the removal
and selling of these trees. Now there was no erosion prevention and the El Nino
winter had hit this area with a vengeance. Our overloaded standard drive van
bounced along on what looked like a drained riverbed.

The drive to the staging point took over an hour and covered but a few
kilometers. Mushenzi’s Toyota was barely out of site when our van pulled onto
another road, ‘a shortcut’, and stopped in front of a mud and thatch hut where we
were told by the driver that we were to wait for them to wake up the local military
commander, and receive permission to pass. The other Congolese passengers and
our soldier jumped out. I watched him take some sugar cane from a local girl and
smoke another of Greg’s cigarettes while lounging in the shade of a banana tree. He
wore a blue on white lettered t‐shirt which said “Bad Boy’ underneath his
camouflage fatigues. The six of us steamed in the van, not parked in the shade of a
tree, for nearly an hour. Then the elusive commander miraculously appeared. He
was the man who been sitting under a tree across the road watching us. He too was
in an Adidas warmup suit.

The commander, the soldier, the driver/van owner, and our entourage of
miscellaneous Congolese piled into the van and once again we were off. The
underbelly of the vehicle scraped on rocks in the road, each determined to rip off the
drive train or puncture the oil pan, or find some way to disable the Toyota.
Inevitably, one finally snagged us. We were stuck like a beached whale at low tide
on a red sea. Everyone jumped out and joined in rocking and pushing the van.
Wheels spun and I hoped that it would not slide and run us over if we ever
successfully freed it. Once unstuck, the van coasted five feet and died, exhausted,
apparently a common occurrence. There was nothing left to do but throw our packs
on and start walking.

Fortunately, ten minutes later, we saw Mushenzi’s white truck speeding

toward us.

As we moved farther from the border and closer to the mountain, the
buildings had become more primitive, and many appeared to have been abandoned
‐‐ some with doors closed with a padlock hanging outside, overgrown fields, the
remnants of a burned food storage hut, a few pigs and goats grazing untethered in
open fields and weed‐choked culverts. In the space of a few kilometers, we had
moved from the bright yellow cinder block and blue‐grey tin roofs of Kisoro, to the
red mud brick buildings with blue UN tarp roofs along the roadside to Djombe, to
the mud and woven thatch one room huts near the base of Sabinyo. In moving a
small distance, we had traveled far back in time, or at least in construction
techniques, to a world little changed in the century.

As the truck climbed slowly up the mountain road, a few children ran to the
roadside waving “Jambo,” while parents and older siblings peered suspiciously from
behind darkened doorways or paneless windows. There was silence except for the
struggling whine of the truck and that one word. The last person we saw was an old

man sitting alone by the side of the road holding a walking stick and pipe. The color
of his clothes were the same as the soil – it looked as if he was either growing out of
the ground, or it was slowly reclaiming him.
*****

Upon arrival at the staging point, which was nothing more than the end of the
road, we found there were no porters and also no water, other than that which we
had in our packs. We would have to carry our gear up to the rangers’ station base
camp, a 600 ft vertical climb. At our current elevation of over 5000 feet, this would
take us to 6000. The late day heat and the fact that my heart was already pounding
from the ride and freeing of the van, as well as a significant amount of anxiety from
the soldiers' guns ‐‐ had me more than a little concerned about my limited ability to
handle the elevation. I silently wished I had spent more time on the Stairmaster
back at the gym, and had been able to better curb my appetite for packing along a
herd of micro, but in mass, heavy, media gathering consumer electronics devices.

Arriving at camp, the military was everywhere. What once had been a
secluded tourist lodge for gorilla trekkers had now been converted into a military
base, and the rumors of “maneuvers” in the park began to make sense. I fully
expected Joseph Conrad’s Kurtz to come sauntering out of one of the bungalows, but
what I saw was obviously a wiry Rwandan military commander. He was with
Mushenzi.

As I lay on the grass catching my breath and trying to rehydrate myself, I
watched a half dead chicken tied by its feet to a soldier’s pack next to a large duffle
bag stuffed with bottles of Coke. It squawked and struggled and then was silent,
breathing heavily while trying to regain strength. Lunch for the soldiers. With
burning lungs and pounding heart, I felt as trapped as it was ‐‐ although I knew at

least I was not lunch.

We learned that the area had been closed for the previous two days due to
military maneuvers, and two weeks earlier, patrols had cleared all of the villages
within a kilometer or two of the border in order to limit the hiding opportunities for
the notorious rebel Interahamwe, who had been making nightly crossings across the
Virungas into Rwanda. I then understood why there had been no porters waiting as
usual. The village was empty. The word “aimisha” was used ‐‐ relocated. To where ‐
‐ “The camps.” For how long ‐‐ “Who knew.”

The rangers’ camp was another 30 minutes through an alpine meadow of tall
grasses and wild corn. Fortunately, at the military camp, we found porters to help
with the transportation of our gear. They were soon ahead of us, moving out at a
double time pace.

The gorillas had not been tracked for two days due to the maneuvers, and
consequently the rangers did not know even their approximate location. Usually,
gorillas were tracked every day, and during parts of the Rwanda and Congolese
conflicts, had been tracked on a 24 hour basis ‐‐ that meant that rangers watched
them until they built their night nests, and then returned before they awoke at dawn
in order to follow them throughout the next day. The rangers, with us tagging along,
would have to make up for the lost days of tracking. A long day was in the cards.
And with the size of our group we were not apt to be a very silent force in the jungle.
Nearly a dozen soldiers insisted on accompanying us along with our rangers and
trackers. “For your safety and protection,” we were assured.

As much as the soldiers were a source of worry for me, the rangers and
trackers were a true blessing. Sixty rangers patrolled the Congo side of the Virungas.
Ten percent of them were lost in the various conflicts in the area. Those who were
with us wore recently donated bright orange gortex Pantagonia jackets over the
deep forest green of their fatigues, tucked into the glistening black of rubber Wellies.
Generally rangers were armed while tracking, although they were required to leave
their weapons behind when approaching a gorilla group. On this trip, because the
military were carrying weapons, the rangers were forced to leave theirs behind.

Vusu and Jeremiah were the rangers leading our group. As much as their
physical appearance contrasted, their work in the jungle mirrored each other. Vusu
was Hutu, shorter stature and round laughing face. Jeremiah was a prototypical
Tutsi ‐‐ tall, rail thin, and angular. Somehow they had found a way to work together,
under a common cause ‐‐ the gorillas ‐‐‐ while members of their respective tribes
continued to be entangled in years of mutual hatred.

For most of the afternoon, I walked behind Vusu who pointed out half hidden
logs, boot‐sucking mud holes, snaking vines, and gaiter piercing stinging nettles.

With his machete, he cut a bamboo sapling and fashioned a hiking stick for me, and
later when I was exhausted ‐ a bench out of brambles and vines. He always looked
back when he heard a stumble. He moved with the jungle while I seemed only
capable of struggling against it.

Tracks and spoor of hyena, antelope and elephant and a tall blue gum tree
trunk worn smooth from rubbing told us that game was around. But none was to be
seen or heard. Old guide books and naturalists’ tomes state that the Virungas are
home to 60 species of mammal and 180 varieties of bird, but in our two days, we
were to see nothing other than gorilla and red Safari ants, siafu. The most prevalent
sound was the high‐pitched electric hum of insects which at times elevated to ear
bleed levels and then would suddenly disappear.

Intermittently replacing the insect buzz in my head was an odd mixture of
pop music lyrics ‐‐‐ Peter Gabriel’s ‘Red Rain’ and Barry Manilow’s ‘Copacabana’
running simultaneously in some kind of collective unconscious battle of the bands.
I could understand why under these circumstances, my unconscious might call up
words about “red rain is pouring down, pouring down all over me “ ‐‐ a symbolism
of blood and death. But lyrics like “Her name was Lola, She was a showgirl “ seemed
quite incongruous and out of place.

The pungent smell of crushed and rotting leaves and evaporating rain water ‐
‐ the composting of the jungle ‐‐‐ increased with each step as the brown uniformed
trackers used their machetes to cut through tangled vines and brambles as we
walked up hills with vegetation growing high above our heads into untamed
archways. While these tunnels provided some shade and relief from the heat they
also engendered an odd kind of claustrophobia and near panic in me. Initially, I
attributed it to overheating and dehydration, thinking that physical discomfort
could bring fears to the forefront and distort certain senses. But somehow I thought
I was made of tougher stuff than this. This was not the time or place to have a
meltdown. That altitude and dehydration could peal back a layer so thin to reveal
fear and thoughts of death was unnerving. But then I began to think about what we
had seen so far in the day ‐‐ the empty villages, the story of relocations to the camps,
and what that might really mean as rumors of a massacre by the Congolese of Hutu
villagers spread its way down the line of hikers.

Here we were climbing Sabinyo, and it was on this mountain that there had
been 3 gorilla deaths since the beginning of the civil war. On the Rwandan side,
Mrithi, one of the stars of the film ‘Gorillas in the Mist’ was the first mountain gorilla
killed on May 12, 1992 ‐‐ shot by soldiers. And in August of 1995, the silverback
Rugabo and his mate were killed in Djombe, Congo by poachers capturing an infant.
There was a collective memory of pain and death seared into the black muck that I
was slogging through.

A clearing unveiled itself, baking in the unforgiving stare of the equatorial

sun. A quick scan indicated that it was relatively nettle and siafu free making it a
temporary safe haven and a rest stop to suck down a few drops of Gatorade and
Emergen‐C laced water from my ever shrinking Platypus bottle. The soldiers,
porters and rangers settled in with Mushenzi holding court, and bottles of Coke
spilled out of the dusty duffel that one of the porters had lugged up the mountain,
balancing it on his head and shoulders. I couldn’t get over how they looked like an
odd bunch of extras from a David Lynch‐directed Coke commercial. I could imagine
them all turning to the camera and simultaneously shouting: “It’s the real thing.”
This fantasy evaporated as I watched Mushenzi handed a bottle by a sullenly silent
Tutsi soldier. AK flapping loosely over his shoulder and machete strapped tightly to
his hip, he took hold of a magazine clip and used it as a makeshift bottle opener.

*****

The rangers found our gorillas hidden deep in a dense bamboo grove,
shading themselves from the unusually hot sun. This would make it a challenge to
see them, but our group of six and two rangers headed in while the soldiers stayed
behind. No more than eight people are allowed in with a large habituated group and
no guns are ever allowed near the gorillas. Recent history is riddled with cases of
soldiers killing gorillas in fear when a silverback has initiated a fake charge to
protect an infant. This was the case in Uganda on May 17, 1997 when 10 gorillas
were killed by Congolese soldiers on patrol who stumbled onto a group with a non‐
habituated silverback who attacked. Soldiers sprayed the group with gunfire from
AK47s killing the entire group of 10, a massacre of a size unprecedented, even in
Fossey’s time. “If the soldiers had had some basic training in gorillas behavior this
could have been avoided, “ Greg Cummings believes.

This group we found was the remnants of Rugabo’s group (the silverback
who had been killed in the area almost 4 years ago) ‐‐ and it was still without a
silverback leader. Eleven members in all were led by young male blackbacks and
females, an unfortunately increasingly common occurrence. The group was feeding ‐
‐ precisely, languidly stripping leaves off of pale green bamboo stalks. When they
looked at us they watched us like silent buddhas.

Without the fear of stepping too deeply into the world of
anthropomorphization, gorilla family behavior is oddly ‘human’. Silverback adults
(males), while interested in visitors, are usually too dignified to pay attention to
people, and almost always present their magnificent backsides. Young males, called
blackbacks, are a different story. They are the energetic and curious adolescents.
The two young males in Rugabo’s group were obviously intrigued at our presence
and were clearly unafraid ‐‐ engaging in a raucous wrestling contest some eight feet
from us in a small clearing in front of a dense bamboo grove. They sat on top of each
other, entwined toes, pinned each other temporarily to the ground, and then just as
quickly both would stop and stare at our group ‐‐‐‐ the sound of camera shutters

and motors quickly clicking away in an attempt to get that one perfect combination
of expression and exposure. At times they laughed before beginning their rolling
again, gleeful grunts echoed in the mountains punctuated by the snapping of
saplings.

One of the blackbacks was identified by a ranger as “Hat’ who got his name
from a predisposition for stealing ranger and visitors’ head gear. As he watched us
and rolled within 3 feet of our group, I knew that he was debating which was the
more interesting activity ‐‐ stealing Mushenzi’s baseball cap, or continuing his
wrestling match. His decision was made for him as his fellow wrestler called him
back and the match started again, broken by occasional chest beating, mostly to
relieve tension.

During the breaks in the wrestling, the rangers and Greg engaged in ‘belch
vocalizations’ ‐‐ which are meant as soothing sounds to the gorillas. These sound
like a deep clearing of the throat followed by a high‐pitched question mark. The
blackbacks appeared to find the attempts amusing.

Eventually Hat and his pal rolled topsy‐turvy into the undergrowth of tangled
vines and we struggled on behind our machete‐wielding tracker to find other
members of this group. We found three in a small clearing peeling bamboo and wild
celery. Two ignored us, while the third, a female, watched us and then sprawled
coyly on her back like a plus‐size fashion model. Cameras clicked away.

With only a few minutes left in our time with the gorillas ‐‐ observation time
is limited to a maximum of one hour so not to cause undue stress in the gorillas ‐‐‐
we found a blackback sitting deep in a blue green bamboo grove, golden light
filtering down through the high laced branches, cutting the darkness, and feathering
onto his face. A starlet would have killed for that kind of lighting, magical and other
worldly. He seemed to be thinking or even meditating as much as he was eating the
tender bamboo tips. He sat back and looked thoughtfully up to the tree tops.
Another great photo op, but it was getting difficult to shoot, as the result of the
exhaustion and dehydration, it was nearly impossible to hold the camera steady
enough to shoot at the needed slow speed.

*****

It was time to go ‐‐ our hour was up and we discovered that we were
required to be across the border before curfew ‐‐‐ and it was a two hour trek down
the mountain and then the drive from Djombe to the border. So the thrill of gorilla
communing was immediately whisked away in the harsh reality of a forced march
out of the Virungas ‐ back through the dense undergrowth, brambles, stinging
nettles and boot sucking mud. There was little time to enjoy or contemplate the

surroundings ‐‐‐ there were just small snapshot images of elfin blue and white
flowers peering up through mud and elephant dung, the yellow bloom of hypercium,
small families of burnt orange and brown freckled mushroom fungus peering from
under rotting tree trunks, the pink blossoms of blackberries, and the occasional
unidentifiable bird call cutting through the trudging silence.

We emerged from the dense jungle and into the open meadow of high alpine
grasses, and a half mile in front of us we saw the ranger camp and the valley below.
Another half hour down the 600 foot vertical trail and we were back at the white
van which had miraculously reappeared and was running again ..... tenuously. The
slow tortuous standard drive, belly scraping ride in reverse back through the empty
village, wondering which rock would claim us this time. Two soldiers with guns,
trackers, rangers, porters, the commander and us. Once the smoother dirt road to
Djombe was encountered, the turtle crawl transformed into Mr. Toad’s wild ride set
against an extravagant African sunset ‐‐ an out of control high speed red dust
pedestrian scattering explosion through town. Immediate religious conversion to
all in the van. And while there was no conversation among the trekkers, only the
whine of engine and Swahili from the soldiers, in my head there was a shouting
match of contrasts as I tried to piece together the emotions experienced in such a
short period of time ‐‐ of the morning frustration of entering Congo and the hair
brained ride in , the anxiousness caused by the soldiers, the utter joy with the
gorillas , and then the slap in the face reality of the impossible human situation
which surrounds them.

We reached the border after dark and after curfew, but with luck and a few
bucks, we discreetly crossed back over the no man’s land and dragged ourselves
gratefully back into the Defender waiting nearly invisible in the dark .

As we pulled into Kisoro, I looked down the road into town and at the crest of
the hill the wraithlike silhouettes of villagers were backlit by the mist‐diffused high
beams of an oncoming vehicle. In my exhaustion and dehydration, they were
transformed into silent spirits. Witnesses to the genocide. Ghostly echoes of night
massacres.

That night we were all relatively silent around the dinner table as we took in
at least a liter of water apiece to restore what we had lost during the day. Through
Greg’s efforts, we all had been able to purchase two passes into Congo for gorilla
trekking, and with only 8 hours before leaving for the next day’s trek ‐‐ the men
from Wyoming would go again as they needed to meet with Mushenzi, while the
three women would remain with Greg and go again one day later.

*****

The night before we departed on the second trek, the weather changed to

that more typical of the Virunga rainforest, where it rains 49 weeks of the year.
Heavy thunderstorms blasted rain against the tin roof of the guesthouse. I knew that
the second trip would not be the same as the first, at least in terms of the weather.

At breakfast, choking down some dry, unfortified cereal with protein powder,
I was still somewhat unsettled and anxious from the trek of two days ago, unsure of
what we would face this time ‐‐ soldiers inevitably, although we did not know how
many or with what expectations. The weather would now be a different factor as
the blinding heat of Thursday had been replaced by the cold rain of Saturday. As we
pulled out of Kisoro, the low grey clouds hugging Sabinyo signaled even more rain at
higher elevations.

Departing Kisoro at 7:20 we arrived at the border by 8 and our Tutsi customs
official took our passports and Visas while dressed in peach cotton pajamas. One
got the distinct feeling that he considered us a necessary nuisance that continually
cut short his night’s rest ‐‐ and he wore these clothes to communicate that to us in
no uncertain terms.

This time, the dirt yard in front of the customs house was filled with a dozen
people. Clearly after two days, the word was out that we were here and there was
money to be made. Young boys tried to sell valueless Zairian banknotes,
distinguished by the image of Matheshe, a silverback lowland gorilla that was a
national icon and was killed by poachers. Several porters clustered together,
chatting, clearly sizing up whose pack they would take for the best tip. Our teenage
soldier was there again, a silent restlessness in his stance and flat brown eyes with a
look that he meant us to see. This time he wore a red t‐shirt underneath his
camouflage fatigues ‐‐ black letters proclaiming: “I want it all.” Was this a signal to
us, or just another odd coincidence? American pop culture t‐shirts were a common
occurrence in Africa, from Tupac Shakur to Nike logos. Donated clothing from
charitable groups in America inevitably arrived for sale in black market stalls in
various villages. A Western fashion statement did not necessarily mean a statement
directed at us.

Once again, the white Toyota van pulled up and we footed the bill for a half
dozen or so Congolese who piled in with us. The van ride cost us $150. And we had
paid another $100 for the privilege of “military protection.”

On the drive through the village, the rain began again and children walked on
the roadside carrying enormous tarot leaf umbrellas, the rain collecting in a small
pool on the leaf and then dropping off their backs. White fist‐sized bell‐shaped
blooms of deadly nightshade perfumed the air as they intertwined with lilac
morning glories and Queen Anne’s lace vines which had wrapped themselves
around a decaying bamboo fence.


On the ride up to the staging area, there was an even greater military
presence than the first day‐‐ a dozen soldiers with semis and spears walked on the
side of road, and the driver stopped to chat. I was more uncomfortable by their
increased presence and also by the fact that we were now without Mushenzi and the
men from Wyoming who moved out the night before for Goma. It was now three
women and Greg. The rumors about the clearing of the villages and a massacre had
now become fact to us. And the odds were better than even that those assigned to
“protect” us had been participants. On this drive, we looked closer and saw the
circular ashes of four burned huts. The fields were abandoned untended. “Aimisha”
‐‐ relocation.

This time there was no stopping at a hut, no stranding on an unfriendly rock ‐
only the occasional sideways slide through the muddying road. With porters, we
climbed the hill again and arrived at the ranger station by 9am . The rain intensified.
In this situation, one praised the invention of gortex and quick drying synthetic
materials.

The four of us stood silently in the rangers hut along with a dozen rangers,
trackers, and soldiers. The soldier in charge wore an Australian style hat, one side
jauntily buttoned up, and a flask of whiskey poked out of his back pocket. Greg and I
pulled out a recorder to take in some rainfall ‘ambiance’ to cut into video later on. If
I was going to drag this all over Africa and up that hill, I was damn sure going to use
it.

Nearly an hour later, it was clear that the rain was not going to stop or even
diminish, and when we were told that there was a lone silverback within 30 minutes
of the camp ‐‐ we headed out ‐‐ energized by the cooler weather, and the prospect of
a less arduous hike. The tracker quickly found the silverback’s night nest of crushed
vegetation and several large piles of droppings, which they often sleep with for
warmth. Since gorillas are vegetarians and eat vast quantities, the droppings were
abundant and slightly green with a semi‐sweet smell ‐‐‐ much like the odor of horses
chewing on alfalfa hay on a summer day. Given the early hour, we knew that he had
to be near as the home range for a gorilla is from 2‐15 square miles, and one would
rarely range more than a few kilometers a day.

Twenty minutes later we stumbled onto him as the tracker cut through some
bamboo intertwined with blackberry and gallium vines. The four of us crouched
down and followed a lone ranger, while the soldiers remained behind.

It was a silverback between 16‐19 years old named Rosiraboba, “the one who
causes no trouble”. Up until a few weeks ago he had been paired with a female that
had left Rugabo’s old group (which we had seen two days before). But she had left
him and rejoined the group. He had since been alone. Perhaps in a few months or in
a few years he would be mature enough to take over leadership of that group, give it

a silverback once again, and regain his mate.

The only other known silverbacks in the area were with another group of 9
members some 2.5 hours hike away. Two silverbacks were a part of that group, but
only one was dominant.

We sat in the wet woven groundcover of moss and vines some four feet from
the silverback. The scent was sweet fresh wet green. The sound of water collecting
in leaf pockets and dripping from the tops of the vine choked bamboo to the ground.
The occasional call of a songbird that at another time of the year would migrate to
England along the same route that our plane out of Entebbe would take us. The only
sound from the silverback was the snapping of pulled vines, and his slow, rhythmic,
deliberate chewing.

His only concern seemed to be in picking out the gallium vines with the
tenderest leaves, which he did with methodical precision. He sat surrounded, nearly
buried to his chest in their knotted lushness, and when that which he desired
appeared above his head, his massive arms and shoulders would erupt out of the
greenness to pull down the branch or sapling that they had been growing on. When
he had dined enough in one area or was made too anxious by our presence, he
lumbered on, his massive 400 pound frame clearing a pathway for us through the
jungle, virtually eliminating the need for machetes. This was in stark contrast to our
stumbled and halting movements on the first day when we had to count almost
solely on machetes to make our way.

Our experience with the silverback was markedly different than it would
have been had he been with Rugabo’s group or his previous mate. His behavior
toward us was almost more blackback than silverback. Rather than pretend to
ignore us, he watched us as we watched him. His eyes looked deeply into us,
unblinking, as he ignored the whirring of video and still cameras alike. There was
no sign of aggression or fear, only an occasional release of anxiety of high pitched
“hoo hoo hoo” and the “rat a tat tat “ of chest beating. The plaintive ‘hooting’ sound
seemed incongruous to his massive weightlifter frame, and it broke your heart to
hear it.

I was truly amazed during these moments of chest pounding that I could sit
so safely within 4 or 5 feet of this creature, that could easily rip a chunk out of me if
he so chose, but which I knew he would not. Greg had told me that the only
habituated gorilla attack that he knew of directly came during the filming of a
silverback charge for the movie “Gorillas in the Mist,” when the cameraman Alan
Root had deliberately provoked a silverback with an infant nearby in order to
capture some charge footage. The silverback obliged ‐‐ but with a real charge, not a
bluff, and tore a piece out of the man’s hip before tossing him into the brush. Greg
had also told me about another ‘attack’ in which a researcher was observing a group
and an infant fell on its head. The silverback, Shinda, believing that the man had

attacked the infant, held the man’s knee in his jaws and stared at him for a good 15
minutes, communicating in no uncertain terms what he could, but would not, do.

We followed Rosiraboba into another small clearing and watched him roll
over onto his back, exposing his smooth hairless chest, and grabbing a sapling with
his feet, bringing it close to his face for inspection, examining it as if discovering it
for the very first time ‐‐ something that he had seen every day of his life for nearly
two decades. His long black fur was studded with waterdrops which caught the
early morning light now breaking through the storm and piercing the bamboo and
vine‐woven canopy. As I watched him, I put down my camera and experienced a
feeling I have only had once or twice in my life ‐‐‐ a feeling which meditation
masters describe as emptiness ‐‐‐ an emptiness of exquisite calm, pleasure and
contentment; not an emptiness of fear and loneliness.

Our hour ended as the rain began to abate, and we returned euphoric to camp,
passing by the night nest, which was now beginning to wash away. As we broke out
of the jungle into the open field, I could see valley mists and fog hugging the lower
elevations. It was like walking on clouds.

When we reached the van, we found eight people, several live and bound
chickens, and large sacks of potatoes already loaded into it . Our entrepreneurial
driver, gestured for us to sit on the sacks in the van with our gear, and we told him
in no uncertain terms that there was no room for us and that this was not the deal
for our $150. Silverback euphoria seemed days away as the reality of daily life in
Congo slapped us unceremoniously in the face. Greg continued to complain and
negotiate on our behalf in both Swahili and English. The driver reacted by violently
throwing out the packages of one young passenger ‐‐ spilling open a burlap sack
filled with rough carvings ‐‐ obviously meant for the tourist trade across the border
in Uganda. No one else in the van, particularly the laughing woman and two soldiers
in the back moved. This act was clearly for our benefit. He was going to keep in the
van whomever he wanted.

Before we backed out onto the road, several rangers and trackers were
stuffed into the van, including our guides from the first trek, Vusu and Jeremiah.
Their presence made it clear to us that after our departure, the Virungas would be
closed to outsiders again.

*****

We left Kisoro on Palm Sunday. Up at 5:30 am, a half moon and Orion backlit
the three most northern Virunga volcanoes with Sabinyo smiling its crooked grin.
The peaks stood guard over the valley filling slowly with the sweet scent of purple
jacaranda, shadows dark against a pearl gray sky.

As we drove off in the Defender, I was not sure whether or not I had received
the revelation I felt I was promised. Congo’s deadly silence had roared loudly in my
ears and in my heart for most of the journey. If there was to be a revelation, I
thought that perhaps it was that within the center of Hell there may still be a Garden
of Eden. That the acts of man often diminish those of the serpent. That a silent
looming creature, glistening black and silver in a tropical storm more than a mile
above the earth may hold answers to questions we may have not even thought to
ask.

Later, as I sat in the comfort of my reclining seat on my BA night flight out of
Entebbe, and as the darkness of Africa became early morning over the Atlantic, I
thought about Rosiraboba and hoped that he would find his mate once again and not
be alone in Eden anymore.

Appendices/Additional Notes

1. Environmental Impact of War

All along the border of Congo and Rwanda there are signs of massive
deforestation. In the summer of 1994, when nearly one million refugees burst over
the border from Rwanda into Congo, refugee camps such as Kibumba at the foot of
Mt Mikeno, Kitale (near the Ugandan border), and Mugungu near Lake Kivu, were
set up within 5km of the hostile border marked by the Virunga Mountains, a world
heritage site. A camp was even built on recent lava fields caused by the 1994
eruption of Nyamlagira and was devoid of any natural shelter or vegetation. By
UNHCR rules these camps should have been located at least 50 miles away. During
the period of July ‐ September 1997, the height of the disaster, one thousand tons of
wood were removed from the forest each day by refugees who received
encouragement in these efforts from various relief agencies. This represented the
loss of more than seven football fields of forest each day. When cholera broke out
in the camps, medical waste was dumped indiscriminately in the Virunga forest.

“Some may debate that the impact on the environment is incidental
compared to the human suffering. But if all of the Virungas was taken for
development, only two months of population growth would be accommodated by
those resources. This would be at the loss of an irreplaceable ecosystem which
provides up to 40% of the water for Rwanda and Congo.” Greg Cummings,
Executive Director, DFGF UK.

“ At the height of the refugee crisis, with 1 million people in the camps on the
park boundary, they represented the largest cities in all of central Africa. As the
Rwandan government was attempting to attract refugees back to their country, the
birth rate in the camps was exceeding the rate at which the Rwandans were
returning.”

2. Rangers

At full capacity, there are 70 rangers in Congo, 50 in Rwanda, and 30 in
Uganda working in the various mountain gorilla habitats. In Congo alone, 12
rangers have been killed in the past year, taking their number down to under 60.

In resource‐strapped Congo, rangers often do not receive their pay for
months, even as long as a year. In that case, their wives become the real
breadwinners for the family as is the case in many parts of Africa where woman are
the true economic backbone.


3. History of Gorilla Deaths (19921998)

At least 19 gorillas have been killed in the years between 1992 and 1998 (2
unconfirmed deaths in Rwanda by a landmine). No one really knows the final toll as
a comprehensive gorilla survey has not been undertaken since 1989.

Date Name Location Cause of death
May 92 Mrithi Mt Sabinyo, Rwanda Shot by soldiers
5/21

Oct 94 Mkono & female Mt Visoke, Rwanda Landmine,
unconfirmed

March 95 Four killed Bwindi, Uganda Speared by poachers
in K group capturing infant

Aug 95 Salama* Bukima, Zaire Shot, inconclusive
evidence

Aug 95 Rugabo*&mate Djombe, Zaire Shot by poachers
caprtuing infant

Aug 95 Luwawa* Bukima, Zaire Shot by poachers

May 97 Kabirizi Bukima, Congo Shot by soldiers
& 9 others

(courtesy of DFGF UK)

* Salama, Rugabo, and Luwawa were all brothers.

4. The Karisoke Rangers (1998)

When the massacres began in Rwanda, the Karisoke rangers disappeared
into their villages. Six rangers were imprisoned, accused of participation in the
genocide. One ranger, Lateri, has been in custody for nearly 4 years and has not yet
come to trial. “I cannot imagine any of the rangers being involved in atrocities,”
Greg Cummings.

One month later, in August 1994, Ian Redmond and Dieter Steklis were sent
in by DFGF to accompany four rangers back across the border into Rwanda to
evaluate the situation at the research center. At that time, they found that the

gorillas had survived remarkably well and there had even been a few births. The
facility itself had been looted. That same month, Jean Bosco , another ranger, while
attempting to follow the Redmond group, was detained and nearly beaten to death.
He currently lives in a remote village in Rwanda.

Today, nothing remains of Dian Fossey’s original buildings at Karisoke

5. A View from Space

On April 12, 1994, six days after the massacres had begun in Rwanda, the
space shuttle Endeavor passed over the Virungas during orbit 58 and with
Spaceborne Imaging Radar took what is known as a “false‐color” radar image.
Arthur C. Clarke, the famed science fiction author and patron of the DFGF UK, had
convinced NASA to document this area so that the images could be used for further
gorilla habitat study. This image was seen in the movie, “Congo,’ which was filmed
primarily in Costa Rica, but set in the Virungas.

“ It seemed so weird having all this happening (the massacres) while we had
a space shuttle overhead.” Greg Cummings. “


©1998 Elizabeth Gebhardt "In The Center of Hell There Is A Garden"

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