It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents — except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept up the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies) (Edward Bulwer-Lytton), or as in my case the African bush and it was no gust of wind. A sixty knot wind came through our camp site. We held onto whatever we could. Glasses, crockery, cutlery, food, all went flying. It was not my first traveling dinner, but it was certainly the most exciting!
I was doing show and tell for a somewhat sophisticated audience. My guests included two members from the tribe of Gucci, a trendy Englishman in a long black leather coat and his companion, almost fresh from England, a family from Sandton complete with 4×4 spray-on mud, a wide-eyed journo and of course the Naked Minister.
The Sandton elites decamped to more formal accommodation, the type with actual walls and a roof, never to be seen again. The rest of us salvaged what we could, ate on the hop, and retired to our tents. The naked minister circled my tent like a hungry beast that can smell its kill. Eventually he gave up and slunk away.
The next day dawned glorious; the previous night’s storm but a fading memory. The female of the Gucci tribe peeked out of her tent, her hair a bird’s nest, bags under her eyes. Eventually she emerged, gingerly at first and then a little more boldly, high-heels abandoned in favour of “getaway” shoes. During the night, as she waited to be dragged away to her death by the creatures that lurked in the dark, she realised all she had to do was run faster than one other person to save herself.
The Englishman emerged in his coat, black leather pants, boots and hat. All that was missing was the cigarillo hanging from the corner of his mouth and strains of the Good the Bad and the Ugly playing in the background. His lady-friend flexed her tattooed biceps as she cleaned her nails with a pen-knife; something which would have been far more impressive if she was doing it in a speeding car or while riding a horse.
Last but not least the journo slipped quietly if embarrasedly out of the naked minister’s tent. This time, he came, he saw, he conquered!