Earlier this month, I told you about
surviving a hippo stampede on the first night of our orientation-to-Africa
course. (If you missed it, click on Terrors of the Night: Hippo Stampede.)
Hippos stayed in the lake during the
day, for the most part, but at night they roamed freely throughout our
campground, Fisherman’s Camp.
Each hippo can consume up to 80 pounds
of grass each night, using their wide and uniquely muscled lips to rip up the
greenery. While they roam and eat, they made monstrous grunting, munching,
belching noises throughout our campground.
According to Alina Bradford, “Hippos
are very loud animals. Their snorts, grumbles and wheezes have been measured at
115 decibels . . . about the same volume as you’d get when 15’ from the
speakers at a rock concert.”
Now, picture this: Hippos routinely grazed
within an inch of our tent wall.
Imagine waking up at night to such ghastly
noises—just an inch or two from your head!
I often snuck out of my sleeping bag, grabbed
my camera, lifted the tent flap, and snapped photos of a massive hippo’s face looking
back at me. (Unfortunately, we lost all our photos from Fisherman’s Camp. How I
wish I could share them with you!)
But then one day things got even more interesting.
I wrote in my memoir, “One morning
several of us unzipped our tents and headed for the outhouse, only to find that
a couple of hippos still grazed among our tents. With sturdy, long, razor-sharp
tusks in mouths that open four feet wide, hippos are deadly.” (from Chapter 1, Grandma’s Letters from Africa)
Deadly, indeed!
“Hippos are aggressive and are
considered very dangerous,” says Alina Bradford. “They have large teeth and
tusks that they use for fighting off threats, including humans. . . . [They]
kill an estimated 500 people per year in Africa. . . .”
I continued writing this about that
breath-stopping moment when we discovered hippos among us:
“It seemed like we all stopped
breathing and moved in slow motion. Some of us stood at a distance and watched
to see what would happen.
“Fellow trainees Dick and Nancy Baggé
and their two children stood near their tent, keeping an eye on a hippo about
twenty-five feet away. I sensed Dick and Nancy weren’t sure whether to stand
still or run.
“After a few tense seconds, that hippo
charged them—but in an instant of inspiration (divine, no doubt), they darted
into their tent and zipped the flap.
“When that hippo lost sight of them, it
made a sharp left turn and kept charging—toward me. I stood about fifteen feet
away but. . . .”
And here’s where I didn’t write the
whole truth in my memoir:
Instead of doing what Dick and Nancy did
and flinging myself into my tent and away from danger, I stopped to snap a
photo! Can you believe it? What a foolish thing to do!
I stopped to take a picture of a charging
hippo only 15 feet away and rapidly closing in on me.
Alina Bradford continues, “The hippo is
considered the world’s deadliest large land mammal. . . . Hippos are highly
aggressive and are well-equipped to deliver considerable damage to anything
that wanders into their territory.”
Hippos’ teeth can be as sharp as razor
blades. “The bite force of an adult female has been measured as 8,100 newtons
(1,800 lbf). Hippo teeth sharpen themselves as they grind together. The lower
canines and lower incisors are enlarged, especially in males, and grow
continuously. The incisors can reach 40 cm (1 ft 4 in), while the canines reach
up to 50 cm (1 ft 8 in). The canines and incisors are used for combat and play
no role in feeding.” (Wikipedia) Don’t miss this YouTube video at the 1:22 mark.
What a fool I was to stand there and
take a photo with one of the world’s deadliest animals charging me! I was the
kind of person Proverbs 17:12 describes: “a fool caught in foolishness.”
But by God’s grace, at the last
possible moment,
I unzipped our tent flap and ducked
inside.
In a hippo’s world, out of sight is out
of mind,
and that massive, angry, lethal,
creature thundered on by,
just inches from where I had stood.
Imagine! Only a flimsy tent wall kept
me safe!
A year later I wrote this letter to my
granddaughter:
October 25, 1994
Nairobi, Kenya
Dear Maggie,
We
heard that a hippo killed a man at Lake Naivasha where your grandpa and I
camped during our orientation course. It attacked a family while they slept in
their tent, and in order to save his wife and child, the man ran outside to
lure the hippo away. He succeeded but, in the process, the hippo killed him. I
tremble when I think of all the nights hippos ate grass within inches of our
tent window and I snapped pictures of them. God watched out for me more than I
knew. (Chapter 7, Grandma’s Letters from Africa)
at Lake Naivasha (on Facebook).
