Some timely advice
Only food runs
By Andy van Smeerdijk, Staff Writer
Published: September 28, 2007, 00:00
Ask Peter Allison what to do in case a lion were to charge at you, and he would say, 'Hold your ground, make yourself look as big as possible and roar back at the lion!' The safari guide/author tries to convince Andy van Smeerdijk that this trick works 'most of the time'
He has been charged at by lions. (Twice.) He's leopard-crawled up to cheetahs, swam among elephants, sunk Land Rovers in croc-infested lagoons (also twice) and been hopelessly lost in the African wilderness (more than twice).
Yet somehow, his safari guests seem to tolerate Peter Allison. Even like him.
When you read about his adventures in the African bush in his book, Don't Run, Whatever You Do, you might at first mistake him for a boastful, macho safari guide, but the 32-year-old Australian admits he's more of a khaki klutz than a chest-pounding hero.
"Machismo has never been my strength. I am too uncoordinated for sport and am not a particularly good driver or mechanic so can't even fake it when I try," says the Sydney-based safari leader.
As a 19-year-old, Peter backpacked through Africa and by chance landed himself a job as a general dogsbody in a South African wildlife camp.
There he learnt some of the skills of guiding: how to drive a 4WD, identify plants and animals but most importantly he was told the secret of how to avoid ending up on the wrong end of the food chain.
"Whatever you do, don't run is the golden rule of the bush," says Peter. "Only food runs. This was the very first thing taught to me by the safari guides I worked with. If a lion charges, or an elephant, you have to hold your ground, make yourself look as big as possible and do your utmost to convince it that you aren't afraid."
The Aussie is slight and not particularly fierce looking. So how exactly does this work?
Peter admits he was "never quite sure how this one works. In my case, whenever a large animal hurtled at me with the full capability and possible intent of killing me, you would have smelt the fear in Tokyo. It does work though - most of the time."
He adds that roaring back at a lion is also an option. But does he really think that roaring makes any difference? "Not the way I do it, but it always makes me feel better," he chirps.
Armed with this knowledge, young Peter followed his mentor, Chris Greathead, north to Botswana and ended up working as a safari guide in the midst of the most pristine wetlands on the planet, the Okavango Delta.
Here he was based in a rustic safari lodge, Mombo Camp, populated by expatriate managers, local staff and guides, not to mention the other visitors: hyenas, wild dogs, squirrels and monkeys. The latter were a particular adversary as they used his tent as a trampoline!
Oh yes - and guests. People from across the globe forked out considerable wads of cash to see nature in the raw and these proved just as fascinating as the denizens of the Okavango.
Each day, he took guests out on game drives through the floodplains, savanna and scrubland in search of cheetahs, lions, leopards, elephants and other animals.
His book careens from one adventure to the next: luring a buffalo away from his guests while on a walk, chasing lions as they pursued rival lions and witnessing the first few steps of a newborn elephant.
Sounds like a dream job? Just wait. Peter, who quit being a full-time guide several years ago, says it was a privilege being able to witness the
day-to-day life of wild animals. He's always been besotted with animals and claims he would sooner shoot a tourist than a leopard! However, spending three months solid guiding tourists grated nerves.
Not to mention the isolation - being at a safari camp, wildlife was his work, pastime and main source of conversation. It's not as though he could watch a movie or go to the gym.
"The downside is not having a real social life," says Peter.
"I would tell my city friends 'I had a huge party the other night - there were five of us!' Also, day after day dealing with the sometimes unreal expectations of tourists can wear a statue's patience thin. People who think there is no stress in the job haven't gone three days without finding any lions."
Part showman and part naturalist, Peter took - and takes - his job seriously. His mission: to share his love of nature and conservation with others.
"I con the safari goers into believing that I am an entertainer with my bad puns and showy explanations, but it is all a ruse. At the end of each safari they will leave knowing such obscurities as a giraffe's blood pressure or why you can't go near a blue waxbill's nest (240/160; and because they make them close to wasp nests).
With a near photographic memory, Peter quickly rose to become one of the finest guides in Botswana. He turned his fascination with animals to insects, trees, history and culture. He's also a self-confessed birder geek.
But regardless of his or her talent, even the most articulate and knowledgeable guide finds it difficult to keep guests entertained and informed.
Either tourists are plain ****** or they're so swept away by their surroundings, their commonsense abandons them. There are many examples of this in Don't Run, Whatever You Do.
While Peter has had his share of numbskulls, he recalls one particularly dim-witted person he took on safari.
"A group arrived who had all made some attempt to outdo each other. One had the most super-duper camera, another the biggest lens while the third had a video device that would have made Stephen Spielberg jealous.
"The not-so-bright one, though, came with a parabolic microphone and wanted to record every sound. I took great delight in sightings as he aimed his microphone at animals like giraffes and asked everyone to be quiet for a minute. A soon as he was recording I would turn to the group and say, 'Giraffes are mute.'
The monotony of life at the camp was also broken by the pranks the staff played on each other. As he speaks Japanese, Peter was always called upon to guide the rare Japanese groups that came to the camp.
"A group of Japanese was coming to our camp, and as I speak a bit of that language the magnificently named and just as formidably-built Chris Greathead (the camp manager) asked me how to say, 'Welcome to Mombo'.
It took me three days but he finally had a phrase down pat.
Unfortunately, it meant something entirely different and when the group arrived they were greeted by an enormous man with hairy knuckles shouting at them with a beaming smile, 'Beat me and call me Queen!' When I explained what he had said he hid for the rest of their stay!"
One of Peter's most memorable adventures was the time he tried to cross a deep lagoon in a Land Rover. Vehicles are open in Botswana - there's no glass between the guests and the animals - and in this case the guests got spray-painted in muddy water.
Peter says he suspected he was in trouble when there were hippos both sides of the vehicle, but by then it was too late - the vehicle stalled and drowned.
Always the optimist, Peter says he would like to see car makers produce vehicles more suited to his driving style - a Land Rover submarine model perhaps.
"Without a doubt ... preferably with short acting stun torpedoes for any crocs they try to pluck the tourists out from the back as you cross lagoons.
"The reason for my enthusiasm for your suggestion is that while I detail in the book one time I drowned a vehicle, I neglect to mention that I did it again a month later. Maybe it wouldn't have been such a problem if Land Rover just put a few litres more of silicon over the sensitive parts, like the engine?"
As well as working in Botswana and South Africa, Peter did a short stint as guide in northwestern Namibia, including some safaris at the Skeleton Coast Camp.
The aptly named camp is located in an evocative yet harsh stretch of the Atlantic coast, where beaches are littered with whalebones and shipwrecks. Here he met his most undesirable guest.
"I had always believed that a bad sense of humour was better than no sense of humour, until I took an English advertising executive around the Skeleton Coast."
"He made excruciating puns at every bit of information given out, and called his wife "Mummy" in a little boy's voice.
At one point when he was out of the vehicle a homicidal voice whispered to me that I should just drive on, and let his bones join those that gave the region its name. I didn't, and all of those irritating breakfast ads are the likely result. I'm still not sure that I didn't do broader society a great disservice.''
Serious side
Peter's comebacks are as quick as a cheetah's pulldown and his pen's not too slow either. But he's a sensitive, genuine person who has experienced his fair share of pain in his life.
Indeed, his serious side comes through in his book when a fellow guide dies of Aids. His grief at this is juxtaposed with the memory of his own mother's battle with cancer. It's candid and revealing but quickly moves on.
In between safaris, Peter yearns for the African bush, especially the animals he knew intimately. When Mombo's two male cheetahs died three years ago, he was devastated.
"I was broken for days when I read of their death - I had figured it would have been years ago, but to think that they were still there until only recently and I never saw them again broke my heart."
After this, he received news that another local guide he had worked had also died and his grief was "given a different focus", he says.
"I've been to the Delta a number of times in the past few years but haven't been to Mombo for more than five years. It would be strange and sad going back now I think."
While today the photographic safari industry tries to protect wild areas through eco-tourism, for decades wildlife areas were set aside for hunting - an unlikely saviour.
Although many people who work in the eco-tourism industry feel that hunting still has a role to play, Peter is adamantly against it.
"I'm no fan of trophy hunting. And no matter what economic rationale you give for it, it still boils down to this: a living creature that feels pain and fear is killed for entertainment. No justification makes that worthwhile."
Having worked as a guide trainer, he feels there's more required of the modern guide than showmanship and knowledge. He feels they must have a sense of responsibility towards conservation.
"There is a new requirement to the job of safari guide which has come about with the realisation that Africa is not boundless and does not have infinite resources. New guides have the responsibility of making sure that tourists leave Africa desperate to preserve it."
The future
So what inspired him to write the book? "I was sick of being a carpenter," Peter quips, adding that there is another book in the pipeline.
"Yes, another book in the burgeoning genre of African adventure comedy non-fiction short story, which is titled Brace Yourself! This Might Get Rough! After that, a book about finding the real America is under consideration."
So what's his favourite animal?
"The Labrador. Because I was practically raised by two of them, and that is why I love animals so much," he says.
"But you probably meant wild animal, and I have two of those. I love cheetahs for being so fast but wimpy at the same time, as I like the idea of a big fierce-looking animal that is actually quite vulnerable.
"They are a bit dumb though, and it is their intellectual opposite that is my overall favourite. Elephants never stop teaching you about themselves and by being the most unpredictable animals, to me (they) are the most fascinating.
"They have the capacity for tenderness, violence, playfulness and excitement every time you see them, and unlike the dozy lions, are nearly always doing something."
Peter lives in Sydney with his Italian fiancée, Flavia. "I have a cat and he has a weight problem. The stereotype of the overfeeding Italian mother is in this case correct!"
To supplement his income, he still runs the occasional safari to Africa. In fact, his sign-off shows where his heart truly lies.
"I lead at least two safaris a year because I go dribbling, licking-the-walls, shouting-obscenities-at-small-dogs crazy if I don't get into the bush and watch wild animals every few months."
Peter Allison's website is
www.peterallison.com
Children in the wilderness
Peter is also involved with the Children in the Wilderness scheme, which "to my mind it is the most innovative and selfless conservation programme that I have heard of'', he says.
"Every year Wilderness Safaris shuts a large number of its camps and brings kids from surrounding areas into the reserves that are usually closed to them.
"They meet educators who teach them cultural aspects that might be dying out (attuned to the speciality of their locale, be it basket weaving, stone carving or computer programming) and they are taught health and hygiene things as well.
"Most importantly, though, they have fun and see the animals and have the experiences that to my mind are their birthright. Many come from underprivileged backgrounds (one orphanage spent a week in Damaraland Camp in Namibia) and for many of (the kids) it is the highlight of their lives.
"Some may take little from the experience long term, but if just one or two grow to be the next generation of conservationists the programme is a greatsuccess. I have to go and blow my nose now," he adds.
For information on Children in the Wilderness programme, go to
www.childreninthewilderness.com
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