Читать книгу Best Day of My Life: True stories to inspire, move and entertain - Told by a cross-section of the UK's celebrities and courageous everyday people - Giles Vickers Jones - Страница 7

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I’d been told to go home and I was not expecting the trip to have a happy ending. I’d packed my bags, crossed the border into Rwanda and checked into a small room in the eaves of a beaten-up old hotel. Seven hundred rebels had occupied the base we needed to get to, outnumbering us 33 to 1.

I’d spent three weeks training with the Advance Force Rangers of the Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo for a TV programme and I’ve never met a greater group of men. Their commander, Ellie Mundima, promised me that, if I completed my training and won a green beret, he would take me to meet one of the 29 mountain gorillas left in Congo. I’d passed, but the presence of the rebels, ruthless murderers led by an indicted war criminal called Laurent Nkunda, meant we couldn’t travel to the gorilla area.

When Ellie heard how many soldiers there were, he looked down. ‘You cannot fight a mountain,’ he said, and told me to go home.

If it’s true that you find the greatest heroes where there are the greatest obstacles to overcome, Ellie certainly proves it. His unshakeable optimism would give him a quixotic air, were it not for the very real dangers that he faces. He’s been the victim of at least one assassination attempt, when poachers killed his bodyguard. And over five million of his countrymen are thought to have died as a result of the war in Congo which started in 1996. Yet I’ve never met a more positive man.

I asked Ellie about the fate of the gorillas and the lines on his forehead flinched. He told me that they would probably be killed for meat. If the rebels saw one of the babies, they might kill its entire family so they could take the tiny creature away and sell it on the black market.

I’d completed a three-month training course in three weeks, with Ellie taking me for runs every morning, teaching me jungle survival, first aid and endless military drills. He also gave me an AK-47, which he taught me how to use and ordered me to keep within arm’s reach at all times. I should have been ecstatic to have succeeded. Instead, I was going home early, a little disappointed that I wouldn’t see a gorilla, but mostly depressed to have seen first-hand what the rangers were up against. Their cause seemed hopeless.

Then I got a call from the rangers. According to local villagers, the rebels had left and the post was empty again. The rangers told me to get back immediately so we could go and check on the gorillas.

Our plans had changed so many times that I didn’t allow myself to get too excited. I knew there was a strong chance that we’d find nothing or that rebels would force us to flee again. Or we could find an entire family killed for their baby. The rangers love the gorillas and I didn’t want to see their reaction to discovering an entire family butchered. With only three families left in the entire national park, such a loss would surely tell them they were defeated.

We arrived at the base after a couple of hours of driving and there was no sign of the rebels.

As we had done so many times over the last three weeks, we stood in line and cocked our guns together. All we now had to do to make our guns ready to fire was flick the safety catch off. The ritual made everyone become deadly serious. But I also knew this was the last time I would do it with these men, and I knew I was going to miss them.

After five hours of walking, we found a huge area of flattened leaves, which Safari, one of the trackers, told me had been a bed the night before.

There was only one flattened area, so it must have belonged to one of the three lone Silverbacks in the park. Gorillas eat a huge amount and don’t travel far in a day, so, dead or alive, he had to be close.

Soon everyone stopped and motioned to the rest of the group to crouch and be quiet. I was told to take off my beret and remove the gun from my shoulder.

‘Don’t point at him, don’t make sudden movements. Make eye contact with him for a few seconds then look to the ground, so he knows you are not challenging him. If he charges, just lean forward and remain still.’

I moved towards Ellie and, beyond a huge branch, in a small patch of brilliant sunlight, I saw the thick shiny coat of the gorilla. His head looked three times the size of mine. His shoulders were the size of watermelons. He looked at us and one of the rangers made a quiet grumbling noise, like an old man being disturbed in his sleep, and he went back to eating.

If we had both stretched out our arms, we could have made contact. He stared into my eyes, as if he was searching for my intentions. It felt like we were communicating and I was reluctant to look down, as ordered.

When I did, I dipped my head forwards theatrically and then slowly looked up at him again, finding it impossible not to grin. I hadn’t even dared to imagine that this moment would really come. I turned to Ellie and whispered, ‘When the rebels came I thought I would never see the gorillas.’

‘Even if they kill, they can’t end all. There must remain some,’ Ellie said triumphantly.

‘And you kept your promise.’

Ellie laughed and broke into the shining, permanently optimistic smile that I’d seen so much of over the last three weeks.

‘Yes of course. Yes,’ he said, as if the outcome had never been in doubt.

The gorilla, one of only three lone males in the entire national park, was named Kareka by the Rangers. Three weeks after I left, Nkunda’s rebels killed the other two.

There are now less than 700 mountain gorillas left in the world, and perhaps less than two dozen left in the Virunga National Park in Congo. But, on that one day at least, Ellie showed me what a glorious place it could be.