Running in Opuwo

The Road to Sesfontein

The footpath is lined with desiccated brown shrubbery and thick yellow brambles. My steps are light but they kick up puffs of dust and cause something to rustle in the underbrush to my left. I peer into the brush, half expecting one of the many large spotted pigs to come barging out. It smells vaguely of feces; and not just from the pigs, donkeys, and cattle. The bush is the toilet for those living on the outskirts with no plumbing, a lifestyle dependent on what nature is willing to give them.
The path ends and I am on a road of gray Earth and walnut-sized rocks. To the left are the fields from which I emerged, and, behind them, a hill dotted with concrete shacks and topped with a water tower. To my right are tall stick fences and round thatch-roofed huts. There is the faint squabbling of chickens and children from somewhere inside.
A pickup truck grinds past with its bed full of Himba women, their ochre-red skin aglow in the light from the fading sun. The wheels cough up a maelstrom of dust in its wake, filling my eyes and lungs as it hangs in the air. I pass the branching road where mounds of trash are dumped and later burned. It is constantly smoldering with blackened cans and shards of glass.
I hear rapid footfalls behind which eventually fall into cadence beside me. It’s a tall Himba youth with a loincloth and a long, carved wooden stick. We run with the hanging silence of our separate worlds, bound together for those few moments before it’s time for me to turn around. I wave as he continues down the road to Sesfontein.
On my return I spot four children, all boys who reach a bit higher than my waist. They are barefoot and waiting for me. When I get close enough, I shout “Indjo! Tupuka!” (Come on! Run!). They chatter excitedly and swarm around me, running proud with concentration, often surging ahead to their own cheers. I point to each head and count to four in Otjiherero. They nod to indicate that I am correct and then stop suddenly, melting back into their homesteads. “Kara nawa!” I call and fall back onto the footpath that leads to my home, just as the stars are beginning to peek out from their indigo blanket. In the distance I can hear a drum and the voices of men and women, chanting and singing, to which I match the cadence of my steps.


Bull Run

My frayed shoes pound the dust; it feels and looks as if I’m jumping in bowls of gray baby powder. Two boys are crouched by a polluted trickle of river, and watch me guardedly as I pass. “Moro!” I greet them, and they grunt a response.
I pass two Himba women with bowls on their heads, monochromatic in red dreadlocks, skin, jewelry, and animal hide skirts. They stare unashamed at me, stopping and turning in their tracks, and then jogging a few steps while laughing to let me know that I’m the duck out of water, the one who is looking and acting odd. High-pitched children’s voices shouting “Otjilumbu! Otjilumbu!” (roughly translated as “white person”) can be heard from somewhere inside the thicket of trees.
I round a corner and find a small herd of bulls, their horns and ear tags gleaming. They are closer than I wish and I have to pass within ten feet of the biggest one, the one in the lead, who lifts his head from munching yellow weeds to watch me. I look down quickly, realizing with relief that I’m not wearing my red shirt. However, I become wary of the bull’s eyes following my every move. When I am a short span past them, I begin to hear the faint sound of beating hooves. I look back to see the lead bull jogging, the others joining him, a wall of raised dust at their rear. Panicked that I have started a stampede, I take off through the trees to my left, across jagged terrain and dried up river beds.
I keep one eye out for spitting cobras in the grass, and the other for following bulls.