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Authors: Karl Pilkington

Tags: #General, #humor

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Shirley was making Jess a drink of tea and asked if I’d like one. While I went for a normal English Breakfast tea, Jess had some fancy redwood tea from a two-litre plastic bottle. Strange
to think a hippo had fancier tastes than me.

It was hard to imagine that hippos are classed as one of the most dangerous animals on the planet as I stroked her on the head and gave her a drink. It didn’t even touch the sides. It just
went down her throat like I was like pouring water down a grid.

Jessica was now eleven years old and hippos have been known to reach the age of forty.

SHIRLEY
: I’m her mother.

KARL
: Is that how you feel?

SHIRLEY
: I am her mother. Definitely. After I miscarried I actually felt that nothing good could happen to me in my life, and while I was pregnant
Jessica actually licked my belly. And after I miscarried I went through a traumatic experience in my life where I got addicted to tablets and alcohol very badly. And I slept with her every
night, and when she became interwoven with my life, and licked my belly and accepted me, I could actually kick the habit. So, Jessica cured me.

KARL
: So, you saved her and she saved you.

SHIRLEY
: Yeah.

I went into their home through a doorway that had a big steel security gate fitted to the doorframe. But unlike the bars at a zoo it wasn’t designed to keep an animal in, it was to keep
Jess from roaming into the house when she pleased. Shirley called to Jess. She made her way out of the river and up the steep garden and into the front room. It was at that point I first got a
proper idea of the size of her. It was a mad sight, like something in a cartoon or dream. And to think I’d asked if I should take my shoes off when I entered a few moments earlier! They
didn’t have many ornaments dotted around, but then this wasn’t really a home for Toni and Shirley to live in, it was more hippo-friendly. I doubt any insurance company would cover the
costs of breakages if it was reported that a pet hippo knocked over a Ming vase. But this is the problem with having such a pet. It would take over your life. It’s bad enough when you have a
dog or a cat and you have to get someone to look after it when you go on holiday.

When I was about twelve I had a pet magpie that was fun to have at first. I would throw small glittery things like Coke can rings and rolled-up tin foil and it would fetch them. On a few
occasions it came flying into my bedroom window with bits of jewellry that it must have either found or nabbed from going into other open windows. I would ride around the estate on my bike with
Maggie (the magpie) sat on my handlebars or shoulder, and it would hang around the school so I could play with it in the breaks. But after a while it seemed to get quite aggressive. It got to the
point that I’d look out of the windows before leaving the house to check it wasn’t around. I’d think the coast was clear, but it seemed to know the sound of our door opening and
it would swoop down and peck at my head like a scene from Alfred Hitchcock’s
The Birds
. The final straw was when it popped the tyres on my Raleigh Grifter, so I rode to the water
park with it and then sneaked off as it was trying to steal some bait off some fishermen. I never saw it again.

Shirley told me Jessica hangs about with other hippos downstream for a few hours a day but she always returns. She sometimes brings her pals back, but they aren’t allowed in the house. It
reminded me of a childhood mate who lived in a flat on our estate. His mam was obsessed with keeping the place spick and span and wouldn’t let me in, so I used to have to stand outside his
bedroom window, and he’d have to stretch the joystick over so I could play him on his computer. It was just as well he lived on the ground floor.

Shirley gave me a carrier bag full of green beans and got me to stand behind the worktop in the kitchen as she called Jessica over. She opened her mouth 160 degrees as I threw in handfuls of
beans. She never really chewed or tasted the food, just swallowed them as if they were Hundreds and Thousands and then flipped open her big mouth quickly like a lid on a pedal bin for more. I
suppose it’s a good way of getting rid of scraps.

While we had been feeding her, Toni had dragged in a mattress off the porch and put it in front of the plasma TV. Shirley announced it was time for her massage. Jessica did a five-point turn to
get out of the kitchen area and headed for the mattress. Once it was lying down it looked even wider. It’s funny to think Suzanne won’t let me have a 50-inch telly ’cos she says
it would take over the room!

Shirley got out some cream and all three of us sat round Jessica and rubbed it into her back. She was really relaxed and nodded off as we massaged her. It was similar to polishing a car. Wax on,
wax off. The skin felt like hard rubber. I suppose that is one good thing about hippos as a pet. No hairs on the sofa. Just a few days ago I was building a hut for a family of five. Now, here was a
hippo in a house getting a back rub while nodding off watching the telly.

Later that day Stephen called to explain that I’d be visiting the Ndebele tribe as the next stage of my trip:

STEPHEN
: The Ndebele tribe, they’re a disappearing culture. They’re fading out, so they’re quite keen to pass on their heritage
to people like yourself. You’ve already got your own kitchen in your caravan, so I thought it might be nice if you pop by and cook something up for the king of the tribe using the caravan
we sorted for you. More sharing, you see.

I don’t really do cooking. Luckily, Suzanne likes to do it and I like eating, so we work well together. If I have to sort myself out it’s never anything nice, it’s just
something to stop my hunger. Suzanne makes really nice butties with loads of extra bits like tomato, cucumber and lettuce, but I never think about putting those layers on. Once I’ve put the
cheese on it’s ready to eat as far as I’m concerned.

I stopped off at a Spar supermarket and bought some bits and pieces that were going to be easy to cook using the basic cooking implements I had in the caravan. At home I suppose you’d have
to ask if anyone had any allergies to anything, but I don’t think people in this part of the world worry about things like that. I’ve never seen Lenny Henry turn up to a poor town in
Africa on Comic Relief and someone saying, ‘Thanks for the bread but I have a wheat allergy.’

I like to have a pasty with some bread and a cup of tea, but I can’t see the Queen being up for that. Plus, the Queen wouldn’t want to be wasting time with me
either. It’s a right rubbish gig she’s got. I’m glad I wasn’t born into the royal family. Your life isn’t your own. I had a mate who had no choice but to be a
butcher ’cos his dad wanted him to carry on the business. The Queen’s job is the same in a way.

I can’t be bothered going to weddings of people I know ’cos I’d have to chat to long lost cousins. The Queen has to speak to total strangers she’s never going to meet
again. Always being the centre of attention must be annoying for her, as well. Never being able to be left alone – it must be like sitting in the front row at a comedy club.

I know someone who got an invite to some lunch do with the Queen. They said some fella called the Master of the Household tells you the rules on how to speak to her. Apparently she is given
biographical notes about you so she can lead the conversation. I just hope that I was ever invited they don’t use Wikipedia, as someone once asked me if it was true that I knocked an old
woman off a bike and killed her as they’d read it on there.

I bought some nibbles for a starter. Crisps, biscuits, two apples and some sour wiggly worm sweets. For the main I went for the English classic of cheese on toast with beans, with chocolate cake
and custard for pudding.

I got to the Ndebele village. They’re known for their brightly coloured buildings, which are painted by the Ndebele women by hand with no help from tools or rulers. The designs are
complicated triangles, diamonds and zigzag patterns that would give a chameleon a headache. The bungalow-type homes are painted in a variety of reds, yellows, blues and greens with a thick black
outline. They look like a game of Tetris.

Stephen told me it was an art form that was dying out. Because it’s not done to be sold, it’s more of an opportunity for the wives to express themselves with the choice of colours
and designs and set themselves apart from their neighbours.

The artist I met was a woman called Francina who is famous for her work. She was sat with a few friends and family on the floor in the shade. Some of them wore clothes that were as bright as the
walls they were leaning on. Francina wore metal rings round her neck.

KARL
: How many have you got? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve rings round your neck!

NATIVE WOMAN
: These ones are the original rings.

KARL
: You can’t take them off?

NATIVE WOMAN
: You sleep with them, you bathe with them, you work with them.

KARL
: Oh, I couldn’t be doing with that. Why can’t you take them off?

NATIVE WOMAN
: It’s our tradition.

KARL
: So is it like a wedding ring?

TRANSLATOR
: Exactly.

NATIVE WOMAN
: You are supposed to wait until your husband dies, or you yourself die.

The story goes that the rings show their faithfulness to their husband. I don’t know why so many rings though. Her neck was like a curtain rail. I didn’t like wearing polo neck
jumpers when they were trendy as they’d give me headaches, so I couldn’t put up with this. The only positive I could think of is that she would never be strangled by anyone.

The younger woman had something different round her neck. It wasn’t tight to the skin or made of metal. It was a plastic temporary one that looked like the big rubber seal you get on a
washing machine. Her version was like the baggy loose-fit compared to Francina’s skin-tight rings.

KARL
: So, if that means you’re married, what does that one mean?
(points to softer big ring around another person’s neck)

BOOK: The Further Adventures of an Idiot Abroad
6.84Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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