Transvaal Blue Skies is a story is based on true events, as documented in photos, letters and family oral history, of how, early last century, Suzanne moved to Africa and built her laager. This is a series of loose dots weaved in a chronological thread, wrapped into a story to be plucked and observed, heard and remembered, recognised and judged. Suzanne Dulière was my grandmother.
François still talks to Claude about the Nkudu head of Bétaré Oya. He should not. Dripping skulls and carcasses are not conversation topics for young girls, sorry, darling dearest dear. We do not live anymore on the Frontier, that Africa which now only exists in your mind. Remember? Times have…
A shadow drifts above the timeline, a creeping sense of déjà-vu.
This is the sister-ship to the SS Baron Dhanis, in May 1931. Suzanne is in Kalemie once again. 10 years ago, only. 10 years ago, already. This had been their Africa, the Africa of the Tanganyika, of the Mutambala…
François is Belgian, and, well, we are at war since a year and half ago. It used to be an administrative formality, an oddity even. But, with his employers, the CEM, headquartered in Paris on the wrong side of oceans, the Demarcation Line, trenches and U-Boats, it has become a…
The team is 20 men: not Special Forces, nor even secret agents, just motivated volunteers, officers, NCOs and soldiers, high-ranking administrators and even 2 priests, Fathers Dehon and Pouille, to act as liaison. The British commander in Nigeria is dismissive of the ragtag band. But the British governor in Lagos…
When does a country die? When it loses its territory, its people, its institutions, its leaders? All of it? Part of it? France is a 1000 years litany of implosions, of losses, of separations: sliced by Carolingian infighting, partly sold to the Vikings, split up during the Hundred Years War…
War. Or something like it.
On every frontpage of the “Eveil du Cameroun”, whenever she can get her hands on it, that is. There, Suzanne can read the war updates, rendered in pretend-military language. It turns into a laundry lists of ships sunk, damaged, troops sent here or there…
Suzanne and François are in Bangbel, on the hill overlooking the River Lom, their island in the middle of the Sun, the blood and the teeth.
Just North of Bétaré Oya, a stone throw from Suka, a walk from Kissi. They still greet and cheer at the chief of Suka…
The SS Ussukuma ploughs through the waves of the Canary Islands, the swells just there to reinforce the impression of a race to the stables. It could have been a perfect 10 year anniversary of the First Crossing, but for a year. Anyhow, Tenerife then, Tenerife today, Tenerife tomorrow. The…
Camp 6, Doroko on the Mari river.
Zanne was now discarded, irrelevant, a memory of someone now gone. Suzanne remained. And happened to Life. Oh, she believed scrupulously in God, in Country, State, Polite Society, School, Medicine, Cuisine and commonly held rules. Else, what would society become? Packs of feral…
Cameroon, Mari River. It is drier than Katanga, more primal, rawer. The monkey crawls up to nestle in the crook of her elbow. Both hands tucked in her apron, Suzanne looks at the view. Their view. Later tonight, an exhausted François and his team will emerge from the treeline, after…
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