The terrain was all pure white sand. He was being fucking ridiculous because there was not one single weed in the camp! It crossed my mind to use my week-old twisted ankle as an excuse to get out of this futile exercise but decided against it, not wanting to take the chance of being left behind on light duty if the siren wailed and we had to fly out on Fireforce. I picked up a rake and joined the seek-and-destroy mission that ambled about in small groups, chuckling among themselves at the stupidity of the action.
“This is almost as futile as finding and shooting a real live SWAPO.”
“Yeah—we’re on the border fighting a war and he thinks we’re raw recruits in 1 Para!”
That night in the tent square we relaxed as the burning South West African sun sunk red behind the sand banks that surrounded us and threw a beautiful pink against the sky. As soon as it was dark Stan and I shuffled down, heads low, past the ops room and down through the air force tents to the prefab air force offices on the far side of the big brown hangars, where twenty Mirage fighters were kept. The place was crawling with blue; our brown army uniforms stood out like SWAPO tiger-stripe in the blue air force world that we were in.
We stood in the shadows like insurgents and listened to The Police’s ‘Walking on the Moon’ as it drifted softly from the cassette player in the bar. Stan and I peeked through the flap into the bar. There was a tall air force sergeant with a walrus moustache, talking loudly about all the bullshit he had to go through to get his mail and complaining that he’d had to personally go and check at the postal unit for his parcels.
We stood in the shadows a full half an hour before he finally left and Stan quickly slipped into the long bar and bought two bottles of good South African brandy. The barman was a happy, chubby lad who was also doing his two years’ national service. He sold us booze even though he knew he could lose his cushy job if he was caught.
“When are they going to allow you meat bombs to have a drink?” I heard him ask Stan mockingly.
“After the next contact, or when we get ten kills a week,” Stan answered, trying to sound like an old bush war veteran and glaring at the barman with his well-known ‘I’ll kill you’ Waffen SS stormtrooper look.
“You know, you guys must be the only unit in the whole damn South African Defence Force that’s not allowed to have a cold beer at night— why?”
“Because we’re always on standby looking after you guys’ arses. We’re like Squad Cars—on duty 24 out of 24, you know. We’ve got no time for daily drinking like the rest of you.”
“Probably won’t let you because you can’t handle your drink. Look at us… easy, relaxed… making the best out of a bad thing. Here, I know nothing about it if you’re caught.”
Stan quickly passed me the bottles through the tent flap, walked calmly out the bar empty-handed and slipped past two lieutenants who were just walking in and luckily seemed too deep in conversation to notice him.
The chubby air force barman was right. The Parabats were the only unit I knew of that was not allowed to drink. Nobody knew what the real reason was. Every other unit in the SADF was allowed two beers a night, starting from after basic training. The Bats weren’t allowed to drink at all; not throughout training back at Bloemfontein, or even up here on the border. It was a pretty low rule for a tough paratrooper outfit—not allowed to have a cold frosty after a long, hard day—but we had all sort of got used to it and just made the most of it when we got the chance. The result of this was that when we did get the chance to drink, we would all binge, go overboard and get fucked up. This binge-drinking would result in a sad loss to us later on. One of the stories as to why this rule was in place was that, years ago, some drunken paratroopers had walked into the officers’ mess in Bloemfontein, fucked everyone up and torn the place apart; hence no drinking for any paratrooper any more, except now and then at braais when we returned from patrol or ops. So far this had only happened twice.
We walked quickly and purposefully through the rows of air force tents, sticking to the shadows. I was hunched over to try and keep the brandy tucked in the front of my pants and from sliding down my trousers. We looked like two fat hunchback paratroopers going for a pleasant evening stroll among the tents.
At night, the big air force base of Ondangwa took on the cozy feeling of a summer camp. Yellow, naked light bulbs shone through the flaps of the long rows of tents occupied by the air force and the paratroopers. The untarred roads that ran between the tents also had the occasional light that shone on camo netting… the occasional roar of laughter or strum of a guitar mingled with a dozen cassette players blasting out a variety of music, all backed by the constant, gentle but insistent hum of half a dozen big electric generators. I enjoyed the nights at Ondangs.
Reaching our tent undetected, we triumphantly pulled out the two bottles of brown gold and disappeared down into the underground bunker next to the tent. John the Fox and Doogy had already made preparations and had some warm Coke, canned sausages and cigarettes at the ready. I was in a great mood, full of energy. We had borrowed a guitar and pretty soon I was hammering out Hendrix’s ‘All along the watchtower’ and some smoky, hazy blues. Dan had come in and soon we were all tanked up and trying to speak louder than the next. I tried to coax Danny into airing his views on South West Africa as he had that afternoon, but with a crowd he was not too eager and made a point of drinking a toast: “May all SWAPO leave clear spoor under the full moon for us to follow!”
We were having a whale of a time when suddenly we had to move the party upstairs in double-quick time after a jealous neighbour tossed a red smoke grenade into the bunker, instantly filling the bunker with thick, acrid smoke and sending us scurrying to the top, coughing and cursing. The red smoke soon enveloped the bunker and wafted up into the tent which we had to evacuate and dangerously take the party out into the open air, in the line of sight of any wandering corporal. I had the presence of mind to unscrew the light bulb on the way out so that the dense red cloud billowing from the tent would not be seen and which now looked like a dark, spooky form rising from the tent.
The grenade had stained the guitar with red dye that would not come off, which made the owner mad as hell when I later returned it.
FIRST BLOOD
I had always loved the bush and was starting to get the feel of Owamboland. I was getting used to the wild, perfumed smells that wafted in from the vast bush and the faint peppery smell of sand that was on everything you touched. I was even getting used to the baking hot sun that had us sweating at seven o’clock in the morning, and the inky-black cold nights that fell so suddenly.
The only thing that I could not get used to was the squadrons of mosquitoes that would rise, seemingly from nowhere, as soon as the sun dipped under the horizon to strafe and torment us till daybreak. At Ondangwa we had nets over our beds that were a blessed protection, but out in the bush we were easy pickings for the marauding squadrons. They would send out a scout to recce the area for targets and once they found exposed white paratrooper skin, it was mere minutes before a ‘Fireforce’ mozzie platoon was called in to relentlessly attack the hapless target. Military insect repellent seemed useless; the only relief was to retreat into your sleeping bag like a cocoon and breathe stale air and vile rat-pack gas and smelly feet. It was a tough choice.