CIA 114
collective nouns 50
colonialism see Britain; France; logging; slavery; USA
Congo, Democratic Republic of (DRC) 80–1, 97, 101–2, 104; Kinshasa 98, 121
Congo-Brazzaville 99–142; history 101–2, 102–3; Makoua 123–9, 312; Ouesso 132, 140–2; politics 103, 132; visas 13–14; see also Brazzaville
Congo River 98, 115–17
cormorants 34
coucals 39
crocodiles 110
crows 50, 275;
pied 85
cuckoos 34, 275
de Gaulle, Charles 118, 218
desert navigation 255–6
Dikongoro 61–2
Dinesen, Isak see Blixen, Karen diseases and illnesses; bird-borne 191; see also Ebola; malaria
Dover 298
doves 35
dragons 61–2
DRC see Congo, Democratic Republic of
DRS 214
eagles 34, 50; fish eagles 67
Ebola 126, 138–9, 142
Ebro River 278, 279
elephants 75, 76
Elf oil company 102, 103
England see Britain English Channel: ferries 296–8
Ethiopia 1–2, 97
falcons 240; Eleonora’s falcons 67–8; hobbies 67, 75, 244–5; peregrine 66, 67
festivals; International Women’s Day 156–7; Ncwala 89–94
fieldfares 275, 315
Finder Keepers (Heaney) 16
FLN (Front de Libération Nationale) 218–19
folklore and superstitions; birds 275; swallows 7–8, 39, 275, 279, 280, 287, 302, 316–17; travel 17; witch doctors 95, 103, 199–201
football 57, 58–9, 222–3
France 287–97; and Algeria 212–13, 217–19, 224; Bordeaux 293; Calais 296–7; and Congo-Brazzaville 101–2, 103, 104, 118; and logging 155–6; and Morocco 239; Narbonne 291–2; Newby on French 291; and Niger 204; northern countryside and agriculture 296; Paris 294–6; Perpignan 287–90; Toulouse 292
Fulani people 186
Gabon 120, 124
Garden of Secrets, The (Goytisolo) 241
geese 34, 275;
Canada 315
GIA 214
Gibraltar 261–5
Gibraltar, Straits of 261
Giggs, Ryan 222–3
goats 53–4
goldfinches 219
Goytisolo, Juan 241
Great Karoo 26
great snipe 28
Growing Business Foundation 189, 190
Guinea, Gulf of 8, 179
gulls 253, 275
harmattan 190
Hausa people 186
hawks; bat hawks 67; goshawks 67; sparrow-hawks 67
Heaney, Seamus 16
Himba people 44
hip-hop 195
hittistes 215–16
HIV/AIDS 84, 96
Hobbit, The (Tolkien) 28
‘Home Thoughts from Abroad’ (Browning) 306–7
hoopoes 30
Ibo people 187
International Women’s Day 156–7
Islam; in Africa 186, 187, 191, 192; buildings in Spain 278; unrest in Algeria 213–14
Kabila, Joseph and Laurent-Desiré 104
Kaokoveld desert 43, 56
Kavanagh, Patrick 19–20
Kenya 79–80
kestrels: lesser kestrels 32
kites 50–1; red kites 29
Kovango River 61–3, 65–6
Kruger, Paul 25
legends see superstitions and folklore
Leopold II, King of the Belgians 101, 172
Leuillette, Pierre 218–19
Likouala River 135
La Linea 265–9
Lissouba, Pascal 103
Livingstone, Dr David 78
logging 136, 155–6, 157–8, 164, 171
London 302_4
Lonely Planet Guide to Namibia and South Africa, The 16
Luangwa River 87–8
Lusaka 84–7; Cairo Road 85; Cha cha cha Road 85
Madrid 270–7; Atocha Station 277; British Consulate 276–7
Magnus, Olaus 10
magpies 275
Malakani nuts, carved 51–2
malaria 15–16, 68, 85
Mali 203
Mambili River 115–16
Marrakech 229, 237–47; Jamaa el Fna 238; Medina 245–7
Mawanasa, President 92
Migration Atlas: Movements of the Birds of Britain and Ireland 9
millipedes 58
Moller, Anders 29
Morocco 227–57, 292; Agadir 254; border with Algeria 225; Casablanca 229–37; Essaouira 249–54; Fez 256; Tangier 257; Taroudannt 254–5; time zone 280; see also Marrakech
mousebirds 45
music; hip-hop 195; rai 195–6
mythology see superstitions and folklore
Namibia 41–76; Caprivi Strip 55–6, 59, 75–6; Divundu 76; Grootfontein 51; history, politics and living conditions 42–4, 56; race relations 48–9; Rundu 52, 55, 56–9; shape 56; Trans-Caprivi Highway 46; Tsumeb 47–50; Windhoek 42
navigation 80, 255–6, 292
Ncwala festival 89–94
Newby, Eric 291
Niger 193–205; Birni n’Konni 193–4; Niamey 202–4; Touareg rebellion 203–4; visas 14, 168
Niger River 199, 201
Nigeria 177–93; Abuja 187–90; Bornu 186; Calabar 180–4; crime 186; Cross River State 185; happiness 187; history 186–7; Kaduna 192; Lagos 187; politics 185; slavery 182–4; Sokoto 192; visas 14, 168; wealth 185–6
nightingales 34–5
nightjars 139–40
Ninjas (Algeria) 214
Ninjas (Congo-Brazzaville) 103
Ntumi, Pastor 103
Nuttall, Rick 29–36
oil 179, 184, 211, 216
‘On Raglan Road’ (Kavanagh) 19–20
Orange River 40
owls: eagle owls 35
Paris 294–296
‘Parlement of Foules’ (Chaucer) 34–5
peregrine 66
Perpignan 287–90
Piaf, Edith 230
pirogues 115
plovers: blacksmith plovers 65
Plutarch 274
Politkovskaya, Anna 219
Pygmies 133, 135–6
Rafter, Denis 272–3
rai 195–6
rails: water rails 29
rain: African 39–40, 79, 122
rainforest 129–30, 131–6, 155–6; see also logging
ravens 50, 275
red bishops 30
red kite 29–30
redwings 275
religion; African sectarian divide 191; see also Islam
riads 238–40, 241
rollers 30
rubber 171–2
rugby 36, 48, 146–7, 164–6, 188
Russia; and Africa 120, 121, 216; and Chechnya 219
Sahara desert 12, 194, 201–2
Sahel 189, 192, 193
Sangha River 141–2, 146
Sao Tome 124
Sarkozy, Nicolas 118, 293–4
Sassou-Nguesso, Denis 103
Savimbi, Jonas 56
shebeens 54
slavery 182–4
snakes 21, 60–1, 95
SNCF 290–1
snipe: great snipe 66
South Africa 4, 17–41; Great Karoo 26; history 23–5; Kimberley 24–5, 26; Matjiesfontein 25; Natal 24; Orange Free State 24, 27; race relations 17–19, 26–7; Transvaal 24, 25; Upington 40; visas 13; see also Bloemfontein; Cape Town
Spain 265–87; African immigrants 272, 277–8, 279–80; Algeciras 261; Barcelona 285–6; see also La Linea; Madrid; Zaragoza
springboks 70
Stanley, Henry Morton 101
storks: white storks 240–1
sunbirds, double-collared 32
superstitions see folklore and superstitions
swallows; in Algeria 217, 220, 221–2; appearance 3, 21–2; arrival dates in Europe 281; in Britain
2–3, 305, 306, 307, 308, 312; calls 242; in Cameroon 153, 170; collective noun 50; in Congo-Brazzaville 110, 115–17, 134, 138; courtship, mating and parenting 68–70, 83–4, 312; feeding habits 34–6; flight 11–12, 30, 34, 40–1, 170–1, 201; folklore and superstitions about 7–8, 39, 275, 279, 280, 287, 302, 316–17; in France 292; greater striped swallows 29; in history 9–10; in the Koran 191; learning to fly 315; in literature 34–5, 274, 306–7; longevity and mortality rates 31, 44; migration dangers 201, 202; migration departure 315–16; migration fat reserves 201–2; migration groups 83–4; migration routes 4, 8–9, 10–11, 281–2, 298; in Morocco 229, 237, 244, 257; moulting 22, 83; names around the world 7–8, 96, 241, 279, 306, 316–17; in Namibia 50; navigation 256, 292; nests 309–10, 312; in Niger 201, 202; in Nigeria 191; pearl-breasted swallows 29; predators 67–8; sense of sight 117; in South Africa 8, 11, 21–2, 26, 29, 33–4, 40; in Spain 265, 273, 278–9, 285; tail length 170–1; tracking movements 9, 11, 30; types 10–11; in witchcraft 200; in Zambia 83, 96, 97
swifts 242–4; European swifts 240; little swifts 29, 240, 243–4; pallid swifts 240
Tate, Peter 309–10
tattoos, swallow 44
teeth-sucking 173
television: African 172–3
terns: Sandwich terns 21
thrushes 306–7; see also fieldfares time and time zones 280–1
Tolkien, J. R. R. 28
Touareg people 194, 203–4
Toulouse 292
trees see logging Tunisia 295
Turner, Angela 9, 16
UNITA 56
uranium 204
USA; and Africa 106–9, 205, 215; CIA 114; and slavery 183
Usk River 306
Van Riebeck, Jan 23–4
VAT washing 297
Vicwood-Thanry 156
visas 13–15, 76–7, 80–1, 147–8, 151–2, 167–8
Wahlberg, Mark 192
Wales 2, 105, 106, 222 3, 306, 311, 313, 315
water rail 29
White, Gilbert 10
White, T. H. 2
Williams, Shane 250
witch doctors 95, 103, 199–201
Zambezi River 56, 65, 78–9
Zambia 76–97; Chinese business activity 85; Chipata 89–94, 96; flag 86; Great East Road 88–9, 96–7; lack of coins 77; Livingstone 77–81; race relations 77; unemployment and life expectancy 81–2; Victoria Falls 56, 78–9; visas 13, 76–7; see also Lusaka
Zanzibar 56
Zaragoza 277–9; Alfajeria 278; cathedral 278
Zeekoevlei nature reserve 20
Zeekoevlei water treatment works 20 22
Zimbabwe 77; Mana Pools 65
Zulus 8, 24, 39
Acknowledgements
All thanks to Roger, Sue and Claire Paterson, for the days in Rasiguères, where I saw those five inspirational birds. Thank you Claire, especially, for your great kindness, help and encouragement.
Thank you, Angela Turner, and thank you, Rick Nuttall, for your time, trouble and priceless expertise.
In South Africa, thanks to Neville, Muriel and Clive Rubin; to Jonty and Anne Driver; and especially to my father, John Clare, for such a happy and informative week in Cape Town.
In London, thank you Alexander Clare, dear brother, for keeping me in touch with home – and the updates on where to avoid. Thank you, dear Mum, for your excellent advice and fearless encouragement.
Thank you, Judy and Denis and Jane Rafter, for being saviours in an hour of need. God bless you – on behalf of all of us who have knocked on your door.
All thanks to my treasured friends Julian May, Merlin Hughes, Anna Rose Hughes, Elizabeth Hughes, Sally Spurring, Gerard and Margaret Morgan-Grenville, Mohit Bakaya, Rob Ketteridge, Fliss Morgan, Chris Kenyon, Toby Lynas, Suzi Fogg, Tamsin Cooper and Lawrence Pollard for your love, kindness, spare rooms and wise counsel.
Many thanks to Robin Jenkins, Bushra Sultana, Ambar Rashid, Norddine Kamay and Rosie Ryan. I hope we all meet again in Essaouira.
In Rochdale, thank you Jenny and Emma Shooter, and especially Robin Tetlow-Shooter for taking a strange immigrant into your lives, and for being so understanding of the peculiar habits of a writer. Thank you Jodi Trick, Jazz Powers, Esther Pryce, George ‘Jud’ Greenwood, Miria Griffiths and Janey Majid for your great kindess, and for making me feel so at home.
For the time to begin thinking about this book, I would like to thank the students and staff of Atlantic College, particularly Ken Corn and Dave Booker, for the residency, which was a joy.
For the assignment which turned into a path-finding mission, many thanks to Peter Browne and Sarah Spankie at Condé Nast Traveller. The opening lines of Patrick Kavanagh’s ‘On Raglan Road’ are reprinted from Collected Poems, edited by Antoinette Quinn (Allen Lane, 2004), by kind permission of the Trustees of the Estate of the the late Katherine B. Kavanagh, through the Jonathan Williams Literary Agency.
For work on this book all thanks to Tif Loehnis, Alison Samuel, Rachel Cugnoni, Parisa Ebrahimi, Lisa Gooding, Stephen Parker and all at Chatto & Windus. Thank you Jeff Edwards, for your beautiful maps.
Many thanks to Frances Macmillan, and all at Vintage, for this beautiful volume.
Thanks to Gill Coleridge, for your reading and suggestions, and thank you, above all, Rebecca Carter – superlative editor! Without your tremendous work and wonderful skill this book would have been a poorer thing indeed.
And to all those along the way, some of whom appear in these pages, and many of whom do not, who helped in so many ways, thank you. Thank you particularly, Mark Evans, Anna Reeve and Ndidi Nnoli-Edozien.
I would like to thank France Spackman for helping with my French, and above all I would like to thank Roger Couhig, otherwise known as ‘Welsh Rog’, or ‘Roger le Gallois’, as they call him in Cameroon, for his kindness, connections, quite wonderful assistance and friendship.
Finally, thank you, dearest RKS, for so much. This is for you.
Bibliography
Ayto, John, Dictionary of Word Origins (London, 1990)
Browning, Robert, Poems, selected by Douglas Dunn (London, 2004)
Butcher, Tim, Blood River (London, 2007)
Camus, Albert, The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays (Paris, 1942) , tr. Justin O’Brien (New York, 1955)
Evans, Martin and Phillips, John, Algeria: Anger of the Dispossessed (Yale, 2007)
Horne, Alistair, A Savage War of Peace: Algeria 1954–1962 (New York, 1977)
Knight, Cassie, Brazzaville Charms (London, 2007)
Priestley, Mary, A Book of Birds (London, 1937)
Shakespeare, William, The Complete Works of Shakespeare, ed. W. J. Craig (London, 1908)
Tate, Peter, Swallows (London, 1981)
Turner, Angela, The Barn Swallow (London, 2007)
Tydeman, W. E., British Land Birds (London, 1870)
Wernham, Chris et al., The Migration Atlas: Movements of the Birds of Britain and Ireland (London, 2002)
White, Gilbert and Mabey, Richard, The Natural History of Selborne (reprinted London, 2006)
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