hunting again...hunters' arrogance is sometimes puzzling. They don't seem to realize that a significant part of the world hates them, or they do and proudly don't give a damn. In a way they remind me of some missionaries greeting you with "god bless you" (their god of course), aggressively signing their letter by "proud American christian", showing no respect for what one might believe in or not.
a friend of mine, a private pilot, had been asked to deliver rifles to a hunting camp. The weapons had been left behind for whatever reason. For a private pilot, being offered to fly and paid for the expenses (but no profit) is a golden opportunity. Still my friend was stricter than me and refused the flight, saying he might be tempted to drop the shit in lake Victoria! It must have been a tough decision to let slip precious flight time like that.
one day I was on a medevac (medical evacuation). A difficult airstrip for it hadn't been maintained for weeks during the rainy season, and things grow fast here. After a few buzzes over, I was sure the strip was OK for a short landing and I'd have a walk before take off to check closer. There had been a car crash, a few guys quite wounded. One of them, less damaged, came to greet me by "Hi, I'm John, professional hunter". "Hi I'm Ben and I suggest we talk about something else". He got the message luckily...what's wrong with these people? I can't think of any other people mentioning their job like that in the greeting.
some years later, I was in a camp, enjoying a day off. Things change, the office had forgot a flight. I was already pissed off to cancel my safari that day but on top I was told it was a recce flight for hunters! I had been promised while signing my contract that there would be no hunting business! Anyway, I flew to the airstrip, met the hunters who stank old meat and blood. One of them proudly started their story about killing and skinning and preparing trophies etc, that they had been in that smell for 2 weeks. Again I had to cut him short and said I couldn't care less, had no pity for their nostrils and I had no time to waste. I guess I killed my tip there...they wanted to fly for one hour, low and slow to spot any animal. Low like 50 m or so they said. I answered that I couldn't do that, the rule was 500 m above parks and reserves. They argued that this was Africa, the bush, that we were far from any rangers etc. I smiled and said that I only broke the rules when I saw fit, found fun in it for me and friends or for some other good reasons only. They were pissed off but couldn't really argue. We took off and I flew high and straight, didn't make any effort to ease their spotting whereas with tourists or photographers, I'm quite good at looking at them, seeing what they want or try to look at and fly accordingly. Binoculars through bluish old aircraft windows...not the best combination. They spotted one buffalo in one hour. My boss was flying at the same time somewhere in the vast Tanzanian sky. I got him on the radio and moaned. He understood my point and knowing me, he guessed right away what I was doing when I mentioned my altitude of 500 m. He laughed and remembered that he had told me off a coupla times for flying too low around the camps. I don't know if those hunters ever complained about my lack of enthusiasm, my rudeness ...but the office kept quiet.
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