TBT #60: Finding and killing contemporary pterodactyls

So here I am: early-20s, college graduate, a world of potential, spending a weekend in Papua New Guinea with one of my best friends. And what are we doing? Are we touring, exploring, experiencing this great country? Are we relaxing, going to bars, meeting girls? Are Jake and I enjoying the last days of our youth, doing everything we can to have a good time before reality sets in (whatever that means)? No. No, we’re not. We’re standing on top of a redrock mountain, looking out at a vast expanse of forest and fields covered with a soft white blanket of fog, giving way to a sun that’s just barely edging over the horizon into the sky because, hey, it’s 5 fucking a.m. in the morning. And I’ve got a rifle slung over my shoulder that scares the hell out of me because a) I don’t know if it’s loaded and b) I have no idea how to use the damn thing. Jake’s standing beside me, looking as ridiculous as I probably do in an all-khaki get-up, topped off with a silly little hunting cap. We’re standing back from the edge of the mountain, watching his father — his cranky, sour, always pissed off father — blow into a ridiculous whistling contraption that emits a disgusting squawking sound, like something you’d hear if you were to slowly suffocate an antelope.

He makes the sound for a while, as Jake and I stand there quietly, trying not to yawn. Finally he turns and nods his head at the both of us. “That should do it,” he says. “That should get ‘em.” And he smiles a smile that’s not happy as much as it’s sadistic, making sure to catch both our eyes before he turns back towards the sun and waits.

And it hits me, as I stand atop that mountain smelling that early morning dew smell that always reminds me of greenhouses, casting sidelong glances to Jake, hoping for some sign that he’s as close to laughing as I am, his father making satisfied ‘Hm’ sounds every couple of minutes as he reaches back to touch the barrel of his rifle, this is what we’re doing, I think: we’re hunting dinosaurs.

His father had done most of his talking on the ferry ride to Umboi Island, which was set to be the best place for what we wanted to do. We stood near the bow of the mostly empty boat — Jake’s dad had paid the ferry company to make a special trip in the wee hours of the morning just for us — drinking water from canteens and trying to shake off morning cobwebs. Jake’s dad smoked a cigar slowly, letting the smoke drift upwards in deliberate arcs.

He had been eyeing me cautiously since I arrived. He and Jake had been on mainland Papua New Guineau (PNG) for weeks before I got there, preparing for the expedition, securing necessary permits and permission. He didn’t say much when Jake and I walked into the hotel room, all his attention focused on a half-dozen maps he had spread across the bed. Later he cornered me in the hallway and asked me if I had Christ’s love in my heart. He was standing so close to me, his six-four frame towering over my head such that I was staring directly at his chest, at a shiny gold cross hung round his neck.

“I do,” I said, not lying, because I reasoned that we all would have Christ’s love in our hearts, if Christ was real.

“So you’re saved,” he said, not as a question, backing off slightly, letting me meet his eyes.

“I am, sir,” I replied, lying this time.

It didn’t take much to get me here. When I graduated, I had two things on my mind: travel and procrastination. It was one of those chicken and the egg things, really, in that I couldn’t figure out which came first: did I want to travel so much that it was necessary to put off everything else, or did my desire to procrastinate necessitate traveling, if only to give not working for a year some sort of legitimacy? I barely had time to think about any of this before Jake, who I had met in grade school, known through high school and roomed with in university, offered me the opportunity to take this PNG trip — for free, no less — I would have been ridiculous to refuse.

I didn’t really know why he and his father were going to such an exotic country. About the only thing I did know about PNG before I got here was that it wasn’t your typical vacation spot. I also knew that it was near Indonesia. So I knew two things, and only two things. But, still, I boarded a plane, made three damn connections, exhausted my laptop and iPod batteries, ogled four stewardesses and had a two-hour conversation with a woman who was really excited about crocheting to get here.

Going to great lengths to get practically nowhere is one of the hallmarks of youth.

“Jake may have told you we were here to find pterodactyls,” Jake’s dad said, as we stood on the boat, watching the island get bigger. “We’re not. Not specifically, anyway.”

He took a puff on the cigar, holding the smoke inside for a moment. I started to talk but he interrupted me, letting his smoke meet the morning haze.

“It’s a pterosaur,” he continued. “That’s what we’re looking for. Pterosaur. Don’t ask me how to spell it. Think there’s a ‘p’ in there somewhere. It’s like a pterodactyl but, you know, a little different. Doesn’t really matter, though. Hell, there’s probably pterodactyls out there too, but that ain’t what we came for. We came for pterosaurs. They’re a bit bigger. Easier to shoot.”

He flicked ash onto the deck of the ferry.

When we reached the shore, Jake’s dad insisted that Jake and I set up camp near the shore, while he scouted the area. We had brought a tent and enough supplies to last more than a week; I was told that most of these expeditions lasted at least that long. Jake and I got to work pretty quickly and I was glad for the opportunity to get away from the old man. He had made me uncomfortable for as long as I had known him. When we were kids I used to lie and make excuses to leave Jake’s house before six, knowing that otherwise I would be forced into an encounter with his dad, who would no doubt ask me about my family’s church and our tithes and all that stuff I really had nothing to say about.

Jake and I hadn’t really talked much since graduating. I had stayed near school for a few months until my lease ran out, while Jake had gone back home. We were both in the same boat as far as life went, holding arts degrees that actually, really didn’t mean a damn thing. I sort of knew that I wanted to go into publishing, but Jake had no idea at all, which is why it was so easy for his dad to convince him out here. “I don’t really understand exactly what Dad wants to do there,” he had told me. “But he’s really excited about it. And I’ve got nothing better to do.”

We set up camp in a hazy clearing between a bunch of tall trees. Their lush leaves glistened with dew, so much so that a soft breeze could convince you of rain. For a while, as Jake gathered rocks for a fire pit and I struggled with tentpoles, the two of us talking about nothing in particular, it was like we were kids again. Aside from the fact that we were in a foreign country, traveling with a man hellbent on shooting a dinosaur, had the potential to be given all sorts of diseases by bugs the size of my head and, also, were technically ADULTS now, it was almost exactly like when we were kids.

I talked about nothing in particular as we worked. I was tired. Jake was tired. I talked because I hated awkward silences. Jake never seemed to mind.

“They showed this movie on the plane here,” I told him, as he unrolled his bedroll. “Um, something with one of those Saturday Night Live Guys. I can’t remember the guy’s name. The one with the little boy face.”

“All those guys have little boy faces,” he said. “And none of them are very funny.”

I laughed. “I know, man. That’s what I was going to say. This movie sucked. Like, megasucked. I don’t know what it is but apparently talking in a loud voice is now the height of comedy.”

“Yeah,” he agreed, looking through his bag. “That one guy — the famous one — his whole thing is yelling. That’s it. Makes a billion dollars doing it. Just yelling. I AM VERY UPSET RIGHT NOW! Stuff like that.”

I was still laughing. I knew exactly what he meant. “Yeah, it’s ridiculous. Even more ridiculous when you consider how good those old SNL movies used to be.”

He looked at me with a wry smile. “Blues Brothers,” he grinned.

“Fucking right, man! Blues Brothers! That’s just what I was going to bring up. Blues Brothers. How many times did we watch that movie growing up?”

He stood up and breathed deeply. The air felt different here. “I don’t know. A thousand, at least. We loved it.”

“Yeah, it was awesome. And you know what? It’s still awesome. I watched it about a month ago on cable and it was still great. And then I see these new SNL movies like that one on the plane or the one where whatsherface smells her armpits for 90 minutes and I get depressed.”

“That depresses you?” he asked, turning to look at me. “They’re just movies, you know.”

I heard his father’s footsteps snapping twigs behind us. He would be back soon. “Yeah, I know. But there’s something sad about how they’ve changed. Do you know the difference between then and now?”

“Things were good then and suck now?”

“No… — well, yeah. Yes, obviously. But, more than that, back then the guys in these movies were CHARACTERS. Now they’re just jokes. Fucking jokes that go on for far too long.”

His father coughed as he lumbered into our campsite. I hoped he didn’t hear me swear. If he did, he didn’t make mention of it, and instead pointed to the rifle cases near our bags. It was time to go.

Jake and I were once again forced into silence as we trekked up the mountain. Jake’s dad wouldn’t stop talking. It was an easy climb, at least; we mostly followed a path that seemed to wind around the outside. On the few occasions when we had to scale the rock, footholds and handholds were already etched into the stone.

“I know you kids learned in your textbooks that the earth is some billion years old but you gotta understand: people lie to you.” Jake’s dad liked to enunciate every word; he spoke like had practiced these words dozens of times before. “People lie to you all the time. It’s a world of sin and corruption and liars and I don’t envy the both of you having so far left to go into it.”

As we turned on the path we were face to face with the rising sun. The fog from the forest seemed to rise up to block its rays.

“With me — with God — you’re only going to get truth. Remember that, kids. Remember that if nothing else. There are two people in this world you can trust: God, and me. And you can only trust me because I trust God. I’m not saying you might not meet other people who trust God like I do, but you need to be careful with that. They could be liars. They might not trust God at all.

“But I trust God completely. I trust God and his only Son and the Word of God.”

The rifle weighed heavy on my back.

“The earth is about six thousand years old. That you can trust me on. I can give you books of proof but really you only need two things to realize this truth. You need your eyes and you need your heart. Your heart will tell you what the Bible tells you: God created us in seven days and all the time since was detailed through His Word. Your eyes will tell you the obvious. Look out there, kids. Look at that forest, that sky, those trees.”

From our height now it was a sea of green covered in fine sunlit mist.

“Those trees especially. We don’t got time to do the measurement but I can guarantee you — I’ve seen the writing on this — that not a single tree out there is more than 4, maybe 5 thousand years old. Consider that for a second. If the earth is really a BILLION years old, why is the only trees we’ve ever seen only a few thousand years old? Shouldn’t there be a couple of trees that are ten, maybe twelve thousand years old!”

He was getting excited now, losing his precise enunciation. He kept glancing back at Jake and I behind him, looking for some sort of recognition in our faces.

“And another thing — though nobody should need another thing — is the dust on the moon! The dust on the MOON! That dust is building and building and building more every year and, really, accurately, scientifically if the earth was billions years of old than that dust would be like 100 feet deep. Do you get what I’m saying, son? That dust would be DEEP. Neil Armstrong would have sunk into it the second he stepped out of that ship.”

I couldn’t help but smile at the thought, but one glance from Jake’s father erased the expression.

“Yeah, it seems funny. But there is nothing fun about miseducation, I’ll tell you that much. So much of the history you know is LIES. Godless, heathen, secular lies. Look at dinosaurs” — he pronounced it like dinosawrs — “they tell you kids these things lived hundreds of millions of years ago but, again, the earth ain’t that old. Now –”

“We know, Dad. We’ve heard,” Jake interrupted. We were once again facing the sun.

“Maybe you’ve heard, son, but your friend probably hasn’t. Learned a bunch of liberal lies at that school of yours. I’ll set him straight. You don’t mind, do you, boy?”

“Uh, no, sir. I don’t mind,” I answered, not really being presented with another option.

“Didn’t think so,” he said proudly. “This stuff will save your life.”

Things were quiet for a few seconds.

“Dinosaurs lived in the Garden of Eden, with Adam and Eve,” he continued. “Adam gave them their names, like he did all the other animals. And they lived with humans for a long time. Noah brought them on the ark, even. Not big ones, of course. Just baby ones so it was no problem for Noah and his family to take care of them. Also they had God’s Grace which made it easier. And they lived for a long time after that.

“You know those stories of dragons they had? Knights and Dragons? You think the idea for a dragon was just pulled out of thin air? They existed! They were dinosaurs! And a lot of them were killed off by the knights of the time but still, they were there. They lived.”

The path narrowed and the three of us moved closer in order to better navigate it.

“Today all sorts of researchers search for dinosaurs. They’re out there — we know that much. These two guys — Gibbons and Woetzel, they went to Africa a few years back. Showed a native a picture and he said he had seen one — seen it kill elephants, even! — and you know what that picture was, kids? Can you even begin to imagine? It was a triceratops! A dinosaur! And then last year, right here in this jungle, some guys thought they saw a damn T-Rex. Can you imagine that? Big as life!”

“That would be scary,” I muttered.

He turned his face to meet mine and we all stood precariously on a tiny path high above the ground.

“Damn right it would be scary,” he said. “That’s why we ain’t hunting one. We’re not going for that. We’re going for a pterosaur. Some of the natives here call them ‘ropens’ Big repitillian birds, they move lightning quick. Dinosaurs.”

His eyes grew big as he said the last word again, syllable by syllable.

“Dinosaurs,” I repeated.

So here we stand, two college kids and an old man with a cross painted on his rifle barrel, waiting for something to emerge from the canopy below. Jake’s father is the picture of determination, pacing, standing straight, his eyes focusing only on the tops of trees.

As he makes his way slowly over to the other side of the mountain’s peak, I turn and whisper to Jake.

“What are doing here, man?”

He only glances at me quick, making a shh sound under his breath.

“No!” I shout-whisper, “Really, you need to tell me. Because this is fucked up. All of this is fucked up.”

He eyes me again, his skin pale, his eyes large, shivering in the tropical heat.

“We’re hunting a dinosaur.”

“I know, but why. Why are we here. Why are you here. Why did you come here with your dad?”

We watch his father slink around, about 30 yards away, still transfixed on the canopy.

“Just shut-up, man. We don’t want him to hear us. This is really important to Dad. He believes in this.”

His father stands up straight now; he’s brought the whistle-thing back to his lips. He blows into it again, making the dinosaur call.

“And do you?” I ask Jake. “Do you believe in this?”

“Get your guns out, kids!” his dad yells from the other side. “You watch your trees on that side; I’ll keep watch over here.”

Jake waves in agreement. His dad puts his fingers to his lips, indicating that we should stay quiet now, and wait.

“Do you believe in this?” I ask him again, as we tentatively unshoulder our rifles. I hold it delicately, like a toy that might break.

“No,” he says sadly.

Down below the forest is coming to life. The sun’s rays break through the fog. I watch a flock of small birds skim the tops of the trees and, beyond that, a lake come into view, one with water so blue it seems artificial. And that’s connected to a waterfall that falls from a fuzzy mountain the top of which is still obscured by distant haze. Further still I can see the village of Maruramo, gray smoke arcing up from the scattered buildings.

“So what are you doing here? Why did you follow your father halfway around the world to search for something that you don’t even think exists?”

The wind makes a hollow sound when it blows through the trees. The insects buzz all at once. The gun in my hand is made from cold steel. My fingers ache. Jake just stares at the ground. And I join him, looking away from the forest, away from the trees, away from any sort of dinosaur.

His father’s scream breaks our silence. “DOWN!” he hollers. The word is punctuated by the sound of his rifle loading, a bullet casing falling to the ground.

I hit the floor on instinct, pulling at Jake at the same time. Sharp rock digs into my knees; I can feel it drawing blood. I knock my jaw hard but could barely register it before the shot is fired, its prolonged echo ringing into the sky again and again. Like three shots from one into the morning. Bang Bang Bang.

I don’t move. Jake doesn’t move. Our eyes closed. We listen as his father approaches behind us, his footsteps heavy on the ground.

“I saw one!” he yells, a smile colouring his words. “I saw one of the damn pterodactyls! How did you not see it, kids? It was right there!”

Jake groans.

“Get up, kids. We have a big week ahead of us. We’re going to get one of these sons of bitches. And we’re going to bring it back home, show it to the TV reporters and once and for all everyone will know that God’s Word is Truth.”

Still laying on the ground, I open an eye, bringing my head up slightly. The smile on Jake’s fathers face seems permanent. He holds his rifle proudly at his side, his other hand firmly on his hip. His hat had fallen to the ground when had run over; his thinning hair stands upright in the mountain breeze.

I look to the right, at Jake, like me, on the ground, his eyes still shut, and I look to the left, at his father, his weathered face still grinning, a gun in his hand, mumbling a bible verse. I look from one to the other, my jaw aching and my knee soaking my pants with blood. But all I could think about was the two of them, the last vestiges of a family, atop that mountain in New Guineau. One a man who had seen God’s truth in a flying dinosaur and the other his son, still afraid to move.

And above them both, a finally clear sky.