One Scout summer camp in Belgium’s eastern
Ardennes region in 1947, when I was 14, I suffered humiliation that would
torment me a whole year. We were camping near Malmédy. Our leaders woke us,
over 20 scouts, at midnight to challenge us to walk alone through a long
stretch of woods and back. The forest path led to Lake Robertville, near the
ruins of Reinhardstein, a 14th-century castle. A German nobleman had built it
at a time that Reihardstein was part of Germany, centuries before Belgium came
into existence as a country.
A walk in the woods at midnight towards a
medieval castle seemed too spooky to all but one of us. He was my 15-year- old
tent mate and first cousin, Jean (John in English), whose virile qualities I
grudgingly, though secretly, acknowledged and tried to emulate. At that time,
he towered above me, he was a born artist, and his good looks made him very
popular among girls. He lived on a Canada street and was known as Don Juan du Canada
Another factor tinged my relationship with
my cousin. My mother’s humble origins were cause for some disdain from our
father’s family. She wanted her sons to be as good as, or better than, their
cousins, and she found in my competitive nature a born ally. She was mad at me
when I was not first of my class, which fortunately I was much of the time. I
was an eager pupil, choosing the front bench, eyes and ears open, and an arm
always up. Like many Third-World children I would photograph later in my
travels, school was exciting entertainment to me, as well as a chance to prove
my worth.
It took cousin Jean an hour round-trip
through the woods, and he slept soundly after that, as he well deserved. But I could not find sleep for the rest of
the night because shame would not let me. I tried to console myself with the
excuse that I was a year younger than he. But I knew that if that was the
honest excuse, I would need to return, at 15, and repeat his feat. To prove to
myself that I was no coward, I decided to do him one better: I would spend the
night in the castle. Fortunately, I had a full year to build my courage.
Next summer came, and my Scout troop
traveled again to the Ardennes, not far from where we had camped the year
before. I let my parents believe that I was leaving with the Scouts, but I
would rejoin them only the next day. First I had to keep my vow. I had to know
whether I had the makings of an explorer. So that evening I took the train by
myself. Alone in my train car, I nearly missed my destination, for the train
only stopped for 60 seconds, and in the dark I could not find the sign giving
the station’s name. No one else got off. The station and the hamlet before
me were deserted, and the forest loomed just beyond a few fenced pastures.
My eyes quickly adapted to the darkness.
I crossed the silent hamlet and squeezed through the fences of the few
pastures, the last of which was where we Scouts had camped the year before.
Squeezing a little too fast through barbed wires to evade an approaching bull
that probably meant no harm, I ripped my shirt, and wondered what Mother would
make me pay for it. I stood now at the edge of the forest—at the mouth of the
dragon.
Initially, the stars had lit my way, but
none shone through the forest canopy, which looked to me like a frightening
trap. I found the path, took a deep breath, and pulled a flashlight and a Scout
hatchet out of my backpack. I would not
have felt differently entering a forbidden temple.
With heart beating hard and a tight grip
on my hatchet, I took cautious steps before quickening my pace. The air was
cool and infused with soothing smells. Though I tried to tread lightly, I
sometimes stumbled over stones and protruding roots. The sounds of my feet
drowned all other sounds. When I stopped to listen, the forest seemed quiet for
a few seconds before filling slowly with furtive and snapping noises. I could
see nothing beyond the reach of my flashlight and so switched it off. Then I realized that the faint light from the
night sky filtering through the leaves gave me a better idea of my
surroundings. It lightened the blackness that the flashlight created all
around––the great black regions where bad people might lie in ambush--while the
darkness helped make me less visible. Now the forest no longer looked so
threatening.
I moved on, thinking that my cousin Jean
at least must have had a couple of leaders secretly watching over him from the
shadows. But I was alone, and no one would rush to my help if needed. Even if I
did not spend the night in the castle, I was already doing better than he. I
told myself this in case I would not find the courage to face my own ultimate
challenge. Though the walk seemed to last an eternity, it took me through the
woods to the lake in half an hour.
Now Lake Robertville spread out in front
of me, as mysterious under a cold white mist as the forest and the castle
nearby. Indistinct under extra layers of mist up a hill nearby, the castle
looked ominous. I lingered at the lake, struck by how different its mood was
from the one I had experienced before under a bright sun. I was in no hurry to
test myself further. All was amazingly quiet, and I felt calmer. I took another
deep breath and forced myself away from the lake toward the castle, still not
sure whether I would dare enter it.
The breeze caused an unsettling
noise––that of the rusted iron grille gate grating on its hinges. I had heard
that sound in horror movies. But there was no turning back. Otherwise I would
not be able to live with myself, and I would never become an explorer. I forced
myself to ridicule my fear. I tried not to think. Nervously, I tightened my grip
on the hatchet again and moved inside the castle’s walls. I had been inside the
castle with the Scouts during the day, but outside the beam of my
flashlight great black shadows lurked all around. Shadows hiding what? I
wondered again. Now I could not switch off my flashlight, as I was no longer
under a forest canopy but under a high ceiling, and the blackness all around
would remain threatening to the end.
I found the stairway that spiraled up one
of the towers and started climbing. Halfway up, on rubber legs, I bumped into
the tower’s circular inner wall, dropped the metal flashlight down the stone
stairs, and nearly fell down the stairs myself. Now in total darkness, I felt
my heart beating all the way to my ears. Cascading down the stone steps, the flashlight’s
loud metallic noise echoed around the castle. That noise would wake anyone
sleeping there, and I wanted to run back down. But it was as dark below as it
was above. And in such darkness I could not run in any direction. I listened
for any suspicious noise, heard none, and calmed down again.
You’re almost there, I told
myself, and winning your wager. Getting your humiliation off your chest.
Thus heartened, I resumed my climb, feeling my way along the humid and musty
curving stone wall like a blind boy, stumbling sometimes. I stopped
occasionally to silence the echo of my footsteps and listen for outside
movements. But again there was none. The climb in the dark now seemed longer
than the forest trail itself.
A faint light finally appeared above. I
had reached the top of the tower, open under the starry sky. I looked down at
the dark forest and the misty lake, amazed to be standing atop the castle wall.
Blood raced though my veins, and my chest suddenly seemed too small to hold my
heart. But this was no longer fear. It was fear conquered. I knew then that my
life would never be the same again.
I spread my sleeping bag on the stone
floor but was too elated to sleep. Like that humiliating night the year before,
I could not close my eyes. Not for shame
anymore, but for pride. How beautiful the stars were! Never had I seen them so
bright. Later in life, as a man dedicated to photographing and describing the
lifestyles of indigenous peoples in the wildest corners of the world, I would
often lie awake all night under the stars, so bright away from city lights––so
humbling in their wonder, that to close my eyes on them felt like sin. Those
countless nights under foreign skies, like the starry sky I described at the
beginning of this story, would always remind me of that wondrous night atop the
castle, when the stars blinked with approval.
