A few months before I turned 30, I was told that the National Geographic Channel had picked up a new TV series and I had, amazingly, been chosen as the host. This series would take me all over the world to live with different groups of indigenous peoples, participate in their customs and rituals, and learn their stories and myths in the hopes of getting a more full understanding of the veracity and importance of some legendary creatures in their cultures. Despite the fact that the only international trips I’d taken before this were to Montreal’s Biodome for a biology-club field trip in seventh grade, Puerto Rico for a microbiology conference, and a couple of self funded wildlife filming expeditions to Costa Rica, I was naively confident that this series would be nothing I couldn’t handle.
I never saw National Geographic’s Beast Hunter (which ran for five episodes in 2011), but that isn’t a necessary precursor to enjoying host Pat Spain’s account of filming the series. A Living Dinosaur: On the Hunt in West Africa: Or, How I Avoided Prison But Was Outsmarted by a Snail is one of six short books that Spain wrote about his time filming with Nat Geo — as he travelled the world looking for monsters and cryptids — and the result in this volume is charming, funny, and thoughtful. As a wildlife biologist, Spain is fascinated by the critters he encounters in the West African rainforest — from millipede to silverback — and as a wide-eyed fish-out-of-water traveller, he has plenty of you-couldn’t-make-this-stuff-up stories about his madcap adventures. Personally, I might have preferred an opportunity to read all six volumes together — or, at any rate, for this book to be longer or deeper — but if my only complaint is that I wanted more, that’s not much of a complaint at all. (Note: I read an ARC through NetGalley and passages quoted may not be in their final forms.)
The first shoot of the series would be looking for the truth behind stories of a supposed living dinosaur, Mokele M’bembe, in West Africa, and I had been warned by our series producer Barny and executive producer Harry that it would be my “trial by fire”.
Mokele M’bembe is said to be a sauropod type dinosaur that has survived into modern times in the rivered borderlands between Cameroon, the Congo, and the Central African Republic; a dangerous long-necked beast that threatens the native population and which Western biologists have been searching for for a hundred years. Spain and his more experienced crew are embedded in traditional villages among Baka and Bayaka people, where they participate in village life and get a sense for the monster's habitat. Not only is Pat Spain a scientist himself, but “as the great nephew of the ‘Prophet of the Unexplained’ Charles Fort”, Spain approaches the idea of cryptids with an open mind; who are we to tell indigenous peoples around the world that their legends aren’t based on fact? (Also: Who are we to say that indigenous peoples around the world aren’t savvy enough to keep telling stories of encounters with mythical creatures in order to attract Western researchers with their cash and gifts?)
I suspect that the story of the actual hunt for Mokele M’bembe is well-documented in its episode of Beast Hunter, but for the most part, this book is concerned with the behind-the-scenes story: Everything from how Spain met his wife in college to how he had to be taught how to stand in a “hero pose” against exotic locations for B-roll footage. There are many roadblocks (literal and figurative) along the way and much of the humour is of the variety found in the name of the second chapter: “An Africanized Killer Bee Just Landed On My Penis,” “He Poops Just Like Us!” said the Pygmy Children Gathered Around Me, and Other Scatological Tales of Mystery and Intrigue. I did smile at all of it (Spain is a charming storyteller), but he also has some more serious insights to share about cultural bias or the value of cryptid hunting:
Too many scientists forget that the general public does not consist primarily of other scientists, and most people would rather hear about the possibility of a bipedal intelligent ape walking around the Great North Woods than the reality of the new barnacle you discovered. Run with that — talk about the possibility. It will get people listening. Then you can throw in some stuff about wolverines, the reintroduction of wolves, and pine martens. Make it something that people, real people, will find interesting. Throw in some jokes, give some sexy facts — more people will be interested in your lame barnacle if you lead with the fact that it has the largest penis-to-body ratio of any animal in the world. It’s over six times the total length of its body! And that’s why they call me “Barnacle Pat”… Okay, you see where I’m going. Don’t refuse to talk about something because you think it sounds silly.
This was a quick and entertaining read — more travelogue than scientific investigation — and I will look for the other volumes in this series.
