Chapter 8 Chapter Six

Kong Xianyun and Mr. Thomas came out of the luxurious Nairobi Airport, and raised their hands to ask for a taxi. Suddenly, she heard a person shouting in Chinese: "Teacher Kong! Teacher Kong!" A boy ran towards her, wearing a peaked cap, hunting jacket, white sneakers, and carrying a small backpack. The most impressive thing was that the clothes were full of pockets.When I ran closer, I realized that it was a seventeen or eighteen-year-old girl with her hair stuffed into a hat.She laughed merrily, and said out of breath: "Mr. Kong, I've been waiting for a long time, I thought I couldn't wait for you guys!"

Xianyun smiled and straightened up: "You are..." "I'm a student of Professor Zhuo, and I learned about your schedule from her. Hello, Mr. Thomas." She greeted Mr. Thomas who had already sat in the car. "Hello." "Are you here for vacation?" "No, no, Sister Xianyun," the girl has changed her address, "I admire Professor Zhuo's biological symphony and piano music the most. No, it's not that I like it. It's a kind of natural resonance. So I want to come to Africa to personally After spending some time with wild animals, I hope to write a piece of music that will be passed down through the ages like Professor Zhuo did."

Xianyun smiled and said, "Does my mother know you're here?" The girl honestly admitted: "She doesn't know. Sister Xianyun, let me go with you. I have many advantages. I am smart, brave, and hardworking. I especially love wild animals. I will not give them to you." Trouble. Will you?" She pleaded bitterly: Xianyun has fallen in love with this innocent girl. She asked Mr. Thomas with her eyes, and Thomas nodded with a smile.Xianyun smiled and asked: "your name?" Knowing that she has been accepted, the girl smiled and said: "Liu Jing, my name is Liu Jing, thank you, Sister Xianyun and Mr. Thomas!"

Three days later, they had set up camp in Tsavo National Park.It is a savannah on the Rift Plateau in East Africa, sometimes with echelon fault lines and deep and narrow depression lakes.This year is the harshest dry season on record, with no rain for 700 days.The grassland that has lost its vitality is dull and yellow on the outside, only those deep-rooted bobab trees (baobab trees) are still alive, and its huge crown with a diameter of 100 meters is still lush.The hungry giraffe raised its head vigorously, tearing at the upper leaves. In the early morning, they rode the Unimog off-road vehicle on the grassland.The bristly bluestem and sedge had dried up, leaving two ruts and curling up a yellow leaf as the vehicle passed.Umbrella acacia trees hang limply from their branches.Suddenly Liu Jing shouted:

"Elephants!" Sure enough, elephants were seen on the horizon.Thomas slowed down and followed quietly.There were more than twenty elephants in the herd, they were exhausted, and they moved very slowly.When the car approached, I saw that a baby elephant had died young, but the female elephant was still pushing and pushing it with her long tusks, and the other adult elephants followed silently, like a slow funeral procession. This process lasted for a long time, and the mother elephant was always unwilling to give up her last hope.The cars didn't dare to get too close, but they could see the miserable eyes of the mother elephant and the lifeless round eyes of the baby elephant.They filmed it all with a camera.

Liu Jing cuddled tightly in Xianyun's arms, and she whispered sadly: "Sister Xianyun, I can hear the mother elephant crying." Xianyun's heart was also very heavy, she held Liu Jing's hand and did not speak.Finally, the herd realized that the calves could never be brought back to life, so they stopped and several males started digging with their tusks.It's not an easy job for the extremely tired, hungry and thirsty herd, but they persevere nonetheless. Suddenly, with a bang, one of the elephant's tusks broke off. The elephant roared miserably, and continued to dig the ground with its broken teeth. Thomas explained softly to Liu Jing:

"The drought has lasted for two years, and the elephant's food lacks vitamins, so the ivory has become fragile and brittle. We have seen many elephants with broken tusks like this." Liu Jing said excitedly: "Mr. Thomas, why don't we help them? Human beings in the 21st century are fully capable of helping them!" Thomas shook his head: "No, we can't interfere with the natural process at will. We can only do it, not to deteriorate the living conditions of animals due to human activities, but we can't feed them on a large scale, that will only weaken their ability to adapt to nature In a word, whether a certain animal race can survive or not depends ultimately on itself."

The sun had already set to the west, and the dry grass more than one meter high rustled under the dry northeast trade wind.The elephants finally dug the grave. They pushed the calf into the grave, and then pushed down the surrounding loose soil with their tusks.The grave was dug very shallow, and the ears of the hastily buried elephant were still sticking out of the soil, but the exhausted elephant had no strength left.They silently raised their heads, stretched their necks, and opened their mouths wide, but they didn't roar. Suddenly Liu Jing shouted: "They are singing! I can feel them singing dirge!"

Xianyun was shocked, and suddenly thought that an elephant could use an infrasonic generator on its forehead to make a sound. She pricked up her ears, and seemed to feel a slight vibration in the air.Thomas, who was filming, turned his head and said: "Turn on the infrasonic receiver behind you!" After conversion by the receiver, the elephant's 20 Hz infrasound is converted into audible sound waves.So, they heard the elephant's mournful cry with their own ears, which was deep and long, with a bleak tone.It is a struggle against death, a pursuit of life, a call to ancestors and future generations.

The herd started moving again.Unimok was still slowly following in the distance, watching them looming in the grass.For a long time the three of them did not speak, all immersed in the sacred emotion caused by death.It was Mr. Thomas who broke the silence: "Anthropologists say that when primitive people have awe of death and have funeral rites, it can be said that human beings have stepped out of ignorance. But what do you say about these elephants? In this dry season, they lived It's very difficult, almost exhausted, but they still seriously bury the bodies of their companions. I often feel that this is not instinct, but a kind of religious devotion."

The twilight was getting thicker, and it was impossible to continue tracking. They left the elephant herd, turned around and drove back.Thomas suddenly asked Xianyun: "Your father is in good health." "fine." Thomas commented with the frankness of a Westerner: "I knew him when I was young. He is a tragic figure. When he was young, he was a biologist who attracted worldwide attention. He created biologically intelligent people and proposed that intelligent people accumulate intelligence from zero. It was a great achievement at the time. Unfortunately..." He shook his head and asked again: "Where is your husband? I know he is deciphering the transmission code of the desire to survive, or in other words, the secret of God's creation of life. Has there been any progress recently?" Xianyun shook his head with a heavy heart.Thomas was silent for a while and said: "In a sense, scientists are the bravest gamblers. They determined the direction of progress by intuition in absolute darkness, and then groped forward firmly. Success will be missed. But at this time, they are often too old to correct their mistakes. So, being a scientist's wife is the most difficult career in the world, salute to you." He joked. Xianyun smiled and said, "Thank you for your understanding." She realized that Liu Jing had fallen asleep leaning on her shoulder, so she moved Liu Jing's body to make her sleep more comfortably.she asked: "What's the general theme of this shoot?" "I want to give it a philosophical connotation. I have already thought about the title of the film. It is called 'Song of Life'. It will express the difficult struggles of all kinds of life in the harsh dry season." He smiled slightly: "I think, The theme of this documentary is similar to Mr. Park’s research, and I will show it to Mr. Park after filming, which may inspire his research.” Xianyun smiled slightly: "Thank you." In the thick twilight, the black shadow of the giant Bobab tree faintly appeared, and it had already arrived at the campsite, and the white tent gradually emerged from the twilight.Xianyun said: "Don't let Liu Jing go to shoot lions at night, I think she is too tired." "No, I'm going!" Liu Jing raised her head from Xianyun's shoulder with a smile, rubbed her eyes, and stretched sweetly: "I was fully charged just now. Mr. Thomas, I had a cat when I was sleeping. My ears are awake, and I heard everything you said. Is there a theme song for this documentary? If not, how about letting me play it? Don’t trust me just because I’m young, I’m Professor Zhuo’s disciple.” Thomas laughed loudly and said, "Okay, it's a deal!" Standing on the watchtower on the top of the Bobab tree, you can see a long and narrow lake a few kilometers away, and now it has become the only water source within hundreds of miles of Fangyuan.At dusk, the remaining animals gathered here to drink water, including wildebeest, bent-horned antelope, zebra, and a lonely two-horned black rhinoceros. The already shallow lake water was muddy. The herbivores watched the lions wandering by the lake warily as they drank, because they instinctively knew that lions were at their most dangerous when their bellies were deflated.Sure enough, a group of lions suddenly rushed over, and the animals by the lake burst into groups immediately. They ran in all directions in panic, while the black rhinoceros turned around in circles, staring at the group of lions with gloomy eyes.Soon, a weakened zebra calf was sacrificed, and the lion began to munch.A dozen or so vultures came in time, flapped their wings and landed beside the lion.Those herbivores that escaped by chance quieted down and returned to the water's edge one after another. Xianyun and Liu Jing on the watchtower have been filming these scenes with a telephoto lens. They saw the hungry male lion holding the prey under his paws and driving away the female lion and cubs brutally.The latter was already skinny, and they didn't dare to resist, but waited miserably aside, trying to pick up some leftovers after the male lion had finished eating. Liu Jing scolded angrily: "These shameless male lions! I want to shoot them with a shotgun!" Xianyun also felt the same way. She said: "Whenever I see this kind of situation, I often can't understand it. Generally speaking, the instinct of animals, whether it is selfishness, cruelty or benevolent maternal love, is the best choice for the continuation of the race. But How to explain the selfishness of male lions? After starving the cubs and lionesses to death, how can the race be continued? It’s hard to explain.” At this moment, a large group of hyenas ran over aggressively.Generally speaking, hyenas do not dare to compete with lions for food, but this time it may be driven by hunger. The group of hyenas surrounded several male lions without hesitation. They barked and gradually narrowed the encirclement.Once the lion turned to meet them, the ones on the other side jumped away cleverly, but the hyena behind the lion pressed on.This group of ugly animals created an imposing manner with their numbers, several male lions quickly succumbed, and they fled cowardly, dropping the food in their mouths. Liu Jing clapped her hands and said with a smile: "It's really refreshing! That's how we should deal with them. Look at how kind the biggest male hyena is. Let other hyenas eat food first when they find food." Xianyun laughed: "You're wrong, that's a female. Hyenas are the only animals in the animal kingdom that can't tell the difference between male and female physically. They are matrilineal clans, and the female leader's male hormone secretion is even stronger than that of male hyenas. , so it is also the strongest." Liu Jing said "oh", she suddenly smiled and said: "Sister Xianyun, after seeing these scenes today, you know what I think. I think females are the greatest in nature! Say yes, sister Xianyun!" Xianyun smiled and didn't answer Liu Jing's childish questions.She thought, I'm afraid this cannot be said at least in the Kong family. There is still a world led by men.Not because of anything else, just because of the temperament and thoughts of the two men.Even if they end up accomplishing nothing in scientific exploration, they can still maintain an unbelievable dignity. They heard rustling sounds behind them, and the Maasai guide hired by the filming team climbed up the long ladder and said in unproficient English: "Ms. Kong, please go back to dinner. Mr. Thomas asked me to tell you that Mr. Park sent a fax." "Thank you." Xianyun explained the precautions to Liu Jing and returned to the camp alone. Thomas was checking the quality of the shoot these days, and without looking back, said: "Mr. Park's fax. Still on the fax machine." Xianyun grabbed a bottle of mineral water and gulped it down, then tore off the fax and lay down on the camp bed.Nearly three months away from home, this is the first letter from my husband.She knew that Zhong Zhe had always been immersed in research and neglected to communicate, so she was used to it. Kong Xianyun jumped up from the bed and shouted ecstatically: "Mr. Thomas, my husband has made it!" Thomas immediately turned around and said pleasantly: "Really? This is a remarkable achievement. I think this is the most important biological discovery in the past century, even surpassing the deciphering of the human genome." Xianyun couldn't control his emotions for a split second, and burst into tears with joy: "Thomas, it's been twenty years. It's like a nightmare that won't wake up. I'm not afraid of failure, but I'm afraid that failure will crush him, just like my father." Old Thomas came over and put his arms around her shoulders tenderly, feeling her twitch slightly.Only then did he understand how heavy psychological pressure this woman with a soft appearance and a strong heart usually bears.He patted Xianyun's shoulder lightly, Xianyun nodded gratefully, quietly wiped away the tears, and retreated to the camp bed to continue reading the fax: Xianyun's brows gradually tightened, and she could feel her husband's heavy depression from between the lines, which was not the mood of a winner at all.Although the husband was ambiguous, it was certain that there was a serious conflict between him and his father.Seeing her expression, Thomas asked with concern: "What's wrong?" Xianyun smiled wryly and said, "Sister-in-law Weng is not on good terms. My father's character is difficult to get along with, and Chong Zhe is too rigid." Thomas said: "If necessary, you go back first." Xianyun shook his head: "No, I have to wait until the rainy season arrives to finish filming before going back. Besides, the two men in my family are too strong, and my mother and I can't control them." As if to increase her worry, the fax machine beeped again and sent a new fax: Reading this childish letter, Xianyun's heart is even heavier.She silently folded the fax and put it in her pocket, and walked out of the tent.Thomas looked at her back and said nothing.