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slash guarantees. Michaela Manbei. I

1:35

looked up the pronunciation in my pronunciation dictionary

1:37

wasn't there. I found a video on YouTube

1:40

talking about this. It's like some sort of

1:42

mythical beast, like a Loch Ness monster or

1:44

some shit like that. And I found some

1:46

dudes saying the name, so I've just deceivity

1:48

got it right. And I've probably already got

1:51

it wrong. But this is Congo's living dinosaur.

1:53

That's not. Dinosaur's alive. I mean, they're unlike

1:55

sharks. And like, they're not dolphins. Dolphins.

1:57

What what am I thinking of? Croctus. Croctus.

1:59

Completely different from dolphins. Aren't they like

2:01

dinosaurs or something? Anyway, that's what we're

2:04

talking about today. Thank you, Mills, who

2:06

wrote it. I'm going to read it.

2:08

That's the format of the show. Let's

2:10

jump in. So tomorrow. Oh, we started

2:12

off with a quote. Sorry. Quote. So

2:15

tomorrow we disappear into the unknown. This

2:17

account I am transmitting down the river

2:19

by canoe. And it may be our

2:21

last word to those who are interested

2:23

in our fate. Is what Sir Arthur

2:25

Conan Doyle wrote? Didn't Sir Arthur Conan

2:28

Doyle write fiction? Did he also do

2:30

a travel log? Or is this part

2:32

of a story? Untouched by man in

2:34

his destructive ways, deep in the heart

2:36

of Africa, lies the Congo River Basin,

2:38

the second largest rainforest on the planet.

2:41

Did they do a top gear there?

2:43

Did I see one of those top

2:45

gear specials in the Congo River basin?

2:47

Am I imagining that? Sounds like some

2:49

where they would, right? This mysterious land,

2:51

locked in time, is a lost world,

2:54

where the naive, yet noble savage hunts

2:56

and is hunted by monstrous creatures from

2:58

the dawn of time stalking the dark

3:00

jungles and deadly swamps. This sounds like...

3:02

I was like, wow! I realize it's

3:04

probably fiction, isn't it? Like, especially using

3:07

the noble savage. This feels like lifting

3:09

very Arthur Conan Doyle and his period

3:11

words, right? Or at least that was

3:13

the belief held in the early 1900s.

3:15

There we go. Further popularized by writers

3:17

like Arthur Conan Doyle in his book

3:20

The Lost World. Wait, is that would

3:22

be, there was the second Jurassic Park

3:24

movie was called The Lost World. It

3:26

was one of the first DVDs. oldest

3:28

DVDs or VHS that I had. It

3:31

doesn't matter, that's not important. Probably not

3:33

even named after it, is it? But

3:35

let's set the record straight, the locals

3:37

of the Congo basin, and either savage,

3:39

nor naive. However, this idea of the

3:41

African jungle as a lost world, filled

3:44

with unknown creatures and living dinosaurs, seems

3:46

to persist well into 2024. I have

3:48

to say I kind of associating more

3:50

like the Amazon jungle. Like, not, you

3:52

know, noble savages. Which is, you know,

3:54

you know, very, a non-non PC for

3:57

non-picy for 2024. But like undiscovered tribes

3:59

and stuff and massive rainforests, I definitely

4:01

associate them more with the Amazon and

4:03

Brazil than I do with Africa, which

4:05

I mean, I know it's not desert.

4:07

I mean, I know there's a lot

4:10

of desert, but there's also rainforests, right?

4:12

Oh God. According to paleontologists, the last

4:14

of the non-avian dinosaurs went extinct around

4:16

65 million years ago. However, what if

4:18

O-O, the god of death and destruction,

4:20

missed one. For over a century... Stories

4:23

of a fearsome beast living in the

4:25

rivers and swamps have been told around

4:27

campfires and whispered to missionaries. Is it

4:29

a spirit creature, a guardian, a protector,

4:31

or a malevolent entity intent on destroying

4:33

everything in its path? Oh, wait, wait,

4:36

what's that? What's that? Oh, oh yes,

4:38

my skeptical brain is telling me, oh

4:40

maybe it's just the thing of people's

4:42

imaginations. Like the fucking Loch Mess Monster,

4:44

which I did a whole episode on.

4:46

Obviously nonsense! Or is it a real

4:49

animal? Unknown to science. Today, I mean,

4:51

if any of those options, obviously the

4:53

latter. Today, we're battling our way through

4:55

the dense jungles and the muddy swamps

4:57

of the Congo basin, like the explorers

5:00

of old, on the trail of the

5:02

ever- elusive Michaela Membei. So, like, this

5:04

in my mind, you know, the romanticized,

5:06

like, oh, is it an adventure, you

5:08

know, age of exploration, where reality is

5:10

you're just getting scurvy on a boat

5:13

and dying, on a boat and dying.

5:15

But like, like, like, like, no. No,

5:17

no, no, no, no. I don't want

5:19

to be trekking through the jungle to

5:21

find some like lost animal. I'm very

5:23

happy, thank you very much, sitting in

5:26

my comfortable office, reading about it. That's

5:28

where I'd like to stay. Thank you,

5:30

world. Meet Michaelimembe. Michaelembe, though, one who

5:32

stops the flow of rivers. So it's

5:34

some sort of beaver, which is a

5:36

suitably dramatic name for a cryptid, is

5:39

a neodinosaur, apparently found, mainly in Lekola

5:41

Swamp region in the Congo Basin. I'm

5:43

sorry about my pronunciations. These like small

5:45

areas of a specific country. They're not

5:47

going to be on Forvo, which is

5:49

my forvo.com. It's where I go from

5:52

my pronunciations. Initially sightings were reported in

5:54

the Republic of the Congo, Brazil and

5:56

the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Kinshasa,

5:58

which are two different... places because in

6:00

Africa we like to confuse people. Oh

6:02

right, yes. It's right. It's also been

6:05

reported in Cameroon, Gabon, and in a

6:07

few other places, a neodinosaur. For those

6:09

of you not well versed in the

6:11

wonderful world of cryptids, is a cryptid

6:13

that looks a lot like a dinosaur.

6:16

Very well. Okay. Thank you. So glad

6:18

to know that about the world of

6:20

cryptids, which, oh my god, I don't

6:22

believe is real or care about. However,

6:24

membei is no dainty little dinosaur. It's

6:26

a big bulky fellow. Some claim it's

6:29

about the size of an elephant, at

6:31

least the size of a hippo, while

6:33

others insist it's much larger than a

6:35

mere elephant. It has a very long

6:37

flexible neck, thick as a man's thigh,

6:39

ending in a small head. If the

6:42

neck is as thick as a man's

6:44

thigh, it, it's thigh, it's thick as

6:46

a man's thigh, it's thigh, it's big

6:48

as a man's big as a man's

6:50

thigh, it's big as big as big

6:52

as a, it's big as a, it's

6:55

thigh, it's big as a, it's big

6:57

as a man's big as a, it's

6:59

big as a, it's, it's big as

7:01

a, it's big as a, it's, it's

7:03

big as a man's, it's, it's, it's

7:05

Ending in a small head, usually compared

7:08

to the head of a snake, lizard,

7:10

or turtle, with nostrils on the front

7:12

of the snout. Turtles have weird heads.

7:14

I saw a turtle the other day.

7:16

I went to this like butterfly place

7:18

with my kids where you go inside

7:21

and it's like 27 degrees and insanely

7:23

humid. And you're walking around and looking

7:25

at like giant butterflies. Like weird looking

7:27

creatures. It sports a long, powerful tail,

7:29

similar to that of a crocodile. The

7:32

skin is smooth, and the color depends

7:34

on who you talk to, and can

7:36

range from gray, brown, or reddish. In

7:38

some regions, like Cameroon, Michaela Bembe is

7:40

also covered in thick, armor-like scales. Once

7:42

again, similar to a crocodile. The animal

7:45

is quadrupedal, a fancy way of saying

7:47

that it's got four feet, usually described

7:49

the size of a frying pan, which

7:51

leaves three clawed footprints in the soft

7:53

soil of muddy river banks. Again, if

7:55

this thing's larger than an elephant, those

7:58

are small, less is a massive frying

8:00

pan. However, considering the variety in sizes,

8:02

when it comes to frying pans these

8:04

days, I'm not sure that's a very

8:06

accurate form of measurement. The creature is

8:08

often described as having three relatively long

8:11

slender pointed toes. However, it has flipper

8:13

like flipper your sense, since it's supposedly

8:15

aquatic, or at least semi-acquatic. You're most

8:17

likely to come across Michaela Membe in

8:19

the deep pools of the swampy truncles

8:21

of Western Africa, however. It seems to

8:24

prefer rivers, and we'll often find washed

8:26

out caves in river vents. You're unlikely

8:28

to see the whole animal, though usually

8:30

only the head and neck are visible,

8:32

and like hippos, it can submerge completely

8:34

hiding under the water. It'll occasionally, hippos

8:37

can go underwater. I kind of just

8:39

imagine them as kind of like halfway

8:41

in the water kind of lurking about.

8:43

It both are mad dangerous, right? They're

8:45

like that unsuspected, super dangerous creature. It

8:47

all occasionally venture onto land at dusk

8:50

and dawn to feed on an apple-like

8:52

fruit of the Malumbo plant growing on

8:54

the riverbank, so be alert if you're

8:56

going for an evening stroll or a

8:58

morning jog in the jungle. Yeah, you

9:01

know what, Ilza, not not not get

9:03

any concerns about that, because I'm not

9:05

going to be going to be going

9:07

to be going to be going to

9:09

be going to be going to the

9:11

rainforest in the rainforest in the Congo

9:14

any time to the Congo any times.

9:16

Thankfully, Michaeli Membe might be a herbivore,

9:18

but it's very territorial, with a particularly

9:20

deep-seated hatred of hippos and general ill-will

9:22

toward canoes. It has a fiery temper,

9:24

doesn't like to be disturbed, and will

9:27

tip canoes floating into its territory, usually

9:29

drowning, but not eating the occupants. It

9:31

just kills for fun, like a dolphin.

9:33

Wait, dolphins that kill for fun. I'm

9:35

killing some fish or something. I get

9:37

sick old bastards. A story here and

9:40

there, paints it as a protector. However,

9:42

a few stories mention killing and eating

9:44

domestic goats. What's a domestic goat? This

9:46

sounds like a pet goat. Since the

9:48

vellum overroot is low on protein and

9:50

fiber, I suppose even a neodinosaur needs

9:53

to stoop to the occasional goat to

9:55

supplement its diet. Africa is a big

9:57

continent, and it's not uncommon to have

9:59

slightly different variations of the same model

10:01

of animal, which might explain some discrepancies

10:03

in description. In some regions it's described

10:06

as having a horn, while others describe

10:08

it as having a cox comb. Cox

10:10

comb? The rooster thing? The rooster thing.

10:12

on its head. Some eyewitnesses also mention

10:14

dermal spines on the neck, down the

10:17

surface like a bronchisaurus, down the spine

10:19

and tail. According to some storytellers, it

10:21

also roars aggressively when approached by humans.

10:23

Others claim that the beast is silent,

10:25

making no sound. Others claim that the

10:27

beast is silent, making no sound at

10:30

all animals. Is that true? All animals

10:32

make sounds. Is that true? All animals

10:34

make sounds. My daughter would be like,

10:36

no. Anytime she doesn't believe anything, she's

10:38

like, no, are you just joking? The

10:40

best time to see Michaelimim, there is

10:43

during the rainy season, as it appears

10:45

when the rivers rise and then leave,

10:47

presumably going downstream, when the rivers fall,

10:49

where it spends the dry season hiding

10:51

in natural caves along the riverbank. Air

10:53

passengers dug deep into the riverside, allow

10:56

our sleepy creature to breathe. Of course,

10:58

only the male Michaela Membe gets to

11:00

sleep in the dry season. The female

11:02

is busy raising little Michaela Membeys in

11:04

nests and swamps. The backer hunters believe

11:06

they only do this once every 20

11:09

years. Oh, which might explain why they

11:11

are so rare. I mean, there's lots

11:13

of rare stuff, but we still generally

11:15

have like a photograph of it these

11:17

days. It's not like people are like,

11:19

oh yeah, there's probably not that many

11:22

hippos, but people of like, you know

11:24

what a hippo looks like. If a

11:26

creature exists and he's and he's big,

11:28

there'd be pictures of it. Especially like,

11:30

the big four one, it's like, well,

11:32

there's just one. So maybe you wouldn't

11:35

be able to photograph him. But there's

11:37

a fucking ecosystem of these guys. There's

11:39

also some debate about whether they give

11:41

live birth or lay eggs, but if

11:43

their eggs are the preferred lunch of

11:46

the Nile crocodile, monitor, lizards, and pythons,

11:48

it could certainly explain their scarcity as

11:50

well. I mean, yeah, but like, creatures

11:52

would work out ways to protect their

11:54

eggs, aren't they? Aren't they? If you

11:56

think that description fits a sawropod, the

11:59

massive long-necked herbivore that sneezed on poor...

12:01

in Jurassic Park. I don't even remember

12:03

that at all. Oh, I do,

12:05

I do! I do! Oh my

12:08

God, I've watched Shrassifark in so

12:10

long. You'll be applauded by cryptosuologists

12:12

everywhere. Of course, if a full-size,

12:15

a parasaurus, or brachiasaurus, running around

12:17

the Congo, we would have seen

12:19

them by now. So in order

12:22

to make the story more plausible,

12:24

Achalimbe, resembles a smaller parasaurus. This

12:26

might sound like an unlikely creature

12:29

to you and me. There's plenty

12:31

of crazy people with money. There's

12:33

probably even a correlation between crazy

12:35

people and money. Except they're not

12:38

called crazy at that point, they're

12:40

just called eccentric. Searching the Congo

12:42

basin, even for an animal the size

12:44

of a small dinosaur, it's no easy

12:46

task. The region is vast with many

12:48

obstacles along the way, including dangerous animals

12:51

and dense jungles. Honestly, if Top Gear

12:53

haven't done this episode, or Top Gear

12:55

haven't done this episode. Or Top Gear

12:57

haven't done this episode. They ended it.

12:59

They could go looking for this.

13:01

That'd be great. They could solve

13:03

this mystery with cars. However, despite

13:06

the hardships in finding at Michaela

13:08

Membe, has been reported for decades.

13:10

There are simply too many sightings

13:12

and expeditions to cover them all.

13:14

So I chose some of the

13:16

most influential names in the game.

13:18

The first mention of a monster

13:20

in the Congo comes from the

13:22

writings of French clergy clergy, liven

13:24

bonaventure, pro-proart. I'm sorry French people,

13:26

but like, come on. You're like,

13:28

come on. Bonaventure? What sort of

13:30

name is that? That means like,

13:32

good, good adventure or something. Listen

13:34

to it. Who published a book,

13:36

History of Luango, Kangonga, and other

13:38

kingdoms in Africa, in 1776, after

13:40

working as a missionary in Africa.

13:43

Cryptozoologists love quoting Preyar. Almost every

13:45

article about the Michaela Meme, Lord's

13:47

the first marriage of the truth

13:49

about monsters in Africa. However, if

13:51

you read the full two sentences,

13:53

he dedicates to the footprint of

13:55

the supposed monster, you quickly realize

13:57

the print most likely belonged to a

13:59

large right. No, really? A rhino? Something real

14:01

like that? I mean, right? I picture

14:04

a rhino. It's got like those saucepan-sized

14:06

feet. Although it doesn't have a small

14:08

neck, does it? Does a rhino even

14:11

have a neck at all? Rhino's completely

14:13

necklace. The stories about dinosaurs running around

14:15

Africa only show up much later and

14:17

the man we have to thank for

14:20

that is Karl Hagenberg, showman, zoologist, animal

14:22

dealer, big game hunter and zoo supplier.

14:24

So not the most reliable of witnesses

14:27

and probably not too concerned with animal

14:29

conservation. They spent millions of dollars looking

14:31

for it just so they could kill

14:34

it and eat it. In his book,

14:36

beasts and men... Published in 1909, here

14:38

accounts stories it heard from locals and

14:40

missionaries and hunters of a huge animal

14:43

described as half element, elephant, half dragon.

14:45

roaming the wild expanse of what we

14:47

now call Zimbabwe and Zambia. Cave drawings

14:50

in Central Africa, which is a long

14:52

way from Zimbabwe, apparently depict a Brontosaurus,

14:54

but unfortunately he never bothered to tell

14:57

anyone where to find these caves, and

14:59

Central Africa is a sizable place of

15:01

real estate to search. Yeah, Africa is

15:04

massive. We all think Africa is a

15:06

bit small because of the Mercator projection

15:08

map, which makes Greenland look about the

15:10

same size as Africa. But Africa is

15:13

really big. Africa is really, really big.

15:15

I think it's like 16 times the

15:17

size of Greenland or something. So when

15:20

you look at those maps, you're like,

15:22

whoa, this is not accurate at all.

15:24

No one. Do the islands look weird?

15:27

Like the islands around Greenland and Northern

15:29

Canada, I mean. Enough about this. Let's

15:31

carry on. This isn't The Map Show.

15:33

One of Hagenbeck sources also mentioned a

15:36

distinct lack of hippos at Lake Bangualoo

15:38

in Zambia. And what creature do we

15:40

know with an innate hatred of hippos?

15:43

Fuckin' no one. Maybe people who've had

15:45

their relatives killed by hippos. Hagenbeck was

15:47

convinced the monster was real. Oh wait,

15:50

is this monster supposed to not like

15:52

hippos? Based on what? Just make it

15:54

shit up again. These people from the

15:57

past. There's no hippos, so it must

15:59

be a monster. Hagenbeck was... Vince the

16:01

monster was real so he set out

16:03

on an expensive expedition to find the

16:06

creature, probably to sell it to a

16:08

zoo, but he was unsuccessful. Hargamex claims

16:10

of dinosaurs in Africa couldn't have come

16:13

at a better time. Dinosaurs were all

16:15

the rage in the early 20th century.

16:17

In 99, they're all the rage with

16:20

my son. If I can love dinosaurs,

16:22

he's three. And he's like playing with

16:24

those dinosaur toys. He's throwing the dinosaurs,

16:26

he's making the dinosaurs, like, attacking each

16:29

other. Just loves dinosaurs. He knows nothing

16:31

about them. He could say like dinosaur

16:33

and that's it maybe T-Rex. He could

16:36

maybe say T-Rex like good like getting

16:38

him to say Apatosaurus In 1905, the

16:40

American Museum of Natural History unveiled a

16:43

mounted skeleton of an Apatosaurus, and London's

16:45

Natural History Museum unveiled a diplidocus. It

16:47

didn't take long for the museums all

16:49

over the world to start showcasing gigantic

16:52

skeletons of sauropods, mostly thanks to Andrew

16:54

Carnegie, an industrialist and patron of the

16:56

sciences, who happily funded many an excavation.

16:59

Hagenbeck's book was snapped up by an

17:01

eager audience caught in the dinosaur craze

17:03

helped along by Arthur Conan Doyle, and

17:06

rider haggered, among others. Oh Arthur Conan

17:08

Doyle I'm just remembering now he like

17:10

wrote Sherlock Holmes but he was also

17:13

he like who's like super logical and

17:15

always thinking things through like pure logic

17:17

Arthur Conan Doyle believes there's lots of

17:19

weird shit like sciences and talking to

17:22

people from beyond the grave and all

17:24

this shit he didn't have a falling

17:26

out with Harry Houdini over it because

17:29

he was like oh Harry we can

17:31

contact your mom And he was like,

17:33

she's speaking to me, Harry, she's speaking

17:36

to me. And Harry Udini's like, what's

17:38

she say? She says she missed you.

17:40

Harry Udini's like, well that's fucking weird,

17:42

because she doesn't speak English. Harry Udini,

17:45

legend. However, the man we have to

17:47

thank for naming the creature is German

17:49

explorer, Ludwig Freher von Stein, zoo Lausnitz.

17:52

Jesus Christ, this is the episode of

17:54

everyone with a super-long weirdine to preserve

17:56

what little is left. of Simon's sanity.

17:59

Oh my God, thank you, Ilzer. In

18:01

1913, while leading an expedition to map

18:03

out parts of Germany's colonies in what

18:06

is today Cameroon, he encountered a whole

18:08

lot of interesting wildlife and collected some

18:10

wild stories about a greatly feared river

18:12

monster living in the Congo basin. The

18:15

descriptions matched that of a small sauropot

18:17

around the size of an elephant or

18:19

hippo with a single horn on its

18:22

head. Von Stein considered the storytellers to

18:24

be trustworthy and noted that the stories

18:26

remained consistent. deeply intrigued, he carefully documented

18:29

the various tales. While he believed to

18:31

be a creature from folklore, he also

18:33

thought the stories might be based on

18:35

something real. Sadly, his trip was cut

18:38

short by the outbreak of World War

18:40

I and his manuscript was never published.

18:42

However, snippets of his account show up

18:45

in later works by Wilhelm Bosch and

18:47

German-American science writer Willie Lay. In exotic

18:49

zoology. The only reason I'm laughing at

18:52

that is because in my mind, I

18:54

didn't even say it wrong, but in

18:56

my mind I read it as erotic

18:58

zoology. And that made me laugh and

19:01

disturb the whole show over a mistake

19:03

I didn't even make. Look exotic zoology,

19:05

exotic zoology, 1959. Lake bears, eyewitness accounts

19:08

of Michaela. I'm just imagining like animals

19:10

in lingerie! What the fuck's wrong with

19:12

me! It's fucking weird! I'm like, that's

19:15

a sexy hippo. Lake, is everything. Lake

19:17

appears eye witness accounts of Michaelo Membe

19:19

with known dinosaurs. And because he was

19:22

a science writer, dinosaurs in the Congo

19:24

had to be real, right? The first

19:26

Westerner, yeah but it was night, no,

19:28

no it doesn't, it was the past,

19:31

although 1959 should have been doing better.

19:33

The first Westerner to support Michaela Membe

19:35

was zoologist Ivan D. Sanderson, who ran

19:38

into Michaela Membe in 1932 during the

19:40

Percy Slade and expedition to West Africa.

19:42

While canoeing along the Mine New River

19:45

with fellow expeditioner, Gerald Russell, the two

19:47

local guides, the men were startled by

19:49

a loud, terrifying roar as they passed

19:51

some submerged caves on the cliff-like riverbank

19:54

at dusk. At the first bellow from

19:56

the caves, the native guides, the only

19:58

ones who could confirm the sighting, conveniently

20:01

fainted. I mean, for one we know,

20:03

fainting is not really a thing in

20:05

situations like this. People don't faint because

20:08

of fear, it was just like some

20:10

weird social... thing that people did, they

20:12

like fainted, because it was like part

20:14

of what society expected you to do.

20:17

Sanderson found his canoe being swept closer

20:19

to the entrance of the cave when

20:21

another wild roar was followed by an

20:24

animal rising out of the water, giving

20:26

a final roar and plunging into the

20:28

river disappearing from sight. The animal was

20:31

shiny and black and its head alone

20:33

was about the size of a hippo.

20:35

The locals later informed Sanderson that he

20:38

had crossed paths with Mobulu immembe or...

20:40

Mecu Mabembu. I am sorry. Sanderson couldn't

20:42

quite get his story straight on that

20:44

detail. Oh, okay, so he's trying to

20:47

remember the name they gave it. I

20:49

mean, fair enough. And also, then these

20:51

words definitely don't have a correct pronunciation.

20:54

Personally, I'm inclined to believe our man

20:56

encountered a mostly annoyed hippo who didn't

20:58

like being disturbed, but Sanderson insisted that

21:01

it was the Michaela Meme herself. I

21:03

don't believe it. Some people who want

21:05

to believe they're going to believe, hey

21:07

ho. By the 1940s, the Western interest

21:10

in Michaela Membe had dwindled. There were

21:12

more interesting things happening in the world,

21:14

like a big war. There were local

21:17

sightings of plenty, but Michaela Membe pretty

21:19

much vanished from public imagination until the

21:21

late 1970s, when there was an unprecedented

21:24

revival in interest in the Congo dinosaur,

21:26

spearheaded by James Powell and Dr. Roy

21:28

Macal. It all started in 1976 when

21:31

James Powell, an American herpetologist. I don't

21:33

know what that is. Herpetologist. decided to

21:35

launch an expedition to study crocodiles. I

21:37

guess it's got something to do with

21:40

studying crocodiles, then, in the rainforests of

21:42

Gabon. He also was interested in learning

21:44

more about a mysterious water creature after

21:47

reading Trader Horn, the 1927 memoir of

21:49

Alfred Smith, an employee of the British

21:51

trading company out of Gabon in the

21:54

late 1800s. The book recounts some of

21:56

the more memorable local tales of a

21:58

dragon-like water beast known as Amali or

22:00

Jagginini, meaning giant divergiver. However, unlike Michaelamembe,

22:03

this creature would leave the water to

22:05

devour people. Apparently, goats were not good

22:07

enough. Following up on these stories, Powell

22:10

visited the villages of the local fan

22:12

people in Gabon, who shared stories of

22:14

their own river monster, the Nyamala. A

22:17

local witch doctor Michael Obang claimed to

22:19

have seen the creature while swimming in

22:21

a jungle pool sometime around 1946. In

22:23

attempt to figure out what the creature

22:26

looked like, Pow showed Obang pictures of

22:28

a variety of animals, both living and

22:30

extinct, and was surprised when Obang picked

22:33

out the Diplodocus, a long-necked sauropod, as

22:35

the closest match to the nayamala. I

22:37

mean, yeah, but he could just been

22:40

far away. It was, wasn't it partly

22:42

submerged, it could just been like a...

22:44

I made a video recently about how

22:47

like... everyone was describing back in the

22:49

day some sort of creature and then

22:51

it's like oh no if you think

22:53

about it they just never seen it

22:56

had seen a giraffe before it turns

22:58

out they were probably just seeing a

23:00

giraffe for the first time and we're

23:03

like oh my god it's a monster

23:05

look at that neck and it's just

23:07

a just a creature it's just a

23:10

regular ass creature Showing locals the pictures

23:12

of dinosaurs became a popular gimmick used

23:14

by every expedition that followed, but it

23:16

seems like the idea originated with Powell.

23:19

Upon his return home to the United

23:21

States, he eagerly shared this remarkable discovery

23:23

with Dr. Roy McCullough, a biochemist from

23:26

the University of Chicago, and vice president,

23:28

and the International Society of Cryptozoology. In

23:30

1979, Mikhail, along with Powell, arrived in

23:33

the Republic of the Congo, launching their

23:35

first expedition in search of Michaelimembe. Their

23:37

plan was to travel from one small

23:39

village to the... next, collecting eyewitness accounts

23:42

from local people. Everywhere the expedition went

23:44

they heard tales of a water-dwelling creature

23:46

grazing at dusk and leaving large tracks

23:49

on muddy river banks. One of their

23:51

first witnesses, Furman Mossamele, claimed to a

23:53

car-cross Michaelimembe when he was 14 years

23:56

old, while paddling around a bend in

23:58

the Lekula U. Herbs River. it had

24:00

the signature long neck. And our man,

24:03

Mossamele, wisely decided not to tangle with

24:05

the creature, promptly starting to row in

24:07

the opposite direction. However, the animal quickly

24:09

vanished. Apparently, Mackel, had a book on

24:12

prehistoric animals, casually lying on the dinner

24:14

table during the interview, and without being

24:16

asked, Mossamele picked out a picture of

24:19

a sauropod, claiming it closely resembled the

24:21

creature he saw. Some of the car's

24:23

techniques were a bit questionable, so I

24:26

have to wonder, did Mossamele, pick up

24:28

the book, and... page through it until

24:30

he found a sauropot or was the

24:32

book conveniently open on a picture of

24:35

a sauropot? Soon more witnesses came forward

24:37

and they all agreed, the Michaela member

24:39

is a sauropot like creature. This is

24:42

a situation where it's like you can't

24:44

really give much credence to it because

24:46

it's like I do another podcast called

24:49

Casual Criminalist and the police are always

24:51

like, well they don't put all the

24:53

details of the crime out in the

24:56

public because then if someone comes to

24:58

the police and has a detail that

25:00

isn't publicly knowledgeable knowledgeable knowledgeable knowledgeable, then

25:02

they need to be taken seriously, then

25:05

they need to be taken seriously. In

25:07

this situation, some dudes like, yeah, it

25:09

looked like that sauropod, right? Right? Right?

25:12

And everyone else is like, yeah, yeah,

25:14

yeah, yeah, it looks like that sauropod.

25:16

And then that just, like that echo

25:19

chamber continues. Some locals also shared an

25:21

exciting tale of a sighting in Lake

25:23

Talay around 959 when a Michaela Membe

25:25

was actually killed by a local tribe.

25:28

Lake Tala was a favorite fishing spot

25:30

for both the tribe and Michaela Membe,

25:32

so the fishermen blocked off the waterway

25:35

where the animals lived and built a

25:37

barricade and large spice to keep them

25:39

out. When one of the animals tried

25:42

to break through the barricade, it was

25:44

trapped and killed with spears. Parts of

25:46

the animal were cooked indeed and eaten

25:48

during a traditional victory celebration. is that

25:51

the meat of the Michaela Membe is

25:53

poisonous. Makal, being a man of science,

25:55

when it suited him, speculated that the

25:58

deaths were more likely due to food

26:00

poisoning due to spoiled meat and natural

26:02

causes. After all, the life expectancy in

26:05

the region is quite low. By the

26:07

1980s, some of the stakes used to

26:09

construct this trap could still be seen

26:12

at Lake Tele, so obviously the story

26:14

is 100% true. Of course, by the

26:16

time Michael and Powell heard the story.

26:18

Everyone who had been involved were already

26:21

dead and no one knew what had

26:23

become of the skeleton remained. So once

26:25

again, we're left with nothing but a

26:28

story. Yep. What a surprise! Based on

26:30

all their research, McCall determined that the

26:32

most likely habitat for Michaela Membe was

26:35

the remote Lake Tello. So in 1981,

26:37

Michael was back in the Congo, this

26:39

time with Jack Bryan, heading south on

26:41

the Lekula Uherbs River, in an attempt

26:44

to reach the small shallow lake in

26:46

the heart of the swamps. Fallen trees

26:48

and dense vegetation made path along the

26:51

narrow waterways near imposible, so the team

26:53

didn't make it to Lake Tello, but

26:55

at least they had their own Michaela

26:58

Membe in counter. This sounds so miserable.

27:00

I'm like, yeah, it sounds kind of

27:02

fun. But then you're like, oh my

27:05

God, but you just put your foot

27:07

in the water and I don't know,

27:09

you could like have a little nibble

27:11

from a piranha, there's gonna be mosquitoes

27:14

with all sorts of horrible diseases, it's

27:16

gonna be hot. Going outside sounds rubbish.

27:18

Coming around bends in the Lekoala River,

27:21

north of peanut, the expedition first heard

27:23

a loud splash and then a large

27:25

wake, around five inches high, originating from

27:28

the east bank. washed over the canoes,

27:30

25 centimeters by the way. The weight

27:32

could only have been caused by something

27:34

big suddenly dipping below the water. It

27:37

was too big to be the result

27:39

of a crocodile and there were no

27:41

hippos in the area. However, local guides

27:44

apparently started screaming Michaelambei, so apparently they

27:46

knew what it was. McCarland is fellow

27:48

expeditioners, though by the sound of it,

27:51

not the locals who were terrified and

27:53

wanted to turn around to get the

27:55

hell out of there, searched the area

27:57

for around 30 minutes. because the wake

28:00

and terrified locals it was long gone

28:02

so far so close yet so far

28:04

after successfully attempting to raise funds for

28:07

a third expedition this is another thing

28:09

right I'm like there's money in here

28:11

because he goes for this second expedition

28:14

he's like oh boy would I like

28:16

to come back here and get bitten

28:18

by more mosquitoes because he's a weird

28:21

weird guy like part of this he's

28:23

adventurous he's adventurous unlike me and if

28:25

he comes back and he's nothing there

28:27

Can you give me some money to

28:30

try again? But then he's going to

28:32

say no. But if he comes back

28:34

and he's like, dude, we were in

28:37

the water and then this wave came

28:39

and all the locals started screaming that

28:41

it was the creature, but we just

28:44

didn't see her. We must have just

28:46

missed it. Can I have more money

28:48

so I can go again? The second

28:50

one is going to get you some

28:53

more money. I mean, much more likely

28:55

to. So of course there's a conflict

28:57

of interest here. After unsuccessfully attempting to

29:00

raise funds, oh, but he doesn't succeed

29:02

anyway, but he's still more likely to,

29:04

so he still has a reason to

29:07

make stuff up. Macau finally published a

29:09

book, A Living Dinosaur, in search of

29:11

Macaulay Membe, based on his expeditions. The

29:13

book also included pictures of cave paintings

29:16

in Tanzania and Zambia, supposedly depicting lock-necked

29:18

quadrupeds, unknown to science. However, after a

29:20

quick glance in the pictures, I'm barely

29:23

certain the long-neck creatures are a most

29:25

likely lizards. both things that absolutely exist.

29:27

Nicole and his team never found anything

29:30

conclusive, but he believed the number of

29:32

eyewitness reports meant that there was something

29:34

out there that science has yet to

29:37

explain. Around the same time as Michael's

29:39

second expedition, another expedition led by Pasadena

29:41

native Herman Regusta's and his wife Kia.

29:43

set out for Lake Teller, Overland, and

29:46

unlike the Macal expedition, they actually managed

29:48

to get there. If you believe the

29:50

tales, they brought back. The Regusta's expedition

29:53

was by far the most successful, as

29:55

they reported multiple encounters with what could

29:57

have been Michaela Membe, while exploring the...

30:00

southernmost lobe of the leg, Hahn and

30:02

Kia first heard a loud cry from

30:04

an unknown animal coming from the jungle.

30:06

They described the cry as starting with

30:09

a low windy roar increasing into a

30:11

deep-throated trumpeting growl followed by the sounds

30:13

of a large beast of some kind

30:16

moving through the jungle. Becken is just

30:18

a story after five minutes. They heard

30:20

it when is this happening? What year

30:23

was this? Sorry? around the same time

30:25

as the previous one, so like 70s?

30:27

Bros, you've got cameras and stuff, just

30:30

take some cameras! Interesting side note, elephants

30:32

also growl. A startling sound, if you're

30:34

not expecting it, and forest elephants live

30:36

in the jungles and make of that

30:39

what you will. Gonna make it that

30:41

is probably an elephant, isn't it? The

30:43

sound was heard again a few times

30:46

during their stay, and the expedition attempted

30:48

to record it, but the recordings were

30:50

a very poor quality. Oh. Uh, videos

30:53

of Bigfoot. Goosh. It's always super low

30:55

quality, despite the fact that we're all

30:57

walking around with like 8K cameras in

30:59

our pockets. Or have a much a

31:02

phone does these days, it's a lot,

31:04

right? The expedition also reported a number

31:06

of sightings, but conveniently, the team photographer

31:09

managed to miss most of them. Ah,

31:11

no! What surprise! What surprise! The most

31:13

impressive sighting was made by Kia, while

31:16

exploring the southernmost most tip of the

31:18

lake. Two members of the team heard

31:20

the strange cry followed by a loud

31:22

splashing sound as something big entered the

31:25

water. Not long after, Kia claimed to

31:27

have seen a long serpent-like neck emerging

31:29

from the water around 30 meters on

31:32

98 feet away, facing the direction of

31:34

the inflatable raft. Not sure that's what

31:36

I would have used to go and

31:39

find a creature that loves to dip

31:41

over canoes and drown people. Nope, I

31:43

would have used a boat. Nope, I

31:46

would have not gone at all. The

31:48

expedition finally returned home with footprint casts,

31:50

low-quality photos, and low-quality sound recordings of

31:52

an unknown animal. They also claimed to

31:55

have filmed one of their encounters with

31:57

Michaela Membe, but the heated humidity ruined

31:59

the film. Oh, what, just that film!

32:02

happened to ruin that one and all

32:04

of the other low-quality photos just were

32:06

fine. Their guides were later interviewed by

32:09

other expeditions but despite the Augustus claiming

32:11

that at least ten local guides were

32:13

present at one of the sightings they

32:15

didn't remember seeing anything. Mikhail criticized the

32:18

expedition arguing that the sound they heard

32:20

was made by the Ella Matuka another

32:22

unproven crypted and not by Michaela Membei

32:25

are unproven scripted. are unproven

32:27

scripted. Yeah, it's just a fucking

32:29

elephant guys. Ills just told us

32:31

they growl. People know, they know

32:33

the elephants growl, the elephants are

32:36

growling. I didn't know elephants are

32:38

growl. I'll be surprised if I

32:40

saw that, but I wouldn't be

32:43

like, oh my God, that's not

32:45

an elephant. Elements don't growl. Or

32:47

maybe, and I know this is

32:49

crazy, maybe the local guides might

32:52

know something more than you do.

32:54

Somewhere out there. In 1985, you've

32:56

got absolutely no excuse for not

32:58

gathering video and photographic evidence. No

33:00

excuse. It's the 80s. You have

33:02

that shit. The first expedition, creatively

33:04

named, Operation Congo, lasted from November

33:06

1985 to May 1986. They made

33:08

it to Lake Tele, but found

33:10

no signs in McCullough Membe. They

33:12

discovered a new subspecies of monkey,

33:15

though, so I guess it wasn't

33:17

a complete waste of time. Gibbons

33:19

wasn't going to give up that

33:21

easily. So a second expedition. Operation

33:23

Congo II was launched in November

33:25

1992. This time, the team made

33:27

their way along the largely unexplored

33:29

Bai River through dense swamps and

33:31

searched two unmapped small lakes, Lake

33:33

Philoko and Lake Tibet, which according

33:36

to local folklore were supposed to

33:38

be home to Michaela Membe. Their

33:40

search was hampered by fear and

33:42

superstitions. The locals believe that talking

33:44

to white-ites out are outsiders about

33:47

the Michaela Membe meant certain deaths,

33:49

so the expedition finally had to

33:51

give up and return home. with

33:53

nothing to show for their efforts

33:55

in 1994 except like no because

33:58

that the people would talking

34:00

about it a lot before they were

34:02

like shouting its name according to some

34:04

people but probably not because they probably

34:06

made it up maybe they made this

34:09

up who knows it could just miss

34:11

it's just all made up In 1994,

34:13

a bloody civil war broke out in

34:15

the Congo, effectively putting a stop to

34:17

any further expeditions since the region became

34:20

far too dangerous for foreigners. However, Gibbons

34:22

had heard tales of unidentified creatures spotted

34:24

in unexplored forests, swamps, and rivers of

34:26

South-Eastern Cameroon, which borders on the Congo.

34:28

So in November of 2000, we are

34:31

rapidly moving through the decades, aren't we?

34:33

Gibbons teamed up with Dave Wodesul and

34:35

Pierre Sima, a Cameroonian hunter, familiar with

34:37

the jungles and the back of people

34:39

who lived there. The team spent... most

34:42

of their time, wading through waist-high swamps

34:44

and floating down rivers, traveling from one

34:46

rural village to the next, collecting first-hand

34:48

eyewitness accounts at Meghambe, although the locals

34:50

refer to it as Lei-Kelambei. It turns

34:53

out that the back of people in

34:55

Cameroon didn't have the same fear in

34:57

superstitions attached to Michaela Membe as the

34:59

Congolese neighbors, and were perfectly happy

35:01

to answer any questions. This quickly

35:03

confirms that the creature still inhabited

35:05

the rivers and swamps of southern

35:08

Cameroon, which borders Gabon, the Congo,

35:10

and the Central African Republic, suggesting

35:12

a wider range of Michaela Meme

35:14

than was considered before. It was

35:16

the first time that they asked

35:18

about these animals, and once again,

35:21

they were shown pictures. Firstly, animals

35:23

they knew, like the crocodile followed

35:25

by pictures of animals they wouldn't

35:27

recognize, like, the American brown bear.

35:29

Seeing, if you're from, like, the, the,

35:31

the, the, the, the jungles of Cameroon,

35:34

and you're like, you're like, you're not

35:36

really, you know, it's probably no internet

35:38

and shit there. And you just be

35:40

like, oh man, what is that crazy?

35:42

Seeing a bear would be pretty wild.

35:44

They were finally presented with

35:46

the extinct animals. They didn't recognize

35:49

bipedal dinosaurs like the tea wrecks

35:51

or the flying creatures. When showing

35:53

pictures of different sauropods, they identify

35:55

diplodocus with its long neck and

35:57

brachiasaurus with its dermal spikes as...

36:00

Most like Michaela Membe. It was

36:02

the first time the picture parade

36:04

was done in Cameroon, so it's

36:06

interesting that the local still picked

36:08

the same saw-report. Now that is interesting.

36:10

I don't have a way to

36:13

shit on that immediately. It is

36:15

interesting. In 2001, Gibbons was back

36:17

with a new team. A joint

36:19

venture between Cryptosafari. Sounds like a

36:21

strange cryptocurrency project that would tie

36:23

into the safari browser, and the

36:25

British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, or

36:27

BSCC. After an arduous cross-country journey,

36:29

since there doesn't seem to be

36:31

any other kind of journey in

36:33

this part of Africa, the team

36:36

set up a base camp near

36:38

a major river in the south

36:40

of Cameroon. One member of the expedition,

36:42

Robert Mullen, casually mentioned the search to

36:44

a young boy who became very excited

36:47

because his father, grandfather, and uncle, had

36:49

all seen the creature they called Michaelimembe.

36:51

The father and uncle agreed to an

36:53

interview and described a huge creature with

36:56

a long neck and a fiery temperament

36:58

that didn't take kindly to being disturbed.

37:00

Once again, the picture books were

37:02

whipped out, and once again our

37:05

witnesses dutifully picked out, sauropods, specifically

37:07

dipladocus and brachiasaurus. Other villages were

37:09

also asked to identify the animal

37:12

and they too identified Diplodocus and

37:14

Brachiasaurus as Michaela Membei. We're interesting,

37:17

we're getting somewhere, okay? The

37:19

PC gave us computing power at home,

37:21

the internet connected us, and mobile let

37:23

us do it pretty much anywhere. Now

37:25

generative AI lets us communicate with technology

37:28

in our own language using our own

37:30

senses, but figuring it all out when

37:32

you're living through it is a totally

37:34

different story. Welcome to leading the shift,

37:36

a new podcast for Microsoft Azure. I'm

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wherever you get your get your podcasts

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get your podcasts. again,

37:58

this is according to them. to them. In

38:00

2012 Gibbons finally had his own Michaela

38:03

Membe encounter which just goes to show

38:05

that if at first you don't succeed

38:07

keep on trying for decades. An expedition

38:09

including Bill and Andrew Gibbons, John Kirk

38:11

and Michael Ballot returned to Cameroon to

38:13

explore the Jhar River as far north

38:15

as the falls of Niki. However, one

38:18

of the expeditioners came down with a

38:20

serious medical issue, so the expedition had

38:22

to be cut short. At 6.30am, on

38:24

the morning they were set to leave,

38:26

three members of the expedition, journeyed up

38:28

river to take a close look at

38:31

the falls, and before starting their journey

38:33

back down the river to Nedongo. Not

38:35

long after the party fell ill, Bill

38:37

Gibbons and John Kirk had a strange

38:40

bellowing coming from the middle of the

38:42

river. with trees in their way, the

38:44

men scrambled to reach a spot where

38:46

they could see the river. However, just

38:49

as they were finally in position to

38:51

see what was making the noise, the

38:53

others returned in their motorized parogue, and

38:56

the mysterious quarry went quiet and vanished.

38:58

The 2000s saw a slew of TV

39:00

documentaries from National Geographic to the

39:02

History Channel featuring American and British

39:05

adventurers hunting for the Kalamembei. National

39:07

Geographic in the History Channel. I

39:09

remember when you used to make

39:11

actual, like, you know, educational content

39:13

rather than, let's hunt for cryptids.

39:16

Gotta get those views, though. Most

39:18

of these documentaries were focused on

39:20

entertainment. Yep. rather than accuracy, so

39:22

not much was found. A Monster

39:25

Quest, an episode airing in 2009,

39:27

followed a Bill Gibbons expedition taking

39:29

place near the Jar River in

39:31

Cameroon close to the Republic of the Congo.

39:34

The expedition discovered some large underwater caves and

39:36

what appeared to be air vents. However, for

39:38

some reason, they decided not to investigate it

39:40

any further, you know, loaning a camera into

39:43

the caves or something. They had a whole

39:45

film crew with them. I'm sure someone had

39:47

something on hand that could do the job.

39:49

In 2016, South African crew made their own

39:52

documentary about Michel Amembe, which they later sold

39:54

to Discovery Africa. Some of the folks, they

39:56

interviewed, claimed the creature was very real, but

39:58

they also told the... crew that the

40:00

last Michaela Membe died around 2006. So

40:03

whatever the creature was, it's now extinct.

40:05

Again, it is all just stories. A

40:07

civil war kicked off in Cameroon in

40:09

2017, making field work in the region

40:12

a challenge. Cryptozoologists have now turned their

40:14

attention towards Gabon, where there is some

40:16

interest in and a healthy amount of

40:18

sightings of Michaela Meme. Personally, I think

40:21

it's very considerate. Perfect to keep moving

40:23

out of war zones, making it easier

40:25

for Westerners to go and find her.

40:27

It just seems like these guys just

40:30

want to go, like, have some fun in

40:32

the jungle. And I'm just like, yeah, no, I

40:34

saw that, that thing down there. Hey, discovery,

40:36

pay me money. Hey, random finance here,

40:38

pay me money. Let's go. Where's the

40:40

evidence? Great question, Elsa. Considering all

40:42

the eyewitness accounts collected by Macau,

40:44

Gibbons, and every other MacAremembe expedition

40:47

to make its way into Africa,

40:49

there must be hundreds of sightings

40:51

of sightings of sightings of sightings.

40:53

While this number of sightings is

40:55

impressive, other than vague photos that

40:57

don't actually show us anything, is

40:59

there any proof for Michaela Membe?

41:02

Digging around, for more evidence, I came

41:04

across a few artifacts, eagerly presented as

41:06

proof of Michaela Meme's existence. The first

41:08

is a wooden carving discovered in a

41:10

souvenir shop in the Congo in the

41:13

1980s, of what appears to be a

41:15

long-necked animal with short powerful legs and

41:17

long powerful tail, no visible ears, and

41:19

ahead somewhat resembling that of a snake

41:21

with large eyes. and what seemed to

41:24

be a frill down its back. Well,

41:26

that's definitely evidence of something real, isn't

41:28

it? Someone carved a dinosaur, looking thing,

41:30

so it's got to be real. Or

41:32

it's just part of legends. Like, maybe

41:34

this is the reason that they knew

41:37

about it or could describe it

41:39

as like this apatosauracy-style dinosaur in

41:41

different countries, because we're in the

41:43

same region. And these countries are kind

41:46

of just randomly chosen lines post-colonialism

41:48

for a long part. There's going

41:50

to be tribes there, and there's

41:52

going to probably be some shared law

41:54

about a creature like this. It doesn't have

41:56

teeth, thus meaning it must be a herbivore.

41:59

According to the... The Young Earth Creationist

42:01

website, oh God! Presenting this piece's

42:03

actual proof, this carving is an

42:05

attempt to depict a sauropod dinosaur,

42:07

thus proving that the Kelle Member

42:09

is real. Yeah, but the Young

42:11

Earth Creationist, like, as a source,

42:13

is like, obviously they're wacko. Obviously,

42:15

they're not right. In the head.

42:17

Or factually. If you buy a

42:19

figurine in the Congo that may

42:22

or may not be a representation

42:24

of the Michaela member, it must

42:26

be proof that the creature exists.

42:28

Because obviously the locals can't possibly

42:30

be that artist, it creative. We'll

42:32

show some entrepreneurial spirit by giving

42:34

tourists what they want. Of course

42:36

not. Another interesting artifact is a

42:38

reptile gold weight obtained from Ghana,

42:40

called the Little Gold Dinosaur. often

42:42

associated with Michaela Membe and other

42:44

similar cryptids. These weights were made

42:46

from brass and used to ensure

42:48

fair trade. The creature's head is unusually

42:50

large for the body, which clashes with

42:52

the popular description of a small head.

42:54

But if this is Michaela Membe, it

42:56

suggests that the animal's range could extend

42:59

into Ghana. Skeptics who have to ruin

43:01

everything have argued that the weight is

43:03

just a stylized monitor lizard. I mean,

43:05

they'd argue that because you know what's

43:07

real for sure monitor lizard. Like,

43:09

I've seen a monitor lizard, I

43:11

know that shit's real. A third

43:14

possible Michaela Membe artifact was found

43:16

in the most unusual places, islands.

43:18

All right, come on now. Residing

43:20

at the Glencomer House of Rosminion

43:22

Missionary Fathers, the piece possibly dates

43:24

to the 1950s. The Rosminion Fathers

43:26

is a missionary order that worked

43:29

in Africa for many years, and

43:31

many of the missionaries brought back

43:33

souvenirs. The piece is around six

43:35

inches, that's 15 centimetre tall, carved

43:37

from a single piece of wood

43:39

and consists of two creatures. Oh,

43:41

well, according to the Young Earth

43:43

Creationist website or whatever, well, then

43:45

obviously they're real. Like, what fucking

43:48

logic is this? This is insane!

43:50

The larger of the two look

43:52

somewhat like a sauropot with the

43:54

long neck and everything. However, some

43:56

details, like the large pangle and

43:58

like, overlapping scales... on the body

44:00

is a bit of a problem, sauropods

44:02

didn't have scales. A second smaller creature

44:04

with the same scales is standing upright

44:07

on its hind legs, resting directly on

44:09

the large creature's body. It doesn't have

44:11

a long neck, so perhaps it's a

44:13

baby or the carver ran out of

44:15

wood or something. Both creatures have a

44:17

peculiar fin-like structure visible at the base

44:19

of the tail. The large creature also

44:21

seems to have long pointed teeth that

44:23

would be a bit at odds with

44:25

a hurt with a herbivorevore unless it's

44:27

feeding on super-sized Venus fly-sized. At the

44:30

carving dates to 1950, it would have

44:32

been made before the Macal expedition in

44:34

the 80s that really set the Michaela

44:36

Ember roll rolling. What makes this carving

44:39

interesting is a story told by Dr.

44:41

Pierre Nuyen, who found himself stationed in

44:43

French Equatorial Africa in 1958 to 1959.

44:46

Arriving in a small village while travelling

44:48

from Impondo to Epina, the villagers told

44:50

Nien about an animal living in the

44:53

swamps of Lake Teller that looked something

44:55

like an enormous pangolin. was our cover

44:57

depicting a real animal. Pictures of

45:00

footprints and footprints, casts, are also

45:02

presented as indisputable proof. During a 2004

45:04

expedition to Cameroon led by Milt Marcy,

45:06

one of the expedition members, Peter Beach,

45:08

found a three-toed footprint on the very

45:11

small island known as Swamp Island in

45:13

the Jha River. Some of the overhanging

45:15

vines had been stripped away, suggesting an

45:17

animal around 18 feet or 5.4 meters

45:20

tall, and the print was the size

45:22

of an elephant. Beach made a cast,

45:24

one of the toes, since he didn't

45:26

have enough plaster to cover the entire

45:29

print. I mean, you know you're hunting

45:31

something big. Why wouldn't you bring enough

45:33

plaster? The locals informed the expedition of

45:35

the nearby caves, where Michaela member likes

45:37

to spend the dry season, and the

45:39

team found scratch marks. On the wall

45:42

of one of those caves, thus leading

45:44

to the inevitable conclusion that the prince

45:46

belonged to Michaela Membe. Inevitable conclusion! If

45:48

you're still not convinced, oh my god

45:50

I'm not even close, we even have

45:52

video footage. Okay, here we go, Michael

45:54

and me, let me guess, it's going

45:57

to be terribly grainy. In 1992, a

45:59

Japanese film crew... making a documentary, was

46:01

filming aerial footage over Lake Telle when

46:03

they spotted something in the lake. What

46:05

follows is around 15 seconds of footage

46:08

found all over YouTube of a black

46:10

object moving across the lake. Some articles

46:12

claim that it dives out of sight,

46:14

but the footage I watched cut out

46:17

before the supposed dive takes place. The

46:19

film has been analyzed extensively and most

46:21

people agree that we're looking at a

46:23

crocodile. Shock horror! A boat with two

46:26

people or an elephant. Elephants are surprisingly

46:28

good swimmers! I'm learning lots about

46:30

elephants today. Elephants raw.

46:33

Elephants can swim? With

46:35

what? They just got these giant

46:37

legs. I guess elephants can

46:39

float because like, anyone's can

46:42

float because they just have

46:44

big lungs or whatever. But

46:46

like, elephants swimming. And they

46:48

also enjoy being in the

46:50

water. Well, there you go.

46:52

They even dive using their

46:54

trunks as a snorkel. That's

46:56

cool. Elephants are awesome. One more

46:58

reason not to go snorkeling in

47:01

African Lakes, but I mean, isn't

47:03

nature amazing? Nature is scary, it

47:05

seems. Is it real? It seems

47:07

that for the last century, stories

47:09

of living dinosaurs in the

47:11

heart of Africa have been

47:13

exciting the imagination and emptying

47:15

the pockets of eager explorers,

47:17

desperate to be the one

47:19

who makes possibly the greatest

47:21

discovery since table salt and

47:23

string cheese. I'm an adult.

47:25

A surprising pension. for string cheese.

47:28

My wife buys me these protein string

47:30

cheeses and they're surprisingly delicious and I

47:32

tell my kids not to play with

47:35

their food but then I'll find myself

47:37

secretly like peeling apart a string cheese

47:39

like a small child. However is

47:41

there anything lurking in the dark

47:44

jungles patiently waiting to be discovered

47:46

or are we just chasing phantoms?

47:48

Nowadays, young Earth creationists leading the

47:51

charge seem very keen on proving

47:53

that Michaelambe is a living dinosaur,

47:55

as it will somehow disprove evolution

47:58

and prove the Bible. How? However,

48:00

there are a lot of details

48:02

about Michaela member that don't fit

48:04

into the description of a sauropod

48:06

dinosaur starting with the three toad

48:08

footprints. sauropods didn't have toes. They

48:11

had compact feet, like that of

48:13

an elephant. Oh yeah, they don't

48:15

have toes. For a long time,

48:17

paleontologists also imagine that sauropods were

48:19

living in swamps. But we know

48:21

today that a Patosaurus and friends

48:23

preferred seasonally dry woodlands, where they

48:25

could shower down on conifetries and

48:28

cycids. The idea that the animal

48:30

will nest in caves in

48:32

riverben, in some cases even

48:34

burrowing out these caverns, doesn't

48:37

make sense. Small dinosaurs, certainly

48:39

were capable of burrowing, but

48:41

sauropods, even the smallest ones,

48:43

didn't burrow. Many accounts mention

48:46

a horn, which a saurobod,

48:48

most definitely did not have.

48:50

The horn is often ignored

48:53

or it's explained away as

48:55

a misidentification. Von

48:57

Stein saw an Emila Natuka and thought it

48:59

was Michaela Membe, but how do you

49:02

confuse something you're naming and describing

49:04

for the first time with something

49:06

that's not even been invented yet?

49:08

Speaking of the name, that's another

49:10

problem altogether. How accurate is the

49:12

translation, one that stops the flow

49:14

of rivers? I still think they're

49:16

talking about beavers. They're just, they've

49:18

mistaken this all for a, for

49:20

a, for a beaver. We know

49:22

the name Michaela Membe originated with

49:24

von Stein. However, we only have

49:26

Willy Lay's translation of von Stein's

49:28

work, and since the original manuscript

49:30

is lost, we have no idea what

49:32

von Stein actually wrote. The name only

49:34

shows up in exotic biology in 1959,

49:36

and while Lay claims that it was

49:39

a name used by the locals, he

49:41

also admits that von Stein wasn't sure

49:43

if the name had any special meaning

49:45

at all. The name was only translated

49:47

as one who stops the flow of

49:49

rivers by Herman Registas in 1982 and

49:52

he was neither linguist nor native Lingala

49:54

speaker. Another possible translation, he who divides

49:56

the waters, sounds rather biblical, and would

49:58

certainly fit a young earth. creationist literature.

50:00

When French anthropologist and linguist Pierre

50:02

Alexander attempted to determine the origins

50:05

and meanings of the name, he

50:07

was told by around 30 young

50:09

Congolese natives that the Michaela member

50:11

was a species of giant crocodile. Makes

50:13

a lot sense, doesn't it? It's

50:15

just a big crocodile. Another possible

50:18

translation comes from the second Macal

50:20

expedition. There's some debate about how

50:22

all this went down, so I'll

50:24

just tell the story and let

50:26

you decide for yourself. Apparently, during

50:29

an interview with an important government

50:31

official serving in the Epina district

50:33

of the Lekuala region, Mikhaila mentioned

50:35

the name Mikhailimabembe, who, to which

50:37

the man smiled, claiming that in

50:40

Lingala it means rainbow. Mikhail seemingly

50:42

under the impression that he was

50:44

more familiar with Lingala than the people

50:46

who actually spoke the language, insisted that

50:48

the man was wrong. Dude, this is

50:50

a wild shit. He's like, no, no,

50:52

no, no, no. No, no, no! Let

50:55

me tell you something about your language,

50:57

you savage! He quoted a passage from

50:59

exotic zoology, written by a German who

51:01

had never set foot in Africa. He

51:03

told the official that if a rainbow

51:05

could be killed with spears and eat

51:08

fruit, he'd be very interested in seeing

51:10

it. The very next day, the official

51:12

changed his story, claiming that after some

51:14

reflection, he decided to tell the truth

51:16

about Michaela Membe, even offering up a

51:19

whole bunch of witnesses who had seen

51:21

the creature. Good science there chaps, great

51:23

great science, well done. Personally, I think

51:25

he saw an arrogant little white man

51:28

who didn't care about the truth, so

51:30

he told the expedition what they wanted

51:32

to hear to get him out of

51:34

the district. Yep. Yep. That one I'm

51:36

pretty sure about. The guy sounds like a

51:38

bit of a knob, doesn't he? Now language

51:41

is a fascinating thing. It grows and it

51:43

changes. While we have no idea what Michaelimembe

51:45

meant when Bonstein heard it back in 1913,

51:47

after Michael's meddling and with each new expedition

51:49

going on a monster hunt, bringing books full

51:52

of dinosaur pictures, it seems that the word

51:54

Michaelimembe has now taken on a new meaning,

51:56

though nothing as dramatic as the one who

51:58

stops the flow of rivers. These days it's

52:00

used to refer to sauropod dinosaurs,

52:03

and in the Akar language, it's

52:05

apparently also used to refer to

52:07

any large unknown animal, which obviously

52:09

leads to a bit of confusion

52:11

for our intrepid, cryptid, cryptid

52:13

hunters. I'm not particularly

52:16

annoyed that the cryptid hunters are

52:18

confused. They're easily confusable, it seems.

52:20

Sadly, the alleged incident with the

52:22

government official wasn't the only example

52:24

of bad research that I came

52:26

across. Shocking. He was eager to

52:29

tell his audience how every local

52:31

picked out sauropods when asked to

52:33

identify Michaela Membe. However, it appears

52:35

that this wasn't always the case.

52:37

In one village near Lake Telle,

52:39

the villagers told Macal they'd never

52:41

seen it. Instead of noting it

52:44

down like a scientist would, he

52:46

decided that they were all in

52:48

on a conspiracy to keep it

52:50

a secret. In another village, a

52:52

concrete government official allegedly flat-out threatened

52:54

people, who then suddenly remembered encounters

52:57

with Michaelamembei. Mikhail was also accompanied

52:59

everywhere by a security team with

53:01

AK-47, which is pretty intimidating if

53:03

you're a rural farmer or villager

53:05

just trying to go about your day.

53:07

Did I see a dinosaur? Yeah,

53:10

I saw dinosaurs, loads of them.

53:12

I saw a T-Rex, too. If

53:14

the guy with the beer and

53:16

security team carrying AK-47s in a

53:18

country rife with government police corruption

53:20

is asking you to tell a

53:22

specific story, bro, you are going

53:24

to sing that story like a

53:26

canary. Any tune the white man

53:28

wants to hear, as long as

53:30

he leaves and takes his AK-47-wielding

53:32

friends with him. Is it just

53:34

me? Or all of these eyewitness

53:36

accounts of Michaela Membe, which Michael

53:38

used to build his case, suddenly

53:40

seem a bit hollow. Oh, they

53:42

seemed hollow right at the beginning.

53:44

Michaela and those following him had

53:47

no anthropological training, and in anthropological

53:49

terms, they were a disaster. The

53:51

picture parade of animals, with the

53:53

locals invariably picking out the sauropods

53:55

as a spitting image of Michaela

53:58

Membe, makes for great TV. However,

54:00

pictures of the sauropods have been circulated

54:02

so much by Western as looking for

54:04

Michaela Memme that the testimony from locals

54:06

is now tainted with whatever the previous

54:08

expedition, with the dinosaur books showed them,

54:11

or wanted to hear exactly. With their

54:13

constant interference over the last hundred years,

54:15

it's possible that the folk memories and

54:17

stories about Michaela Member have been twisted

54:19

to follow a narrative more acceptable to

54:21

Westerners, meaning that the local stories can

54:23

no longer be trusted. Now please don't

54:25

send a lynch mob, I'm not saying

54:27

anyone is lying intentionally, but the stories

54:30

have been told to tourists for so

54:32

many years by so many generations that

54:34

many of the local people now also

54:36

believe the stories that they've heard from

54:38

their parents, their grandparents and village elders.

54:40

Yeah, this is kind of how like

54:42

a myth is born. While these questionable

54:45

research practices are problematic enough, there are

54:47

just as many expeditions, actually even more,

54:49

who went to the Congo and found

54:51

absolutely nothing. In the early 1970s, when

54:53

James Powell was doing his first expeditions,

54:55

he traveled through the same area von

54:58

Stein was in when he wrote his

55:00

lost manuscript. Powell showed the locals pictures

55:02

of sauropods and pliersier saucers, but they

55:04

didn't recognize it. And when he asked

55:06

them about Macile and Bombay, they'd claim

55:09

they'd never heard of it. A Dutch

55:11

expedition visiting the Congo in 1986 interviewed the

55:13

guides of the Reguster's expedition, which claimed to have so

55:15

many encounters, but none of them remembered seeing anything. But

55:17

2001 BBC series Congo also tried to replicate the tired

55:19

old pick-the-annimal trick, but instead of pointing out a sore

55:21

or poor dinosaur, the locals picked out a rhino. And

55:23

there goes the ratings. But I like the unlike History

55:26

Channel, allegedly. BBC's like, oh, well, that's interesting, that it

55:28

didn't turn out the way that we'd like it to

55:30

for the TV, but we're making a TV show, honestly.

55:32

So we'll make it anyway, or a history channel, or

55:34

a like... No, no, no, no, no, no, point to

55:36

the other, point to the other, point to the other

55:38

one, point to the other one, just, just, I'm exaggerating,

55:40

I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating,

55:42

I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, I'm

55:45

exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating,

55:47

I'm exaggerating, I'm exaggerating, Many of these

55:49

expeditions, especially the more recent ones,

55:51

rely very heavily on the idea

55:53

of the noble savage who has

55:56

no reason to lie. In Monster

55:58

Quest, the narrator claims that... What

56:00

did you say? No dinosaurs! In Monster

56:02

Quest, the narrator claims that these people

56:04

have virtually no contact with the outside

56:07

world, and according to Bill Gibbons, the

56:09

people native to the region, especially in

56:11

rural areas and small villages, have no

56:13

television. Radios, books or magazines, and are

56:16

mostly illiterate. However, while filming one of

56:18

the many television documentaries in a small

56:20

village, the narrator's asked what Michaelemembe looked

56:22

like, and one villager said it looked

56:25

like a bronchosaurus. When asked when he

56:27

heard the word, he said it had

56:29

added on TV. This idea that

56:31

rural Africans have little contact with

56:34

the outside world and a completely

56:36

out-of-touch is old-fashioned, at best and

56:38

horribly racist at worst. Even the

56:40

most remote of these communities have

56:42

contact with missionaries and well-meaning aid

56:44

organizations providing relief efforts in often

56:46

war-torn communities where the majority of

56:49

the population lives in extreme poverty.

56:51

Yeah. If you're a truly isolated

56:53

tribe these days, that's going to

56:55

be very unusual. In 1989, British travel

56:57

writer Redmond O'Hanlon went on his

56:59

own expedition to find Michaela Membe.

57:01

A lot of people he encountered

57:03

claimed the creature was a creature

57:05

of spirit, specifically a water spirit,

57:07

not an actual living being. In

57:09

one village he was informed by

57:11

the son of a village elder

57:13

that the stories of the Congolese

57:15

dinosaur were meant to bring idiots

57:17

like you here and make a lot of

57:20

money. He'd be like, dude! I'm coming in trying

57:22

to try to find out what these idiots are

57:24

up to. I'm not one of the idiots and

57:26

then he's like, oh shit, I am the idiots.

57:28

I don't need to disprove this. It needs

57:30

to be proved. Far from being too

57:32

naive and innocent to see economic potential

57:35

in a creature like Macalembe, the local

57:37

people in the area are well aware

57:39

of the Western fascination with their living

57:41

dinosaur. Yeah, and it's like I bet

57:44

the hotels around Loch Ness in Scotland

57:46

are like, oh, it's definitely not real.

57:48

They're like, oh, maybe it is, because

57:51

money. They have a vested interest in

57:53

creeping the creature alive and just out

57:55

of reach. The rich Westerners keep coming

57:58

back, spending a lot of money. hiring

58:00

guides, trackers, porters, and in the case

58:02

of Makar, handing out beer to anyone

58:04

who can tell them what they want

58:07

to hear. It's easy money in a

58:09

region rife with poverty, and if the

58:11

gullible white man keeps throwing it at

58:14

them, why shouldn't they take it? No,

58:16

milk these suckers. However, the biggest argument

58:18

against the existence of Michaela Membe is

58:20

the fact that not a single specimen

58:23

alive or dead has ever been found.

58:25

A single dinosaur couldn't live for 65

58:27

million years. So if Michaela Membe is

58:30

real, there has to be a breeding

58:32

colony somewhere. Considering its size, even a

58:34

small breeding colony would be found by

58:37

now. Animals leave behind scat, footprints, and

58:39

when they die, carcasses. Yeah, they don't

58:41

just fucking pf, vanish. We found the

58:43

skeletal remains of rhino and elephant graveyards,

58:46

but so far we haven't found a

58:48

single bone from Michaela Meme or any

58:50

other neodinosor, for that matter. Advanced technology,

58:53

especially aerial and satellite surveillance, makes it

58:55

possible to identify elephants, so we should

58:57

have seen a saurobod, even a litzel

59:00

one by now. I will be the

59:02

first to admit that large animals can

59:04

hide surprisingly well in the bush. Just

59:06

ask anyone who ever accidentally come across

59:09

an elephant or a buffalo. Oh my

59:11

God, I'll be so terrified. A buffalo,

59:13

even buffalo, buffalo are really big. However

59:16

while the jungles of the Congo are

59:18

very dense, the area isn't completely unpopulated.

59:20

Even if we can't catch a glimpse

59:22

of a living sauropod... with a drone.

59:25

There are enough photographers, hunters, journalists, park

59:27

rangers, writers, smugglers, warlords, evangelical Christians working

59:29

to disprove evolution, camera crews, poachers, documentary

59:32

makers, cryptozoologists with unregulated qualifications and no

59:34

field training. And locals carrying phones with

59:36

cameras built into them, so that if

59:39

a sauropod-like creature were roaming the jungles

59:41

of Africa, the law of sheer dumb

59:43

luck dictates that someone should have gotten

59:45

a clear shot by now. You would

59:48

be saying like, oh, you know, the

59:50

guy saw it on TV. It's like,

59:52

yeah, the technology, technological infiltration, infiltration makes

59:55

it sound like a bad thing, but

59:57

the technology... What is really lurking in

59:59

the jungles? I'm sure we can all

1:00:02

agree that whatever Michaelambe is, it's not

1:00:04

a dinosaur. However, considering all the reported

1:00:06

sightings, it's clear that people are seeing

1:00:08

something in the jungles of Africa. So

1:00:11

what's the most likely expert? I think

1:00:13

it's just, it grunts, grunts? Roars. It

1:00:15

roars like an elephant. You know what

1:00:18

I'll say, if it roars like an

1:00:20

elephant, maybe it's just a fucking elephant,

1:00:22

guys. Of course, the first argument presented...

1:00:24

is the one that creatures once believed

1:00:27

to be extinct were rediscovered millions of

1:00:29

years ago. Yes, it's that fish again.

1:00:31

You know the one I'm talking about.

1:00:34

A study done by the University of

1:00:36

Queensland zoologists showed that it's possible for

1:00:38

some modern mammals thought to be extinct

1:00:41

to still survive in small hard-to-find pockets

1:00:43

of their former haunts. However, they found

1:00:45

that if proper search was launched, the

1:00:47

one's extinct animal would usually be rediscovered

1:00:50

within three to six searches. After more

1:00:52

than 11 unsuccessful unsuccessful, unsuccessful searches, the

1:00:54

odds start dwindlinging which doesn't bode well

1:00:57

for the Tasmania. Tiger and the accuracy-river

1:00:59

dolphin, but is even worse for Michael

1:01:01

Membe, who's been the subject of more

1:01:04

than 50 expeditions over the last 40

1:01:06

years or so. Of course, this study

1:01:08

assumes that those doing the searching are

1:01:10

trained and qualified zoologists, or researchers in

1:01:13

related fields approaching the search in a

1:01:15

strictly scientific framework, which obviously no one

1:01:17

in today's episode, other than the guys

1:01:20

who went later, they're just not serious

1:01:22

about science. They're just not. The majority

1:01:24

of those looking for it are self-described

1:01:26

explorers, with little and no relevant training

1:01:29

in scientific methods or experience in doing

1:01:31

field work or tracking and studying wildlife.

1:01:33

Ironically, if the animal in the Congo

1:01:36

basin is a living sauropart once thought

1:01:38

extinct, it means that it adapted to

1:01:40

live in a swampy and environment, which

1:01:43

actually proves evolution, instead of disproving it.

1:01:45

Another possibility is an undiscovered species. We

1:01:47

sometimes think that we've learned everything there

1:01:49

is to know about this amazing planet

1:01:52

of ours, but the Megamouth shark was

1:01:54

only discovered in 1976, and a new

1:01:56

series of monkeys, the Highland Manjbe, were

1:01:59

discovered in Tanzania in 2005. In 2008,

1:02:01

125,000 lowland guerrillas were discovered living in

1:02:03

the Congalese jungles at a time when

1:02:06

they were considered on the brink of

1:02:08

extinction. I mean this is all very

1:02:10

cool but these are real things with

1:02:12

verifiable, you know, they've been verified. Environments

1:02:15

that make it easy to hide, and

1:02:17

which quickly erase any trace of a

1:02:19

creature being there, like dense jungles, are

1:02:22

very likely content of a housing some

1:02:24

undiscovered species. If the animal is particularly

1:02:26

shy or the species is critically endangered,

1:02:28

and therefore small in number, the possibility

1:02:31

of it still being undiscovered by science,

1:02:33

further increases. There are lots of species

1:02:35

endemic to the Congo basin, which certainly

1:02:38

support the idea that there could be

1:02:40

animals living there that's found nowhere else

1:02:42

on earth. The Congo Basin and surrounding

1:02:45

regions also aren't the most hospitable place

1:02:47

in the world to do research. They

1:02:49

have to deal with political instability in

1:02:51

war, a lack of infrastructure like roads

1:02:54

and reliable internet, corrupt governments, and a

1:02:56

level of bureaucracy that would make Arthur

1:02:58

Dent weep in hopelessness a nice reference.

1:03:01

A more likely explanation is a simple

1:03:03

case of mistaken identity. Our elusive dinosaur

1:03:05

has a lot of traits in common

1:03:08

with regular African animals like elephants, rhinos,

1:03:10

rhinos, hippos. All of those animals are

1:03:12

gray. Hippos sweat red, which might explain

1:03:14

why some people describe a reddish-color animal,

1:03:17

and the rhino has a horn. Now,

1:03:19

hippos aren't indigenous to all the regions

1:03:21

where Michaela Membei sightings have been reported,

1:03:24

so another possibility is the West African

1:03:26

manatee, but neither the hippo nor the

1:03:28

manatee look much like a sauropot. We've

1:03:30

already seen that elephants can swim and

1:03:33

dive, holding their trunks above the water

1:03:35

to breathe, which might explain the thin

1:03:37

neck and small head seen from a

1:03:40

distance. Carl shu-cur-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-a- Cryptozoologist argues that it

1:03:42

is unlikely as such encounters would be

1:03:44

rare, but it's not like people bump

1:03:47

into Michaelemembe on a daily basis, Carl.

1:03:49

Some reptiles could fit the bill, considering

1:03:51

that many eyewitnesses describe the neck and

1:03:53

head of snake-like, we should consider the

1:03:56

possibility of rock pythons. A snakes can

1:03:58

grow up to 16 and a half

1:04:00

feet off five meters. I don't like

1:04:03

this. This is why I don't want

1:04:05

to go there. And it can swim.

1:04:07

It's fucking terrifying, dude. I don't like

1:04:10

snakes. Snakes are scary. As if I

1:04:12

needed another reason not to swim in

1:04:14

a river in Africa. Oh, that's something

1:04:16

I would never do. The African soft-shell

1:04:19

turtle also has a wide range, and

1:04:21

it isn't too picky about its environment,

1:04:23

living in rivers, streams, lagoons, swamps, and

1:04:26

lakes. It spends its days lying in

1:04:28

the muddy bottoms of waterways, coming out

1:04:30

at night, to feed, leaving three-toed footprints

1:04:32

in the mud. The head and neck

1:04:35

can seem quite long, while it's obviously

1:04:37

nowhere near the size of a sauropod,

1:04:39

most sightings only describe the head and

1:04:42

neck, and sometimes they're rounded back as

1:04:44

the animal dives beneath the water. Perhaps

1:04:46

instead of seeing a big animal very

1:04:49

far away, people were actually seeing a

1:04:51

smaller animal a tad bit closer. A

1:04:53

tadpid closer. Finally! Really? You don't say?

1:04:55

I think... Mostly it's people making it

1:04:58

up and getting taken advantage of by...

1:05:00

just because you're gullible and that the

1:05:02

locals want to make some money off

1:05:05

you and fair play to them. And

1:05:07

then some people are like hearing an

1:05:09

elephant growl and being like, oh my

1:05:12

god, it's the macalamembe. And the guides

1:05:14

being like, dude, you know, elephants can

1:05:16

growl rise. And they'll be like, shh!

1:05:18

I'm listening to the macalembei! When you

1:05:21

find yourself in a new and unfamiliar

1:05:23

environment, like say a jungle, it's common

1:05:25

to see things that aren't necessarily there.

1:05:28

People go into jungles looking for Michaelim

1:05:30

Membe, they believe it's there, and confirmation

1:05:32

bias does the rest. Sure does. Conclusion.

1:05:34

Conclusion. Conclusion. With its dense jungles and

1:05:37

uncharted swamps, it seems that if a

1:05:39

mysterious prehistoric creature was still alive, the

1:05:41

heart of Africa is where it would

1:05:44

be, and in a world where real

1:05:46

giants like elephant, rhino... when giraffe exists,

1:05:48

stories of mysterious giants hiding in the

1:05:51

forest make perfect sense. We often create

1:05:53

fictional monsters to slay the monsters that

1:05:55

we can't, so I find it very

1:05:57

telling that Michaela Membe is a hippo

1:06:00

killer. Hippos are the most dangerous animals

1:06:02

found in Africa. The big cats are

1:06:04

fearsome beasts, and I personally had an

1:06:07

experience with an elephant that will make

1:06:09

me think twice about going into the

1:06:11

bush again. But nothing compares the hippos.

1:06:14

I'm so glad I live in just

1:06:16

like safe Europe with no scary animals.

1:06:18

Like I see Australia or something, you

1:06:20

know, like I've got mates in Australia,

1:06:23

you see Australian television, you're like, God,

1:06:25

the weather's nice there all the time,

1:06:27

basically. Everything seems great. The only problem

1:06:30

is it wants to kill you. Perhaps

1:06:32

Michaela Meme was real, perhaps it even

1:06:34

killed hippos, or maybe it was a

1:06:36

gentle giant which only became Buffy the

1:06:39

hippo Slayer when the last Michaela Membe

1:06:41

disappeared from the swamps and jungles of

1:06:43

the Congo and entered the realm of

1:06:46

folklore. To me, it seems there are

1:06:48

two Michaela members. The Michaela member created

1:06:50

by Westerners rooted in colonialists and a

1:06:53

racist perspective of Africa as a backwards

1:06:55

continent, a dark continent, a which had

1:06:57

made little progress since the time of

1:06:59

the dinosaur. Instead of learning about the

1:07:02

beauty of the continent, Western explorers, Kainen

1:07:04

droves, looking for dinosaurs and monsters. This

1:07:06

Michaela member probably never existed. How are

1:07:09

the second Michaela members? The creature known

1:07:11

to the native people. Each region has

1:07:13

their own. To some, it was a

1:07:16

creature of spirit, wrapped up in mysticism

1:07:18

and magic. Some describe it as a

1:07:20

ghost. However, others insist that it's a

1:07:22

real creature, and if you go back

1:07:25

to the stories told before the arrival

1:07:27

of McCullenco, there are one or two

1:07:29

stories that stand out. In Vonstein's tales,

1:07:32

the creature is about the size of

1:07:34

a simple elephant, not the size of

1:07:36

a dimbladocus, and an elephant-sized animal outside

1:07:38

the realm isn't outside the role of

1:07:41

possibility. It's also interesting. But the first

1:07:43

people shown pictures by Powell in the

1:07:45

early 70s identified a sauropot. Perhaps it

1:07:48

was a creature from memory. Many regions

1:07:50

with tails and Michaela men, they don't

1:07:52

have rhinos. But they're... These animals were

1:07:55

far more abundant and they would stray

1:07:57

into neighboring regions. A fisherman or a

1:07:59

hunter who's never encountered a rhino is

1:08:01

going to have an interesting story to

1:08:04

tell after their first meeting. It could

1:08:06

even have been the memory of an

1:08:08

extinct animal, something that looks like the

1:08:11

pangolin depicted in the strange carving in

1:08:13

Ireland. The local stories describe the animal

1:08:15

in great detail and while these stories

1:08:18

may have become twisted, Perhaps they still

1:08:20

contain a grain of truth that's been

1:08:22

exaggerated over the years. Yeah, normally there's

1:08:24

some, you know, something starts it off.

1:08:27

Personally, I would have loved to hear

1:08:29

the original stories Michaeli Membe told around

1:08:31

campfires at night before Westerners arrived and

1:08:34

muddy the waters imposing their ideas on

1:08:36

a continent and to people. They made

1:08:38

no effort to understand. It seems that

1:08:40

instead of searching for Michaeli Membe, they

1:08:43

destroyed it. Yep. Agreed. I think Ilzer

1:08:45

and I, very much on the same

1:08:47

page on this one. And as the

1:08:50

end of today's episode, if you like

1:08:52

the show, please like, subscribe, if you're

1:08:54

listening on, uh, as a podcast, give

1:08:57

us a rating on Spotify, why not?

1:08:59

And I'll see you next time.