The mokélé-mbembé, spirit of the Congo transmuted into a dinosaur

Like a green ocean, the moist canopy of the Central African rainforest stretches as far as the eye can see. Below, long, winding rivers crisscross the wilderness—sometimes a muddy brown, sometimes a clear blue under clear skies. Forest elephants trample the undergrowth, hornbills circle above, and mountain gorillas sulk in the gloom. And somewhere in this primordial vastness, a dinosaur lurks.

Emmanuel Mambou, a fisherman living in the hinterland of the Republic of Congo, claims to have seen it. Since childhood, he has fished in a network of tributaries of the Congo. And he isn't afraid to describe, in great detail, his solitary encounter with the dinosaur believed to reside in the area, the mokélé-mbembé.

It was last year. On a warm, moonlit night, Mambou sat on a secluded stretch of riverbank, cooking freshly caught catfish over a crackling fire. His fellow fishermen chuckled when he began to tell his mokélé-mbembé story. For the hundredth time, they mocked.

In his memory, the event occurred in October, many years earlier, when the monsoon was in full swing in northern Congo. Aboard his pirogue, Mambou glided down the river. He