African Entrepreneurship Record

The human labor conference, in the era without large-scale mechanical engineering, every project required manpower, and this task was clearly beyond the scope for the African people who had just stepped out of the primitive society.

On the western side of the Mitumba Mountains, in order to clear the way for the Hessen Railway, the Hessen Government planned to mobilize 400,000 people to modify the planned route.

Of course, 400,000 people could not be gathered all at once. In addition to applying from abroad, it was more important to mobilize the citizens of Hessen Province, mainly militia, to ensure the orderly progress of the project.

Apart from suppressing Black people, there were also various dangers in the primordial forest, and these needed to be handled by the locals. After all, they had accumulated considerable experience living here for so many years.

Felling trees alone was already a considerable project. It wasn’t as easy as just toppling a tree; the roots underground also needed to be thoroughly cleared.

The primordial forest of Hessen Province was quite dangerous, with trees reaching over ten meters high frequently, and thirty to forty meters were also not uncommon. If the direction wasn’t controlled well, it could randomly crush a lucky person. Even in the twenty-first century, logging was a dangerous job, so this risk was inevitable.

Black lumberjacks, with ropes tied around their waists, nimbly climbed to the treetops, reached behind their backs to take out the rope, skillfully tied it to the trunk, and then slid down.

Later, two lumberjacks below wielded iron axes produced in East Africa to split the trunk. Finally, under the joint effort of a dozen people, a towering tree that had grown for countless years fell in a fixed direction.

But it was far from over because the felled tree did not fall directly to the ground; instead, it was upheld by the surrounding dense vegetation. To move it thoroughly to the ground required more trees around to be felled.

”Clear all the vegetation within fifty meters around, remove all the leaves, and throw them into the nearby jungle. Trim the branches from the trunk and pile them in the periphery. Process the main trunk into logs and stack them properly,” instructed Hans, the project foreman, according to higher-up requirements.

The fifty-meter range served as a temporary site, and Hans’s task was to lead the team to continually extend this fifty-meter-wide road northward, making subsequent construction easier for the workers.

The collected logs that met standards would be processed by carpenters into railroad sleepers or cable support poles for use along the railway.

The wood that didn’t meet the standards wouldn’t be wasted either. The leftover branches, when dried, would serve as natural fuel for boiling water, cooking, and maintaining hygiene.

After all, this was a primitive rainforest teeming with countless parasites or fungi. For the workers’ safety, they were required to bathe, wash clothes, and soak their feet every day.

All these needed hot water. Luckily, it was a primordial forest here and did not lack wood. Of course, the continuous rainy weather easily drenched these natural fuels. Therefore, the East African engineering team was also equipped with coal and other fuels prepared from the rear.

”Lazybones, grab your machete and clear the leaves. What’s the use of hacking at the air?” Hans booted a slacking Black worker in the rear.

Hans managed over fifty people under him, including seven militiamen from Hessen Province, six overseers, and three cooks.

An overseer monitored four or five Black workers. Because of the location in the primeval forest, to prevent the Black laborers from escaping, Hessen Government and the Ministry of Railways paid special attention to surveillance.

It wasn’t an overreaction; the surrounding area was all dense forest with a complex topography. If Black laborers did escape, they would genuinely disappear, and East Africa could not venture deep into the forest for tracking.

Of course, losing a few Black workers wasn’t much of an issue; the main concern was preventing a rebellion of these armed ”tools” triggering a bloody conflict.

With the outbreak of East African steel production, the tools in East Africa were updated continuously, equipping even Hans’s small construction team with dangerous tools like ”iron pickaxes, axes, machetes, shovels, and iron drills.”

Even though East Africans wielded hot weapons, who could guarantee that these Black people wouldn’t act irrationally, insisting on a life-and-death struggle with East Africans. The primeval forest wasn’t suitable for hot weapons, so better to be cautious.

Of course, different from the East Africans’ concern, most Black laborers simply lacked such awareness.

It wasn’t that they didn’t yearn for freedom, but where would they run in this unfamiliar land? Most East African Blacks originally lived in the savanna areas of the plateau, where they had been led to work by East Africans constantly, never staying long in one place. As a result, they were quite unfamiliar with the Congo rainforest. The only ones in the team relatively familiar were the militiamen from Hessen Province or the rubber agricultural workers.

The vast, dark tropical rainforest made most people feel anxious, and Black people, used to living on the sunny tropical savanna, were no exception, thinking it foolish to dive into the unknown primal forest.

Moreover, the key point was that East Africans provided food; if they genuinely ran away, how would they solve their food problem? On the savanna, they could still use traditional hunting skills, but in the rainforest, anxiety kicked in. The ecosystem here is completely different from the savanna, and the animals are also not the same.

Of course, Black people on the savanna couldn’t escape either—the vastness was too open. Even if an East African let them run a hundred meters ahead, they could still be shot down.

Another key point was that under East African rule, the spirit of these Black people had long been worn down. A few years ago, some Black people might still have had the desire for freedom, but now East African Blacks didn’t have the courage to confront East Africans anymore.

….

”The weather in Hessen Province changes at the drop of a hat. Just now, it was clear and bright, but now it’s pouring rain,” Hans remarked.

”Captain Hans, let’s have everyone take shelter from the rain first! It’s impossible to work in this weather,” said Militia Captain Chris.

”How long might this rain last?” Hans asked.

”That’s hard to predict; it could be a few minutes, a few hours, or even a few days. But that’s not important—it’s getting dark soon, and soon we won’t see the sun. So we might as well wrap up now while it’s raining and prepare dinner and hot water at the same time.”

Chris, a militia from Peneensari Village nearby, was quite familiar with the local climate.

”Yes, that’s all we can do. Have those Black workers hand over the tools, count them, and then take shelter in the tents from the rain. Hera and Will will be responsible for overseeing them, and the rest will rotate every two hours,” Hans said.

The tools were all quite sharp, so every time work wrapped up, they needed to be collected and handed in—this was a mandatory procedure for every East African construction team with Black workers.

This regulation wasn’t born from thin air but was a lesson learned from bloodshed. There had been instances where Black workers took the tools distributed by East Africans and, under cover of night, bashed in an overseer’s head. After such incidents happened repeatedly, recovering tools became a rule for East African construction teams.

At night, Hans and his group sat around the campfire, having dinner. The sound of rain continued incessantly outside the tent, and the damp wood crackled in the flames.

The Black workers slept in a large tent; their treatment wasn’t as good as the East Africans, but they still received two large bowls of rice, each directly lying on mats as their bed or, more accurately, as the floor.

The Hessen Province Railway was divided into four segments, all starting simultaneously. However, the initial progress was slow. The weather and environment were hurdles to railway construction, especially the persistent rainfall year-round in Hessen Province, which was vastly different from the dry and wet seasons of the plateau.