Game Boy vs the Zambian bush? No competition

Take your six-year old on holiday to a mud hut in Africa, writes Helen Truszkowski. He'll love it

'Ucokera kuti?" demanded the first. The next in line charged forward: "Unazaka zingatti?" An incoming toddler stared at us with dinner-plate eyes, opened her mouth and screamed. Not your average welcome.

George came to my aid. He smiled. The crowd of children smiled. Then, mouthing that miracle child-lingo that transcends all other tongues, the herd circled away with George at its core.

Saved by a six-year-old.

I don't know when it first occurred to me to take my son into the Zambian bush to stay in a village. It might have been after the Christmas holidays, when he informed me that his friend Ben has "a radio and a CD player and a TV and a telephone in his room. So when can I get my own telephone, Mum?". Maybe it was the cumulative effect of a year spent listening to George and his fellow classmates measure their worth in Harry Potter merchandise.

I stood alone eyeing the sunset's pink flush, listening to hippo vociferously re-affirm their claim to a stretch of river. Turtle doves warbled. Crickets rubbed shoulders. A football fashioned from newspaper and elastic bands reached my sandalled feet. I'm no Seaman, so I let it pass. Cue the stampede and whoops of delight. "Inde, inde, inde!" George was evidently making headway with the nyanjan patois.

Just 20 minutes earlier we had abandoned our preconceptions and inhibitions on the tarmac as we drove on to a trail sliced through maize and cottonfields bound for Webby's Village, our home for two nights. With encouragement from Jo and Robin Pope (possibly the best known safari operators this side of the Zambezi) the villagers first offered a few inquisitive visitors bed and breakfast "Kunda style" some four years ago. The take-up has been surprisingly slow.

You might figure it takes a certain type of traveller to venture here. One that values personal discovery above prescribed experience, adventure over the passive predictability of habitual holidays. Highbrow it all you like. Truth is, I'm just a mum and George is just a schoolboy and the invitation to talk, to touch and to be touched by our tribal equals, normally a world apart, was both a rare and beguiling opportunity.

Sheathed in a chitenje (sarong) to protect my modesty, I joined the gaggle of women preparing supper on a reed mat. Plucking a still-warm chicken, they spontaneously broke into peals of joyful song. I responded with a tuneless round of "Under the bramble bushes, under the sea". A fit of giggles later I knew we'd bonded. Forty-eight hours later and I'd practically chained myself to the bamboo fence, willing the villagers to take me on as an apprentice.

Looking back now, my diary beggars belief. Tuesday I hauled water on my head (spilling more than I saved), learnt to strip maize kernels and swapped candlelit tales over a meal of boiled groundnuts. At dusk I took a stick and scratched an unlikely map of the world, highlighting the extent of our journey to a chorus of sighs.

Trailed by his pack, George appeared and reappeared momentarily, increasingly unkempt, Lord of the Flies-style, his face smudged with sweat and dust. "Dirt," he enthused. "I like dirt."

Wednesday we got a peek inside the primary school at rows of enraptured students aching to ask: " How old are you?" A daunting, girls-only ceremony saw me under the scrutiny of a traditional singanga (healer). Knocking on 90, she was wiry, innocent and had a smile of irresistible charm. Her diagnosis was frighteningly accurate; her herbal cure unimaginably vile. The evening collapsed into revelry as George and I danced a dubious chitelele alongside bottom-jigging naturals way out of our league.

Our accommodation for those nights was a simple rondavel mud-hut. A screened-off tin bath took the place of our regular en-suite. No electricity, no cutlery, no flushing loo, no telly. Any doubters among you will be gagging to probe the shortfalls of a village stay like this, so insignificant may seem the tokens of modern-day comfort, even basic reassurances for visitors. Fair enough. Buzzing through a clouded Simpsons sky on board a mini-aircraft destined for a shaky landing on a duvet-size airstrip had seemed less than comical. Clicking our legs into reverse as the quick-witted villagers stoned a random spitting cobra was even less of a laughing matter.

On balance, though, the chance to exchange life experiences with these vanishing tribal people, to build a rapport with the incredibly hospitable villagers and participate in their day-to-day lives was far too good an offer to miss.

As late as the 18th century the people of Zambia had hardly any contact with non-Africans. It was the arrival of David Livingstone that broke Zambia's comparative isolation. At Webby's, on the day we arrived, the screaming toddler had thought we were ghosts. George played the 21st-century envoy, charming the ever-intrepid youngster with noughts and crosses scratched into the earth. Harry Potter's Game Boy Advance doesn't come close.

The Facts

Getting there

Wildlife Worldwide (020-8667 9158; www.wildlifeworldwide.com) offers trips to Nkwali Camp (00 260 62 45090; rps@super-hub.com) and Webby's Village, as well as Kapani Lodge (00 260 62 45015; email: kapani@super-hub.com). Nkwali and Kapani's operators are committed to enabling local people to benefit from tourism.

A tailor-made package would include return flights to Lilongwe with British Airways, costing around £500, and onward flights with a local air service to Mfuwe for about £300 return. From June to October, it costs £155 per person per night to stay at Nkwali Camp and £150 per person per night to stay at Kapani Lodge. The price includes transfers, all-inclusive accommodation and activities and is based on two sharing.

Day trips to or overnight stays in Webby's Village can be arranged through Nkwali Camp. The camp is home to Jo and Robin Pope and is on the fringes of the Luangwa River overlooking the National Park. Access is by pontoon and boat. The six spacious guest chalets are made of bamboo and thatch, and have open-air bathrooms. The area is rich in wildlife and has stunning ebony woodlands, grass plains and enclosed pool. The income generated by trips to Webby's Village helps support the school, local orphans and villagers with disabilities.

Kapani Lodge, one-time home of legendary game ranger and eco-pioneer Norman Carr, features luxurious thatch-roofed suites with solid wooden furniture and cool tiles underfoot.