Crocodile Hunting Nick, a tourist, accompanies Jack Cox, a crocodile expert, on a night-time crocodile hunt in the

swamps of New Guinea. Jack has assured him that in the swamps it is easier to see crocodiles at night.

The sun disappeared below the horizon as we paddled further into the swamp. Now that we were free of the reeds, I
found the balance of our canoe difficult to maintain. Its sides were high, but its draught was decidedly shallow, and the
slightest movement tended to send the whole vessel lurching dangerously to one side. It wouldn’t have been my craft of
choice for a crocodile hunt, especially without a life-jacket. My thoughts turned to the size of the specimens we might
encounter. ‘It all depends on whether we come across salties or freshies,’ Jack told me. ‘The saltwater crocodile is
massive. A mature male reaches a length of more than three metres, but really big ones can grow to twice that length.’
He was sweeping the beam of his powerful torch across the water in front of him.

It sounded distinctly possible that we’d come across a considerably larger croc than I’d seen in the pen. Hearing Jack
point it out in such a casual manner made my blood run cold. The nightmarish scene was not difficult to imagine: our
monstrous aggressor would gobble us up with a sudden snap of its gigantic jaws and use the boat’s splinters as giant
wooden toothpicks. I asked myself what I was doing on this hair-brained expedition and failed to come up with a
rational explanation. I asked Jack how he could tell the difference between a big crocodile and a small one.

‘Distance between the eyes,’ he murmured without interest. He was obviously concentrating hard on the sweeping
beam in front of him.

We glided along for some time, accompanied by the sound of frogs that resonated like castanets in the distance and
the pneumatic buzzing of mosquitoes and other flying insects. I was being eaten alive and hadn’t been told I’d need
repellent. The dark expanse of open water ahead of us was a floating wilderness of submerged, tangled tree roots,
dotted with reeds and small shrubs sprouting above its surface. Jack continued scanning the murky waterline beneath
the overhanging ferns before deciding to move on. We swept off into the darkness.

A few moments later, Jack resumed his vigil with the torch. ‘There’s one,’ he whispered. I strained to follow the beam
trained on the water, but couldn’t spot a thing. As we moved towards the crocodile, Jack whispered, ‘Lost him, it dived.’
We hung around the area for a while to see if the croc would resurface, but it didn’t, and we moved off again. ‘That’s a
shame because it was a massive one,’ Jack said. I couldn’t tell whether he was being serious or just trying to scare me,
but either way I wasn’t too unhappy to have missed it. We paddled for some time before Jack made an effort to scare
me again.

I’d been trying to get him to admit that what we were doing was dangerous. He denied it, but then he confessed that
there was one situation that could be construed as risky. ‘If we come across a daddy croc, he might mistake our canoe
for competition. The underside of a canoe looks fairly similar to another crocodile and if our croc felt like attacking, he’d
have this boat over with one whip of his tail.’ I closed my eyes and shook my head, in the vain hope that this whole
expedition would turn out to be a bad dream. But shaking my head was not a good idea, because it started the canoe
rocking dangerously.
I drew a deep breath: ‘OK Jack, if that did happen, and we ended up in the water, what should I do?’ Jack paused. ‘Well,’
he said, ‘don’t splash about because that will get him excited. Dive underwater and swim away. Crocs rarely bite
underwater and he’s unlikely to follow you.’ I had noted that he’d said crocs rarely bite under water and that it was
unlikely to follow me, but I didn’t pursue these points as the entire scenario was too horrible to imagine.

I fell quiet, leaving Jack to continue scanning the water for swamp monsters while I digested this information. The whole
escapade had been preposterous. If you choose to venture into a remote swamp in search of crocodiles, you might
reasonably opt to do so with more equipment than a torch, a broom and a ball of twine. A gun might be handy for a
start, and preferably a nippy boat with a large engine enabling a fast getaway.

TASK: Re-read the descriptions of:

(a) Nick’s fear of crocodiles in paragraph 3, beginning ‘It sounded distinctly possible…’

(b) The swamp in paragraph 5, beginning ‘We glided along for some time…’ Select 3 powerful words or phrases from
each paragraph. Your choices should include imagery. Explain how each word or phrase selected is used effectively in
the context. Write about 200 to 300 words. Up to 15 marks are available for the content of your answer.

HINT:

MENTION THE OVERALL EFFECT OF EACH PARAGRAPH FIRST.

THEN SELECT 3 WORDS OR PHRASES THAT LINK THE MEANING TO THAT OF THE OVERALL EFFECT.

AFTER SELECTING THE 3 PHRASES OF WORDS, EXPLAIN FIRST THE DIRECT MEANING AND THEN THE INDIRECT MEANING.

In paragraph 3, the writer expresses his trepidation and anxiety of the dreadful thought
of encountering a hungry or hostile crocodile. We can comprehend that the writer is
filled with uneventful thoughts, fear and regret as to why he ever signed up for this in
the first place from the use of certain powerful words and phrases. The writer uses the
hyperbole ‘made my blood run cold’ which tells us that he was deeply terrified and
uneasy at the thought of encountering a massive crocodile. The phrase produces a state
of alert and accentuates the dangerous environment around. It is effective in arising a
sense of fear within audience and convey the writer’s emotions. The belligerent
metaphor ‘monstrous aggressor’ implies that the writer thought of crocodiles
formidable, malice and violent animals by comparing them to monsters. The phrase
once again highlights the writer’s fear. It also suggests how the writer was not quite
excited to encounter a crocodile as the thought of having to fight the aggressive
creature. The metaphor is effective in portraying crocodiles as possible antagonists
given the writer’s negative thoughts regarding them, it also adds to the gloomy and
risky environment. The writer uses then uses the phrase ‘ hair brained expedition’
implying the expedition to be illogical and irrational. We can also decipher that the
writer no longer wanted had the desire to continue. Although it also suggests that
writer knew something terrible might result from this. The phrase is effective in putting
fourth the writer’s regret and concern.

In paragraph 5, the writer describes the gloomy and irritating environment of the
swamps, buzzing with insects in the darkness as they advanced further. The simile ‘
frogs resonated like castanets’ compares sound of frogs to the clatters of castanets. This
connotation of a musical instrument highlights that was the only sound resembling
music in the otherwise quite and dull environment. The writer then uses the hyperbole ‘
I was being eaten alive’ to covey his annoyance upon the hovering mosquitoes
constantly biting him. It also portrays the mosquitoes as predators feasting upon their
prey. The phrase ‘We were sept of into the darkness’ in explicit terms points to the
motion of water carrying them forward. However, through an alternative view we can
decrypt that the water hurling them into the unknown and awaiting danger.