I had always believed the lion was king of the jungle – until I travelled to Africa and heard stories of the honey badger.

The first was at the Na’ankuse Wildlife Sanctuary in Namibia, a sanctuary that cares for orphaned, injured and human-habituated animals and returns them to the wild when possible. A member of our tour remarked on a gravestone that was on site.

“Oh, that’s Meatballs,” was the reply.

We were told that Meatballs was a male lion who had once called the sanctuary home, until the day a honey badger came along and took a bite at his, well, balls, and the lion bled to death. Hence his posthumous name.

Now I couldn’t tell if this was true or if my leg was being pulled. But I was learning there can be a morbid side to the African sense of humour – at least in Namibia and Botswana, where I was travelling through – especially relating to wildlife encounters. Maybe because they live side by side with the wild, and the danger it brings, that a good dose of humour is needed.

Another example of this was when a guide on our Botswana to Victoria Falls tour told us a story about a person who had unknowingly crossed an elephant corridor at night. The punchline: “in the morning, all they found was his boots! Ha ha!”

Ha ha – wait, what?

When we told him about the Meatballs story, he said it sounded right. Honey badgers – they look like a kind of weasel-like badger – are known for their aggressiveness. He had his own story of when he was camping outdoors with a friend and woke up face-to-furry-face with a honey badger on top of him. He said he blew puffs of air into its face as a defense mechanism to confuse it, before his friend scared it off.

Little did we know, our own honey badger encounter was almost upon us.

On one night of our tour, we stayed at Elephant Sands in Botswana, a lodge and campsite featuring safari tents, a restaurant, bar and pool – all surrounding a natural waterhole frequented by elephants within the private conservancy.

It was after dinner and night had fallen. A group of us were sitting around the firepit – which was positioned behind a low wall and a barrier of pointed rocks, to avoid any too-close encounters – watching an elephant drink at the watering hole. It was quiet. The only sounds came from the distant rippling of water, the occasional hiss of the fire.

It was so quiet we didn’t hear an elephant approaching the watering hole until it walked by right in front of us, only about ten metres away. A hush of excitement swept around the group, like an invisible Mexican wave. It was that special moment of connection you feel when you have just witnessed something awe-inspiring in nature, and shared the experience with a group of strangers.

It was an almost sacred experience – very different to ten minutes later, when we had gotten up to go to bed, and heard a commotion by the restaurant.

“It’s a honey badger,” said our tour guide, peeking out from his position behind a pole.

We saw the small mammal scurrying around near the pathway that led to the restaurant, but it soon headed off towards the watering hole, and we watched the creature we had heard so much about disappear into the darkness.

We retreated to our safari tent after that, using torches to follow the path circling the waterhole. But the night wasn’t over just yet.

Our safari tent – also surrounded by an arrangement of pointed rocks to make sure elephants couldn’t come too close – was elevated on stilts, and the bathroom section at the back had a floor of timber slats with gaps between them, so I could easily hear everything outside. I was brushing my teeth when I heard a loud noise that came from right by the tent – an elephant, making not a trumpeting sound, but a low, deep rumble that had me shaking in my PJs.

It seems the king of the jungle can take many forms.

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