IAN IS ODDLY quiet this morning. Joining us for breakfast, he proffers a cursory greeting but then seems to brood. Maybe it is because the stove ran out of gas and his tea is cold. My breakfast is equally disappointing; it is whatever I had thought to bring when I left Nairobi: several cans of tuna fish, Snickers bars, some processed cheese, instant coffee. I had forgotten about breakfast. Ian offers his supply of Weetabix, a sort of shredded wheat, and UHT milk.
“I won’t be needing them. I’ll be gone in a couple of hours.”
Andrew looks up and over at the security man at the far end of the table. Ian seems more diminutive in this light.
“You just make that decision?” Andrew asks. The sharp tone leaves no doubt about his feelings.
“I’ve been here five weeks, gentlemen. I am scheduled for leave. Time to go.”
That is all he will say. No reference to last night’s discussion, no desire to keep talking. Perhaps his candor then was whiskey talk. Although he didn’t seem the sort who would say something drunk that he would not say sober: He showed us his memos to the front office suggesting evacuation; he revealed his cynical take on our mission. So I can’t help but also feel a little resentful, as if we are being deserted, left to the wolves. It shouldn’t matter to us whether he stays or goes. But we are surprised, disappointed, and, more than that, almost betrayed; why didn’t he tell us last night when he was being so honest?
He doesn’t owe us. He is the security man for southern Somalia, with a burden of responsibility I would hope never to have. He has a few more things to worry about than the ruffled feathers of the two new birds in the coop. Still, we can’t afford him the opportunity of denying us our place in this strange dream. It now will be just Andrew and myself, and that is disconcerting, for we are without the experience that might help put this insanity into perspective.
Bravo Delta radios us that as a result of meetings all night long with General Morgan and the sultan, the troops will be withdrawn by noon and we can proceed as planned.
Later, when we arrive at Unicef, only a few of our rifle-toting blue pajamas are guarding the gate, and they are sitting in the shade of an old mango tree nearby. No angry crowds, no shrieking women. A half dozen little boys in threadbare clothes throw rocks at a whimpering piebald mutt, bone thin and stupid, which despite the stoning tries to return to their arrant friendship.
Inside the headquarters, there are faces I have not yet seen—European, Somali, and darker sub-Saharan members of this humanitarian effort. Joel is the French-speaking Belgian, a container-ship captain who is currently running the port. He will be leaving within a day or two, and while I set up the delivery base, I am also to take over the port until he returns. Mwalimo, the Tanzanian procurement officer, is keeper of the keys—that is, he fuels us, feeds us, and, I am told, if necessary will kit us out with peacekeeper combat helmets. There are a number of random Somalis: drivers, cleaners, secretaries, and cooks who keep the compound running. Despite being held hostage, surrounded by Technicals and heavy weapons and probably kept awake all night, none of the “internationals” seems the worse for wear. No signs of exhaustion, no short tempers: These people are going about their jobs as if it is just another ordinary day at the office.
I sign my life away for some bottles of drinking water from the kitchen, the cost of which I am told will be deducted from my paycheck.
Andrew and I take our places inside the Land Rover for the trip to the airport to pick up the boat. The unspoken rule is that we are always to be sandwiched between loaded guns. Never, it seems, will it be possible to grab a cooling window seat. The car doesn’t move more than a few meters inside the fortress before it is stopped at the steel doors and we are told that the compound once again is surrounded by troops and Technicals whose heavy guns are aimed at the gate. The militia has orders not to let us in or out. The agreement has collapsed.
The ruckus on the other side of the wall is clearly audible; it is unclear who is doing all the shouting—I suspect the militia and the locals are yelling at our guards. And for what purpose? Demanding to let them in to kill us? Perhaps it was one such incident in another era that decorated the inside building with bullets. Despite the garbled angry sounds of whatever is going on out there, it remains peaceful inside. No gunfire yet. Gunfire appears to be the standard to gauge the tension. While there always seems to be shooting, day and night, distant gunfire, at least, no longer seems to make much noise.
Outside the car, Harun, our young driver, leans against his door, chewing a stick of mswaki, a twig from the toothbrush bush. Western-style toothbrushes and toothpaste are not found here, and this is the traditional way of keeping teeth clean. It is very effective.
“You captain of port?” he asks.
“For a while. You my driver?”
“Shua, I am your driver now, Captain.” Harun’s smile is unaffected and cheerful.
“Sure?” I am not quite certain I got the word right.
“Shua, Captain.”
Harun shakes my hand in the East African tradition: the palm, then the thumb, then the palm; it is far more expressive than our Western handshake. Introductions made, I realize that I need to learn some Somali if I am going to be working with these people, and the first phrase is “good morning.” “Subah wanaqsan,” he offers. I try to repeat it and make a mess of it. He and his militia mates, with their assault rifles slung over their shoulders, find my efforts hilarious.
Harun wears a tattered New York Yankees baseball cap back to front and a frayed pair of Reeboks; his slightly pocked face is unshaven, his eyes are clear, and he is quick to smile. There is something personable about him, something immediately sympathetic—and very individual. Appearing more solid than the others, he wears a thoughtful self-assurance. I take an instant liking to the man.
I return to the lounge upstairs. It is the kind of place that you might expect of a headquarters in a no-man’s-land: cracked windows that front onto the dusty parking area below, walls of different colors crumbly from the dry heat, collapsible rusting chairs and unsteady tables, cushions eaten by moths and silverfish. The place is well used and well ignored and a fitting statement of our eternally temporary existence.
A Time magazine and a Nation, the Kenyan English-language newspaper brought in on a recent rotation, offer some reassuring link, however tenuous, to the Outside. There are a few paperbacks on a shelf: forgettable dime novels and one curious volume, water-stained and faded: Canto XVI, The Divine Comedy, Hell by Dante, published in 1949. It doesn’t appear that anyone is reading it, so I slip it into my pocket in case I get bored.
In a corner near the kitchen, an old Somali dressed in a white apron sits before a small color television and video recorder, angled intently toward the screen like a frail tree in a blow. So close is his face to the television that reflections from the tube dance on his dark skin. Before him on the screen, a man in a dark suit, clutching a name card and microphone, paces in front of a studio audience, the soothing voice of reason. The camera switches to two jowly women who overflow their stick-back chairs. They are apparently twin sisters. Between them, a scrawny guy with earrings in his nose looks worriedly from one to the other. One woman barks: “You couldn’t get it up with me, so why do you (bleep) think you’re going to be able to (bleep) her?” The audience cheers. The Somali, who I imagine commands no more than a few basic English words, giggles quietly.
In the conference room below, Brian, Ian, and Jeri negotiate for our release with the sultan, General Morgan, and his aide-decamp Major Yeh Yeh, a reed of a man with a sharp goatee and a red-checkered kaffiyeh atop his head. Yeh Yeh is the appointed “protector” of the UN contingent.
Was it like this during the early days of the Iranian hostage crisis? Was this the way it began and the way it felt for those trapped inside? There is one significant difference: Then the world was watching and waiting. There had been a certain amount of posturing for the cameras, and the media milked the situation for every entertaining drop of blood. Now in Somalia, the media world doesn’t know we are out here. There is no geopolitical agenda here in this run-down land, no reason why anyone should care. Certainly these events are not important to a nation’s pride or ego. To our advantage, however, being away from the public eye permits men to negotiate on a one-to-one level as human beings without seeking the approbation, the huzzah of a public that has become so involved through instant news reports. Egos remain localized, and while it appears that offended Somali pride can result in instant death, the natural relationship between human beings of conflicting cultures is based on a grudging respect. Ironically, in this unknown little place on the planet where the value of life is measured in camels, the foundation of reason is still the prevailing modus vivendi.
Last night’s discussion still sticks in my craw. We do not belong to any one nation, we are neutral, internationals without specific identification; we are with the UN, a monster of an organization with offices flung over the globe, of varying missions, nationalities, empires, large and small. We are the people on the ground, in the field, moved, shifted, arranged according to the needs of those we must help and according to the needs of the slaves to their own measures of importance, those builders of empire. Does anyone care what happens out here? I would like to think it is because no one has been told and so no one knows. I heard that the executive director of the WFP, Catherine Bertini, had made an inspection trip to some secure village on the river a few days ago. I am told she saw what she wanted to see, patted a few children on the head, clucked at the apparent misery, and that evening, back at some embassy function in Nairobi, the discussion probably turned to another humanitarian crisis, another humanitarian opportunity. Security for those in the field is apparently not much of an issue, and I am beginning to think that nobody takes much interest unless one of us is shipped out in a body bag. A murdered relief worker does not warrant the same attention that a well-armed soldier gets when killed fighting for some nation’s military and political policies—and declared a hero. There are the others also not worth the attention: a pregnant woman and a schoolkid. We are dickering over the number of camels.
Brian and Ian return from the meeting with the Somali leaders, and I can tell by their long faces that the discussions did not go well. The seven internationals are called quietly together in the lounge. The local staff and our Somali overseer Major Yeh Yeh, who I am told are usually involved in staff meetings, are excluded. Brian wants to discuss our evacuation.
The airport as an escape route is out of the question. We could never run the gauntlet, the roadblocks and checkpoints. Ian reminds us of the time he was shot at on the way to the airfield. I suggest that if I can get one of the boats operational, we could escape by sea. That presumes I can get them delivered to the seaport—thus far a nonstarter. Brian wryly suggests we find ourselves some fishing rods.
Last night in bed, staring up at the noise of the revolving fan, listening to the tree frogs, the hyenas, and the occasional gunfire, I had rehashed the conversation with Ian and found myself planning my exit. If escape from a city were necessary, I would be the first one trampled by the masses. Out here, close to the sea, I know I can survive if I rely only upon my own wits. I don’t know if I’m being selfish or cowardly, but I am beginning to think that soon—minutes, hours, days—it will be every man for himself.
“You come up with a plan, then,” Bravo Delta says. It is not a suggestion, it is an order.
Two and a half hours later, word is sent into the compound that we may go about our business. Where this word comes from is anybody’s guess. There were no further negotiations for our release.
Andrew and I hop into the car and are cheerfully waved out of the compound. There are no militia, no Technicals, no one other than the normal few locals looking for jobs or handouts. The stone-throwing boys are gone, and the dog lies asleep in the shade of the fortress walls.
At the airport, a flatbed truck is parked next to the boat, engine running. The boat keys left in the ignition by Mario when it was loaded onto the plane (“We can leave them in. What could happen between here and Kismayo?”) have been stolen. I should have insisted on keeping the keys since the boat was ultimately my responsibility. It is going to be a pain in the ass to hot-wire the theft-proof ignition. God help us if the boat is needed at a moment’s notice. I do have a key to the lazaret in the bow, but the door has been forced open: The medicine chest, including the painkillers and, most important, the chloroquine for malaria, has been looted.
The colonel in charge of airport security arranges for the boat to be loaded on the truck, and it is done with remarkable efficiency. The truck and gun-mounted Technicals leading and taking up the rear form the convoy to the port. In a feeble attempt to hide the hideous-looking boat from the idle masses in the city as we motor past, I have strapped a gray plastic tarpaulin tightly around it. The tarp is emblazoned with a large logo of Uncle Sam’s clasping hands and Gift of the People of the United States of America. I wonder if I am not making a mistake by parading the Stars and Stripes. Is this symbol of American aid so common that they no longer see it? Or is it a red flag that triggers an instant response of resentment and hostility? It wasn’t so long ago that Somalis dragged the corpses of American soldiers through the streets of Mogadishu, members of the peacekeeping mission assigned to protect UN food deliveries. As this symbol of American generosity is unintentionally displayed, will they assume that we relief workers with a neutral UN are an extension of American foreign policy or that we work for the U.S.?
For all my efforts and concern, the armed militia boys riding shotgun on the boat take off the tarp shortly after we leave the airport and stand proudly for all their people to see. One young rifleman, gun on his hip, his leg cocked on the boat’s swim ladder, stands like a dashing frontiersman in a Frederic Remington painting, a proud young hunter over the carcass of his dead buffalo. Briefly in their lives, this fancy Western boat is theirs and they flaunt it.
A causeway leads to the harbor and the wharfs, warehouses, and the port’s administrative headquarters. The harbormaster’s office is little more than a bomb-and shell-ravaged two-story cement building. Shadowy figures inside stand before the dark window cavities and stare out at the convoy. A helicopter landing area, the departure point for the fleeing UNOSOM peacekeepers a few years back, is painted in front of the building, an X within a circle on the pier.
A barnacle-encrusted fishing float rides the slight swells beside the wharf. It marks the graves of two Soviet-built warships, frigates sunk during some battle for Kismayo years before. These vessels, visible through the clear water, rest on their sides, their missile tubes and guns pointed toward the surface in constant state of battle. Brightly colored tropical fish dart in and out of the portholes.
A small group of women in colorful chadors huddle around a clay charcoal brazier in the shade of the port office building. It is impossible to know the beauty or the age of these women, for only their dark eyes sparkle through the opening in their veils, the only part of their bodies open to the public. A fire-blackened earthenware jug with a long neck nestles amid the white-ash coals.
A row of boxy warehouses stand like Monopoly properties at the far end of the wharf toward the entrance to the harbor. Scrawled on the face of one wall in English:
THE GUN IS NOT A TOOL OF UNITY
SUBCLANS ARE NOT THE PATH TO NATIONHOOD
The other boat that had been in the UN lot has been delivered, and it rests on a flatbed in front of a warehouse.
We pull up to the harbormaster’s headquarters. Part of its front wall is missing. This nearly empty building has no electricity or running water, and I am to discover later that the building’s one toilet is just a hole hammered through the concrete foundation into the earth and overfilled with excreta.
Ali, the port manager, has his office on the top floor, and it looks down on the harbor and our truck below. He oversees the infrequent ship traffic in what once was a vibrant commercial port. He has offered to help me arrange the off-loading of the boats and set up a logistics base for the river deliveries.
In this land of crossed communication, misunderstandings, slights, and insults, Ali, blessed with a quiet sense of his own dignity, offers an open and trusting hand. Over cha, syrupy-sweet Somali tea, he reminisces. “We once had a very beautiful port. That was when we had a government. It was a very beautiful place. Very busy.
“One day there will be no more war. No more killings. One day a government will come. Someday.”
Down on the wharf, the delivery of the two boats has caused quite a stir among a large crowd of expectant laborers. They press in on the craft, partly out of curiosity, partly, I discover, to be first chosen for the work of off-loading. It is a ragtag bunch, poorly clothed, teeth stained from miraa. Many are holding hands, not unusual in this part of the Arabic world. They are not hostile, these people of long narrow faces, high cheekbones, small mouths, small eyes, and strong Roman noses—handsome people. They look up at me with expressions of hope that they will get a job.
I feel honored, thrilled to be with these men, to work among them. My excitement easily overrides any discomfort I could feel. I look at them not consciously superior, just comfortably different. I wonder if this isn’t what a missionary might have felt a hundred years ago faced with unknown challenges. At this moment, oddly, I feel less fearful than when I am in town.
“Subah wanaqsan! Subah wanaqsan,” I say to anyone interested. I use up the only Somali I know. The men laugh, return the phrase, some even translate in barely decipherable English: “Good morning!” The ice is broken. I appear to relax. They appear to relax.
“Ali, I will need at least ten men per boat to slide them off the trailers and into the warehouse,” I say as I climb onto a flatbed.
There are about a hundred or so eager faces, and they look to me for selection. From above, I expect to select the men. There are problems. Many more men than are required are looking for work, and there is some tension. I point at one, then another. Immediately, the selection process falters as the arguments begin. The port guards, identifiable not by any uniform but by their loaded guns, stand off to the side and watch the longshoremen squabble among themselves. Voices are becoming louder, more strident. One man shoves another. Angry jabs of fingers and furious faces. A punch is thrown, a face is bloodied. Someone is kicked, a wet sound as another fist connects.
Ali sees that I have lost control of the situation and asks my permission to choose. Ignoring the simmering violence, Ali selects this one and that one without obvious favor. Those chosen whoop in delight. I can’t help but wonder at the criteria for selection, possibly membership in his own subclan. Thirty, ten more than necessary, are given the jobs. The winners laugh, joke; those rejected skulk off to the side, raise their fists, and threaten revenge.
Inch by inch the men slide the heavy boats off the flatbeds. I wedge myself between sweaty Somalis and, with some authority, repeat their cadence: “KOH, LABA, SADER, HOEK!”—One, two, three, STRONG!
The men opposite and next to me grin broadly as we slowly ease these half-ton rockets off the trailers and into the warehouse. We applaud one another’s achievement. “Ficaan, ficaan.” Good, good.
A feeling of fellowship shared briefly with these strange people, my first contact with Somalis not on the UN payroll and not members of the militia. They are laughing with me and at me and at my silly attempts to learn their language, and they seem to enjoy sharing a bit of sweat and a bit of success, however small. I delight in their easy laughter; it is open and honest, and when these guys finally laugh, it feels sincere and spontaneous and without reservation, an indication perhaps of their exhaustion from the state of continual war. I congratulate them for moving these heavy boats, and they cheer. It is evident they are just as ready to laugh as they are to fight. After the recent tensions, I laugh hard and enjoy these moments of levity. Just as desperately.
Joel, the Belgian, joins me in the warehouse to help commission the boats. I had borrowed some tools from Joe Suits, the loadmaster of the C-130, and combined with Joel’s personal set, we are able to get one of the boats nearly ready to launch. A small crate from Nairobi in the corner of the warehouse contains some of the essentials: outboard oil, two liters of hydraulic fluid, jerry cans, and a tangle of thin plastic rope, which I suppose is to be used for anchoring. There are no anchors. Digging through the box, I can’t resist a feeling of resentment toward Matt Wolff for sending me out here so poorly equipped.
Despite stern warnings from far away, we rip out the extra seat and the console. We strip off the silly cartoon faces plastered to the hulls. Looking-glass mad the UN may be, but out here the reality is other. I do leave the manufacturer’s name on the side; maybe they will get another contract after the cameras focus on the boats.
Outside the open warehouse doors, the clamant bickering continues. Small groups of men fight among themselves. The guards try to separate the combatants. Older men stroke the goateed chins of the angriest; a traditional soothing gesture or a provocative one? It seems a very long time to keep up such anger, to still argue about who should have been hired. The conflict seems to have evolved into a greater feud. Suddenly, a gunshot. I jump nearly out of my skin. My nerves are already frayed from the sound of too many guns, too many threats. A sudden noise now takes on a new meaning. It doesn’t help that the report of the gunshot is amplified tenfold in the nearly empty metal warehouse. My ears ring in the silence. I have ducked behind one of the boats. Joel is crouched next to me.
I look around for death. I am alive. Everyone seems to be alive. Outside, one of the guards, the stock of his Kalashnikov jammed onto his hip, finger still on the trigger, has fired into the air. The surrounding crowd of angry men simply stares at the man and his gun. Like crickets after a summer storm, the babble of angry voices begins tentatively, then rises in crescendo without restraint.
Another guard snaps his bayonet onto his rifle barrel and jabs it at the mob. At the outer edge of the pack, a youngster no older than thirteen or fourteen kicks an old man leaning on his walking cane squarely in the middle of the back, sending him sprawling onto the cement. I can’t imagine why.
“Quick, you must leave here,” Ali says, taking me by the hand. “Please, you call on your radio, the UN to take you away. You must not stay here. There will be trouble.”
Couldn’t we go to the other side of the port out of harm’s way and wait until things cooled down? With my thoughts on escape, I know I must get one of these boats ready to go today. He agrees, but he is not happy with my request.
“Yes, all right. But now you must go or you may be killed.”
We have to walk out of the warehouse and through this angry crowd. There is blood on some of the faces. A guard presses his bayonet tip against the chest of one of the men, waiting, it seems, for him merely to breathe hard. There appear to be two factions of armed men; each points guns at the other. Grudgingly, they slowly move aside as we walk past. Our backs to them, there is now only a resentful silence, and that is even more frightening. My legs, weak and shaking, have a will of their own.
Escorted by two armed militiamen, I look for a place to run when the bullets start to fly. There is a shipping container nearby, but I don’t think we can get behind it fast enough. Behind us, the low rumble of anger increases like a slow-approaching train.
A few minutes later, Joel and I sit quietly on the riprap of the breakwater behind the warehouse area. A school of multihued wrasse swims lazily among the rocks at our feet. Across the bay, a heavy shower dumps rain on the low hills where the airport should be. Here the sun blazes without obstruction.
We discuss our escape plan. His idea is to take one of the two boats and speed out to the shipping lanes.
“There is a ship to and from Mombasa every six hours,” he says in a thick Belgian Walloon accent. It is a clever idea, but it is doubtful that a tiny boat bobbing in the ocean swells could be spotted by a passing ship. Or, if found, that any ship would stop to pick us up. The officer on the bridge would assume that anyone approaching his ship on boats like these were pirates preparing to attack. Additionally, only a few of our radios are equipped with any of the marine frequencies.
My own suggestion is to load fuel and water onto whichever boat is properly commissioned and attempt the 147-mile trip down the coast to Lamu, Kenya, where there are resorts and cold beers and relative peace. Joel doesn’t think the small boats would survive the voyage. Privately, I agree, but that won’t stop me.
Later, back at the warehouse, there is no indication of the fighting of a couple hours earlier. Most of the combatants sit in the shade of the warehouse, chewing miraa.
Spurred by the recent violence, I load the forward lazaret of each boat with plastic bottles of water and ten emergency food packs, certain now that I’m doing something to save lives, even if they are our own.
A Unicef guard in blue pajamas rushes up and in broken English explains that I am wanted urgently in the port manager’s office.
Sweaty and grimy, wearing an oil-stained sleeveless T-shirt, and looking more like those I work with than a UN supervisor, I climb the circular stairs to Ali’s office two at a time.
Ian and a new international sit in hardback chairs in silence at one end of a long table. Opposite, some puffed-up Somali officials I have never seen before sit staring straight ahead like Easter Island stones. Apparently, I’ve kept them waiting.
The man at Ian’s side is unexpected and a mystery. Broad shoulders, craggy handsome face, and short white hair, he sits patiently without expression among these dusky Somalis, one hand clasped atop the other in the pose of a preacher at the Eucharist. Dressed in a long-sleeve blue shirt and jeans, he can’t hide that he was born in a soldier’s uniform. I watch him observe me as if I were something unidentifiable his bird dog once rolled around in.
“Captain,” Ali says with a wink, “we are glad you can join us.” He, at least, is enjoying himself. I flip a brief salute. One of the corpulent port officials laughs. The new international at Ian’s side looks shocked.
After introductions and some compliments by Ali, I’m told I have a serious problem. The port guards, he informs me—as if I were the boss—are demanding payment for providing security for my boats and me. I say nothing. Considering the tensions earlier, I hope they pay them anything they want. Ali is assuring me that, of course, in Somalia there is always a solution.
They are talking to the wrong man. I deflect the problem/solution to Ian. Ian, expecting to be on the next rotation to Nairobi, passes the problem/solution on to his apparent replacement, who fields it deftly with the logic of the day with which all such issues are handled.
“Security is arranged through General Morgan,” the new man says. There is a hint of a drawl in these first words. His tone is deep and commanding and his words are slow and measured. His cool gray eyes scan those at the table, apparently measuring his audience. He unclasps his hands and jams them into his pockets and leans back. There is time enough to note that on his right hand there is only a stump where his thumb should be. I wonder. Had he been covering his hand to hide it?
“Unicef pays the general, and we understand that he takes care of the port. Our security here and at the airport is his responsibility and I would suggest that he is the one you should talk to.”
But the port officials appear mollified when the new security man agrees that we will pay for additional security once the small boat jetty is completed and my little go-fasts are permanently in the water.
Outside, Chet Sloane, a former U.S. Special Forces colonel, offers a reluctant hand. Juliet Bravo, meet the new Sierra Sierra, the top gun, the head of UN Security/Somalia. What a job that must be. Head of security for a nation ripped apart by civil war. Something foolishly contradictory here. Like putting out a forest fire by pissing on it.
Sloane is a stern, aging bull from New Orleans, a security consultant during the Somali fiasco in ’93–’94 who at one time operated a “security” (read “mercenary”) business with assignments in various parts of Africa. He is a soldier of fortune kind of man. He will bunk with us at the UNHCR quarters. It should be interesting.
At the evening staff meeting, the new Sierra Sierra gets updated by Brian on our current security situation. I suspect that is the reason for his posting—to determine if Ian’s assessment is accurate. Or whether his colleague was buckling under stress and just needed a well-deserved break.
The elders of each subclan, Bravo Delta reports, are satisfied that the two guards guilty of the shooting are under protective arrest; still, the sultan, on behalf of the families, is demanding one hundred fifty-six camels in total for both the dead woman and for the boy, whose brains, we are told, are permanently scrambled.
“We are balancing on the head of a pencil here,” Brian says. “It’s all right now, but in ten minutes it could go to shit. If the Hercules is at the airport and if some of us are out there—like Andrew and anyone else—well, that will take care of one or two. But that won’t help the rest of us. If we’re not at the airport when we have to leave, then we will never get out.”
His thinking is that I should have a vehicle ready at all times and spend most of my waking days at the port. The urgency to get the boats ready for the water is not to save some lives upriver but to have them available when we need to flee. When we are radioed the evacuation order, I am to take one of the boats to a designated spot on a beach and collect the remaining staff. It saves them risking their lives trying to run the roadblocks that are between them and the obvious exits of escape, the airport and seaport.
“When will you have the boats ready to go upriver?” Chet asks.
“One of them possibly tomorrow. By the way, I have no charts of the area, not of the harbor or the river entrance. We have any?”
Brian snorts, shakes his head.
“No charts? You got any equipment?” Sierra Sierra asks.
“Equipment? What equipment?” I respond. I had sent with Ian a note to Matt and Saskia requesting tools, more outboard oil, hydraulic fluid, a high-frequency radio for each boat, replacement painkillers and malaria medicine. If I am going to be running around some Somali river, possibly alone where they are shooting at one another, then I sure in hell am not going without the gear. “The rope that I do have is a plastic clothesline that wouldn’t hold a wet T-shirt, and there’s not much of that. I have no long-range radios, so once out of sight my boat drivers will be on their own with no communication. There are no anchors, but I can use cement blocks. The only tools are those that I borrowed from one of the crew of the Hercules. We have been promised satellite navigation sets, but I suspect they’re still in some bonded warehouse in Kenya.”
“What the hell do you need GPS for?” Brian asks. “You’ll know where you are, where you’re going—doesn’t take a genius to follow a river.”
Before I begin to take affront at Brian’s question, Chet explains: “He needs them. It is not to keep the drivers from getting lost but to call their location to a helicopter in case they run into trouble. Don’t worry, son, I won’t permit you to go upriver without a full set of comms and navigation equipment. You can use my set until yours arrives. You are the one who needs it.” He opens a briefcase and hands me a small handheld GPS.
“We may have our problems here,” Chet says, “but you could just walk smack into it when you begin your delivery runs on the Jubba. They have been known to shoot across the river at one another.”
“The river I’m going to be on?”
“You got a clan on the east side, another on the west. We’re trying to get some guarantees; we won’t let you go up until we get permission from both sides.”
“I’m going to be some moving target?”
“Why, I sure in hell hope not.”
“We have flak jackets?”
“I’m not sure. Mwalimo?”