ESCAPE FROM KISMAYO is becoming something of a preoccupation. Although Jeri has been able to get some food to the IDP, and Andrew is putting into some order the shambles of an airport, hard as I might I can’t think of anything else that has been accomplished, that has required my presence here. There is still no word from the warlords for me to begin delivery runs up the coast and into the river. And the dickering continues over the number of camels a dead pregnant woman is worth. The schoolboy is still alive.
During the morning briefing, Chet suggests another reconnoiter for possible pickup sites, this time along the barrier reef on the ocean side.
“But don’t get too close to shore, Juliet Bravo. Stay well out of range.”
“What’s the range of a Kalashnikov?”
“About four hundred yards.”
“Four hundred yards! I was well within that yesterday.”
“Guess you were lucky.”
“Not much chance I can find a proper landing area from that distance.”
“Could be a problem. Well, don’t you worry, if it’s any consolation, these guys are terrible shots.” He chuckles. “Except . . .”
“Except?”
“The gun tends to climb in automatic. That’s when they find their range and could peg you. But I wouldn’t worry; by the tenth round I suppose you’d be almost as far gone as Kenya.”
“Just say the word and I’m hasta la bye bye.”
“So—give it a try?”
“Sure, glad to get out on the boat. You should come along, see what this place looks like from the sea.”
“You can bet on it.”
“Don’t think I’ll do more than one pass. They won’t be expecting me, and by the time they decide to use me for target practice I should be well over the horizon. I am sure not going back for a second look.”
“Understood. Keep your head down. Now,” he continues, including the others, “when—if—evacuation is necessary, I’ll get on the radio and announce that there’s going to be a poker game today. That means we’re pulling the plug. I’ll ask each of you to acknowledge receipt of the message. At the seaport, Juliet Bravo, you’ll be told that the poker game will be at a certain hour. This means that you should take your boat to our predesignated location—you get that worked out on the GPS—and pick up the staff who can’t get to the airport.
“Alpha Kilo, you’ll have to find out what is flying, what’s in the air and nearby. Inform the pilot on your mobile radio—out of earshot of your militia guards—that we need an emergency pickup. Have the plane taxi up to your location, engines running—turn, load, and fly.”
“Won’t fool the militia,” Andrew says quietly. “They’ll see us board and they’ll know we’re getting out. Easy targets.”
“You’ll have to use some discretion. It’s difficult no matter how we cut it. If it looks impossible, then you’ll have to stay with those of us who can’t escape. Any questions?”
There are none. Except that I feel like asking why he addresses us only by our radio call signs, a habit I seem to be falling into. Of course, none of us knows each other very well and perhaps none can afford the luxury of attachment, as tenuous as it is. With the loner in each of us, who has the inclination to get to know each other? Andrew I know, because we share the same quarters. Maybe Brian and Jeri are close. I haven’t seen it. Being so distant out at the port, I am perhaps the least attached, the least connected to the whole operation. When I am with these people, they are either too busy, too stressed, or too exhausted to act very personal. The way things are going, when this is over—years later—I probably will have forgotten their names. I will never, however, forget the faces behind the radio call signs.
“Okay, I realize it is a bit rushed and half-cocked, but it might work,” Sierra Sierra continues. “Let us hope we never have to play that game.”
“Are the boats operational?” Brian asks.
“Ready to go. I’ve rewired both and they are stocked with emergency rations and water. I’ll put extra fuel in them and break in the second engine during the trip up the coast.”
“Good.” Beyond the occasional facial tic of his pursing lips, there is something of a smile. “You know, if I ever get a break, I’ll take you up on that offer. I’d love to get into one of those boats. Haven’t had a day off in weeks.”
“Mi barco, su barco, Brian. My boat is your boat.”
“I could fancy a bit of fishing.”
“I haven’t been out to the reef yet, but from the shore I saw the birds working, bird-feeds everywhere. Means tuna, marlin, sailfish—well, you know all about that. I’ll work up a never-fail lure, try to find some nylon line. Give me a call when the fires are out.”
I hope he does get down to the port. He needs a break.
He and Chet are making another trip to Goob Weyn, and without much conviction he says his contacts assure him that this time they’ll get through. Sierra Sierra doesn’t look too sure. “We should be able to get you security guarantees for the run, hopefully as far up as Hum Hum. Will you be ready to go tomorrow?”
“As ready as I’ll ever be.” My tone is none too enthusiastic; I have a lump in my throat, a bad feeling about this. They shoot across the river at each other. Why couldn’t I have been sent to the “secure” areas upriver like Jamaame or Bardera, where the only worries are about displaced jungle life?
My concern must be evident as I walk to the car.
“Problems, Captain?”
“No problems in Somalia, Harun. Only solutions.”
His laugh is genuine. He opens my door and walks around to his.
“Ah, Captain,” he says behind the wheel, turning to me with a big grin. “Diep maleh, diep maleh—no problem, no problem.” His dark eyes glow. “You Captain Diep Maleh!” He is delighted with himself. My gun-wielding guards, who are taking on personalities of their own and are no longer mere gangsters, take up the call: “Captain Diep Maleh!” They laugh, flashing a thumbs-up sign of approval. Captain No Problem.
* * *
At the port, the second boat is wheeled out of the warehouse and lowered into the water. The bickering among the longshoremen seems less intense, but I do keep an ear out for the metallic sound of the sliding cocking levers of the assault rifles.
I do my high-five with Isa, who, while still reluctant, indulges me and his supportive mates. He helps move the heavy stuff, even volunteers to siphon fuel from the drums to the boat tanks, an unpleasant process that always involves gagging on the gasoline in the siphon hose. He has appointed himself my personal guard, his automatic rifle slung loosely over his shoulder at the ready, his eyes quickly scanning wherever I go. I am supposed to have at least one Unicef guard with me every minute of the day, but some of the blue pajamas appear so unreliable and sleazy that I prefer to walk alone. Isa, it seems, is always there.
Working with these hair-trigger Somalis—the attendant fear and adrenaline rush, the certainty of violence and the possibility of death—is beginning to fulfill some perverse challenge. I am accepting. I wonder if this adaptation to reality might breed complacency.
Curiously, I find myself frequently happy, almost giddy. Is it the buildup of too much shit? Or is it the result of some recondite satisfaction just now revealing itself? There are moments when some minor success—moving a boat, communicating, merely forcing a smile—brings exhilaration, actual happiness. I suppose it is the unwitting comparison with worse times; in danger and misery, I read somewhere, the pendulum swings.
The men I work with are becoming more understandable and a little more predictable. It doesn’t take a genius to learn when not to press a point, when to slink away, when to keep your mouth shut and let someone else do the talking, when to crack a joke or even make like a fool. It is a delicate line easily and mistakenly crossed. I know now that Somalis would rather laugh (but never be laughed at) than pull a trigger. I seem to make them laugh with my crazy antics and my silly appearance. I cannot see myself as they see me when I shake my butt with these men during a high-five. But their reaction to my foolishness is mirror enough, and that is warmly satisfying. I have learned that getting them to laugh at me—the white foreign-aid worker on a mission—seems to level us. It is a damn sight better than a brawl.
So they have come to know me a little, these rifle-toting gunmen with their fascinating brooding faces. I will never get beyond their suspicion, but they have let me in a crack. As violence is their common currency, they do not consider me a threat, because I have shown them I am a poor man.
I sit back against the hard cement wall of the warehouse in the shade of the overhanging tin roof. It is that time of day; the long wall is lined with hot and tired bodies, knees up—it is the midday miraa break.
There is a certain style to chewing miraa. In Aden, shopkeepers huddle over their paper bags of qat behind display cases of feta, pistachio paste, and hummus, ancient tins of Soviet caviar and sardines, and hope no customer will come in during these precious midday hours. Their cheeks bulge like nut-gathering squirrels, and reluctantly they serve customers despite the green slurry that drips down their chins. Chewing miraa here appears more refined. Possibly because of the poverty or because of the basic aristocratic nature of these people, a Somali plucks an individual leaf off the stalk, inspects it reflectively as one might a fine Cuban cigar—and chews it with a private look of satisfaction.
Baseball cap shading my face, eyes half-closed, I detect a movement close by. I look up at a bundle of bright color standing before me.
A girl in a chador of cheerful red, yellow, and green looks down at me without expression. She appears no older than her mid-teens. She holds an infant in her arms, wrapped tightly in a cotton shawl. She doesn’t seem too maternal about her baby. She is holding the child out almost at arm’s length as if she were proffering it as a reward.
I feel lazy, dazed by the heat, the humidity, and the general malaise of the drugged men sitting next to me. I really don’t want to be bothered.
Her round childlike face continues to look down at me, waiting, expecting.
“Harun, what does she want?”
Harun speaks harshly in his indecipherable language. Her eyes tighten angrily. She squats down to my level, her little-girl face suddenly too close to mine. I smell her breath, I smell her sweat, I look into her sharp obsidian eyes, inches from mine, challenging. In one easy motion, she places the baby in my lap, gets to her feet, and lords over me, hands on hips, as if assessing my worthiness.
I stifle an urge to toss the baby as if it were a venomous snake. I remain motionless, suddenly aware of the weight of the child.
He is a few months old. Flies swarm around his plump face and puffy eyes. He smells of a musty, pungent wood-smoke odor. Sweat runs in rivulets down the child’s face; the bundle of swaddling clothes itself is damp. I feel his body heat through the blanket. The baby does not move.
“What do I do with him?”
“It dies, Captain. It is her baby,” meaning, I think, give it back to her, it’s her problem.
The child whimpers quietly. The young mother continues to stand over me, waiting.
Getting to my feet is difficult. She doesn’t take the baby from me, and I have to sling him under one arm and use the other to push myself up off the wall. I try to return the baby. Her hands remain at her sides. She looks directly into my eyes smugly, confidently, without wavering. She turns and walks away.
“Hey, goddamn it! Come back here. Take your baby!” I shout, but she keeps walking. The men sitting against the warehouse laugh quietly. It must be great theater, and for the first time I am beginning to resent them.
I look down at this Somali infant and know that he is now my responsibility. I feel the infant begin to shake uncontrollably.
“Malaria,” Harun says softly at my side.
I radio the Unicef office but no one responds. I suppose they are putting out another fire. What do I do with the one in my arms? The young mother has disappeared. Turned a corner, vanished into the bombed-out port office building, wherever; she is just gone.
“Let’s go, Harun. Médecins sans Frontières Hospital. Let’s do it fast!”
I cradle the baby in my arms as we speed out of the port, down the dusty road toward town, past the barricades.
The child is shivering so violently my body shakes with it. He opens his big black eyes and I think he is trying to smile. He is a beautiful creature, and I can’t help but feel love for this little thing. I take a sweat rag from my back pocket and wipe the child’s rheumy eyes and the sputum from around his mouth and the beads of sweat off his face.
The car slows to a crawl. Ahead, a pair of old swayback donkeys stand side by side in the middle of the road, solid and unconcerned.
“Go around them!”
Harun drives up the roadside hill, grazing a palm tree before swerving back onto the road. I clasp the baby tightly, protectively. Before, this was just a job, a duty. Now it is a mission. I want desperately to get this baby to the hospital; I want desperately for this child to live.
The baby’s fever has abated apparently, for he is no longer shivering, and I relax. I look down at the infant and smile, talk to him softly.
The child’s eyes, heavily lidded, stare back at me. They are glazed and old tears are drying on his cheeks. I wipe his eyes and try to reassure him, soothe him. But now I sense, I suddenly realize, that there is nothing there! A second ago—just a second ago there was life. Now there is nothing, not a living thing, not a soul, not a smile.
A Somali male nurse at the broken-down MSF/Belgium Clinic takes the baby and assures me he “will be taken care of.”
I hand the baby over gently, and with the same reverence he takes the little body in his arms, turns, and walks through the hospital doors. I am left stunned. Emptied.
It is written that a child dies from malaria every thirty seconds in Africa. But why do I have to be part of this child’s death? Is there a purpose? Am I supposed to get some sort of message? Are we merely statistics?
* * *
In the driver’s seat of the boat, I sit under the sun, staring out at the painful brightness of the water. I am unable to hold on to a thought, a feeling, a reason. I still feel life pour out of the child. I almost remember the physical sensation of the flight of life, as if, had I realized it in time, I could have kept existence from leaving the body. I feel so fragile, so tenuous. And disconnected. I am drifting away from myself. I hope I don’t lose it. I’ve got to get back out to sea, clear my head. I need some company.
I invite gentle Ali, the port manager, and Abduah, the crane owner, out for a run around the point, perhaps along the coast. After all, there is a mission, a reason for my life. Abduah carries the G-3 automatic rifle.
I put the boat through its paces. According to Chet’s GPS, we clock forty-seven knots, faster than I have ever been on the water. I need the rush.
What the hell. Ali and Abduah are loving it; it is a vital respite for them. It is vital for me.
So we take the boat outside the barrier reef, eighteen miles up the coast to the mouth of the mysterious Jubba River. There is hardly any wind, but still there are small waves. A small motorboat in the open ocean does not make for a good time; slamming into the foot-high chop is not only dangerous but also hard on the family future. But we are out and away, blessedly free from back there.
The coast, lined with tall stately palms, is stunning. Long, deserted beaches of cream-colored sand, a languid surf, and no signs of people; it may be one of the last unspoiled coastlines on earth.
“No swim,” Ali says, reading my thoughts. “Many, many sharks. Many children die from sharks.”
Yet a mile or so up the coast, a cluster of thick dark paint strokes moves slowly down the beach toward the water. I slow down and steer toward shore and I sense my passengers stiffen; Abduah casually rests his hand on the muzzle of his rifle. With binoculars, I distinguish a dozen or so women in black chadors, laughing, splashing one another, gamboling along the water’s edge, some up to their waists in the sea. Their sense of modesty is impressive and they have my respect. They stop, look up at the approaching speedboat, hurry out of the water, and disappear into the shadows of the trees. I hope I haven’t spoiled their afternoon.
A few miles from the Jubba, the azure blue of the Indian Ocean terminates not gradually but distinctly against a flood of muddy coffee-colored water that fans out seaward as far as the eye can see, as if the country is bleeding itself to death. At the mouth of the river, the torrent is re-creating the coast, spilling over the dunes and cutting the peninsula in half. The flow of the raging river breaks as a crushing wall of white water over a sandbar. This is the mighty stream that is creating such hell inland, and with some awe we watch the torrent empty into the sea.
“Want to go up the river a little way?” I ask them half seriously as we circle in front of the mouth. Thick brush and tall trees line the delta. Beyond, forbidding darkness defines enemy country. “I should try to find a way over the bar.” I do have a job to do, although the breaking surf in the channel looks nearly impassable. I would not attempt it unless it was absolutely necessary.
Their cheerful faces mask over with a look of horror.
“No, not a good idea,” Ali says evenly. “We will be killed. Marehan.”
“You’re sure? Won’t take but a few minutes.” I find myself playing with these guys. Perhaps to push my own uncertainty.
Abduah looks up at me with sudden hostility, then to his rifle.
“Okay. You’re right.” I swing the boat back toward the sea and my passengers relax. I throttle back and enjoy the peace. Ali and Abduah quietly sing. They tell me it is a Somali love song, a tale about a man who loves a woman from another clan.
* * *
The story of the child’s death is met with barely a murmur at the evening staff meeting. In Somalia, nearly a quarter of all children die before their fifth birthday; to everyone but me, it is merely another anonymous death. Their attitude is that—yeah, well, we’ve all been there, welcome to relief work. The event does not warrant any discussion, and their lack of interest seems to lessen my own—what? Confusion? Guilt? In any case, it becomes easier to ignore the feelings that are trying to define themselves. Like everyone else has learned to do.
Andrew reports that mechanics flew in from Nairobi with nuts, bolts, rivets, strips of aluminum, and speed tape. Four hours later, the Hercules made a practice run, and after a touch-and-go, continued on to Nairobi, about six hundred miles away.
Sierra Sierra says their trip to Goob Weyn was uneventful; the bandits at the checkpoint even welcomed them as if nothing had occurred the day before.
“The good news is that the Marehan will authorize your relief run into their territory. Also, General Morgan now says he will ‘consider’ permitting a test run of a delivery upriver.”
“Well, damn me, that is good news.” Sierra Sierra does not miss my sarcasm.
“The Marehan are getting desperate—they need the food. They have rising floodwaters at their backs and Morgan with his artillery in their faces. They are trapped. Morgan is being something of a humanitarian to let us take food to his enemy.”
“Yeah, I heard what a humanitarian he was.” I’m not in a good mood. “How many people did he kill in the bombing of that city up north? Ten, twenty, fifty thousand? And he’s permitting us to take food to his enemy? Something’s fucked here.”
“It is not for us to second-guess the bastard,” he snaps. “We should be grateful he will let us—you—cross the line. It is not certain he will permit the run. I said he would ‘consider’ the deliveries.”
“There has got to be a reason.”
“No doubt. But if he agrees to the deliveries, then we deliver. That’s final.”
“What—Marehan and the Majerteen talk to each other? They call each other and say, you don’t shoot, we don’t shoot? Or is it just you and Brian working this out?”
“There are comms on all sides. Don’t worry. We will insist they stop shooting during the relief runs.”
“I heard we are expendable. . . .” I know I’m pushing it.
Chet looks up sharply, looks at me as if I’m some subordinate noncom. But then he softens, not quite a smile, but more like an admission of truth; who’s shitting whom?
“For whatever it’s worth, the general told us that if he can’t guarantee your safety, you don’t go. And, Juliet Bravo, I won’t let you go if there is any danger. Count on it.
“But to be honest,” he adds, “your personal safety is less important to him than the boat. He’s concerned that if the Marehan get hold of that speedboat of yours he couldn’t touch them. With a gun on the bow, they could control most of southern Somalia and as much of the Jubba as they wanted.”
He has laid bare a thought, a fear I may have been denying. My little blue boats are considered spoils of war and everybody wants one. The driver is just in the way. “So what is to stop Morgan from trying to take the boat?”
Chet grimaces as if I still don’t get it.
“Who is to be my protection—who is riding shotgun with me during the run? The general’s men, or the Marehan boys?”
“Well, we’re working that out. You can see the difficulty.” He hesitates. “You may have to take it up alone.”
“Alone?”
I am beginning to feel this is getting out of hand, that I am mere fodder, a pawn in some larger contest with no game plan. Expendable.
“There is another problem that you should be aware of—and it may stop your run,” Sierra Sierra says. “I’m not at all sure our good general can control his boys when he goes. They may want to prove something to him or to their own subclans.”
“Morgan going? Where?”
“Bossasso, for the ‘unity’ conference with [Hussein Mohammed] Aideed and [Ali] Mahdi.”
“Soon?”
“A couple of days. Or maybe never. You know how it goes. But the last time he left town, he lost control of his forces. Started a clan war.”
I shake my head in dismay.
“Look, Juliet Bravo, if your safety is not absolutely assured, I can guarantee you that as chief of security I won’t let you go. That’s a given. That’s my job.”
If I was worried before, I’m downright nervous now. None of the combat-toughened militia will venture out of their own territory. I am not going without guards or without guarantees. I’m not in the army. I’m a civilian, for God’s sake, a relief worker. I can refuse.
* * *
While Ali, Abduah, and I were puttering up the East African coast checking out Somali bathing beauties, Russ Ulrey, the WFP regional logistics officer in Nairobi, was on a slow boil. The rains were slowly moving southward, and day after day of heavy blinding torrents fell on the Kenyan capital. Like so many others, Russ was sick of it. The problems he was getting from the field did not help his outlook. Following a morning meeting with Matt Wolff, his river operations manager, he had received a report that an Operation Lifeline food-drop zone in Sudan had been bombed by government forces. A Hercules had just dropped sacks of relief supplies near Bahr-el-Ghazal; WFP staff had begun to collect the cargo, and locals were picking up whatever scraps and remains might have spilled when the bags hit the ground. From out of the sun, a lone Soviet-era transport plane swooped low over the drop zone and rolled a single bomb out of its cargo bay. None of his staff was injured, but some Sudanese civilians were killed. Earlier he had received word that one of his relief supply trucks on the road to Lokichoggio in Sudan had been hijacked.
The meeting with Matt had ended some time ago. Never one to lose his temper, this time he came damn close. This kind of crap was exactly what he had hoped just once, just for one crisis, could be avoided; it dragged down relief efforts, turned your hair white from frustration. Yet it was the bureaucracy and it was inevitable.
The UN Country Team (UNCT) report was still on top of other papers where he had tossed it. Compiled by Unicef, it glowingly detailed current relief operations in southern and central Somalia:
As at 11 December, at least 1,695 people are reported to have died (confirmed deaths) from drowning, accidents, reptile attacks, disease and malnutrition. An estimated 230,000 persons have been displaced while the lives of at least one million Somalis remain at risk as they have lost their livestock, harvest and other supplies. . . . On 9 December, UNHCR reported that torrential rains and flooding of the Tana River in northeastern Kenya adversely affected the refugee camps of Ifo, Dhagaxley, and Hagadera, sheltering 123,000 Somali refugees.
The air-fleet presently available in Garissa consists of one Twin Otter, two Buffalo planes, two Mi-8 helicopters, and two Caravans. Kismayo and Bardera . . . are also operating as bases for the operation. On the ground, 21 boats are operational, distributing relief supplies to distant and cut off villages in need. Boats are operating in Bardera, Bualle, Jamam[sic], Sakow, Marere, Belet Weyne and Jowhar. . . . [A]dditional boats in Kismayo are not yet operational. The airdrop operation has now been backed up by two C-130 planes based in—
The innocuous reference to the boats in Kismayo was there for all to see. It did not have to add that the WFP was responsible for the operation of these boats and thus the implied mismanagement was ultimately his. It was hard enough to get the jobs done without a competing agency chortling over the perceived operational failures of his people. Maybe it was because of the dismal weather, but Russ was on a short fuse and he had confronted Matt.
“Explain. Why are those boats in Kismayo not operational?”
“There are some security problems apparently, and I’m having trouble getting the equipment to him. Also the keys to the boats were stolen.”
“Who the hell is out there?”
“A yachtie—older guy—you met him.”
“A yachtie! You mean he doesn’t know how to start an outboard? Jesus, where did you get these guys, Matt?”
“I think he knows what he’s doing. One of the security guys brought me this note from him.” Russ took the message and read:
Matt:
I expect to have at least one and perhaps both boats in the water Monday P.M. and tested ready to go by Tuesday midday. Brian of Unicef will probably have a good idea of operational areas once he gets approval from the subclans upriver. There have been a few problems: The keys to both boats were stolen and I have hot-wired one of them, hoping to get the other done soon. The medicine chests were looted. Thus suggest when next transporting any boats, anything that is not screwed down should be sent separately.
DO NOT send any more boat operators or boats here until cleared with Brian. I think this has caused a problem. There are SERIOUS security problems and we have been in a lockdown off and on since my arrival. Shooting is normal around here. This has delayed launch of our little “fleet.”
Matt, can’t go to sea without the gear. VERY URGENT: Need two-stroke oil and hydraulic fluid (40 liters), first-aid kits and malaria medicine, more Polypro line (at least 60 meters), the GPS handhelds which I understood were in the customs warehouse, and of course HF communication equipment. I am reluctant to go upriver without HF comms.
Please tell Joe Suits, loadmaster of C-130, that I will return his vise grips and Phillips head screwdrivers when I get back to Nairobi.
Last thing. There is no river in Kismayo. It is an 18-mile offshore trip up the coast so unlikely that we can run deliveries from Kismayo.
Burnett
“Good God!” Russ muttered. “No river, no equipment, and what serious security problems?”
“I looked into that. A C-130 was shot at; there was a killing outside the Unicef compound.”
“Didn’t you check if there were problems there?”
“I was told there weren’t any problems. All of our efforts are upriver.”
“We have anyone else in Kismayo?”
“We got someone putting the airport back together, but he’s been attached to Unicef. Burnett is the only one. Kismayo is a Unicef operation.”
“I know it is! And there is no river in Kismayo? Didn’t you know that?”
“Unicef thought it would be a good idea to have the boats there, and suggested that we should try to run up the river from the sea.”
“No doubt.” Russ shook his head, knew that Unicef had hoped to control at least that part of the river operation.
“This UNCT report was written yesterday, December twelve. When did you get Burnett’s message?”
“Only yesterday afternoon. The security man apparently took it home with him when he went on leave. Forgot about it, I guess.”
“My God! I want those boats operational—yesterday!”
The discussion rankled him. He liked Matt. It was not his fault, Russ knew. Wolff had to deal with dozens of drivers and boats and their equipment needs, but if he didn’t know what was going on in the field, then who the hell did? The Brit was a hard worker, honest and sincere and, in most instances, thorough. Maybe, however, the scope of the remit was just too enormous for him to handle.
The telephone interrupted his dull gaze out into the rain-soaked courtyard.
“What! Jesus, I’ll be right there,” he said, reaching for his foul-weather gear.
* * *
Matt had returned to the Somalia WFP office in a fury.
He was at the end of his rope. Always the rules, the procedures, the obstructionists, the ego of those who were trying to control. All he wanted was to get the job done. He had boat drivers in the field and they needed backup, they needed equipment, the gear that would keep them out of harm’s way. Since the operation began it was never “Can-do, how and when do you need it,” instead: “Sorry, can’t do it, not possible, sign the forms, maybe tomorrow, maybe never.”
Matt jumped out of the UN rig, slammed the door, and stormed through the rain into the old settler’s house that was the WFP Somali office. He took a left at the stairs and without knocking burst into the office. The slight, older Ethiopian finance officer looked up and offered an unpleasant patronizing smile.
Before he could speak, Matt leaned across the desk and thrust his face into the stubborn bureaucrat’s. The exact conversation is not known, but Matt’s booming voice was heard throughout the building. Apparently Matt bawled him out for obstructing at every turn his efforts to get equipment out to the boat drivers in the field. The bureaucrat replied that if Matt only followed the procedures, filed requests in triplicate, and got three quotes for the bidding process when outside material or help was needed, then maybe he would get what he wanted.
The shouting match poured out into the hallway, Russ recalled. Matt started shoving the finance man toward his own office, demanding that he sign the requisition slips on his desk for radios, GPS, and a plane to take the equipment out to the field.
“You are just sitting on your ass, doing bugger-all. I will bloody well make you sign these forms so that I can get this stuff out to those guys.” Matt kept pushing the Ethiopian and was apparently close to cold-cocking him when Saskia and other office workers intervened.
When Russ entered the office, the finance minister was on the phone to the police.
* * *
Andrew and I lie on our bunks in the dark. I can envision the slow run against the current between the shooters. I wonder if I will hear the shots over the sound of the outboard.
“I really don’t want to do this.”
“I can’t blame you.”
“I feel like this is getting out of control—like I have no control over my own fate. I always thought I had. I really do not want to go up that fucking river.”
“You can refuse.”
“I wonder. Well, I hope that I don’t have to make the choice. Might not have to go anyway. . . . I’ve been meaning to ask, what brings you out here?” It has the ring of one prison inmate asking another: What are you in for?
“Money, pure and simple. Money.” He laughs quietly. “You can’t make this kind of money trying to start a business in Nairobi.”
“Party business.”
“A what?”
“Blowing up balloons, acting like a clown. I was trying to start a party business. Like they have in London. I suppose in America too. You know, balloons, clowns, party favors—arranging parties.”
I can see him in my mind’s eye lying on his bunk in the dark. I know his eyes are wide open and he, like me, is looking up in the direction of the fan, recalling the more-ordered life that we left so long ago. There are few men we meet who are immediately kindred, but Andrew is one of them. He is young enough to be my son. Yet we seem ageless together. I was him then; he will be me soon enough. He shows the same awe that I once had for life, we share the same indefatigable curiosity about all things, we ask questions, we need to know why and why not. We think along similar lines but we do not think alike. We can communicate easily, and I suppose that is what makes two persons get along. We have the same cynical attitude about this UN relief mission, and although he has some previous experience, he is as surprised as I am by the fast-moving events and the uncertainty of our future here in Kismayo. I would call him a sidekick, to use a rather dated term, but he’s more of a comrade-in-arms and a friend.
“Nairobi is a party town, you know,” he says after a while.
“I hadn’t heard. I saw a riot the day I was there. I heard people call the place Nai-robbery.”
He laughs freely. “Not far from the truth. Nairobi didn’t have a party business, so I was trying to put it together. But it was difficult. The people here are the last to come around.”
“The white Kenyans?”
“Certainly the white Kenyans. Fifth-generation Rule Britannia, still mired in the colonial days. Some are no more worldly than Welsh coal miners—some have never left Kenya. Never want to. I should have realized that just because something works in England doesn’t mean it will work in Africa.”
It is quiet. There is only the soft whir of the fan over the report of a single gunshot.
“The rich black Africans first look at how the Europeans do it, whether it is accepted by the Europeans, before doing anything on their own. They are really our market. And they do like to party.”
“So why aren’t you back partying?”
“Shifta. Somali bandits broke into my flat, tied me and my girlfriend, threatened to cut us up, stole all the equipment, the compressors, the helium bottles, even the clown suits.”
“You get hurt?”
“No, but Jill was in therapy for a few months. Pretty horrific, actually. We didn’t know what they were going to do to us.”
“So that’s the end of the party business?”
“Absolutely not!” I hear the grin in his voice. “Make some money here and go back and start it right this time. But, bloody oath, if I ever see anyone walking the streets of Nairobi dressed as a clown . . .”
* * *
Later, when we both might have been sleeping: “You miss your lady?”
Silence. There is no one starting this conversation; either one of us said it first.
“Feeling guilty?”
“Yes. You?”
“Yes. I’m surprised. Haven’t had much time to miss her. You?”
“Been too busy.”
“And scared.”
“Yeah, scared. You hear those last shots? Pretty close.”
“Hope they weren’t in the compound.”
“Outside, I think. I wouldn’t have thought about feeling guilty. But I guess I do. We’re pretty close. Surprised I don’t miss her.”
“Same here. I haven’t had much time to think about anything but what I’m doing here. And avoiding these stray bullets.”
“You wonder if they think about us. And what they’re doing. You write yours what it’s really like?”
“Not enough to worry them.”
“No, but just enough.”
“Yes, just enough. Good night.”
“Night.”