ANDREW AND I mush through bowls of soggy Weetabix and UHT milk in silence. My mind is a rat’s nest of tangled thread knotted with recollected viscera and the fear of the moment: Faces and ghosts—and the imagined smell of dung, as if I had stepped in it and carried it back—combine with an almost sickening nervousness about going upriver. I am wired to the past, wired to the future. To save myself, I must force myself to concentrate on the job ahead. Just get in the boat and drive. My tin lockbox and backpack together with some supplies and emergency rations are to be “airlifted” to me at Hum Hum. I am not sure what “airlift” means—dropped by parachute, lowered from a helicopter, hurled by catapult; from what I understand there is no landing field in the area, otherwise I would have been delivered.
I have been so preoccupied with the run up the river that I have never spent more than a glancing minute wondering what it is I am supposed to do when I get there. Establish a base for the distribution of the relief supplies, which is to presume that I know how to set up a distribution base. What is a distribution base? Something like Marerey, I would imagine. The idea, it appears, is first to get someone out there and figure it out on the spot. My presence on this part of the river apparently will establish a bridgehead, and back at the office the bureaucrats will tack a colored pin on a map on the wall and tell the donors: “We also have a base here at Hum Hum, very effective, very effective, indeed. We are well covered. Yes, spending donor money wisely . . .” Am I to be met by village elders, or warlords? Have they arranged for locals to help me? What do I do with the emergency supplies? Are they going to helicopter others out there to join me—some of Wolff’s river people? Has anybody thought of these things?
“I’ve been thinking,” Andrew says cheerfully. He fishes out a large greenhead fly from his bowl, examines it, and flicks it away. “Think it came from the milk?” He reads the label on the paper carton. “I don’t think they have tsetse flies in Italy.”
“You’ve been thinking . . .” I am in a resentful mood.
“We could defect.”
“Defect!”
“Sure, why not?” He grins. He’s got me. I am taking things too seriously. “You go to General Morgan and offer your boats and your services. You offer to run the port until the tourists come. I’ll bring the radios and offer to run the airport. He would pay better than the UN.”
“You have been working too fucking long in the sun, my friend.”
Whether it is the fragility of the moment or the absurdity of the notion, I wonder if I do not actually begin to consider it. I mean, what do I owe these people—the UN? “Yeah, I’ll help the good general market Kismayo as a new ecotourism paradise where things are as they always have been, as they always will be, guaranteed by the city fathers never to change. I’ll run his water-sports operations.”
“I’ll start a gliding school—there are good thermals in this area.”
This nutty conversation reminds me of the one with the Swedes in that fancy Nairobi hotel. That was so long ago that I remember more the nervousness that triggered the humor, less the discussion itself.
“Too late for me. I’m supposed to visit the competition today.”
“Well, when you get to the other side, you could defect to them. They might pay better anyway. When do you go upriver?”
“Before the wind gets up.”
His is a good attempt, an appreciated effort to steer my thoughts away from what lies ahead. I know about today, about running the gauntlet, about ducking the bullets with anything but full clarity. It is as if I am looking through a ground lens, an unfocused view of an event of absolute certainty. I suppose I am as prepared as I ever will be, although that is not saying much—like taking meager comfort because I am wearing my fast running shoes through the bad part of town. A bitter taste of bile rises, burns, subsides. I am starving, and I feel nauseous and overfull.
One of our compound guards with deferential bow and scrape begs to interrupt us. “Sirs, big problem at Unicef. No UN move today.” With some difficulty he tells us the guns are out and aimed at our colleagues’ headquarters. A deep breath—another delay. I expect to rouse Chet with the news but find him sitting in a straight-back chair against a wall reading a paperback.
“Thought you were still asleep.”
“Nope. Just doing a little reading. The Unbearable Lightness of Being.” He turns the book around and looks at the cover as if appraising its value. “Have you read it?”
“No, not yet.” How he finds the time or the presence to read a book I will never know.
“Interesting.”
“It’s the militia again. They got the guns on the Unicef compound—maybe no river trip.” It is more of a statement than a question, as if the way I present the suggestion might influence the outcome.
“I wouldn’t worry about that—I suspect we’ll be able to work this one out. You packed and ready to go?” Chet doesn’t seem to give a damn one way or the other. It is the only thing I think about. I nod glumly.
“I wonder if they know? They are probably still asleep over there—it was a long night last night. Might as well wake them with the news.”
Chet radios Happy One and tells her to wake up, look outside, see the guns—you are under siege. The sleep is still in her voice. “Yeah? Okay. So what’s new?”
An unidentified Somali voice snaps over the radio: “All expatriates are to remain in their compounds! Out.”
“Who was that?” I ask.
“Anybody with a handheld. We’re not the only ones with comms.” A number of locals wear the small black portable VHF radios—“gifts,” Chet says, from the UNOSOM forces that wisely got out of town in a hurry.
“What’s the problem?”
“Same thing. The shootings, the blood money. We were dealing with them well into the night. They got us by the cojones.”
The poor kid hangs on but he is as good as dead. It apparently makes no difference that the woman was not pregnant and that the schoolboy is not yet dead—the demand is still one hundred fifty-six camels. While Brian and Chet have agreed to the number of animals, there is some dispute about their value. The families don’t really want us to deliver a herd of camels to their wattle shacks, just the money they would fetch on an open market, a market that exists only in their imagination. Payment, they are insisting, must be in U.S. dollars.
Two hours later Bravo Delta announces over the radio the guns have been withdrawn and negotiations have resumed. Always guns first, then negotiations, and during negotiations we are allowed to continue to try to help these people. Somalis, it appears, need to cock their guns, point, and then talk. A Somali would not a good next-door neighbor make.
During the morning briefing the siege is shrugged off matter-of-factly. As the others file out to start their days, Bravo Delta asks me to wait. He wants to discuss the logistics of the turkey shoot. He drums his fingers on the surface of a small writing pad, a sign he’s impatient to get this over with, as if his taxi is waiting.
“Rather plan an outing on the lake in Central Park on a lazy Sunday afternoon,” I say glibly.
“You could be there. And we would be here,” Brian says. That puts an end to any nervous reverie. “We are going to be leaving in a few minutes for Goob Weyn to get final approval for your trip. They’ve told us there shouldn’t be a problem, but Sierra Sierra and I want to have guarantees that we can get up there without incident.”
“Real fine idea!” My sarcasm does not go unnoticed. Chet furrows and Brian’s eyes flare.
“Look, there is no trip if we get no guarantees. You can trust me on that.” No longer is he offering to get someone else if I am too much of a pussy to make the trip. “In that case we’ll probably take the boats up to Marerey.”
It does not make any difference to me, I’m thinking—a short gauntlet, a long gauntlet. “Also up the coast and up the river?”
“If it looks dodgy, we can use a helicopter to take the boats up to Marerey.”
“A helicopter! Why the hell haven’t we done this before? I have had two boats ready for days.”
“Because, goddamn it, we will bloody well deliver our supplies from Kismayo. That’s what you are here for!”
I suddenly understand. If the boats are based any further than Hum Hum or Goob Weyn, Brian and his agency no longer have any control and he loses my boats and his flotilla. Other than trucks—and most of the roads are washed out—there is no other way to distribute. Could this determination to send me upriver be simply a matter of losing power, of ego?
“Well, I hope to hell we go by chopper.”
“Chet and I will radio you after our meeting with the elders. In the meantime, prepare the best boat for both events. And suss out a landing area for a helicopter at the port—I think there’s one marked on the wharf. It needs about three hundred meters for an approach.”
“What do you mean, best boat? You and I going together in one boat?”
“No, I’m not going. You’re going to Hum Hum when we give you the signal from Goob Weyn. Don’t worry, we will be waiting for you there and—”
“Can’t. By the time we get back, as you rightly point out, the wind will be too strong to go. We have to get a boat upriver today. If we don’t, we’ll lose the one chance we have. We will wait for you there.”
I shake my head and repress a smoldering anger. I suppose I had always thought I would be going alone. I look at Chet for some support. His hands clasped behind his back, he stands next to Brian without expression.
* * *
I am a little anxious about seeing Harun this morning but the drive to the port is almost routine. Other than a noncommittal “Subah wanaqsan, Captain,” Harun says nothing to me and only a few words to the guards. It is impossible to know what he is thinking or if he is thinking at all. Just as well. He sings along to the whiny Arabic tune on the cassette, which seems to be a little louder today than usual, and that precludes any conversation. I am now cautious of the man; at least by the end of the day I will be elsewhere.
We pull up to that one formidable barricade across the road. I still get the jitters each time we drive through it. The guards peer in, flip thumbs-up, and smile and pull away the coiled razor wire. The little sentry with his big gun stands proudly by the cross ties of the antitank traps. The little bugger who may have earned his bars at our expense motions us through with solemn authority. As we rumble past, the kid breaks into a friendly grin of recognition and waves. I could never hope to understand these people.
At the port, fat little Chaco is lowering boat number one into the bay, ignoring the differing instructions from the surrounding workers. I look around for Ali, but only Abduah, the crane owner, is present.
“What’s going on?”
“Boat in the water!” Abduah says proudly.
“Yes, but who told you to put it in the water?”
“Boss.”
“Bigger boss.”
“Which bigger boss?”
He nods toward the port office building. “Many bigger boss today,” he says ruefully.
A white UN Land Rover speeds into the port in a plume of dust and drives up to the wharf’s edge. Mwalimo, the pleasant Tanzanian procurement officer, emerges without greeting.
“Glad you are still here. I thought maybe you would have left.”
“Waiting for the word, Mwalimo. Here to see me off?”
“No, no. I brought you these.”
He opens the rear door. A couple of baby blue UN combat helmets, Unicef stenciled on the brow, lie on a heap of flak jackets on the seat.
“Bravo Delta thought you should carry them. Just in case.”
I had given up asking. Their delivery now is not a particularly good omen—like the boat in the water, another nail in the coffin.
I put on the helmet, adjust the chin strap, and grin stupidly at Mwalimo, then at the crowd of dockworkers who have gathered around.
“They are very good,” he assures me. “That one is new.”
I would expect the Somali workmen to laugh, but a shadow of suspicion falls over the men. One voice, dark and murmurous, rolls over the mob. I don’t much like the change in mood. So I ham it up, bang a fist against the helmet, and make silly faces. Still there is no laughter. I unbuckle the chin strap, wondering if I haven’t abruptly become someone other to these with whom I have worked so long. Maybe they see me now as a peacekeeper, maybe as an interventionist; maybe they think I have betrayed them.
“Will it take a bullet, Mwalimo?” I say, taking it off.
“Not directly. Not supposed to.”
“Last time I had a helmet like this was in high school. American football.”
Mwalimo, a Dinka from central Tanzania, looks at me blankly.
The flak jacket that he hands me must be about twenty to thirty pounds. It is not like the one I saw in Harun’s home. Not baby blue, not Kevlar or whatever it is supposed to be; this is Vietnam or World War II vintage, olive drab and dusty and stained with old mud or old blood. It is not easy to put on. How the hell is anyone expected to wear this thing when driving a speedboat at forty knots down some winding river? One bad turn and, if you fall in, it will take you straight down to the bottom like diver’s weights. “This is supposed to stop a bullet, right?”
Harun approaches, grinning. What does that smirk mean?
“Captain. You go now?”
“Soon, Harun.”
He looks below at the lone boat bobbing on the water.
“You must not go,” he says quietly. His tone is gentle, his eyes sympathetic; I cannot imagine him capable of such anger.
“It’s a job, Harun.”
I give the flak jacket and helmet to a Unicef guard who shoulders them down the metal ladder. The boat is ready to go, loaded with a few bags of maize meal, blankets, a couple of tarps, and jerry cans of water and extra petrol. With all the gear stowed, the small boat lies heavily in the water. There is precious little freeboard for any kind of seaway. If I leave soon, I should be able to make the entrance to the mouth of the Jubba in less than forty-five minutes, just before the sea breeze gets up. That is my professional view, thoughts I now concentrate on to avoid defining the real feelings that churn through my system.
I feel deceived, cheated. Brian had said he was going and if he was going, I was going. Yet here I stand looking down at this puny toy boat, waiting for the phone to ring, for word that the governor has refused to commute my sentence.
“We’ve got a shooting at the airport,” Alpha Kilo announces over the radio.
“Anybody we know?” I ask.
“Don’t think so. A couple of gunshots just under the tower. There were some people running around down there yelling like fools, but it’s quiet now. No one has come up the stairs yet.”
Sierra squawks back from some obvious distance: “Sounds like another Somali conversation.”
“Roger that. The same one we hear every day.”
“Sierra Sierra, this is Juliet Bravo.”
“Sierra Sierra back.”
“Sierra Sierra, I got a boat in the water and we are ready to go.” Unwittingly, my trepidation is succumbing to excitement.
“Good copy. Alpha Kilo, you on station?”
“Alpha Kilo,” Andrew answers.
“Where is the chopper? Nearby?”
“Just left for Bardera.”
“Better tell ’em they may be needed in Kismayo. We’ll confirm in about twenty mikes or so. Copy?”
“Good copy.”
“You copy, John?”
“Juliet Bravo back. Roger the helicopter and fingers crossed! Juliet Bravo is standing by.”
I dare not think it, dare not hope it. It is possible, though. I pray for the reprieve.
It is an endless, mindless wait. Some people yawn constantly when they get nervous. Others yammer on about nothing in particular, tell jokes. Some pace, walk around. Some scratch their heads, their balls. Right now, I need a cup of coffee and a good laugh.
I realize these are my last moments in this place. I don’t really think I will ever see Kismayo again, and that is a comforting thought. Yet I find it extraordinary that I came to know the place with such frightful intimacy. Amid the days of Sturm und Drang, there was relative peace, a sort of security, an equanimous routine. I had a bunk that I was calling my own, colleagues I was getting to know, local people I could work with. I was even able to recognize their guns. Now I fear leaving this for an even greater unknown.
I wander over to the warehouse and peer inside for anything overlooked. Another UN rig pulls up. Jeri McGuinness, Happy One, steps out; long white dress, radio packed like a pistol, short black hair luminous in the sun, she seems uncertain, lost. A few workmen in the area begin to gather round. Jeri may be a powerful fixture in the IDP camps and at the airport, but my men have never before seen anything like her. They hold back, out of respect, awe, even fear.
“Thought I’d come down. I’ve never been to the port.” She looks around the warehouse and at the remaining boat. She seems stiff, possibly critical.
“My office.” I can think of nothing clever to say. “Show you around?”
She walks with me out to the pier. Her UN rig follows behind. She gazes down at the two sunken patrol boats clearly visible beneath the water, their missile tubes straining to break through the surface.
“Russian, I’m told. Bombed. Don’t know when.” We continue walking along the wharf.
“Is that what you’re taking up the river?” she says, squinting in the sun toward my small blue boat tied to the pier.
“That’s the one.”
“Doesn’t look so ugly in the water. You could ski behind it.”
“It has been suggested.”
I am finding this difficult. I don’t feel like being a tour guide or being conversational. Or even pleasant. She is offering no personality, nothing to go with, nothing to react to. I have my own problems: My stomach is in knots with something like the first-night jitters before the curtain is raised. I don’t want to talk, I just want to hop in that boat and hit the road.
“Well, I just wanted to see the port,” she says abruptly. She shakes my hand stiffly. “Good luck.” I expect her to turn on her heels, but she hesitates. Her eyes are remarkably clear, suddenly soft, that impenetrable patina removed. She leans forward and kisses me lightly on the cheek. She turns, ducks back into the car, and is driven quickly away.
My cheek is afire from that whispered touch. It has the same impact as everything else—extreme and frightening—and without a history for me to know how to react.
“Juliet Bravo, Sierra Sierra.
“Juliet Bravo, Sierra Sierra—you copy? Juliet Bravo?”
Chet has to call twice before I realize the call is for me. Here I go. My bladder flutters.
“Juliet Bravo, stand down on Hum Hum. I repeat, stand down on Hum Hum. Having a little trouble with the elders. They can’t—or won’t—guarantee your safety. Have Alpha Kilo get that chopper to the port. You’re flying to Marerey or Bardera or Sakow—your call.”
“God damn! Great news, Chet!” I respond, forgetting all radio etiquette. “Fucking great news! You all right up there?”
“Yeah, we’re okay. We should be back at the port in about thirty. Don’t forget, three hundred meters for the chopper’s approach.”
Leaning back against the cold cement warehouse wall, I regard Brian and Chet in a fresh light—did I not give them enough credit? Did I exaggerate the dangers of the trip, building my own fears without warrant? Such thoughts are a luxury I can afford to have now that it will never happen.