Keeping the Peace

That's the Badger!

Yes, indeed. That's the badger. My favorite new British phrase, for something that's really cool/the thing/the greatest/right on. From our new British star, Seb. You will be seeing Seb in this film.

That's the Badger, for those of you who worried, that Rob made it to me, live and in person, with all of his gear in tow. It's great to have him here, and we'll be heading off on our next adventure, insh'allah, on Monday. He had to laugh at our accomodation (well, where we're living until Monday, when we move all of our stuff into the UN office for safekeeping)--the ice cold drippling water that eeks out of the European shower head, sleeping in a pool of sweat after the generator-powered air conditioner kicks off at three in the morning...you get the picture. Welcome back to Africa. He gallantly suffered through an ex-pat beach party until one this morning because my UN host kindly offered to drive me to to pick him up at the airport and then, of course, we had to stop by the party. Rob can hold his own.

In keeping with the theme of this voyage, our newest star, the British military observer, Seb was only found after I missed my initial helicopter flight to Kailahun, which is about as far East as you can go in this country, and one of the most important former rebel strongholds. I missed the flight because you've got to have your Movement of Personnel & Flight Request Form filed 48 hours before you fly, and, though I had requested the flight a week before, the paperwork hadn't been filed. That would have really diced my day but there happened to be a special flight leaving an hour and a half later, so I caught that and made it to meet my Candadian connection, Ross, in Kailahun.

I could quickly tell that Ross was going to have a B part in the film, that he didn't really want to be filmed and was just trying to give a girl a hand, rather than really enthusiastic about the idea of being followed about while brushing his teeth. So, it was a dark night. I was wondering how I was going to spend the rest of the week at the end of the country (there was no fast way out as it takes a good two days of horrific travel to get back to Freetown from Kailahun) as I bedded down in the Pakistani guest tent for women. I was there because Ross thought it would be more comfortable than the UN house of men, but that was to change.

In the middle of the night I semi-awoke to a figure dropping an oversheet on me. I had only one sheet, so I'd rolled myself into a Jessie-taco. I was so tired that it was more like a dream and I didn't think much of it. The next night, however, I heard a rustle and looked up to a dark figure in white shorts coming into my tent, and it didn't look as if he was bringing me any amenities. He bolted when I said, "Hello?" but I didn't get much more sleep that night. So much for Pakistani hospitality-I moved on to a vacant room in the UN house. But the Pakistani battalion chow kicked some serious ass. For $10 a day, I got the tent and the food, $2 day bought the food alone. The UN staff has worked out a sweet gig in Kailahun where they pay to be fed. It's lovely, as long as you're into spicy dahl, chicken and lamb daily.

I knew that I had to look for other characters, and I'd talked to Seb about horses, so I asked him if he'd mind wearing the radio mic (wireless microphone) when we went out on patrol. He didn't, and Ross was much more natural when he wasn't thinking about me listening to what he was saying. I'd hoped not to make this a Brit-centric show but that may be the way it lands. The team commander is a smart, articulate man from Zambia who was here in 2000 and has said he would probably go on camera if I went back to interview him later, so Kailahun may be the last week.

Did I tell you about the roads? I have finally indeed discovered the reason for the existence of the 4x4, and I have a new appreciation for what those bad boys can do. We were traveling on roads, or mud paths, rather, with ruts and rocks and, in places, several feet deep of water, up and over rocks and bridges made of logs that spanned streams lengthwise-stuff that even I would look at and cringe. I couldn't believe that we could do it, the vehicles making some of the most interesting scraping and grinding noises I've ever heard.

Of course we got stuck in the mud. Or, rather, our Nepali "driving Miss Daisy" (Seb-termed) colleague did. Twice. I got to witness the real-life use of that little winch thing at the back of the 4x4. They do in fact work.

We were on patrol. Patrols are good. Patrols are meant to serve as a means of taking the temperature of the locals, as well as assuring them of UN presence, security and tranquility. The process of walking through the jungle (no machetes involved) with a group of Sierra Leonean police, one Canadian, one Brit, a Kenyan and a Jordinian into a village is really something. The visuals alone were out of control. Most of the villages we drove or walked through were comprised of circular huts with thatched roofs, mud floors, the lot. Shirts optional for women, who you find with children washing their clothes and bodies in most of the streams we pass over and through. Rice is the main crop here, though there is some coca. One of the main questions we were asking on our patrol was the price of coca. Because changing prices can bring instability. The other main communication we had for the people in these villages, other than an exchange of candy (British "boiled sweets") and oranges (theirs, for us, which they eat by cutting off the top and squeezing out the juice like a juice squeeze) was to let the disarmed rebels know that their disarmament payment, though late, was on its way.

Whenever we drove through a village of any size, especially if there was an outdoor school around, the kids would run after the cars yelling, "Bleeetish, Bleeeetish!" or "Paki, Paki, Paki!" They seemed to have the identiy of our crew down, and the sight of dozens of small children in identical school uniforms running after our Land Rovers waving their hands was lovely. My favorite, however, are the naked boys that rip after us in their bare feet up the red clay roads, usually doing pretty well at keeping up as we wind our way up hills and through ruts. The children here seem generally well-fed and, other than the awful malaria I hear about, healthy. Of course, the unhealthy children wouldn't be the ones running after our cars.

UN personnel are seen today, anyway, as trusted intermediaries between different factions, different villages and the government. The military observers, soldiers in their own countries, are unarmed here. They tell me that they prefer it this way because it makes their job much more clear and that they feel that they have a level of trust with the locals that they would not have if they were bearing arms. Which I think is pretty interesting, these guys who are trained to kill now acting as mediators of peace. We talk a lot about that in the interviews. I have a couple of good interviews, finally. Ross, our Canadian MILOB, finally relaxed at the end of our interview yesterday while talking about missing his dog. He said that two things he would really regret here would be if he were to harm a child or a dog. Ducks and chickens, however, he saw as fair game.

Wednesday's patrol with the Pakistanis, staged for my benefit, was another experience entirely. The Pakistanis rank and file, who I had somehow imagined would be all speaking perfect English, willing, ready and able to tell me what it meant to be a peacekeeper. Not so. Not only do only the officers speak English, but the officers weren't too hip to the notion of what it takes to make a documentary. I.e. advance warning of what the hell they were doing, and the time to set up the camera, sound, gear to capture any of it. I asked the second in command to try to give me some warning about when and where we'd be stopping, and he told me that it was up to the Captain. Which would have been one thing had the entire practice activity not been specifically meant for my benefit. Kind of a good news/bad news situation. The good news was that they treated me very correctly, even having a special plate of grapes and a chocolate muffin they found Allah knows where, to meet my special needs, because they were all fasting. I wasn't going to eat because they were fasting, but the food was bouncing around so much on the plate that I had to either eat it or throw it away. I ate.

The Pakistanis have an interesting relationship with the local population. They, like most of the locals in these small villages, are Muslims, and they have done much to construct mosques, build roads and schools, and during the month of Ramadan the locals line up outside of the battalion for the fast-breaking meal. I asked my second-in-command what his troops thought of the local women-given that they were going from the land of women who dress modestly to a place where naked breasts abound, and he told me that for himself it was no problem, but it did take his men a little while to get used to the sight. He told me off camera that since the women were black it didn't matter so much anyway. Racism is definitely a factor in this equation.

But yes, friends, when I'm peeing behind a tall clump of grass on a helicopter stop on a swath of pavement in the jungle on my way back to Freetown to meet my husband, I tell myself that life is good. Seb tells a story of falling off a bridge into a waist-high river here one Tuesday morning, thinking to himself, "Not a bad way to spend a Tuesday morning, after all." And I'll have to second that. I think we'll have a story here. The characters and the scenes are coming. We're heading back to the Makeni crew on Monday, and hope to do Liberia the week after that. Not sure how much role Monrovia will play in this story, but it has to be done, given that this is really all just one big party, one big war.

Otherwise, friends, I'll leave you with these impressions before heading out:
-the incredible generosity of the UN people with who've been giving me office space, helicopter rides, allowing me to get up-close-and personal with their daily lives, introducing me to people and places and generally making this happen.
-the beauty of this country outside of the capital.
-children calling us whiteys "pomoi" (a variant, somehow, of the "Portugese" who were here long ago) and waving as we walk by.
-large trucks who stop regularly to allow ducks to pass on the dirt roads before them.

Rob's here!

Image - Jess hard day at the office

Posted by Jessie Deeter at November 1, 2003 01:24 PM