This is for me to remember and for the record. These things are important not to forget:
11.21.04
We touch down at Roberts air field at around 9 p.m. and are promptly handed a piece of paper that allows us free passage because the curfew from the last two weeks of riots is still in place. Blamed on Muslim-Christian differences, the riots followed the end of disarmament (the UN, Opande, ultimately sent over 100,000 through a process that was originally budgeted for only 40,000) had more to do with various factions that are still fighting over the distribution of power after the peace accords than any religious issues. From the States, the riots looked pretty grim, with 16 left dead and a rumor that a UN APC had rolled over and killed at least one civilian. That rumor seems baseless, and the fact that at the height of the riots most people were armed with nothing more dangerous than machetes is a sort of testament to the effectiveness of the disarmament this time. Though, when pressed, neither Opande nor Klein could satisfyingly explain what exactly constitutes a successful disarmament, and how, with a rather large discrepancy between the number of actual weapons collected and the number of persons "disarmed," they can call the process a sucess. It seems that the best answers are anecdotal.
Like the fact that things are Moving in Monrovia. When we flew into Roberts last fall, the airport was desolate and we didn't even technically enter the country because nobody bothered, then. Today, the airport is thick with street hawkers and even has an outrageously overpriced Duty Free shop and a bar. The streets of Monrovia are packed with people flirting, buying, selling, pushing, pulling, angling. The flip side of that equation is that the city is crowded, polluted, still lacks basics like power and clean water, and is now stuffed with a bunch of young former fighters looking for justification for their decision to stop fighting. How these lives are going to begin, exactly, was part of my project, and part of the surprise.
I have to say again that I have effectively received a grant from the UN, this time primarily in the form of Mohamed and Fred, Opande's right and left hand men. They picked us up from the airport and either drove or arranged for us to be driven everywhere thereafter. Which was vital, given the state of the taxis in the country and the way they only drive certain routes and don't deviate from those. And our hostess, Jane, who has my favorite UN job to date, that of procuring property for UN use, lives in a UN compound called Riverview, an island of air-conditioned luxury way out of any taxi lines. This time, as last time and the time before, I was able to tell Opande what I wanted to do and he made it happen. Or he got his guys to help me make it happen. Even better. More on that to come.
11.22.04
This was a check-in day. I thought I'd take the precaution of getting a real press pass, as I didn't manage to get that done in the hustle of the last trip. Afterwards, Rob and I reacquainted ourselves with the PD150 at Waterside market, one of the most active places to people watch. We were amazed by the vast amount of currency in motion. Wads and wads of cash changed hands over flip-flops, tennis shoes, ladies underwear, deodorant, phone cards, you name it. We headed down to the river, where I wanted to shoot the bridge connecting Bushrod Island to downtown, a famous battle site of the war and its end. Today, the bridge is full of traffic and the pedestrians who push hand carts piled with plastic jerry cans full of water. We were shooting over mounds of garbage, however, and it only took a few minutes for the early drinking crew to start asking us for money for the right to shoot their garbage. We didn't spend too much time in that place.
For the record: damn, it's hot in Liberia.
11.23.04
Back on the helicopters. We were following Opande to the Northern corner that borders Sierra Leone and Guinea. Guinea is interesting these days because it is the seat of the now-disarmed LURD's financial and political power, and is rumored to be the place that has re-absorbed some of the guns that weren't collected in the disarmement process. The North, as a rebel stronghold with poor roads, was a tough nut for the UN to crack, and Opande has to make periodic checks up there to make sure that everybody is still peaceful.
We stopped first in Foya, where Opande did a symbollic disarmament-symbollic because the last guns were actually collected over a week ago-for the benefit of the BBC crew who were also on board. Let me state here that, much as I generally revere the BBC, they can be a royal pain in the ass to shoot with and cause much the same sort of pain for freelance journalists as CNN. They want the shot and the story and will do and say most anything to get them. What that meant for me in Sierra Leone was that I had to deal with a pissed-off public information chief who was bent because he had arranged a private helicopter gunship flight for a BBC crew who had demanded it and then decided that they didn't have time for it after all. Today, it meant trying to stay out of BBC shots so they'd stay out of ours and then dealing with a pissed-off Opande (who, as you will recall, waits for no one for any reason) after he'd allowed them to stay longer in Kolahun to interview a bunch of pissed-off ex-combatants who hadn't been paid when the UN promised them they would be--The BBC showed up over an hour late for our flight.
I was impressed that the General had allowed the BBC to stay in the town where he had planned to give a happy aren't-we-all-glad-we've-been-rewarded-with-money-for-our-guns speech and had instead had to give a you-will-get-your-money-soon-because-I'm-going-to-bust-the-balls-of-the-miserable-wretches-whose-fault-this-is speech to a hot and angry looking mass of young men and women who faced us from the other side of a roll of barbed wire. Opande talked to a couple of ex-combatants and handed out some soccer balls, bibles and korans. The message being, I guess, we're all on the same team here, and here is a little something to occupy your time while you're waiting for your money. While the BBC stayed behind to interview disgruntled former fighters we flew to a fabulous feast in the jungle courtesy of the Pakistanis who somehow manage to bring their white-gloved service and spices all the way from home. One of my favorite versions of surreal experiences has got to be stepping out of a helicopter in the sweat and dirt of a jungle airfield in literally the middle of nowhere and being served apple juice in a glass goblet by a Pakistani man.
I used the time we waited for our BBC crew to ask Opande some questions I had wanted to ask before about the dangers and difficulties of working with dicey characters like Aisha Conneh--and good thing I did, too, because I wound up with a shorter final interview than I would have liked. It went to reinforce my now fully solidified notion that, in situations like these, where you are getting things as they happen and you are dealing with important people with busy schedules, you've got to take what you can get as it comes.
The food was lovely.