As the heat intensifies (though let’s be grateful it’s still semi-cool at nighttime), the numbers of returnees making Northern Bahr el Ghazal their new home has gotten past the 70 000 mark. That’s 70 000 people setting up a new life, with many thousands of local population, and many thousands of IDPs (internally displaced people) still figuring out their lot as they’ve never made it home since the last unrest. 70 000 people looking for a school, health clinic, job, plot of land, cattle, supplies, fuel…peace and prosperity.
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(Author’s note…these returnee stats are still under scrutiny by the humanitarian community…for the purposes of this blog post, we could replace simply ’70 000′ with ‘a hek of a lot of people’…”
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I made it out to one of the transit sites Apadda about 1 1/2 hours from our base…considerably better laid out than other transit sites. In fact some ‘site planning’ actually took place as opposed to the spontaneous settlements. Apart from the temporary nature of all the shacks, the give away sign was the dozens of trucks piled high with belongings of returnees. How on earth these belongings get matched up with their owns, usually arriving by bus, I will never know…
Our ACF matatu van is dwarfed by a truck of returnees' belongings..
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We were 50% down on drivers for several days last week…we normally have four, we only had two. You’d probably expect them to be on sick leave or annual leave. Well, no, one had gone AWOL for four days even though he claimed to have been sick but was well enough to go to another town an hour away for treatment but too sick to just come to the office to signal his sickness …and the other had been arrested for not paying a dowry. No one bats an eyelid…this is not unusual apparently!
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All that said, my team are great. I’m also enjoying putting into practice the lessons I’ve learnt from last time round with respect to people management. I can see why people write books on this sort of thing…and also why you sometimes just have to throw the books away and get back to basic questions about a) what motivates people and b) what de-motivates people to do a good job…
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And then there’s the question of fuel. Fuel prices have soared recently…the supply route from Khartoum has been precarious. The fuel from Kenya and Uganda costs a bomb to transport all the way to us. Your hands are tied. We’re buying ‘just enough’ to avoid being caught short but hoping the price will go down soon…please…
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In the meantime, as we wait for a stock of genuine Toyota Landcruiser car parts from Nairobi, we have to suffice with the overpriced, ok-quality parts from a city about three hours away. It’s a whole-day mission to go there, buy, repair and come home…requiring careful planning and contingencies in case things go wrong. Oh, and did I mention the suppliers there only speak Arabic and well, I speak none, and my mechanic speaks Swahili and English (a Kenyan) and my logistician only speaks enough Arabic to do basic negotiations. I hope an auditor reads this one day…as we desperately try to keep to the donor’s procurement procedures, but have mercy on us…it’s bloody difficult at times!
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It was also quite difficult to work out why a little white chicken’s egg appeared next to my pillow one night. However I was soon shown why the next night as I had my back turned to the door of my tent. I heard a slight scuffling noise and I look out to the entrance of the tent…suddenly a very scared and flighty black chicken is running manic trying to get of the tent. I place the egg outside then, so the mother can get her egg back. Later I find half the egg shell and dried egg yolk and white on the floor in my tent. The mystery remains. Why did she choose my tent to lay her egg? And who or what decided to decimate the egg inside my tent?
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It’s easy to start feeling like my dear chicken when I stay on the base too long too. I’ve been trying to get out of the base at least once a day, usually around sunset, for a wander. Wandering around the village…stumbling across the homes of my staff, since, it’s well, a village. ”Lucy!” I hear a familiar voice. ”Ah good evening John…(my driver arrested for not paying the dowry)” ”Lucy, come and meet my two wives…and these are my three children…and over there in the corner…that’s my father…” He stands proudly with many more than three children (I’m guessing some belong to the neighbours) hanging out around his legs. Like everyone here, his grand estate is a couple of mud hut tukuls and a little dry sandy space in between. But it’s his place and that’s what counts.
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I must admit that I’m pleasantly surprised by the people in Malualkon…it’s about one of the first times during my time in Africa where pretty much everyone is happy to see you, happy to greet you, not instantaneously asking for help and quick to have a good laugh as I try out my very limited Dinka and Arabic. I think this is the beauty of being in a village. This is a generalization but I must say the people feel more approachable here. The kids, while yelling ‘kawadje’ (foreigner in Arabic), are curious and giggly, some daring others shy at the site of me.
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There is often one who captures my heart and is a little more forthright than the others, determined to check out this strange kawadje. I do wonder what the future will hold for these children in an independent south Sudan. For now, they’ve not been taught to fight, to hate or be divisive. Some have already known pain and sickness or disability, sadly, but almost all have known simple, joyful curiosity, a mother’s love and the security of community…indeed, it does take a village to raise a child.
