A night out

Saturday evening at the Camp

It was the usual post-dinner dilemma that I’d seen in my one week at the camp – what to watch on tv. Most were neutral or apathetic to which channel was chosen as they withdraw to their tents soon after, and the usual suspects who bag the remote and set the channel permanently to the English or the French league. I’ve watched more football here than I would care to remember.

Today was different, maybe because it was a Saturday night, but there were more people and everyone was energetic – we all wanted to have a go at the remote, though we were all equally ignorant about what could be watched aside from league football! The friendly bickering continued, and the channels moved back-n-forth. I got a glimpse of Paris Hilton in court, Larry King’s fifty years, Justin Timberlake at some concert, Tony Blair at Madame Tussaud’s, and even a bit of African Magic – the channel for late night soap operas. Some got beers from the bar, while our Italian public health expert talked about the virtues of taking Mefloquin against malaria. It was business as usual. I had eaten too much and the food coma confined me to my armchair at the Rakuba. My biggest concern then was to figure out whether I wanted to return to the dining tent for more watermelon. Deciding against gluttony, I busted out my precious supply of clove cigarettes. It was the perfect moment for a smoke.

As I stood on the sand of the volleyball court outside with the clove, I chit-chatted with WFP James. He’s a decent, laid-back guy and is usually trying to convince people to go out into town – WFP folks like their social life sizzling; we UNHCR people like it mild.

I grinned, "what is there to do?"
He could barely contain himself – “you ask what theya is?? ma friend, Juba is a happening pless, there are bahs, and pubs. You should come out and see! Like today, there’s a dance party at UNMIS!”

Those words in the same sentence seemed like a paradox. The UN Mission in Sudan consisted of all the agencies … and so that meant they were throwing a dance party at their compound! But I admit that humanitarians also need their fun, so why not a dance party? By all means! … you can have one anywhere as long as you have a flat floor and a boom-box … and of course there is no shortage of music with the int’l staff here. And tomorrow they’re showing the Good Shephard – but it’s a ‘bring your own chair, and share your snack’ event. Hmm … very enticing, I’ll have to find a ride tomorrow for sure!!

Peter (Situma) our security liaison, and Eva (Burgetova) walked towards the court, and James started on the ambitious undertaking of trying to convince not one, but three UNHCR fogies to go out for a drink. In less than 19 minutes, we’d all agreed to step out to the Queen of Sheba nearby. Eva and I lazily boarded James’ car in whatever we had on. Now if Situma wasn’t coming, then there was no way I would have taken off with James whom I’d only met. Situma on the other hand is a Kenyan teddy-bear – about my height, and twice my girth, but at the same time careful, vigilant, protective, and very comfortable to be around. Trusting at least him, I decided to roll.

The roads were pitch dark because there were no street-lights or any other lights for that matter. No sane person without an emergency would be seen outside after 8 o’clock and it was already 9. But feeling no qualms while locked inside the UN land-cruiser I just enjoyed being out for the first time past 7:30pm! It was spooky; there are patches of roads – bumpy, dusty and desolate – without any signs of life. An occasional wall or fence appeared here and there, but vanished as soon as the car headlights had moved past it. Our field of view was whatever our headlights could capture, and tonight the headlights died off into the distance without being reflected from anything. There was nothing behind or in front of us. Once or twice we passed another 4x4 at a rotary or an intersection, some of them UN personnel . In Juba, if you didn’t own a sturdy, secure vehicle, then you’re confined to your home after dark.

The Queen of Sheba had at least 15 SUVs parked outside. Most were white, but there were some black, and some that had patches of car stickers all over them. They were all heavily covered in dust so it seemed that this was some clandestine rendezvous that people had travelled far for.

Like the few other restaurants I’ve seen in Juba, QoS is artistically designed out of bamboo with a half wall, and a thatched roof. The rest of it is open. The bar to one side is designed out of wood and bamboo, and well stocked with foreign alcohol. The four of us sat in the high barstools and observed the crowd. We each had a drink and Situma had Red Bull … he’s strange like that.

The huge flat-screen tv was playing music videos from some 90s DVD ... but the music system blared some 80s and 90s favorites. Brian Adams, En Vogue and Boyz II Men. It was chill … I couldn’t stop swinging my legs from my stool, as I sipped my Amarula (Baileys is Western version of it). Life’s simple here. Peter and James tagged each other with more and more fantastic and unbelievable real-life stories … they can be such laughs! I got the inside scoop of what truly happened last weekend when there was a distress signal that one returnee had committed suicide at a UNHCR way-station. It was a false alarm! – I realized the kinds of fabricated emergencies these folks have to respond to at times, and my respect rose for the type of level-headedness they always display. Then it was time for some gossip, and so we scrutinized ALL the other employees in our unit.

At around 11, James thought we should swing by the OCHA compound and see what was going on … apparently there was a party there too, and there’d been some posters around. Note to all of you – if you want to throw a party in Juba, you make flyers, and then you print them and post them at the other agencies, and that's how they find out about it. We decided that OCHA also deserved a swing-by before we head home, but curfew was at 11pm, so it wasn’t a wise decision to be out for too much longer. No one would be responsible for you if you disappeared. I glanced at Situma … he appeared willing, so off we were to our next haunt!

Tt can be all party and play here, but let me tell you that people do it all with a risk. You need to do it to survive because this is such an artificial, restricted environment that everyone has to do something to simulate some kind of normalcy. Even if you have to break a few rules and aren’t ‘most security compliant’. Bottomline is its all about security – if you aren’t alive, then there’s no more humanitarian work.

As the car bounced along in pitch darkness, James told us about a close call. It was two nights ago … when driving back to the camp at midnight he got a flat tyre … everything was closed down, not a light in sight, and not a person around … and with all kinds of dangers lurking in the bush … there may be the militias and gunmen … mad people who want to hurt you, and take a UN vehicle … or rob you of your money, radio, anything of any value … so there are clear guidelines on what to do – if it’s a rear tyre, you just ignore it and drive home … if you hv a partner and it’s a front tyre, you change it … and if you’re alone you don’t stop under any circumstances. I found it fascinating, and our surroundings reinforced that chilling feeling.

The car sped up slightly and the bumpiness got more pronounced. I could see faint tail lights ahead of us. But at our speed, the tail lights approached fast … but no wait, it came up quickly because they’d braked … I wondered why they were stopping in the middle of the road? … there was a vehicle stopped on the opposite side also … James braked sharply, within two seconds of ploughing into the jeep in front … and then all hell broke loose. It happened so fast that I have only one fleeting image in my mind, lit by the headlights of our car. The jeep in front pulled forward a little more blocking the road at an angle, the opposite car flashed its lights, James and Situma exchanged hurriedly what they should do, the hair at the back of my neck stood up from the hard braking ... and it was then that I saw what I cannot yet reconcile - about 15 men in uniform and guns jumped out of the jeep in front of us … they were less than a 100 feet away, and they seemed to be mobilized for something ... I didn’t recognize what uniform it was, police, peacekeepers or militias and I awaited the shots. The only thing in my head was that we were out after curfew. The men started waving their guns to something across the street, and then people jumped out from the opposite jeep … the cluster of gunmen gathered in the middle of the road and then ran across to the other side … in the periphery of our headlights, we saw them holding back two individuals one of whom seemed to be female … someone in our car yelled that we should reverse but someone else said no, we should calmly drive through.

That is what James did ultimately … tightly weaving through the two angled 4x4s facing each other, and about 20 feet from the men, our car just steadily passed through as the armed men tackled some people off to the side of the road… my heart thumped. The time it took for us to clear those 200 yards seemed like an eternity. Looking back, I caught one last glimpse of the roadside crowd, unsure of whether it was a rescue, a hold-up, a gang raid or a heist.

When I regained my faculties, I realized that I didn’t even look at the plates of either of the cars, and can’t remember if I stayed silent or was screaming. Situma was absolutely composed and guided James through the knot. Eva just stayed quiet. We shook the event off in about a minute and a half, and kept driving towards the OCHA party.