Bahai Beach 39

Bahai Beach 39

The video-man.

25th January 2007.

Ever since our assistant public manager Ben Tamam has been given a video camera all events in the camp are filmed, interviews are given and shots are made left and right. I must have mentioned many times that the amongst the refugee population there are substantial number of eloquent, funny and passionate speakers. Let us see if some of our videos can be placed on line.

An old patient came back to the hospital. It is a young man with a knee the size of a football. Amongst the plausible causes are; tuberculosis of the bone, chronic infection of the bone, cancer of muscle/bone, fungal infection. It is doubtful that conventional treatment of this condition will be able to solve his problem. It is much more likely that his under leg needs to be amputated. A difficult choice but right now he does not have a functional use of his leg either since 6 years. Long discussions were held with him and his father and finally Dr Ponce managed to come to an agreement that the two of them will be dispatched to Abeche for a third opinion and a possible operation.

In the camp there are many special patients lining up also. They all have disease which can not be treated in a primary health care center and sometimes even not in a district hospital. Examples are children with cataract of the lens, hernia of the groin or a lady anemia due to vaginal bleeding.

The public health department is starting up a campaign against skin disease. For the next three days all school going children will be checked as to seeing if there are ringworm, warts, herpes, furunkels and other skin lesions. There will be special training for the community health workers to spread the health message needed and a training for the nurses about recognition and correct treatment of different skin problems.

On Sunday the good old Dutch game of ‘paaltjes voetbal’ . Picture 8 men running around the compound defending a little brick as there goal while attacking other peoples brick. Among lots of laughter and clouds of dust. Kings of Bahai soccer were found and the day passed rapidly.

Later that evening if became clear how much we rely on the generator on a day to day basis for our electricity. It started to disfuncition the last week with hick ups and last night was halted at 3 O’clock smoking and sputtering. Thanks to one our drivers who worked the filter and engine for several straight hours I can send you this e-mail tonight.. I must enjoying the silence of the generator not humming in the back ground is a good feeling.

It is a quiet time to ponder and reflect on the last near seven months. We have been living through some very trying times. In fact there is still always the threat of car theft or violence. Convoys rule the daily visits to the camp and still after more than two months our teams are not complete. Life is lived in a barbed wire compound and only since recent small walks are permitted. The food however hard our brilliant cooks try still consist of canned vegetables, small variety of meats and no fruits, milk or cheese.

It has been a demanding time. A lot of the things I set out to do have not been achieved. Even if the reasons are understandable the fact that small construction work, ordering of drugs, introduction of all kinds of systems has not been completed requires a lot of patience. Not something which comes easy to me

The next 5 months the first thing required is patience and security. If these two factors are available the deployment of a full team should be possible. Finally the motto would be ‘Let’s boogie!’

Namaskar,

Ashis

Bahai Beach 38

Bahai Beach 38

Visitors

23 January 2007

‘On your right you may see a braiding donkey and rapidly after on your left a 4 year old helping his 9 year old sister preparing bricks. Bricks that will then be baked in the sun and together with mom will be constructed into a wall. This will act to keep out the merciless wind and sand. Less and less we rely on communal latrines and we actively promote the construction of family latrines. At your left the impact of the fore mentioned wind. This used to be a wooden construction with plastic sheeting. This construction has a function as a pre school. But now all that remains are the wooden poles. The plastic sheets are blowing in the wind. I cannot elaborate enough how harsh the circumstances are for the refugees in Oure Cassoni camp. In the summer it is up to 50 degrees and there is no dearth of water. Water in Lake Carriari may run out as the lake dries up like it did last summer. In the winter the desert climate is cold beyond belief and then around January the storm season (houboub) sets in to pound on the tents and housing in the camp. After three years not all tents are as crisp as they used to be. They beauty of resilience however prevails over the camp. Comparing to the three years ago major progress has been made. No more living under the trees without latrines, health structures, clean water or schools. Now there are schools, there is 350.000 liter water available per day for the camp, there are health post and a health centre and the shitting fields of old have been replaced by proper latrines. There has been a huge improvement in the overall health status of the camp. There are few cases of malnutrition, the number of children dying before reaching their second year of life has reduced and out breaks of communicable disease have reduced as well.’

Doubling as a tour guide duo: beauty (Ashis) and the brains (Joseph) meandered our way through the camp to give the visitors of USAID an honest view and explanation of the camp.

Mathias our Environmental Health Manager had a show stopper in the form of a demonstration of water testing. Ooh’s and Aah’s multifold when he showed the difference between the water from the lake and the water after intense treatment in reverse flow filtration, chlorination and aluminium sulphate deflocking. Not only does it sound impressive it looks impressive. On the top of a hillock there is a water reservoir and with a gravity flow based system and underground piping the camp can be supplied with water.

Alphan, our education manager demonstrated the pre-schools, primary school and talked about our new pride; secondary schooling. We are among the first in Chad to implement this in a refugee setting. Time and time again in meetings youth leaders and zone leaders come up with the lack of opportunity for their children to progress beyond primary school. This is a good opportunity and who knows when the first refugees will be ready to enter University. Although it is a sad thought that people have gone through large parts of their educational years inside a windy, isolated and desolate refugee camp it is the reality of the refugee.

These cats of ours are too cute. Sunday they spent the entire morning sitting in my dustbin basking in the sunlight, purring while observing my flock of chicken. They – the chicken that is – seem to be taking over the entire terrain again. In the morning they come out of their fenced housing and come to pick a worm or insect here and there. I wonder if my songs will start impressing them again. I have tried bargaining, seducing, pleading, begging but still no eggs. It is said they required a rooster. Well I have supplied. They required a stove in their house, installed and all. Now I am happily awaiting eggs. Still dreams exist of becoming the biggest chicken farmer of at least Bahai.

Yesterday in the camp a lady presented with a big belly. A hundred and seven centimeter circumference. She was pregnant of twins and was about 42 weeks. The babies were due to be delivered therefore. In the camp she came at 09.00 o’clock in the morning and the whole day the progression of her labor was slow. At the end of the day we took her to Bahai hospital where she was given a perfusion with medication and we tried to make the contractions more firm and coordinated. In the morning (we had to leave the hospital, leaving a nurse in charge) I was awoken at six. The babies had not come yet. So we had to scramble to make sure she could be evacuated to Abeche for an emergency caesarean. She has just left on the airplane.

More news to follow….

At 18.00 we heard that the mother is fine and that she has two healthy baby boys.

Namaskar,

Ashis

Bahai Beach 37

Bahai Beach 37

January 18, 2007

Yellow Nile

Today I was very lucky to meet an American linguist and missionary in the plane. We started talking and he explained that for the last 5 years he had been working on studying Zaghawa language. As a result he had just released a 1500 word dictionary French-Zaghawa. An English copy will be released soon. He also had a booklet of proverbs and an approach to write Zaghawa in three different ways (as it has no alphabet):

1. Roman spelling
2. Use of Arabic scriptures
3. Use of the camel marking used by the Zaghawa

It was all the more exciting for me as Osman Imam, our Health Administrator in the camp had been trying to develop an alphabet for Zaghawa in the eighties. But he abandoned the project as it was too complex. I am sure he will be over the moon.

And I thought about the teachers they lack teaching materials in their own language. They must be excited to be able to teach their own language. For all the right reasons Zaghawa are proud of their heritage. Or the nurses who now have a way to better understand the ailments the refugees have in the camp. Language brings you so much closer to others. And many of the women and children are not proficient in Arabic so they may suffer to express their worries and pains.

While the plane struggled through heavy sandstorms I was given a crash course on Zaghawa history. Apparently since the Nubian times they have been around. As fisher men mind you on the border of the Yellow Nile. What is now the Wadi Hawa or the dried up riverbed running through Chad into Sudan. Even 3 decades ago the river bed was teeming with life. Trees and animals but lately it has become as dry as the surrounding desert. Imagine fish jumping out of the river, giraffes strolling bye food aplenty and compare that to present days’ harsh environment.

As the river dried up the Zaghawa ancestors moved to different locations. Jebel Moon in Sudan and Kanem in Western Chad were two sites. Even today they can understand each other although the Westerns became market men (and therefore despised by the people from the East). In the East they became warrior nomads with huge amounts of cattle and later camels. By nature they enforced themselves into a position of lording over others. Even today you can start to understand why even though only 1 % of Chad is Zaghawa they still rule the country! The toughness and ruthlessness which is required to survive the desert environment on can see oozing through.

Zaghawa men are said to be afraid only of women laughter and songs. Picture this; Every time a young man enters a room all women present sing a song about how he got wounded in battle, in the back… A clear sign he was not a hero. Or having to hear your whole life that you were not brave enough to steal a camel as dowry (this is custom for the braver members of the tribe)

The same men that attack any animal without fear, who battle until the last man standing have shaking knees when their women sing.

As our plane landed in between copious amounts of sand being swept around us we awaited the arrival of a second plane. It circled the airport three times but due to lack of visibility they had to return to Abeche.

We were lucky. On arrival I rushed straight to my chooks. A head count and it seemed 5 youngsters were missing. Only later in the day after a search of the compound I located all of them. Phew a good moment. And we now have to black kittens with blue eyes.

Tomorrow I can return to the camp. I cannot wait to see. It is 4 degrees at night and I hope all people have warm covers to sleep. Stories need to be shared with Osman, Adam, Zahara and the others. Finally I have laptop with functioning DVD player so I can show them the CBS 60 minutes piece. Also we have a visitor Melissa, media expert who will do some interviews, make some photos and explain the working of a camera so the project of the photo exposition may take of.

All of you a good night,

Namaskar

Ashis

Bahai Beach 36

Bahai Beach 36

January 15, 2007

Kicking up some dust.

N’Djamena – Abeche by car is what I can recommend all. Fourteen hours of landscapes. Passing through little villages with mud brick round tukuls (houses) with straw roofs. Meeting camels and men on horse back with long spears. Even an anteater on a mission was spotted. They look so cute. The landscape becomes more and more mountainous and the road gets progressively more crap. At one point you can envision seeing a lady lying on her back in the distance. The natural rock formations are pilled up as if some one has helped to put up layer after layer. Luckily we did not need to progress to Bangui (capital of Central African Republic) as the mud path there looked really tough.
Halfway through the day our car went air born as the hole next to the road we hit was deeper then expected. Luckily to quote Joseph; “Stop!!! We lost our log frames” and not our lives. We could pick up some carton rolls containing posters with the IRC philosophy. The end of the journey was a nice encounter with the Chadian troops who were not pleased when one of cars almost ran through their barricade. It took some gentle explanation form our side to let us enter into Abeche.

Just thinking back it is less than 2 months ago when rebels took Abeche in a mighty swoop. The same rebels which now have switched allegiance and have joined the Government to eradicate other rebel groups still available. Let us hope the violence will stay under control.

In our neighboring country; a peace agreement, un troops can come, o sorry did we say that, no un troops and the rebels did not sign a peace agreement. How long can the Janus faced Omar el Basher get away with his rule and divide?

The camp is near! Our flight is booked on Thursday and I cannot wait to be back with my chickens. Friday inch Allah I may finally see what has happened in the camp. As I said when I left for a break I am sure they did an excellent job and there was Dr Ponce to cover so all things will be fine. Worries of course about the mental state of mind of the refugees. I just cannot imagine how they will feel after the bombarding near the camp. Just imagine the sight of the ugly sight of the Antonovs. The vicious planes used in the campaign to drive them out of Darfur in the first place. How much silly ness need they go through?

There is good news as well! We have hired a Chadian doctor and the Chadian midwife will be on the plane as well very soon towards Oure Cassoni and then somewhere next week we have a big medical meeting to set out the health priorities for 2007. And a photo exposition of people in the camp will be organized over the next two months. Youths will be given digital cameras and training. We hope to see some beautiful results. If all works out well all the photographers who have visited Oure Cassoni have been requested to send some of the photos they made so an exposition can be organized in the camp, in our Abeche office as well as our N’Djamena office. And we have deployed our huge Mercedes truck. It means that we are less dependant on other agencies to transport our goods to and from the camp. As a first shipment medication, computers, construction items as well generators may be sent.

For tomorrow and the day after in Abeche a media training is being planned. Looking forward to that as well. The intricacies of getting the story told. The story of the refugees.

And the next blog will be from Bahai again….


Lucky me,

Namaskar,

Ashis

Bahai Beach 35

Bahai Beach 35

January 10, 2007

And just when you think the worst has happened…

The beach in Cameroon was still sounding in my ears. Sand in my hair a smile on my bronzed face. Very relaxed. And then you hear that 10 kilometers from the Oure Cassoni bombs were dropped by a Sudanese Antonov. This in an open attempt to destroy the dam or perhaps a scare tactic? What is clear that Omar el Bashir is toning down his voice on intervention of UN troops in Sudan. But his action speaks for it self.

What must go through the mind of the refugees? This is how they were chased from their home villages. Fleeing to Chad in the hope for safety and then…
It seems that their hometowns of Kornoi and Omboro have been target for bombing as well. Split tongue president, master of divide and rule. But I just read the United States have worked hard to prepare for their embassy.
And the Chinese they just smile. Oil is coming their way so our buffoon has his buttocks covered in the Security Council as well. I must say that reading Jung Chang’s Mao biography has put me off beat a bit. He was such a ruthless leader. For his own personal fief 70 million people were executed, tortured or starved to death and the entire population suffered from his megalomania. In those days it was said that what happened was suppressed from the collective memory. Yet what refrains us from see the ugly reality in Sudan?

There is a painful unwillingness to interfere from the regional and international side. Time to speak up.

While events in Darfur are heating up the avian flu crises is popping up in Africa as well. Culling of the poultry as has been done in South East Asia and Europe has not been done yet. But it remains to be seen if these drastic measures are required.

And then the Chadians on the run are now over 100000 people. As we speak a mission is underway to investigate if IRC can help out in setting up a camp for those who have fled their homes. There is another IRC team in the Central African Republic to find out if the needs are there for a camp as well and then there is Cameroon where camps are considered as well. Cameroon being a very fertile country it for sure gives a different feel to camp life of Bahai.

Oure Cassoni now is under sand storms quite often. The chooks have built a windscreen as their lazy boss was too busy bumming around in Cameroon. Their food comes from their underground lair. When the wind gets really bad I am sure we can hide there.

Boys and girls, I will be on route again towards Bahai on Friday. I am curious to know how the camp is doing. Are people terrorized about the plane movements? Are they considering moving? How do they feel about the threat to the dam? These and many more questions come to mind.

But for now I am off to sleep.

Wielenklem,

Ashis

Bahai Beach 34

Bahai Beach 34

Cameroon

January third two thousand seven.

Dear all,

In Douala there is a main square called Hotel de Ville. It was there near a fountain I was playing checkers with one of the local men. Suddenly hue and cries. A white Ferrari rolled up and the boys and men in the park went crazy. It was Djemba Djemba a football player from the English Premiership. As his car was about to be trashed he handed over a huge bundle of money and sped of like grease lightning. And then it was like inferno hit the quiet park. One of the men had received the bundle and he ran to the public toilet. There he was besieged by about 50 men and boys demanding their share of the money. The ruckus caused disturbance to focus on the ongoing checkers game and I duly lost. I must say however the only game I won that day was because my host decided it was embarrassing to end the day with a zero. Riot police now popped up to keep the crowd of about 100 under control. I managed to slip in to the public toilet as some of the money was dispersed. No money for me however. The poor guy who received the money by now was only wearing his shorts as the rest was torn of his body. Seriously crowbars and stones were about to be used.

Money so funny….

In the camp in the mean time everything must be fine. Every day bad news is coming from Darfur where now the big cities are under siege as well. Effectively leaving the refugees or IDPs without access to the essentials. Perhaps they will come over to the Chadian side now. It seems here there is a lull in fighting with major groups signing peace agreements. Yet the camp has managed to transfer a pregnant lady to Bahai and then Abeche for a caesarean. The baby died but the woman survived. And a victim of a robbery got shot in the abdomen and evacuated to Abeche as well. Vaccinations are ongoing as are the consultations and health promotion activities. A self running system with minimal expatriates and national staff. It is sure now that a lot can be done bye the refugees themselves.

Being away now for several weeks now has given a chance to reflect.

Truly the refugees are underestimated at all times. They are true survivors, knowing all about desert life. We operate with more than 15 expatriate posts. It sounds so much to me. As a general rule the less people involved in decision making process the smoother things run. In other organisations people have the same sentiment. Somehow the activities that need to be done are done. For sure some other activities will lose out but what to do in a security environment like this. For me a lesson learnt is that I prefer small teams. A next mission my first question will be how big is the team? The second one: how difficult are the refugees perceived to be?

Forget about difficult… Zaghawa are easy they just know what the want. So if they are constructing houses it means they are preparing to slug it out in the desert some more.
Whenever I ask why the pick such a difficult environment to live in the answer is simple. This is DarZaghawa, our homeland. This is as close as we can be to our real home villages. And this is the lifestyle we are habituated to.
The camp is filled with positive feeling to me. There are adults going to school to learn Arabic. There is hope that the conflict will be resolved by either mediating either fighting. And there are the endless smiles of the children. The last weeks I spent at least an hour every day to walk through the camp. On my way to autopsy interviews or to see the functioning of different parts of the program. Everywhere you go you can hear OK OK. Or Ashis, Ashis. It makes a big smile pop up on my face every day I go to the camp. The administrative issues or the miscommunications within or between agencies are forgotten the moment a little Zaghawa girl comes up to you to hold your hand.

Or talking with the leaders who come up with solutions for the perceived problems in the camp. These endless meetings I have referred to in the past has more to do with not listening on our side or sending unclear messages on our side and there is the tradition of talking a lot by the big fish. Well I must say all sides are talking a lot. Perhaps at time a dialogue is more at place…


The chickens have entered my dream world now. I am being kept updated regularly. The cold is too much and the sandstorms are disturbing them. I have bee requested on arrival also to do something about all the snoring expatriates. The generator they can live with but all the high pitched and low groaning of the team in the field is just too much. They have officially requested for earplugs. As I am new to this business I wonder if anyone can help me out as t what size these darlings of mine require.

I miss my chicken and colleagues.

One day I will be back and well rested.

I am off to eat lobster on the beach

Namaskar

Ashis