Where it all began

Another entry, another African capital. This time though, I already know my way around.

For the first time since 29 Peace Corps volunteers and staff crossed the Chari to avoid the forces of the FUCD (yes, seriously), April 14, 2006 at about 10:30 AM, I'm back in Chad, in N'Djamena. I wouldn't say if I've come full circle though- I feel like I'd have to go back to Gounou-Gaya for that to happen, and unfortunately that's not going to happen on this trip. I originally came up from Yaoundé for about a month to work on a proposal, but after CRS decided not to pursue the opportunity, I'll only be here a few more days before heading back to Cameroon. I'm a little disappointed; the opportunity to be back here, a place that most NGO people and diplomats dread, is wonderful.

The familiarity begins from the moment I arrive. I step through the turnstile gate into the main hall in the N'Djamena airport, and see a face I recognize. Abba Ali Mahamat used to be a driver for the Peace Corps, and is now working for CRS. He's rail-thin, enormously tall, and with skin so black it looks almost bluish. His hair is grayer than I remember, and he's wearing a dark-red 'func suit' as we used to call them, named after the two-piece functionnaire (civil servant) outfit common around here instead of the typical bubu I'd almost always seen him in as a volunteer. We embrace. "Nathaniel, it's been a long time," he says.

"Too long," I answer.

"Tu me rappelles, n'est-ce pas?" he asks. You remember me, right?

"How could I forget- you're Abba Ali Mahamat," I respond.

He smiles.

Even though my life of Land Cruisers, air-conditioning and high-speed Internet is a world away from what I knew as a Peace Corps volunteer, something about being here just feels right, and familiar. This is Africa as I first saw it five and a half years ago; hot, dry, and desperately poor, with mirrored sunglasses and turbans. Everything feels familiar here- the superheated dusty air, the sand along the streets, the beat-up yellow Peugeot cabs with red and blue hand-painted numbers, even the kids yelling 'nasarra' at me, the most familiar word for 'white person' I know.

Perhaps the epitome of this familiarity happens when David, the Country Representative, takes me out to dinner the first night I'm in town.

"We'll go to one of my favorite local places," he tells me on the way. We pass the Rond-Point de 100 Ans, the sculpture commemorating N'Djamena's 100th anniversary, and less than a kilometer later, turn off into the dust and park against a the high wall of a restaurant. "I don't know if you know this place, but this is Le Pelican," David says. "The food is good, and it's inexpensive."

I can't help but laugh, and I explain why to David. As Peace Corps volunteers, Le Pelican was one of our favorite places to go, for the same reasons as David listed. Also, it was an inexpensive taxi ride from SIL, the missionary compound where we used to stay. I've probably been there 20 times, enough to remember the large pelican (the namesake) that would promenade among the tables, squawking at anyone in its way, and to know that the beef brochettes were best avoided, as they usually had the distinct taste of the propane stove they were cooked over.

Memories of gas-flavored beef aside, this isn't to say that there aren't any differences though. To the contrary, N'Djamena feels like a city on the move- I'm not sure exactly where it's going though. On the positive side, newly-paved roads are everywhere; the bumpy track that used to lead to the Peace Corps office is now two paved and striped lanes on each side with streetlights running down the center. People still drive horribly along the roads, only now LED traffic lights powered by solar panels control at least a portion of the madness, when taxis and motorcycles bother to stop for them. On the other hand, the beautiful and enormous trees that used to line the shops of Avenue Charles de Gaulle are now gone, chopped down by President Deby's men following an attack by rebel forces on the capital in 2008. The road passing alongside the Presidential Palace and central government headquarters feels far more militarized, with giant cement blocks lining the walls, higher strands of razor-wire, and many, many more of the Presidential Guard, virtually all of whom come from the president's own Zaghawa tribe, their thin, angular, Arab-esque faces topped with crimson-berets and yellow bandanas, toting enormous machine-guns, all in desert khaki uniforms and reflective sunglasses.

The next day, I'm walking along the street, making my way to one of the nearby shops where I can grab an egg sandwich with peppers, one of the few street food options I happen to see near the office. My shoes have turned almost completely gray from several centimeters of sand lining the road. It's hot (no real surprise there), and I'm not really paying much attention to the people around me.

"Na-tahn-yel, bonjour!" someone yells.

I wheel around- I haven't heard my name pronounced like that in years. Who could possibly know me? I see a young man on a bike- he waves. I look a bit closer.

"Ramadji?" I ask.

"Oui, c'est moi," he answers. Yes, it's me. I shake my head in astonishment.

Ramadji Cyrus was one of my favorite students when I taught in Gounou-Gaya, one of the few who I could see had the real potential to be a success, provided he could get out of the village, and somewhere he could use his intelligence and talents. I'm thrilled to see he has, and to meet him on the street in N'Djamena, a city of roughly 1,000,000 people is pretty incredible. I'm running short on time, so we exchange phone numbers and agree to meet for lunch. The next day, over plates of shwarma and fried Capitaine (Nile perch) at La Marquise, the Libyan bakery in the center of town, Ramadji and I catch up. He's in his second year at one of the local institutes of technology, where he's studying telecommunications- with a certificate in the field, he can get a job with Zain or Tigo, two of the big mobile phone operators in Chad. It's great to see that he's been able to move forward, and listening to him tell me about the handful of other students I'd hoped to hear from - Koussoungue, Mystere, and Sippa, it's great to know that they're all doing well too, in universities, working, or something else.

I get back to the guesthouse that evening, surrounded (in typical expat fashion in Chad) by high walls, electrified barbed wire, and patrolled by guards- the reality of life in a place where the gap between rich and poor is so vast. Getting out of the silver RAV4, I stop to talk for a moment with one of the guards, a rail-thin young man with large brown eyes.

"C'est comment?" I ask. How's it going? It's a common saying around here, even though it's completely wrong in French.

"Ça va," he answers, the standard response for virtually any question in this part of the world.

"So, where are you from in Chad?" I ask.

"Le Sud," he answers. The south.

"Where in the south?" I press.

"A little village called Gounou-Gaya; I'm sure you don't know it."

"Are you serious?" I answer in disbelief.

"Oui."

"I lived in Gounou-Gaya for two years" I tell him. "I was a teacher at the high school."

He looks at me again.

"Monsieur Nah-tahn-yel, c'est vous?" Is that you?

"Yes" I answer. "Were you one of my students?"

"No," he responds. "I was already in Terminale (the last year) when you were there, so I wasn't in your classes."

"What an amazing coincidence, in any case," I answer. We chat for a few more minutes, and I walk into the house, marveling at how small the world apparently is.

A few days later I have a chance to meet Grâce, one of the language teachers we had during our Peace Corps training. She meets me in her sister's 4x4 at the French Cultural Center in the middle of town. She wears a matching blue and yellow complet, with a blouse, skirt, and headscarf, typical attire for Christian Chadian women, especially someone relatively well-off, like Grâce.

Arriving back at her house I meet Béatitude, Grâce's daughter, who I knew as a chubby five-month-old, but who is now a beautiful little four-year-old, who shyly shakes my hand and whispers "Ça va?" when I greet her.

As Grâce and I catch up, Béatitude begins to warm to me, coming over to tap me on the shoulder- I stick my tongue out, and she giggles. We talk a bit longer, and Grâce goes to get drinks from a nearby boutique. Béatitude sits on a plastic mat off to the side, playing with a plastic Fisher-Price airplane. She looks at me expectantly, and I join her on the mat. We play with the plane, tossing the pilots in and out, flying circles around her head, and coming to a landing at her feet.

She wears an enormous smile- it's probably rare that an adult will actually play with her, something that isn't common in Chadian society. After awhile, Grâce comes back, we talk a bit more, and I catch a ride on her friend's motorcycle back to the guesthouse, just as night is falling. It's a slightly harrowing trip on a motorcycle with a headlight that works only intermittently, and I'm very happy when I climb off the bike and back onto the ground.

The next few days fly by, a blur of meeting old friends, including a chance to reconnect with Al-Hadj and Adji, two of the former drivers for the Peace Corps. They both work for the US embassy now in N'Djamena, and over a lunch of nachif (grilled meat and vegetables), we catch up on the past few years. Both seem mostly unchanged, although there are new kids, jobs, and marriages- life clearly went on uninterrupted after we left. We talk about 'les evenements,' as the rebel attacks on the capital in 2008 are referred to, where large portions of the city were heavily damaged, with hundreds of people dying in the fighting. The only evidence I see is the machine that I used to get soft ice cream from at L'Amandine, the French bakery in the center of town- it still works, but now sports a rather large bullet hole in the side. Al-Hadj and Adji talk about a wary sort of calm throughout the city, as everyone waits to see what happens next.

That does seem to be the general theme of life in Chad though- always a sense of waiting to see what happens next, a life dependent on the fates, where the next rebel surge could change everything. Despite all of this, however, life goes on, and people find a way to cope. Life isn't easy there, and being back even for a brief time reminds me just how tenuous things can be. Even as a volunteer, I lived a well-protected and insulated life in many ways, and didn't really get a true sense of that fragility; I'm not sure if I ever could have. Now, I certainly can't. I think the realization that that tenuousness exists though provides some perspective, however, and it's one that I'm glad to have. Realizing that the majority of people in a place like Chad tend to look at life with the realization that everything can change on a whim affects how you design and manage anything, and can sometimes make the whole concept of sustainability seem a little ridiculous.

Ultimately, my trip ends up being much shorter than I'd planned, but I feel like it's been meaningful all the same. Not being able to go back to Gounou-Gaya, I didn't get the closure I guess I thought a trip to Chad might bring, but still feel like it was worth it. Seeing familiar places and old friends was a wonderful way to get some perspective, and as I move into the next step of my life in this whole 'development' thing, I'm grateful to have had a moment to catch a glimpse of where it all started…

Message From An Old Friend

I've been trying for the past couple months, but I was finally able to get through to Marc, my friend and 'host father' while I was with the Peace Corps in Chad. He was my next door neighbor and close friend for the almost 21 months I lived in Gounou-Gaya, a small town in the southwestern portion of the country, not far from the Cameroonian border.

I've wanted to speak with him for awhile now, to tell him about my new job in Cameroon, and how I'm hoping to come back to Chad at some point to visit him, if I can. We haven't spoken since last summer, something I feel really guilty about- I keep meaning to, but something gets in the way, or I'm suddenly off in a place with no phone reception for a month at a time. In any case, the Zain Prepaid gods are cooperating in both Yei and Gounou-Gaya this morning, and my call miraculously goes through.

It's great to catch up with Marc, and we exchange the usual greetings, the endless ritual of "ça-va" ing ('How's it going?' in French), cut short for the phone. He says it's great to hear from me. I tell him about the new job in Yaoundé, and he sounds genuinely excited to hear about it. I hear him explaining it to his wife, Valaddi, in Musey, their native language. I've forgotten the little bit I knew, but I manage to hear 'ça-va-Oui, au Soudan," and "Yaoundé.'

"I wanted to call you earlier to tell you," Marc says in French, "but I didn't have your number."

"Yes, I've been moving a lot," I answer.

"J'ai perdu ma fille en Janvier," he says. 'I lost my daughter in January.'

I freeze. I remember each of Marc's daughters well. Tang-Ira, (aka Tanga), the oldest, who was about eight years old when I lived in Gounou-Gaya. I remember helping her get enrolled in the private Catholic primary school in the village, run by a group of nuns. Ka-Idi, two years younger, started school at the same time, with the cutest wide smile, and always wearing a brightly covered headscarf, to look more like her mother.

Hophyra, the mischievous four-year-old (at the time) who used to run up to me and clutch my leg- I remember her telling her father one night that she wanted to go to school for the bouille, the milky-peanut porridge that all the little kids got for lunch, and watching Marc laugh uproariously. And Dakassia, just around two-and-a-half when I left; I remember how she would poke her head inside the covered patio of my house, looking for me, saying 'Nyah-ne-nehl,' and waving. I had an American flag pattern hacky-sack I got from the US embassy in N'Djamena that she and I used to play catch with; I'd toss it, and she'd fling it back at me, as hard as a two-year-old could.

"Ç'était qui?" I ask, wishing I didn't have to find out. Who was it?

"Ma fille, Dakassia," he answers.

"Oh Marc, I'm so sorry," I say. "Do you know what happened?"

"We think it was malaria."

"My condolences, Marc. Thank you for telling me."

We talk a few minutes more, but I feel like I don't really have much else to say. The thought of his daughter dying hangs over me, and doesn't really make me want to continue chatting.

Less than a month ago, in this same space, I wrote about what it'll be like when I go back to Chad to visit, and how much I was looking forward to seeing Marc and all of his children again. Of all his children, I feel like I was the closest with Dakassia, and found myself smiling to imagine the cute little girl she'd be by now, possibly just starting CP1, the first year of school. Instead, she's dead, of a disease that can be prevented so easily. One more casualty that didn't need to happen.

In Chad, one in five children is expected to die by the age of five; it's the brutal reality of life in that corner of the developing world. The World Health Organization says that almost 2,400 people die of Malaria in Africa every day, the majority of them children under the age of five. I've known about these statistics for years, internalized them, and always thought about how tragic they are. Until today though, they'd just been numbers, and I never had a face to put with them. Now, picturing Marc sitting with all the other men at the place mortiere, the traditional gathering in southern Chad after a death, where everyone arrives and sits quietly with the mourners. Nothing needs to be said- the sense of grief is palpable, and shared.

Objectively, it makes sense- Marc had five children, so statistically, it was probably going to happen. That doesn't make it fair, or right though. I wish I'd known sooner, and I wish there was a way I could have done something to help. Crass at it may sound to say this, it's too late for his daughter, but there are still ways to get involved and work to stop the spread of Malaria. I've included a few links to major NGOs and campaigns working to do things like distribute treated bed-nets, and promote education campaigns, key steps in the fight against the disease.

http://psi.org/
http://www.nothingbutnets.net/
http://malariaconsortium.org/
http://www.rollbackmalaria.org/

I may be in Sudan, but today, my thoughts are in a small Chadian village. It was great to speak with Marc this morning, but I still wish I hadn't heard such terrible news. I hope I'll have the chance to see him before long, and the rest of his kids- when I do though, someone, a little girl, will be missing.

I'll remember though...

Finding My Motivation

A few weeks ago, I found out that I was selected for a fellowship with Catholic Relief Services, meaning that my time with my current organization will be coming to end at the end of June. It makes being here challenging, knowing I have something much better coming down the line.

Earlier this week I learned a bit more detail about the position with CRS, and it looks like I'll be moving to Yaoundé, the capital of Cameroon, beginning in August. After working in Chad, northern Uganda, Niger, and southern Sudan, the thought of being based in a big green city, with mountains, nice restaurants and more is pretty exciting.

For the moment though I'm here, and I'm trying not to let the challenges weigh me down too much. It's mostly little stuff, but when it's all lumped together, the frustration builds. The heat is truly oppressive, for one- it feels completely unfair that it's already 100º F (38ºC) at 11AM, and thermometer regularly hits 112º or more (44º) at the height of the day. The hours between 1 and 4PM are the worst- the fan I have pointed at my face just serves to redirect the hot air more forcefully.

I think the thing I've had the hardest time with though, is food. When the only green things in sight are the canvas tents that serve as our bedrooms, plastic tarps, and acacia trees sporting massive thorns, it makes the thought of a salad feel like a distant, happy memory. Meals around here tend to be basically white rice and meat, with the meat basically looking like it was prepared by forcing a grenade down the unlucky cow's throat.

It isn't the conditions though, as much as just a feeling that I'm ready to move on professionally, and the idea of continuing to work in communications, which is interesting, but not what I want to be doing, is tough. Also, the second-class status that comes with being 'the volunteer' is always there, even if it's unintentional.

I don't meant to turn this into a bitch session though- I knew what I was getting into when I came to Sudan, and if I couldn't hack it, I wouldn't be here. Still, given that I know something better is coming along, it isn't the easiest thing to put up with life in a tent, crappy food, and oppressive heat as daily facts of life.

Whenever I feel like this though, it's hard not to feel a little guilty though, knowing just how I good I have it. Every walk I take down the road, through the market, or even around the compound reinforces the fact that I won the geographic and socio-economic lottery in so many ways, and that being able to leave Sudan in just a couple months is a luxury few people around here, if any, will ever have.

I find myself thinking more and more about what life will be like in Cameroon though, and how strange it'll be to finally be living more of a standard 'expat' life. I wonder if I'll miss some of the challenge that comes along with a place like southern Sudan. The previous places I've worked have all allowed me to claim a certain amount of 'hard-core' credibility, and I wonder how it'll feel to be in a place people go on vacation to, instead of from.

I guess the key is not letting Sudan get to me over the next eight weeks. Yes, things aren't ideal, but it's a temporary thing, and if I can manage to stay busy, I'm sure it'll fly by.

I hope so, at least.


***

On a different note, since I've learned that I'll be going to Cameroon, I've had another thought on my mind. How and when I can get back to Chad? It's just northeast of Cameroon, and I feel like I need to see the people I left behind so abruptly when Peace Corps pulled out. I keep thinking about what it might feel like to show up in Gounou-Gaya; how would people react? How many would remember me? Would it be different, now that I'd be 'the expat' living the big city? Those sorts of things concern me.

Then I think about what it'll be like to see my friend and 'host father' Marc again, to see his four daughters, the youngest of which used to chant 'Nyah-na-nehl' and clutch my leg as she waddled along in the way that only toddlers can. What about Hophyra, who I remember as a mischevious four-year old who loved to wrestle her big sisters at any and every opportunity. Will Ka-Idi and Tanga, the oldest, still be in school?

I'm sure it'll be wonderful to see them, but probably a little weird at the same time. Hard to say though; I guess I'll only know when it happens.