15 years ago, I was on the most remote place in the world
[i-storm on Peter I island]
I have done plenty of crazy stuff in my life, but a few adventures stand out.
Exactly 15 years ago, I was on what is called "the most remote place in the world", an Antarctic island called "Peter I". It was remote, even to Antarctic standards: three days sailing from the nearest South Pole base and 1,000 miles away from the nearest hospital. 1,000 miles of frozen sea and drifting ice bergs.
[i-Antarctica with Peter I Island]
It took our expedition team 6 days to get there, departing with an ice breaker from the Falklands - by itself not known to be the most frequented tourist destination.
When we landed on Peter I, we were only the third team to ever put foot on the island. Imagine that: there had been more people and more landings on the moon than on that island.
15 years ago, to the date according to my diary, we had the roughest storm ever. I described it in this short story.
[i-Peter on Peter I]
This was crazy stuff. The mere size and financial risk of the expedition, the logistical challenges, the nightmares in battling the snow blizzards hoping nobody would get hurt, and that (please God!) the tents would hold up...
But the real nutty stuff was that we had no clue how were were going to get back to the civilized world. A one way ticket to the most remote place on the planet, it seemed...
We had chartered a Russian research vessel to pick us up (see this short story), but they would only go as far as King George island, in the North of the Antarctic.
How we were going to get out of King George, was still a logistics puzzle we had not resolved when we landed on Peter I.
Desperate situations required drastic measures, so while still on the island, we chartered a C130 plane from the Uruguayan air force, through a company in Punta Arenas (Chili).
Over short wave radio, we made deals with the charter company to put day-trip tourists on the plane, splitting the charter fee with us. To cover the remaining costs, we had to sell all our tents and survival gear on King George island before the plane flew us to Southern Chili.
[i-Honey, I chartered a plane... Our C130 on King George island]
That was 15 years ago. Two months after I (eventually) got back to Belgium, I did my first mission as a humanitarian aid worker. And another series of crazy adventures started.
My three expeditions to the Antarctic and the Pacific are recorded in this eBook. It's in Dutch, but try the translate widget in the side bar. Enjoy!
Rumble: Water for the Toposa in South Sudan
Topohsa in South Sudan[i-Topohsa in South Sudan]
Meet the Toposa people. These traditional herdsmen live in a remote area on the shared borders of Uganda, Kenya and Sudan. Their tribe is called "Karamojong" in Uganda, "Turkana" in Kenya (an area stretching from the Rift Valley to Lokichoggio) and "Toposa" in Sudan (from Lokichoggio to Narus and Kapoeta, in the eastern Juba).
They live the life as it once was. Clothing is optional in their "country". If they have a cloth, serves the whole village, used when travelling outside the community.
Their life is centered in function of their cattle. Their cattle is their life. Traditional diet is cow blood mixed with a sort of cassava.
The family and tribe has a patriarchical system: Toposa men take decisions on behalf of the family or tribes in meetings where women and children are kept at a distance while the men discuss the people’s affairs. Tradition has it that important matters are decided in the early hours of the morning before sunrise.
Toposa in South Sudan[i-Toposa in South Sudan]
Last year, the Toposa in South Sudan faced drought, cutting not only their water supplies, but also their food production. Only delivering food aid was not enough, so we started trucking in water with the food.
It was clear that a more permanent solution was to be found, to provide them with water, a rare item in the Toposaland.
delivering water to the Toposa[i-delivering water to the Toposa]
delivering water to the Toposa[i-delivering water to the Toposa]
This solution was to dig a bor hole, where they could pump water from an underground well. We trucked in the mechanical pump, and connected it to a small plastic storage tank. A low cost, low tech but also low maintenance solution.
Offloading the storage tank[i-Offloading the storage tank]
Installing a pump. Any work is a community affair, so loads of people are interested![i-Installing a pump. Any work is a community affair, so loads of people are interested!]
The borhole and pump are operational![i-The borhole and pump are operational!]
Aid with a permanent impact...
This post was written as follow-up to a previous one: World Water Day: One billion people without clean water.
Pictures courtesy Constance Lewanika (WFP), with a special thanks to Cyprien Hiniolwa.
News: The End of the Last Shangri-La?
kindergarten classroom in Bhutan[i-kindergarten classroom in Bhutan]
Back in 2000, I had the privilege to spend two weeks in Bhutan. We had several school feeding project in remote areas. Kids would cross mountains at the beginning of the term, and only go back to their homes three months later. The schools had no funds for the kids' meals, and that was where we came in.
Over the past 20 years I have lived, or visited about 150 countries. From Antarctica to Kiribati, from East Timor to Andorra. Bhutan is the country that I would pick as the one place which left the longest lasting imprint in my mind. The people, their smiles and forthcomingness. The landscape and isolation. The culture. The "world's last Shangri-La", I thought.
This last Shangri-La seems to be no longer sheltered from the typical 21st century world problems, it seems:
A bomb exploded in Bhutan on Monday, the latest in a string of blasts blamed on ethnic Nepali exiles and designed to disrupt the Himalayan kingdom's first-ever parliamentary poll next month, police said. The United Revolutionary Front of Bhutan (URFB), a newly formed armed group fighting for the rights of ethnic Nepalis exiled in 1991, claimed responsibility for the blast, warning of more attacks unless the March 24 elections were cancelled. (Full)
Source: The Other World News
School in Ura, Bhutan: Food for Education[i-School in Ura, Bhutan: Food for Education]
Rumble: Airport Security... Eh?
When coming back from Kuwait, checking in for our flight to Rome, we went through the first security control, at the entrance of the airport departures building. I put my bags through a large Xray machine, and stepped through the screening frame. It beeped, as I still had my mobile, wallet and coins in my pockets. I had not even taken off my heavy overcoat. The security guard did not blink, gave me a quick superficial frisk while was smiling at Liz, one of my travel companions: “Hey habiba, where are you from?” I could have carried an AK47, he still would have had more attention for my blond (female) colleague.
The second security point was just a check if you had a boarding pass, after which you got into the tax free shopping area. After immigration, came the second Xray check. I was about to take off my overcoat, and the security guy waved me through ‘Habibi, jalla, jalla!’ (My friend, fast, fast!). When he saw I hesitated, he smiled at me ‘Come, come. It is ok!’, referring to the overcoat I had half-pulled off. Of course the ‘thing’ beeped. This time, he did not even frisk me. Just smiled at me ‘It is ok, habibi!’
It seemed the real security check was to happen at the boarding gate where two guards with utterly bored faces, asked me to take off belt, shoes, and coat, but only gave the Xray screen an occasional look…
Hmmm… security is only as good as the people who have to enforce it.
Or maybe not… Maybe the machines also play an important role in the dis-security. I remember in Islamabad, Pakistan, shortly after 9/11, we had to push our stuff through a monster Xray machine as soon as we entered the airport building. The machine hardly ever paused, and the security guards seemed to enjoy to see stuff jammed off the belt at the end. A guaranteed mess, certainly as people there were not known for “travelling light”.
One day, I could see the screen of the Xray machine, reflected in the glasses of the guard. I thought I saw the screen flickering as if it were defective. I got suspicious, and while I was grabbing my bags from the pile, I bent forward to see the actual Xray screen. It was as I had expected: the screen did not work, apart from ‘snow’ it only had large horizontal stripes scrolling over it, like an old TV which had lost it signal. The thing was defective, and the whole security setup was only a show..!
Talking about pre-flight security. The funniest was in Teheran-Iran, where during one visit, I had to take national flights regularly. The pre-boarding screening was done manually. You disappeared, with a guard, in a small cubicle, with curtains at two sides, and the guy would frisk you. It seemed it was always the same guy, who frisked me. And he did it very… eh… thoroughly. He clearly liked the body contact, and would hold me really close when frisking my back, standing in front of me – rather than having me turn around… The last thing he always did, was softly squeezing my private parts, while giving me a wide wink and smile. Hmmm…
Anyways, on the flight from Kuwait to Rome, the view from the plane onto the remote areas in Iran was astonishing. Some were like we were looking at the world, from a space ship.. A sample I wanted to share with you...
[i-Iran from the air]Iran from the air[i-Iran from the air]Iran from the air[i-Iran from the air]Iran from the air[i-Iran from the air]
The Theory of Relativity
link[i-link]A young man came to me with a request for a salary advance at the end of another day in the ‘deep field’ - a day full of nuisances and challenges. The form bore two signatures, which gave me some reassurance the request had gone through some initial screening process. I asked him for his name and what he did for WFP. The answer didn’t come immediately, so I repeated my question. After some seconds of hesitation, he uttered a few words in Dinka, the local language. Being Italian, I had no difficulty in using my body language to make him understand to come back with an interpreter which he did.
His name and function though, did not match those on the form. I asked the translator, one of the two signatories, why the name on the form was not the same name as that provided by the young man.
- “Well, because that’s his brother’s name”, the interpreter replied.
- “And where is his brother?” I queried.
- “He deceased a couple of months ago!” he said.
- “This is not a family position” I growled, “We only employ people through a selection process based on competencies and relevant work experience. Ask him how he was hired..”
- “Well, he inherited his brother’s family so he took his brother’s job to maintain them.”
He certainly had a point and I was about to mellow out.
- “So, what type of contract have you been given, my son?”
Without hesitation the interpreter offered the answer:
- “None!”
I held my breath for a moment, thought to answer, but could not but smile. I closed my laptop and called it a day.
Story by Enrico Pausilli, edited by “E” and Peter Casier
Picture courtesy Ulrik Pedersen
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Twenty-Four Hours in Aweil.
I have twenty-four hours in Aweil to build a concrete base for the office satellite communications dish. This system enables us to cut down the communications costs dramatically, so I really have to get it up and running before the plane picks me up again. And I only have one day to do it. The challenge is to find casual laborers to help me build the concrete base. The rest of the work, I can do by myself.
After hiring a dozen of them who resign minutes after they have taken the job, I am introduced to these Darfur refugees who accepted my terms and conditions: work through the night until the concrete base is done, load the gravel, the bricks, the iron rods and transport them to the site. They take the job.
We work from 14:30 and complete the work the next day at 03:00 in the morning. At 08:30 we continue, plastering the bricks. This is when I take a picture of this man. This daily labour is a refugee from Darfur. He has little or nothing. Not even a home. He lives in a camp. He worked through the night and still, he smiles. It is comforting to see this smile.
[i-A smile from a man with barely nothing, but his heart]
When I pay them in the evening, they look at me like someone who just gave them an award or a present. And yet, the salary is their right. They are thankful while yet they did ME a favour!
I leave wishing I could be more of help to them another day. I realize this is what I enjoy about working in this part of the world. In all of my actions, I get the chance to see its immediate impact on the people, on the beneficiaries. I will never regret having chosen to work here. Here I get what a big salary or a promotion cannot give me: the feeling that I have been of help to a human being.
Story and picture by Cyprien Hiniolwa (Camp Juba, Southern Sudan).
Edited by “E” and Peter Casier
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Rumble: Back in Dubai
Burj Dubai[i-Burj Dubai]I am back in Dubai for the first time since I left one and half year ago. In a way, it feels like I never left, and on the other hand, so much has changed in this city where roads are modified overnight and mega skyscrapers are built in record time.
So would I want to live here again? Mmmm. Don't think so. But is great to be back! Read the full post...
Rumble: Updates, New Ebook Stories, and Other Stuff...
link[i-link]While this blog started as a channel to publish my eBook short stories, one day I decided to also blog about stuff happening around me. This is how the 'rumble posts' started, still mostly focused on 'travel' and 'adventure' subjects. As most of my travel is for work, and because the humanitarian cause makes a large part of my drive, I decided a while ago to also publish news items, or digests of news items ("News Round-ups") which come close to my heart.
So if you land at this blog for the first time, you must be confused. "This guy switches from an island in the Pacific, to fundraising in Dubai, to food convoys day by day", you might think. And this is correct. I do. It all makes part of my daily life, my memories.
Pete, whom you know from my transatlantic sailing stories, reminded me the other day, that my blog entries have become so 'serious'.. He was right. Time to also bring out the lunatic part of me. Again! Yuuuhuuu! So a couple of evenings ago, I decided to convert some light-hearted rumble posts into short stories like the one on Italian food translations, and the affair with my GPS lady.
While doing so, I got inspiration, and wrote some new short stories for the eBook. I published one yesterday, about the Pacific. There are a couple more coming about one of my Antarctic expeditions (in addition the the eBook story about the landing on Peter I, which I published earlier)... Oh, I have also a new short-story ready about a day in the Caribbean, to complement the "One Love" story. So... stay tuned... ;-)
link[i-link]In the mean time as we can not loose track of the humanitarian aspect in "The Road to the Horizon", I suggest you have a look at the excellent photo story which Peter (from the Worldman blog) posted straight from Darfur, Sudan. His pictures show a food distribution in one of the Darfur refugee camps. It is people like him who make a difference.
PS: You might also have noticed that in the right column, I updated the blogs I follow. Check them out... If you know of other unlisted blogs of interest, let me know!
Rumble: As an Aidworker, What Right Do We Have to Be Privileged?
link[i-link]In quite a few of the short stories I published, and in those written by Enrico or Cyprien, we tried to draw a picture of how it is to live in the 'bush'. In what we call 'the deep field'. In the remote places of Africa or Asia.
Frida, working for a human rights organisation in Ghor, 'the deep field' of Afghanistan, struggles in a recent post trying to find a balance between finding healthy food, without depleting the scarce resources on the local market or flying in food, and trying to keep body and mind healthy. Or should we really eat what those we serve eat...
Comes with the ethical question 'what make us, the aid workers, different from those we are trying to help?' What right do we have to be more privileged? A feeling and a struggle - I must admit - has been pushed more and more on the background of my mind since I started to work from our Headquarters in Rome, even though I wrote about it at the end of my short story about working with the refugees in Goma.
I guess, the answer is: we are more privileged than those we serve. And as long as we realize that fact, and that we continue to be grateful for this privilege, the only thing we can do is to try serving those we help even better.
PS: Frida also has a photo blog with absolutely astonishing pictures of Afghanistan. Have look!
Picture courtesy Debbi Morello
Shit No Go, We No Go!
When the Akademik Fedorov, our Russian pick-up vessel (the largest in the Antarctic by the way!) arrived at the island three days ago, the sky was covered. After they landed their big Mil-8 helicopter near our expedition camp, we loaded it up as much as we could, but the mist came in from above the sea and in minutes. The visibility turned real bad. So bad that the pilot had to fly on radar trying to find the ship back. The evacuation was aborted then. Three days we are now waiting to get off the Antarctic. On the ship, a few miles off shore, hot showers and proper meals are waiting for us. But it could just as well have been thousands of miles away, so un-obtainable it seems to us.
Sleeping crampled in the kitchen tent. Ralph found the best spot: the kitchen table![i-Sleeping crampled in the kitchen tent. Ralph found the best spot: the kitchen table!]And each day we wake up, we hope for the fog to clear up, but it does not. Luckily it does not storm anymore. For weeks on end, we have been fighting against the storm, the snow, the cold, and now, everything seems quiet outside. Dead quiet. Since we landed here, the only sign of life we have seen is a few birds which seem to nest at the bottom of the glacier, hundreds of meters below our camp. The only connection to the ‘other side’ of the world, the ship, we have, is our radio.
Willy’s voice comes crackling through the speaker. “Peter I, this is Fedorov, over”. Ralph takes the microphone, and answers the call. “Sorry, still no chance for helicopter flights”, says Willy.. Martin and him are the only two from our crew of nine who got onto the one and only flight we Two remaining shelters[i-Two remaining shelters]had to the ship. Three days ago. Three days. We are bored. After the excitement of landing on the island, building up the camp, setting up the radio stations, and in two weeks, breaking the world record – we made 62,000 radio contacts from this island, 10,000 more than the previous record- and the excitement of the first sight of the Fedorov, our pickup vessel, we have nothing to do anymore, but to wait. Wait for the weather to clear up. Reading a bit, making coffee, eating some of our survival rations, sleeping, reading, eating,… We can not do much else. But to look at the grey sky of course.
The Mil-8 helicopter from the Akademik Federov is landing. See the orange smoke?[i-The Mil-8 helicopter from the Akademik Federov is landing. See the orange smoke?]In the afternoon, as by miracle, we start to see a faint sun through the clouds. The cloud cover becomes patchy. Would there be a chance? Willy calls us on the radio saying they will give it a go. As if we were bitten by a snake, everyone jumps up, and gets dressed. Indeed the clouds are breaking up. At times we can even see the sea. Somewhere the ship is there.
Half an hour later, we hear the roaring noise from the big helicopter. We fire up a smoke signal, and turning the low hanging clouds into orange. The pilot spots the signal and very slowly descends, touching down onto the snow. As by magic, the clouds disappear. While the pilot keeps the turbine generators running, the back doors open up, and the heli crew jumps out. They make signs we have to hurry. We drag boxes, crates, bags towards the helicopter, and stuff as much gear as we can into the haul. Half an hour later, they lift off.
We take a break, hoping the weather stays clear. And it does. In no time, the gray-orange helicopter hovers above our camp again, approaching our landing site. Again we drag all we can, The Mil-8. But you also see how foggy it is![i-The Mil-8. But you also see how foggy it is!]as fast as we can to the helicopter. Some stuff is too heavy to carry, so we drag it over the snow, pushing and pulling with all the weight we have, with all the force we can handle. If we don’t make use of this break in the weather, god knows when the next opening would come.
Digging out crates[i-Digging out crates]And we have plenty of gear. Tons of it. Masts, tents, antennas, boxes of radio equipment, personal stuff, left-over food rations, heaters, fuel barrels, gas bottles, generators, tools. All of it is carried, dragged, to the helicopter.
Three hours and several flights later, there is nothing left, but two tents and a survival kit. Now is the critical moment. If we take down our last two tents, we have no more shelter. If a storm comes up, we will have real difficulties to set it up in the wind. Would almost be impossible to put Loading up the cargo haul of the helicopter[i-Loading up the cargo haul of the helicopter]the huge heavy-insulated covers over the metal frames. Ralph, our expedition leader, looks at the sky. “Let’s do it. Let’s break it up”, he shouts. Like animals we ‘attack’ the shelters. In no time, the covers, frames, wooden floors are all dismantled and stacked up, bagged and tied.
The last helicopter flight comes in. We stack all material in it. The last things to go are the white trash bags, with our human waste. We promised the Norwegian authorities who gave us the landing permit for this isolated island, we would take everything off. And everything has to go. Even the human waste. The pilot looks at the bags we carry. He opens one of them and looks inside.. With a disgusted face, he says “Njet”, making signs as if we are crazy. We start a discussion. In the end, I shout, trying to lift my voice above the noise of the engine turbines, in my most simple English: “Shit no go, we no go!”.. The pilot smiles, and gives in. We dump the bags of frozen waste into the helicopter, and get on board. The engines rev up and the huge propellers start turning, chopping into the air. With a deafening sound, the huge thing lifts up, and before we know it, we hover several meters above the ground.
Through the small windows, we gaze at our camp site below. There is nothing left to witness our presence on the island. Nothing but our footprints and two square imprints of where our last two shelters stood, soon to be wiped away with the fresh snow. Soon our presence will be covered, erased from this island’s memory.
Is this symbolic to our presence in the world? Is all of it just temporarily setting our footprints on the earth’s surface, and the moment we go, the moment we leave this existence, those prints are wiped away, to be forgotten? We come, think we can conquer it all, but still, all is temporarily… As I look at the pensive faces of my companions, I smile… At least on this ride, we also took our shit with us! Hopefully they will not ask that from us when we go to heaven. And if so, would St.Peter at heaven’s gate have the same look on his face as the pilot? And would we answer the same to him too: “Shit no go, we no go?”
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Once Upon a Fine Antarctic Morning...
nice dark sunset peter I[i-nice dark sunset peter I]
The sleeping tent[i-The sleeping tent]The storm started yesterday evening, and is still blowing in full force. It pushes and pulls violently on the sides of our Weatherhaven tents as if it is trying to get rid of it. The thick nylon cargo lashes we pulled over the tents vibrate in the wind as if they were huge strings. The storm howls and roars as if it were nature’s way to say “you guys don’t belong here”. It is true, we don’t belong here. It has only been 60 years since the first people set foot on this godforsaken island near the Southpole. There have been more people on the moon than here, on Peter I island. People should not be here. Living creatures don’t belong here. This is a land of ice, an Antarctic desert.
I pull one hand out of the sleeping bag and brush off the fresh layer of snow which was blown into the tent. No matter how much we tightened the tent cover, the snow always finds a way in. The two meter high half-cylindrical frames move with each new violent pull from the storm. Most of our clothing hangs lined up on cloth hangers. They swing slowly on the frames. It looks Getting dressed in the morning: Strip one layer and put 5 other layers on...[i-Getting dressed in the morning: Strip one layer and put 5 other layers on...]like a line-up at the dry cleaners… We are far away from the nearest dry cleaner. Apart from our group of nine expeditioners, we are more than one thousand miles away from other human beings… I pull myself up, and sit on my cod. It is freezing. Must be minus five or ten degrees Centrigrade inside the tent. We don’t dare to light the heater anymore, after the small fire we had a few nights ago. Shivering, I unzip my thick thermal underwear, and put on several layers of polar fleeces, thermal longjohns, and then the Goretex outerwear, thick socks and my leather boots, a cap and a hat, ski goggles and two layers of gloves. There is no part of my body uncovered. With the wind blowing that hard, the windchill drops the temperature down to minus 80 Centigrade outside. Any uncovered piece of skin freezes in no time. A few days ago, we had problems with one of the radio antenna masts. Trying to fix some bolts, I was stupied enough to pull off my gloves so I could fit the nuts onto the bolts. I grabbed hold of the mast with my bare hand and instantly, my skin frooze to the mast. It took three of us breathing onto my hand to melt it off the damned metal.
Willy gets dressed too. Our shift is about to start. A new day is born. The morning shift goes to work. Well almost, as the outer zipper from our tent cover is froozen. I can’t use my lighter as it would melt the plastic. Willy pulls some bags of active carbon from his pocket, shakes it to get it heated up, and holds it against the zipper to warm it up. It takes at least half an hour to move the zipper half a meter. As by miracle, all of a sudden, with a firm pull, the damned cover unzips, and a wall of snow falls into the tent. We are too tired to curse. We know this can happen. Our life here consists mostly of battling against the wind and the snow. The only thing we can see through the half-open tent cover, is a wall of snow. It must be at least three meters high. Trying Picture taken the morning after[i-Picture taken the morning after]not to spill too much of it into the tent, we delve into it, trying to get out. The snow is soft and provides no grip. We have to firm it up by kicking it with our boots. We can only “feel” we are out, but can not “see” anything to confirm it. The wind bites us in the face. Everything is dim grey-whitish in the faint light. Visibility is nil. Totally nil. Ziltch. The snow beneath us, the snow blown up by the howling wind, the sky, all white.
On our belly, we pull ourselves up, and slide down the snowpile which has formed around our tent. When I stand up, I sink up to my waist into the snow. It is light. The snow below is almost as air, so thin, so… well air-y. Walking is almost impossible. We wade through the snow. With some efforts, but at the same time, everything around us is almost psychedelic, making us numb of any physical feeling. This is what they call a white-out. The snow below, the snow blow up by the storm, the air, the ground. Everything has the same shade of white. I tumble over my own feet, and fall. But it is even hard to tell that I fell. There almost no difference in the density of the snow in the air and the snow on the ground. I fall like onto an airy cushion of white. My goggles get covered up, and my own breath sets moister onto it. Makes it even more difficult to see anything. I am floating. A light gaiety wraps around me, I laugh. I am floating. Unaware if I am laying down or standing up. Am I feeling the resistance of the snow on the ground, or the resistance of the wind pushing onto my body? The layer upon layer of special clothing keeps my body warm, makes a protective shell around me, making me even less aware of my surroundings. I float. I laugh. I am flying. Gliding through the whiteness. I could be meters up in the sky, or just wading through snow, I do not know. I.. I just float. Without knowing, I become desorientated. There is no trace of any of the crates we have stacked around our tents, nor of the cables. I see no tents, not even shades of them. Through the howling of the wind, I still hear the faint noise of the generators, and turn my head trying to find a bearing, purely on the noise, but the wind disperses even that. Even the noise comes from everywhere. This is surreel. A dream.
I start walking, wading through the snow to what I think is the direction of the kitchen tent. A dozen yards further, someone pulls me from the back. Willy. He pulls my head close to his mouth, and shouts ‘Are you nuts? Where are you going to?’. I can hardly hear his voice through the storm. I stretch my arm to give an indication of where I am going, but Willy waves his hand. ‘No! It is that way, come’. By myself, I had wondered a hundred meters from the camp, straight into the area we know is full of crevasses. If Willy had not stopped me, I might have disappeared. Nobody would have found me in time. And I would not have been able to get out by myself, tumbling down ten, maybe a hundred meters down the ice caves of the glacier we put our camp on.
Hand in hand, Willy and I make our way to one of the generators. In our efforts to keep them ice and snow free, we tried everything. Our latest experiment was to build a wall of crates around them, but still the snow getss into the sheltered hole. Luckily as we keep the engines running, their heat melts off anything. The disadvantage is that the heat also has the generators dig One of the generators. This one actually stalled and froze up in half an hour[i-One of the generators. This one actually stalled and froze up in half an hour]themselves into the snow. The glacier is hundreds of meters thick here, so they still have some way before they literally hit rock bottom. The disadvantage though is that it makes a hell of a challenge trying to service them, or fill them up with gas. I crawl over the wall of crates and jump into the hole. Willy hands me the jerry cans, and I flip the lid open, put the funnel into the generator’s gas tank and pour the gas in it. The wind sprays the fuel all over my legs, and hands. I can smell the fumes. I have to be careful as the generator is hot. If I spill too much, the whole thing will go off in flames. Willy crawls into the hole and makes a joint between the jerry can’s lid and the gas tank. “Pour!”, he shouts, trying to lift his voice above the wind and the deafening noise of the generator. And I pour. Thinking how much I hate this ‘morning duty’ to refill the gensets. And this is only one. We have four of them. But still, I love it. I love this challenge. I love to find my own limitations, I love to face my own fear and laugh at it, in the face. I love doing this, this expedition, that people said to be impossible. I love to laugh in their face. Even as a new blow of wind sprays fuel all over me.
One of the working tents, after we cleared the snow[i-One of the working tents, after we cleared the snow]An hour later, we unzip the opening of the working tent. In the small space of 2.5 by 2.5 meters, three guys are sitting, working on the radio. They have the gas heater on, and are sweating in their Tshirt. They are concentrated trying to decypher the radio messages, and only look up at the distraction of two people crawling into their oasis of heat. Willy and I look alike. All covered up with patches of froozen snow, mucus dangling off our nose, damped ski goggles and smelling like we fell in a petrol pump. We pull off our caps and goggles, and smile at our team mates. “Goooooood moooooooooooorninggggg Vietnaaaaaaaaaaaaam!”, we laugh… A new day is born on Peter I. The most isolated island in the world. How we love this life.
[i-Another Fine Antarctic Morning. At least on that one, we could SEE something!]
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Doing Good to Others
link[i-link]As we steer into the anchorage, we put the kids below deck, drop the sails, and start the engine. Tine goes to the bow, ready to drop anchor. I steer the boat right in-between the other anchored ships. The rain gushes down. Visibility is only ten meters, sometimes even less. We loose sight of the other boats. Even though we motor slowly, sometimes an anchored boat pops up through the curtain of rain, out of no-where it seems, when it is almost too late to avoid a collision. The wind is strong and gusty, shifting often 90 degrees. A sailboat, and certainly one like ours with a short keel, and very beamy – flat wide bottomed – gets easily pushed around by the wind. Once the boat starts turning with the wind, there is no way to stop the momentum. Then you just HAVE to turn.. It makes it difficult to maneuver between anchored boats, all swinging on their anchor chains, in the stormy wind… But we do well, find a proper spot, and drop the anchor in one go. Phew!
link[i-link]It storms and rains the whole night, but the next morning is bright and sunny, revealing the small paradise we are anchored in. Hardly any clouds left. The sea is clear light green-blue, several fishing terns are gliding high up in the sky, without moving their wings. A soft breeze moves through the leaves of the palm trees bordering the beech of bright white sand. Paradise once more.
In the afternoon, while having brunch on the deck of the boat, we spot two young local fishermen in the water, dragging what seems to be a white surf board. I get a bit suspicious as it does not look like they are having fun, rowing wildly with their arms, barely keeping their head above water. Through the binoculars I can see a black thing on their surf board. Maybe a large plastic bag or a net. As a rain squall comes closer, they seem the more anxious to get ashore. It is all a bit weird: what are they doing in a channel between two islands, on a surfboard? I take our dinghy, and motor to them, only to find that there is no surfboard, but they were dragging a small white wooden boat filled to the rim with water. The black thing I saw earlier is an outboard engine they had unscrewed and put inside the boat. “Mista, you help us, mista?”, they ask. I throw them a rope and tow them ashore. They drag their boat onto the beach, crawl onto the sand, and lay on their back, exhausted. Barely waving their hands to thank me.
link[i-link]When I get back to our sail boat, Hannah, our youngest, stands on the bow of our ship, shouting and dancing “My dad is a superhero! Superdad in action! My dad can do anything!..” Lana gives me a hug. “Dad, I am proud of you. The people on the other boats were just watching, but you DID something… Did you those guys give you anything to thank you?” I tell them when we do good to others, somewhere we will be rewarded by something good ourselves..
In the afternoon, when we scuba dive, and find some astonishingly beautiful cone shelves, Lana says “You see, we are rewarded now. We did something good, and now we are rewarded with these beautiful shelves. We will take them with us, and put flowers in them. As a reminder to do good to others!”.
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Rumble: Top Down or Bottom Up? The Force of Nature Dictates...
One more story by Enrico:
In most part of the world, people have learned how to curb the forces of nature. However, there are still places where this has not taken place yet.
Rumble: How Deep Is the Field?
You know one of my colleagues, Enrico, from a number of posts I published before. He recently moved from Rome, Italy to Bor, South Sudan.
Bor[i-Bor]He just sent me some interesting stuff he wrote about working in remote locations. And when we talk about Bor, we talk real remote locations. Something which we, in the humanitarian world, call the "deep field". How deep is the field? Endless it seems. And the deeper we go, the more basic our needs become.
Here is Enrico:
Just before leaving for Bor, I met a colleague who’d just come back from a field mission. “Where to?” I said, “Khartoum”, he replied.
link[i-link]Khartoum, an as-if family duty station, is considered by the UN an adverse place, bad enough to make you earn the famous hardship-reassignment notch. Khartoum, with its international airport, renowned university and air-conditioned houses and shops, was indeed considered a daunting destination by most HQ colleagues waiting for their reassignment. For me, Khartoum was just the first of the two transit points on the way to my final destination, and the frontier to civilization.
Once reached Khartoum, the prospective had rapidly changed. Colleagues based in Khartoum felt privileged to be there and looked down upon their unfortunate colleagues who’d been chosen for Juba, my second and final transit point (or so I thought), and its sub-offices. A colleague from Khartoum confessed me that he jokingly used “a mission to Bor” as a powerful threat with his staff: “how bad could Bor be,” I wondered? My many previous missions with WFP also gave me the certainty that Khartoum wasn’t that bad, after all … especially for the teetotallers.
Juba[i-Juba]The flight to Juba was pleasant and without surprises, thanks to the excellent services provided by United Nations Humanitarian Air Service. Juba, the capital of South Sudan and one of the three coordination centres of the WFP’s operations, had more of the familiar field looks: a poorly developed place, with lots of challenges, but a place where the bare necessities could still be satisfied. Half of my colleagues were still living in tents, office space was provided by air-conditioned containers, no local infrastructure, rough hygienic conditions and volatile security situation, but all types of food, drinks and a bit of night life were available. In my first few days in Juba, I however felt that that was the level of isolation and hardship that I was ready to tolerate.
At the mention of the word Bor, most colleagues in Juba squirmed, compassionate enough not to unveil the final surprise, but kind enough to give me some indispensable clues that would help me to be prepared for what was yet to be revealed.
Despite all, I was quite anxious to go to Bor and still a bit of optimistic that something was going to be good. Well, my optimism was soon to be betrayed.
When I reached Bor, I felt that that was the end of the known world, the very deep field. The office, located on the West bank of the White Nile, and the compound did not comply with any of WFP’s policies and procedures while food, sanitation and basic living conditions were a mere mirage. I really felt depressed.
Within 24 hours, I, however, discovered a new world. Bor, was the capital city of Jonglei state, the vastest of the ten South Sudan states: 5 times the size of Denmark.
Bor had its own governor, ministers and parliament; the Police; a local market, where a few basic items could be bought (these excluded fruit, vegetables and cleaning material); a would-be all-weather airstrip; and a hospital run by MSF.
link[i-link]Still all this wasn’t enough to brighten my spirits, until I spoke to one of our field monitors. She was about to go on one of her usual food distribution missions with 90 Kg of luggage. “What are you carrying,” I asked. “A tent, cloths, gum boots, water, basic food for 30 days, charcoal and a few other indispensable items,” she replied. “Why food for 30 days if you are going on a 3-day mission, and what are you doing with the gum boots” I replicated. “Well, during the rainy seasons the areas where we operate gets flooded, so sometimes the plane cannot land for weeks and the gum boots are essential to walk in swampy areas, although sometimes they level reach more than 1 metre.” What I had not immediately spotted during our conversation was that she had not been supplied with a satellite phone, a GPS, and an HF radio, and that her tent had holes.
After all, Bor isn’t that deep!
Once, I went to Mpulungu
Click on map to enlarge[i-Click on map to enlarge]Mpulungu, you said?
Once upon a time, Mats and I went to Mpulungu. Mpulungu? I have to admit, I did not know where that was neither. Well, it is a town in North-Zambia, at the most southern tip of Lake Tanganyika.
El Nino had washed away most of the railway system in Tanzania, and we needed another route to bring in emergency food supplies to the refugee camps in West Burundi and Tanzania. We thought of trucking in the food cargo from Southern Africa using Mpulungu as a transit point before shipping it by barge via Lake Tanganyika up to Burundi.
link[i-link]We did not have a base yet in Mpulungu, so we had to fly in the equipment to set up mobile warehouses, electricity and communications systems. As there were no commercial flights from our regional headquarters in Uganda to Zambia, we used a Belgian Air Force C130 Hercules plane, to pick up people and equipment.
So off we went, with a plane filled with cars, warehouse tents, generators, masts, and communications equipment. The C130 crew just came off a long tour of duty working for us doing food drops in Southern Sudan. Our delivery was the last trip they made before heading back home to Belgium, so there was a bit of a party atmosphere on the plane. They played 1960’s rock and roll music over the internal PA-system, as we flew over Rwanda, Burundi and Congo, heading south. The crew had rolled up the sleeves of their T-shirts, and were dancing on the cargo-deck. It reminded me of a scene in ‘Apocalypse Now’, minus the sound of the machine guns and shelling.
link[i-link]As we flew on a military plane, we did not get landing clearance for the military airstrip near Mpulungu, and had to fly to other side of Zambia. We landed at Ndola, smack in the middle of the “Cupper Belt” as the southern part of DRC and North-West Zambia is called. It is always interesting to land at an airport where they have never seen a UN plane before. And certainly not one operated by the Belgian Air Force. But they were good guys, so immigration and customs formalities were a breeze.
Mats and I loaded a Nissan Patrol 4x4 full of equipment, and headed off for a full day’s drive from Ndola to Mpulungu. We had bought some cheap tourist road maps at the hotel lobby in the morning, so we were in good shape. But the roads were not. El Nino rains had damaged the tarmac really bad, and we made it a point to fly over the potholes rather than negotiating our way around them, trying to make good time. Even so, we arrived in Mpulungu at two in the morning.
Mpulungu City.
Mats and I were still rookies in ‘the humanitarian world’, as this story will show in many ways. One of the mistakes was the planning. We thought to arrive in the late afternoon, and meet up at the port with Louis, one of our logisticians who arrived a couple of days earlier. But we had not counted on arriving at two in the morning… The port was closed, and the lights were dimmed all over Mpulungu, which had more of a village than a real town. As we cruised ‘around town’, trying to find a place to stay, we cursed ourselves not having noted the name of the hotel where we should stay. We asked a guy we saw strolling alongside the road, but he was clearly drunk and stumbled in the ditch as we were talking to him. Not much use to us. But sometimes luck favours the unprepared.
We saw a distant glow of light in the pitch dark town, and headed towards it. It was a camping site with a couple of tukuls, round huts for guests, called Nkupi Lodge. The music was playing loud as it turned out they were having a party for two girls working for FAO, our sister organisation, who just finished their two years’ tour of duty. As we shouted our questions over the music, we came to understand Louis was actually staying in one of the tukuls. What are the odds, hey?
There was no more room for us in the lodge, but the two FAO girls suggested we slept in one of their spare bedrooms, so off we went. After many drinks, and at 5 am.
link[i-link]The next day, three hours later, we headed for the port to set up the equipment. By the time Valerian – a Ugandan technician from our team- and Zeff, one of our super duper logistics wizards arrived with another truck full of other equipment, a lot was already installed.
I was quite used to the heat, living in Uganda for several years, but the Mpulungu temperatures surely beat the Uganda ones. And the humidity! As we were working outside in the sun, rigging up masts and dragging stuff in and out of the office container, we had to take regular breaks, bathing in sweat.
Reconnaissance
Zeff thought of also using another port off the Tanzanian side of Lake Tanganyika, and suggested Mats and I did a road reconnaissance along the lake’s shore to find a suitable landing site for the barges.
We agreed to leave very early in the morning, but when I knocked on his door at dawn, I was greeted by the pale remains of my old friend. His face all white. Bent over slightly, both hands on his stomach, he just said ‘Food poisoning’ before speeding off to the loo again. Still, Mats did not give up. Armed with a couple of water bottles, he got in the car, and off we went.
We used the same map we bought at the hotel lobby in Ndola, which showed Zambia on a scale of about ten inches. Not much detailed roads there.. But, after regular stops to ask the way to the Tanzanian border, we felt we were in good shape. The border itself was not much. Up on a mountain pass, in lush green fields, the road diminished into a dirt track.
The border was nothing more but an iron pipe over the track, with an old rusty sign “CUSTOMS” on it. Nobody in sight. We hooted a couple of times, and guy in torn pants and the remains of an official’s kaki-shirt showed up.
“Hallo”, we said.
“Eh, hello, Karibu! Welcome!”, he answered in half English-half Swahili. He looked with wide eyes at our 4x4 with “UN” painted in big white letters on the side.
“Are you the customs officer?”, we asked.
“No, but he is not here, can I help?”, he said.
We learned that the customs officer had gone on a walkabout many months ago, and had not come back yet. Since then, our good friend, had been ‘guarding’ the border post. He was helpful though, and chatted happily about the facts of life as he walked us to the customs’ office, nothing more than a hut in the middle of what looked like a small settlement. He chased the goats out of his office, and looked frantically for his papers and stamps. We wrote our entry in his logbook. The previous entry was from a few years ago, some overland-trekkers passing by. No wonder nobody had noticed the customs officer had disappeared, with all that border traffic!
link[i-link]After an hour, we drove off. The vegetation was so dense it looked as if we were driving between walls of greenery, towering three, four meters high, on both sides of the track. Sometimes the track was so overgrown, we just hoped we did not speed off it. Several times, we had to hit the brakes as a herd of cattle appeared smack in the middle of the “road”, most of the time guarded by a young boy. Time and time again, the youngster would grab all his belongings and run off into the bush, shouting “Muzungu"! Muzungu!” (“White man, White man!”), leaving us stuck surrounded by the cows. It was clear cars were not a common sight there. Leave alone UN cars, driven by a couple of muzungus… Probably the poor guys thought they were invaded by European military troops or something.
The GPS indicated we were on the right track. Gradually, the bush cleared out, and we came in more open fields, driving through small villages until we reached a marsh like area. According to Mr.Garmin, we were just a few miles from our destination, but in front of us, the road was flooded by the water from the marsh. link[i-link]We carefully negotiated our way through the potholes which were probably half a meter deep. Until the unavoidable happened: the side of the car sank in the mud, and the car heeled over. The more we pushed on the gas pedal, the more the wheels spun, digging the car in deeper. Dammit. When we stepped out of the car, our feet sank into the mud, ankles deep. Only then we realized how badly we prepared this trip. Never again would we go on a road reconnaissance without a shovel, a decent bush cranking tool, and towing cables… We really left Mpulungu like we would go shopping in town.. Argh.. All too late now.
And one thing was for sure: on our own, we would not get out of the mud. Not even with the help of the three-four guys who appeared from the fields, and tried to dig the wheels out. The more we dug, the more the car sank in the mud.
Luckily we had a shortwave radio in the car, so we called Zeff in Mpulungu. Zeff said to stay put and he would come to get us even though we were at least five hours drive from our base.
link[i-link]Meanwhile, Mats had taken refuge in the ditch, still throwing up. He was exhausted. It must have been a hilarious sight. Two muzungus, in their big car, stuck in the middle of the swamp, miles away from any sign of civilization. One sitting in the shade of the car, with his legs and clothes full of mud, the other one laying in the ditch, emptying his stomach for the umpth time.
As the sun was setting, we heard the distant sound of an engine. Could not be Zeff, too early. As by miracle, some locals appeared out of bloody nowhere, on a tractor. I had never been so happy to see a tractor. And sure enough, they had towing cables with them. In less than half an hour, they pulled the car out of the mud, we made a U-turn, and followed the tractor up to the next village.
I always wear a safari jacket. And in the back pocket, I keep a paper bag (actually an air sickness bag from ‘Virgin Atlantic’ – but that is a different story), filled with ‘funny money’, left-over money from my previous field trips. I found some old Tanzanian banknotes, and the guys from the tractor were all too happy with them. They invited us to stay with them for the night, but we could not, had to drive back.
How to fix a broken axle using a computer bag.
We tried to call Zeff on the radio again, to warn him we were ok, so he could turn around. In vain though. Boy, he was going to be pissed off to discover he did the trip for nothing.. As we were speeding back, in between villages, cows, goats and other unidentified moving and/or flying objects, the night fell. After each bend in the road, we thought seeing the lights of Zeff’s car, but each time it was a distant camp fire from one or the other village. Villages we had not seen during the day, as they were hidden behind the bushes. But all of sudden, Zeff’s car came steaming out of the jungle, right in front of us. We both hit the brakes and stopped inches from eachother. Reason the more for Mats to throw up again. Poor guy…
Nope, Zeff was not pissed off. He was happy to see us again. He gave us a walkie-talkie so we could keep in contact as we drove back. Three hours later, we reached the Zambia-Tanzania border post on the mountain pass again. Somewhere along the road, we had lost sight of Zeff though, and even looking down the slope, I could not trace any light.. Guess we drove a lot faster than him. We tried to reach him on the walkie-talkie, but nothing.. Meanwhile, the customs official was nowhere in sight. In the light of our beamers we walked to the small settlement and banged on the doors of the mud houses. After half an hour, we found our man, who clearly had passed the evening boozing. He probably had good reason to celebrate, though: two cars with muzungus passing his border post in one day must have been THE event of his life… A pity he was nearly unconscious for the third passage of the muzungus that day…
While he stood there negotiating his balance, I filled in the log again, stamped the passport ourselves, and passed the border. We drove up a small ridge and tried to spot Zeff again. Nothing but a pitch dark night dotted with campfires for as far as we could see. A nice sight though, the pitch dark. Had not seen that since a long long time.. In Belgium, or where we lived in Kampala, there was always light around, but this, this was pitch-pitch dark. Dark like hell. Or heaven.. The starry skies reminded me of those during our expeditions in the Pacific and the Antarctic. But we did not give much room to these romantic thoughts.. Maybe Zeff had an accident.
In the end, we got onto the roof of the car, and opened up the squelch of the radio, and only then we could barely hear Zeff call us in the middle of the radio noise. We understood he had some car trouble.
So off we went again. Back into Tanzanian territory. Did not bother to go through customs again. Figured they would not come chasing after us ‘illegal immigrants’ neither. It took an hour to reach Zeff. It was not a pretty sight. We only saw a pair of legs sticking out from underneath the car. Legs belonging to a guy who cursed like an old seadog. Apparently the cross axle connecting the front and back axles of the car got stuck, so his wheels were blocked. Zeff had disconnected the cross axle already from one side while he was waiting for us, but could not connect it from the front axel. So what to do? He had no power going onto his wheels, and we could not tow him as the cross axle was dragging over the ground…
Luckily Mats – who had vomited his last fluid hours ago – was back into intellectual shape, and came up with the bright idea to tie the cross axle onto the bottom chassis of the car… with the strap of his computer bag… I guess that is not what Mr Dell or Mr Targus had in mind for a computer bag strap, but it seemed to work. Next challenge was that Zeff had a tow cable of two meters only… Ever tried to tow a car through the bush, potholes, over mountain ridges, and through streams with a two meter long towing cable? I tell you, that is SHORT, leaving barely one meter between the two cars ! So short, Zeff was on the walkie-talkie all the time, giving orders to us, in the front car: ‘faster, slower, ease off, go left, go right’. And sometimes ‘stop’ as the computer-bag-strap got disconnected again and the axle dragged over the ground. Each time we had to walk back in the light of a handheld flashlight, trying to find the strap in the mud.
It took us the main part of the night to get to the customs post again. By then, we did not wake up the guys anymore, we just stamped our passports ourselves.. And down the mountain we went, hoping Zeff’s brakes would not give up, having him crash into the back of our car.
At 5 am the next morning, two UN cars drove, ever so slowly, one closely behind the other one, into Mpulungu town. All passengers Muzungus, covered with mud. As we got out of the car, Zeff gave us an evil eye and raised a finger: “Next time, next time!”… We knew: Next time, we had to prepare better, take proper bush equipment, drive slower in a convoy, and and, and, and…
But the story does not end here.
A week later, a small Beechcraft twin engine plane was to come over and fly us back to Kampala. This time, we had received a landing permit for the military airport near Mpulungu. For hours, we monitored the agreed shortwave radio frequency where the plane would call us as they approached, but heard nothing. As we drove off to the airport, we heard a strong interference on the radio and found the aircraft was transmitting slightly off frequency. They answered our call with: “Ah there you are! We have been circling overhead for an hour already, as we don’t have the VHF frequencies for the military control tower. Go and get it! We need to land fifteen minutes, as fuel is running low!”.
Ilink[i-link] still don’t know how we managed to negotiate our way through the military checkpoint at the airport, but somewhere waving my blue UN passport and using a lot of important words got us into the office of the base commander in no time. Sometimes it helps being the only muzungus in a radius of a hundred miles! By the time the plane landed, the pilot said he was ‘flying on fumes’ already.. Anyway, the guys at the airport were all too helpful, invited us over for tea and a chat as the plane was being refueled. They even gave us a discount for the fuel.
On the way back, we zigzagged in between towering storm clouds filled with lightning, with the pilot of our small plane going ‘Oh my god’ and ‘Oh shit, shit!’ the whole time. Not a pretty sight.
Hours later, many hours later, we finally landed at Entebbe airport. We parked right next to Airforce One, as apparently President Clinton had just landed. But that was minor news, compared to the stories of our adventures in Mpulungu we told our families that evening!
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