I had given up hope that this day would actually come, when I would see my passport again…
Although I had been warned that Congo work visa takes weeks to be issued – and I was clearly up for a looong wait – lately I had started to believe in some sort of a bad karma regarding my passport and this whole visa issue. Now, 76 days after I last entered Congo, I finally have this document in my hands again, and I can finally start BREATHING properly.
There are a million and then some reasons why this takes so very long. On paper, the Direction Migration Generale (DGM) in Kinshasa is supposed to issue the $475 work visa in 15 days. In practice, it normally takes at least twice as long, since it has to go to many offices and depends on many bureacrats’ caprices. It didn’t help, of course, that our logs people delayed depositing my passport for more than 10 days after my arrival on July 2 (when they should have done it within 2 days, to avoid an initial fine). As impatient as I was about this back then, I have in the meantime come to terms with the fact that there is always confusion among my colleagues, as to why I am “Kinshasa staff based in Goma”, and that it takes a long time for them to agree on what procedures and codes I should be assigned to.
Anyhow, days after they finally gave my passport to the Kinshasa DGM, I was issued a fancy document stating that I am to pay more than $3,000 fine. The reason? Well, it goes back to my last year’s job, when I had a work visa in Rwanda (since I was based there), and then two six-month-visitor Congo visas issued by the Goma DGM (each of them costing $475). Apparently, though, Kinshasa DGM does not recognize Goma DGM (?!), and their claim was that I therefore worked illegally in Congo all past year. Another frantic episode started, with my former employer issuing explanatory letters and my current employer hiring a lawyer. Nothing helped, of course, especially as the Kinshasa DGM was already smelling the money. In the end they negotiated the fine down to $1,500, and my new NGO did pay up (God bless them, they actually had nothing to do with that…). The only good thing that came out of this: a realization on everyone’s part that in future similar cases the person in question “had better lose their passports” ahead of returning to Congo with a Goma-issued visa, and “start fresh” in Kinshasa (everything is done manually, anyhow, so no computer records will show previous visas)…
However, back to my case -- and another four weeks had lapsed. In the meantime, I had started to get seriously worried: one about my very old grandmother (if something had happened to her I would have been unable to leave this country), but also about my own situation: as Goma offers zero medical care (apart from a MONUSCO emergency point that we are officially NOT authorized to use), in any case of serious illness I would have been stuck here. Not to mention, of course, all the evacuation alerts for security reasons, which would have made my leaving also very difficult, if not impossible. Add to that a daily frustration that had been eating slowly at me: I live just 5 minutes on foot from the Rwanda border, and I was counting on crossing loads, for a more normal life grasp and also to see all my dear friends (and cat) left behind, but every day I had to suck it up and let go of that illusion a little bit more…
As August was also drawing to an end, my impatience was really mounting. Numerous calls and emails remained answered, until last Friday when our rather inept otherwise visa-liaison person called me up with the good news: “The visa is stamped in your passport. But now la guerre commence avec Finance.”
What guerre? Well, it goes, apparently, along these lines: every NGO pays the $475 for each passport deposited, but apparently the DGM finance guy(s) run a bit of a separate business with that cash, counting on the fact that it’ll take weeks before those visas will actually be issued. It was the same now – visa was finally in the passport, but the money to pay for it was nowhere (although it had been deposited on July 15 already). This way, I would have to wait until another file came before the DGM, so that another poor bastard’s passport will be stuck for weeks while THAT money was transferred to my case.
Of course, when you feel like you’re so close the incertitude is even more upsetting. The whole week I fussed around, also because I was supposed to book my obligatory R&R flights for this month (and had heard horror stories of people whose visas had not been issued in time for the R&R, so the passport had to be taken out from the DGM and then resubmitted, for another 3-month ordeal to begin). In this frenzy I even took the risk and bought my flights online yesterday, counting on some miracle (or, rather, on some universal benediction to be bestowed upon me).
And then, this morning, I opened my emails and there it was: the passport had been released last night and already sent on the UN flight to Goma this morning, with some MONUSCO general named Bruno. I rushed down the stairs to ask our liaison guy here to please go find Bruno at the airport when the plane lands and finally retrieve my most longed-for possession ever. I could hardly concentrate all morning, spinning around and smelling the freedom ever closer.
At 14.30 this afternoon I was victoriously holding my barely-legible-by-now-Romanian passport, and ever since then I’ve been feeling on top of the world! It is only now that all those repressed fears actually became real in retrospect (considering that Congo, of ALL places, in not a country you’d like to be stuck for ANY reason, let alone medical or security)…
Almost in disbelief, I am now flipping through the many pages stamped and noticing the following: 1. They issued me a wrong visa which is now ‘annulled’; 2. The current visa is valid until Sept. 2014, so now I really should decide to stay for 3 years in Congo; 3. The visa will actually only be valid if I exit the country within the first three months, otherwise it becomes void (?); 4. The visa needs to be renewed 7 months (?!); 5. There is no picture of mine attached (although I was asked to give 4 to the DGM).
In short – all things that make sense….Tonight, though, I have just one thing on my mind: celebrating!!!! (would love to pop some champagne rose open…). OK, and maybe buying everyone (including all incompetents, it does not matter anymore) lots of drinks. And, maybe, finding Bruno and thanking him for the amazing delivery.
And then, tomorrow, as I will wake up with a heavy head, I will crawl to the border to hop back and forth a few times. Freedom is priceless!
Friday, September 16, 2011
Thursday, September 8, 2011
Kalemie Blues
I am writing this in the ‘waiting room’ at Kalemie MONUSCO Airport, where I am waiting for the only weekly flight out to stop by at some point today and get me to Goma. As I approached the gate this morning, the guard quickly showed up to check my name on the list. He actually had a few lists tucked in one folder, as Thursday seems to be the magic day here: all rare flights from and to all directions converge in Kalemie so that passengers can swap planes. The guard flipped through all the lists, but he somehow only found one Suzanne and one Charlize, and I kept trying to convince him that I was neither. When he was just about ready to dictate I should go back, I caught glimpse of a tiny table at the bottom of one of the lists. There, in all majesty, stood my name! Surprisingly, too, there were no mistakes!!! (Last two times I flew to and from Kinshasa, I was recorded as Silviana-Maria – with no family name – and on the way back Sinziana Demain – which prompted comments after comments when they finally caught on). This time – wow – I was there, with all my three names all spelled out correctly. I was really happy for some 5 seconds, until I discovered how I was registered under nationality: Italian. Why and how come – totally beyond me. I guess someone might have just guessed my nationality according to the sounding of my name… Oh well, I could live with that, and so could the guard, so here I was granted passage in this open-air barrack. Not before I was informed that I would be the only passenger to board here (hopefully not the only passenger on the plane, though…) These flights usually go in circles- i.e. Goma-Kalemie-Kindu-Bukavu-Goma, so I am thinking more stranded people in all these places would join my flying adventure today.
As MONUSCO-Benin contingent soldiers are crowding the area, and one NGO and UN car after another comes by Tanganyika Lake shore and then through the gravel yard to drop off other passengers, I am already getting the blues for this place, where I now spent one full week. Maybe it is just the element of total surprise that I experienced here, or maybe the great feeling of normality (which I have not found anywhere else in Congo) that got to me, but I REALLY, REALLY had a great time in this God forsaken place. Of course, the fact that I lived in a beautiful house right on the lake, AND that I could take loooong walks on the beach, made this week very special indeed.
The one “big challenge” I experienced: finding a place to swim without having hundreds of people congregate around or follow me in the water (mzungus are a rarity around here, and even more so girls in bikinis, I would imagine). Even at 6 a.m. (during the most spectacular sunrises I have ever seen at the beach), or at 6 p.m. (as darkness falls abruptly), the beach is usually swamped: fishermen with all sorts of tools (including mosquito nets for the tiny prey); people washing themselves or tons of clothes; kids playing in the very shallow water; women loading massive sand sacks and then swiftly balancing them on their heads to walk all the way into town; boys coming with the yellow plastic containers to get water for all household necessities (including drinking, of course…) It really is one of those places where the Lake gives life and death at the same time, considering all the many diseases that get carried back and forth through this “good-for-all” water…
Of course the week was not just fun-in-the-sun, but mainly incredibly intense field work. Inland, I visited scores of villages and talked to tens of people about every single aspect of their lives: family, education, health, development… I visited school and clinics, mills and markets. For the first time in my life I saw cholera emergency camps set up (no patients, though, at this time … a surge is expected soon, once the rainy season begins). Also for the first time ever I was in a camp for Internally Displaced People (IDPs), coming mostly from the neighboring provinces where rebels and army alike constantly threaten and destroy people’s lives. It was one of the harshest moments I have ever experienced, witnessing all the misery, disease, poverty and hopelessness…
As my life constantly balances between the lowest of the low, in the world’s most backward country, and the ultimate luxury I am actually bestowed upon, I cannot be thankful enough for seeing and living it all. Kalemie was by no means an exception. A completely astonishing week now comes to the end, and I can say this much: I have never been happier and more fulfilled in my new job than now!
As MONUSCO-Benin contingent soldiers are crowding the area, and one NGO and UN car after another comes by Tanganyika Lake shore and then through the gravel yard to drop off other passengers, I am already getting the blues for this place, where I now spent one full week. Maybe it is just the element of total surprise that I experienced here, or maybe the great feeling of normality (which I have not found anywhere else in Congo) that got to me, but I REALLY, REALLY had a great time in this God forsaken place. Of course, the fact that I lived in a beautiful house right on the lake, AND that I could take loooong walks on the beach, made this week very special indeed.
The one “big challenge” I experienced: finding a place to swim without having hundreds of people congregate around or follow me in the water (mzungus are a rarity around here, and even more so girls in bikinis, I would imagine). Even at 6 a.m. (during the most spectacular sunrises I have ever seen at the beach), or at 6 p.m. (as darkness falls abruptly), the beach is usually swamped: fishermen with all sorts of tools (including mosquito nets for the tiny prey); people washing themselves or tons of clothes; kids playing in the very shallow water; women loading massive sand sacks and then swiftly balancing them on their heads to walk all the way into town; boys coming with the yellow plastic containers to get water for all household necessities (including drinking, of course…) It really is one of those places where the Lake gives life and death at the same time, considering all the many diseases that get carried back and forth through this “good-for-all” water…
Of course the week was not just fun-in-the-sun, but mainly incredibly intense field work. Inland, I visited scores of villages and talked to tens of people about every single aspect of their lives: family, education, health, development… I visited school and clinics, mills and markets. For the first time in my life I saw cholera emergency camps set up (no patients, though, at this time … a surge is expected soon, once the rainy season begins). Also for the first time ever I was in a camp for Internally Displaced People (IDPs), coming mostly from the neighboring provinces where rebels and army alike constantly threaten and destroy people’s lives. It was one of the harshest moments I have ever experienced, witnessing all the misery, disease, poverty and hopelessness…
As my life constantly balances between the lowest of the low, in the world’s most backward country, and the ultimate luxury I am actually bestowed upon, I cannot be thankful enough for seeing and living it all. Kalemie was by no means an exception. A completely astonishing week now comes to the end, and I can say this much: I have never been happier and more fulfilled in my new job than now!
Sunday, September 4, 2011
The Pearl of Tanganyika
I will definitely remember the first fall days of 2011 by this most full of surprises visit I have embarked on in Congo: the nearly forgotten town of Kalemie. Back in colonial times, the Belgians had named it “The Pearl of Tanganyika”, since its strategic location - pretty much half way down Africa’s deepest lake – made it an invaluable resource. They built up a very important harbor here, where the trains with precious ores from Zambia (then Rhodesia) and Lubumbashi (the largest Congo city in this province, Katanga), were swiftly exchanging with merchandise coming by boat from Tanzania. A traffic hub it would have been, in today’s terms… Only that its present certainly does not live up to its illustrious past.
Not that Kalemie has had a positive history all throughout. Even before the Belgians arrived, the Arabs were wreaking havoc here with their slave trade. Then Livingstone and later on Stanley used Kalemie as a strategic base for their expeditions – the latter of which eventually led to the brutal colonization of Congo. At all times, however, this lake-shore town was well known and had its clearly marked spot on the map.
Today, following the total collapse of the Congolese state at all levels and the many wars and rebellions plaguing this country, Kalemie is a no-name. Further up East, where I am based, every property houses an NGO, but here, as the situation is now ‘calm’, not even the humanitarian workers crowd to establish their presence. MONUSCO also, with a battalion of Beninois, has a much smaller mission and mandate than in other parts of Congo. Kalemie, if anything, is marked only as a stop-over on UN flights from Goma or Bukavu to Lubumbashi.
My self-awarded mission here, of a forced 7-days due to the rare flights in-and-out, was therefore something of a conundrum. We have a lot of programs in the region, and my main interest was going to be education around the beginning of the new school year, but beyond that I was anticipating a bit of a bore. Little did I know that this place was going to take me by complete surprise – in the BEST way possible.
Already from the airport, driving the 6 kms. into town, I felt like I had landed not in a different province but in a different country. Surely, the scenery was completely special – the type of Vama Veche in Romania crossed with Monterrico in Guatemala, if I could combine two past experiences on different continents to define a place in Africa… Or, in another way -- the type of climate and easy-goingness that you can ONLY find in seaside/lakeside places. But it was something else that completely shook me. It took me a few hours to put my finger on it, but then I finally grasped it: it was a sense of NORMALITY, which I had not experienced anywhere else in this mad country. Despite the many apparent difficulties people act calmly, and life here is really established. Anywhere else, in the neighboring provinces, this would be a dream, considering their horrible chaotic state due to so many stages of wars and uprisings, with or without a cause and finality. The fact that very mean-looking soldiers and rebels are NOT pacing the town everywhere makes a HUGE difference, of course, and gives the people a chance to breathe and go about their daily businesses in a much more casual, tranquil way.
That AND the stunning beauty of the region – from perfect coastline into savannah and then the bush - should be enough arguments to have tourism flourish here one day. I can only imagine boats crossing from Tanzania, and then tourists embarking on some-day-hopefully-again functioning trains to start their adventure journeys inland, to the heart of Congo’s majestic rain forest. For now, though, a mzungu in town is a rarity, as I have observed over the past four days, and anything catered towards public service is virtually non-existent or completely run-down.
That said, I have had great company. As our American chef-de-mission is on vacation, I am left to share the lakeside house with five African expat men, from Cote d’Ivoire, Benin, Cameroon, Kenya and Tanzania. Incredibly respectful and fun, they have really made it their mission to take good care of me. I feel, again, quite humbled by Africa’s hospitality and charm. To me, the Pearl of Tanganyika certainly merits its name, and then some!
Not that Kalemie has had a positive history all throughout. Even before the Belgians arrived, the Arabs were wreaking havoc here with their slave trade. Then Livingstone and later on Stanley used Kalemie as a strategic base for their expeditions – the latter of which eventually led to the brutal colonization of Congo. At all times, however, this lake-shore town was well known and had its clearly marked spot on the map.
Today, following the total collapse of the Congolese state at all levels and the many wars and rebellions plaguing this country, Kalemie is a no-name. Further up East, where I am based, every property houses an NGO, but here, as the situation is now ‘calm’, not even the humanitarian workers crowd to establish their presence. MONUSCO also, with a battalion of Beninois, has a much smaller mission and mandate than in other parts of Congo. Kalemie, if anything, is marked only as a stop-over on UN flights from Goma or Bukavu to Lubumbashi.
My self-awarded mission here, of a forced 7-days due to the rare flights in-and-out, was therefore something of a conundrum. We have a lot of programs in the region, and my main interest was going to be education around the beginning of the new school year, but beyond that I was anticipating a bit of a bore. Little did I know that this place was going to take me by complete surprise – in the BEST way possible.
Already from the airport, driving the 6 kms. into town, I felt like I had landed not in a different province but in a different country. Surely, the scenery was completely special – the type of Vama Veche in Romania crossed with Monterrico in Guatemala, if I could combine two past experiences on different continents to define a place in Africa… Or, in another way -- the type of climate and easy-goingness that you can ONLY find in seaside/lakeside places. But it was something else that completely shook me. It took me a few hours to put my finger on it, but then I finally grasped it: it was a sense of NORMALITY, which I had not experienced anywhere else in this mad country. Despite the many apparent difficulties people act calmly, and life here is really established. Anywhere else, in the neighboring provinces, this would be a dream, considering their horrible chaotic state due to so many stages of wars and uprisings, with or without a cause and finality. The fact that very mean-looking soldiers and rebels are NOT pacing the town everywhere makes a HUGE difference, of course, and gives the people a chance to breathe and go about their daily businesses in a much more casual, tranquil way.
That AND the stunning beauty of the region – from perfect coastline into savannah and then the bush - should be enough arguments to have tourism flourish here one day. I can only imagine boats crossing from Tanzania, and then tourists embarking on some-day-hopefully-again functioning trains to start their adventure journeys inland, to the heart of Congo’s majestic rain forest. For now, though, a mzungu in town is a rarity, as I have observed over the past four days, and anything catered towards public service is virtually non-existent or completely run-down.
That said, I have had great company. As our American chef-de-mission is on vacation, I am left to share the lakeside house with five African expat men, from Cote d’Ivoire, Benin, Cameroon, Kenya and Tanzania. Incredibly respectful and fun, they have really made it their mission to take good care of me. I feel, again, quite humbled by Africa’s hospitality and charm. To me, the Pearl of Tanganyika certainly merits its name, and then some!
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Keeping Fit
When I gave up my wonderful forest job from last year and I took on this amazing new position with a humanitarian aid organization, I knew changes would come in all shapes or forms. And it was what I happily embraced too, as I was certainly looking for another challenge in Africa. One thing was bothering me, though: I knew that security rules would be much stricter, and that in many places where we work I would not even be allowed to go anywhere on foot (walking being one of my all-time hobbies and definitely a huge need). I was already beginning to wonder how I would keep in some sort of shape (last year in Rwanda the gorilla hikes were more than sufficient, but now ‘field work’ means being taken by car pretty much everywhere.)
My one big hope was that I’d play lots of basketball on my friends’ private court, by the lake. It is one of the most beautiful houses here in Goma, and the family is just wonderfully hospitable. But the place lies pretty much at the other end of town (not that Goma is that big, but with the potholed road and the traffic jams it takes about 25-30 mins. one way, which is not something I would do every day, especially as it gets dark here around 6.30 p.m.). It is more of a weekend activity now, when basketball is usually followed up by dinner and drinks and other fun things. By the time I have to locate one of my drivers to come pick me up it is usually (very) late at night, so they must think I exercise very professionally (although I always shower and change there, which means I leave the house in sneakers and I come back in cocktail dresses and heels).
Clearly this was not going to be sustainable for my becoming and keeping fit on a regular basis, so I had to look for an alternative. The only well-equipped hotel gym in town is Karibu (i.e. ‘welcome’ in Swahili), which lies even further out on the lake, and which is prohibitively expensive, so that would not do. Luckily, just a few minutes’ walk from our house (a walk we can take only during daytime, of course) we have the luxury of the MONUSCO gym – which I can now access for $20/month, as I belong to an NGO doing humanitarian work in Congo.
Walking there, by the only stretch of lake still open in Goma, is really spectacular, especially as the time coincides pretty much with sunset every late afternoon. I usually get completely fascinated by the ocean-like views and I only look up when the road curves from next to the lake towards ‘centre ville’. There, in an isolated high-rise watch post, the blue helmet of the Uruguayan sentinel shows up from banana leaves. MONUSCO compound starts right there and then expands into lots of boring-looking pre-fabricated white buildings, clearly marked and very well guarded.
The first time I went there (end of July), I was quite worked-up about all the formalities at the entrance and a bit apprehensive about being the one non-regular gym goer among – well - professional soldiers… By now, I have already made ‘friends’ with every single Congolese guard at the entrance -- there are loads, and I am not sure exactly what each of them does other than sitting around, but they all want to seem important when they take my work badge and give me a visitor badge and enter tons of numbers on some check-in book. Of course they are slow, and they make mistakes all the time, but they are endearing, and now they call me up from the road already, “Karibu, Sinziana Maria!”
Once I leave the guards idle behind, I pass into a narrow corridor with a screening machine on the right (that either doesn’t work or that is deemed useless, since I was never asked to go through it). A few meters afterwards I have to cross a garden, where to the left a ton of soldiers always hang out – unfortunately, until now, we have only come to the stage where we mumble something between ‘hi’ and ‘hola’ to each other, and then they stay staring at my back as I make my way to the gym, some 30 meters to the right.
I think ANY gym in the world would ask BIIIG bucks if it had this location: above a terraced garden, with full view on the lake. It is just incredible to hop on a bike there and have this waterway at your feet. I many times let my thoughts run with the waves – so much so that once, after some 30 minutes, I thought I was actually rowing rather than biking. As the sun then sets, and the lake slowly disappears, all that is left to see is our own reflection in the big windows and the blue helmet of the sentinel in the garden corner – now slightly turned from the road towards the gym, to catch a glimpse of the excited action… The other times of the day when I went there - some Saturday mornings when I could not sleep in - I just took the lake in for the whole hour, feeling really lucky and blessed for such a life.
That said, the machines are almost completely run-down (none of them is plugged, so you cannot program anything, and so you just keep going at whatever rhythm you can work yourself into). That means that most people who come over – and who are, as predicted, either professional military or some real fitness freaks – go for the serious weight-lifting and other installations the looks of which totally scared me at the beginning (I should add here that I am SO NOT a gym person, actually, and that I never really went to these things more than a few random times here and there…)
With my Italian colleagues and housemates Viviana and Marco I chose, instead, to join the aerobics classes three times a week – which draw a ton of more regular people, of course. Placide, our instructor, is this really nicely built (how else?) Congolese, whose routine excited me at first, but who seems to be running out of many new ideas (or music tracks) as the weeks go by. I will not complain, though, as I am enjoying my getting (and keeping, hopefully) in shape a lot! Truth be told I kind of limp around (both here and on the basketball court), as I injured an ankle months ago and have not had the wisdom or the patience to tend to it properly.
The gym has also given me the chance to meet pretty much all the other mzungus in town I had not already met before. We are really not that big a bunch, so ‘gym types’ have already emerged pretty clearly: the power woman, who just paces around with insanely heavy weights; the fighter, who just kicks this boxing bag with a fury and then throws himself to the ground in an incredible sweaty puddle; the do-it-all guy, who seems to be moving among machines at an incredible speed, while displaying his muscles very consciously (and who, just last night, invited me out for dinner, even if we never really said more than ‘hi’ to each other…); the bicycle lady – a Romanian girl, in fact, whom I had befriended on FB but had never met in person, until she recognized my ‘Romanianess’ at the gym, sometime during her one-hour + frantic biking…
In a bizarre way, the fact that I paid for this monthly gym pass makes me feel more grounded in Goma than anything else. Hope it helps the home-like feeling grow, keep my mood happy and body healthy…
My one big hope was that I’d play lots of basketball on my friends’ private court, by the lake. It is one of the most beautiful houses here in Goma, and the family is just wonderfully hospitable. But the place lies pretty much at the other end of town (not that Goma is that big, but with the potholed road and the traffic jams it takes about 25-30 mins. one way, which is not something I would do every day, especially as it gets dark here around 6.30 p.m.). It is more of a weekend activity now, when basketball is usually followed up by dinner and drinks and other fun things. By the time I have to locate one of my drivers to come pick me up it is usually (very) late at night, so they must think I exercise very professionally (although I always shower and change there, which means I leave the house in sneakers and I come back in cocktail dresses and heels).
Clearly this was not going to be sustainable for my becoming and keeping fit on a regular basis, so I had to look for an alternative. The only well-equipped hotel gym in town is Karibu (i.e. ‘welcome’ in Swahili), which lies even further out on the lake, and which is prohibitively expensive, so that would not do. Luckily, just a few minutes’ walk from our house (a walk we can take only during daytime, of course) we have the luxury of the MONUSCO gym – which I can now access for $20/month, as I belong to an NGO doing humanitarian work in Congo.
Walking there, by the only stretch of lake still open in Goma, is really spectacular, especially as the time coincides pretty much with sunset every late afternoon. I usually get completely fascinated by the ocean-like views and I only look up when the road curves from next to the lake towards ‘centre ville’. There, in an isolated high-rise watch post, the blue helmet of the Uruguayan sentinel shows up from banana leaves. MONUSCO compound starts right there and then expands into lots of boring-looking pre-fabricated white buildings, clearly marked and very well guarded.
The first time I went there (end of July), I was quite worked-up about all the formalities at the entrance and a bit apprehensive about being the one non-regular gym goer among – well - professional soldiers… By now, I have already made ‘friends’ with every single Congolese guard at the entrance -- there are loads, and I am not sure exactly what each of them does other than sitting around, but they all want to seem important when they take my work badge and give me a visitor badge and enter tons of numbers on some check-in book. Of course they are slow, and they make mistakes all the time, but they are endearing, and now they call me up from the road already, “Karibu, Sinziana Maria!”
Once I leave the guards idle behind, I pass into a narrow corridor with a screening machine on the right (that either doesn’t work or that is deemed useless, since I was never asked to go through it). A few meters afterwards I have to cross a garden, where to the left a ton of soldiers always hang out – unfortunately, until now, we have only come to the stage where we mumble something between ‘hi’ and ‘hola’ to each other, and then they stay staring at my back as I make my way to the gym, some 30 meters to the right.
I think ANY gym in the world would ask BIIIG bucks if it had this location: above a terraced garden, with full view on the lake. It is just incredible to hop on a bike there and have this waterway at your feet. I many times let my thoughts run with the waves – so much so that once, after some 30 minutes, I thought I was actually rowing rather than biking. As the sun then sets, and the lake slowly disappears, all that is left to see is our own reflection in the big windows and the blue helmet of the sentinel in the garden corner – now slightly turned from the road towards the gym, to catch a glimpse of the excited action… The other times of the day when I went there - some Saturday mornings when I could not sleep in - I just took the lake in for the whole hour, feeling really lucky and blessed for such a life.
That said, the machines are almost completely run-down (none of them is plugged, so you cannot program anything, and so you just keep going at whatever rhythm you can work yourself into). That means that most people who come over – and who are, as predicted, either professional military or some real fitness freaks – go for the serious weight-lifting and other installations the looks of which totally scared me at the beginning (I should add here that I am SO NOT a gym person, actually, and that I never really went to these things more than a few random times here and there…)
With my Italian colleagues and housemates Viviana and Marco I chose, instead, to join the aerobics classes three times a week – which draw a ton of more regular people, of course. Placide, our instructor, is this really nicely built (how else?) Congolese, whose routine excited me at first, but who seems to be running out of many new ideas (or music tracks) as the weeks go by. I will not complain, though, as I am enjoying my getting (and keeping, hopefully) in shape a lot! Truth be told I kind of limp around (both here and on the basketball court), as I injured an ankle months ago and have not had the wisdom or the patience to tend to it properly.
The gym has also given me the chance to meet pretty much all the other mzungus in town I had not already met before. We are really not that big a bunch, so ‘gym types’ have already emerged pretty clearly: the power woman, who just paces around with insanely heavy weights; the fighter, who just kicks this boxing bag with a fury and then throws himself to the ground in an incredible sweaty puddle; the do-it-all guy, who seems to be moving among machines at an incredible speed, while displaying his muscles very consciously (and who, just last night, invited me out for dinner, even if we never really said more than ‘hi’ to each other…); the bicycle lady – a Romanian girl, in fact, whom I had befriended on FB but had never met in person, until she recognized my ‘Romanianess’ at the gym, sometime during her one-hour + frantic biking…
In a bizarre way, the fact that I paid for this monthly gym pass makes me feel more grounded in Goma than anything else. Hope it helps the home-like feeling grow, keep my mood happy and body healthy…
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Food Cravings and Woes
Of all the cuisines I have tasted around the world, traditional African cuisine will easily earn the last spot in my book. It is definitely unrefined, mostly heavy, and just about boring altogether, with a few dishes repeated to nausea: brochettes (meat skewers, which when are good are excellent, but one can only have so many brochettes…); samosas (a sort of fried dumplings, filled mostly with minced meat, which, again, are incredibly heavy and tend to get boring after a while); fried fish (a great addition when you live next to the lake); boiled potatoes; fufu (a sort of tasteless porridge, that they make either out of manioc or maize flour); hard boiled corn; creamy soups (which are to be found on all hotel buffets); some undefined veggie-grassy mixes; and other occasional foods that mostly float in reddish palm oil. If and when you want diversity, the few popular places would offer pizzas and pasta, croques monsieur and madame (this last recipe changes all the time, so the element of surprise is always there), and delicious fruits and veggies (which are in abundance, of course, but which for some reason are not at all popular with the locals – one explanation for this that I heard in East Congo goes back to colonial times, when the whites apparently indulged in these things while the blacks developed a strong cultural resistance.)
Overall, though, I should not complain, as both last year in Rwanda and this year in Congo we have had AMAZING house cooks, who have tried to appease the tastes of us difficult mzungus with ‘weird’ things, such as tender meats, clear soups, plenty of fruits and veggies, and delightful quiches and pies and cakes and soufflés, all nicely garnished and incredibly tasty. I have also been quite lucky to live with and around Italians, so high quality pasta, cappuccinos, and the best risottos of my life have been regulars on my diet.
That said, when you end up in a big city such as Kigali or Kinshasa, diverse cuisines are huge draws. Last year, on such occasions, I would splurge on FANTASTIC Chinese and Moroccan, while this summer I discovered the stunning cossa-cossa - the gigantic Congo River prawns that just about feel like heaven (I keep wondering, however, how come Kinshasa has not given in to a sort of African paella, I bet it would be a huge hit over there…)
In any event, this time around, doomed to spend two weeks in that fascinating but ultimately terrible big city, I thought I would at least indulge in whatever crazy food experiences I could get. Forewarned they would cost an arm and a leg, I was happy I would at least get per-diems to offset some of these costs (and started dreaming even more avidly of New York, and its amazing food scene at a fraction of the prices here…)
The first try was a Chinese restaurant, in the company of a Romanian SECU guy. He thought he knew its location by heart (somewhere behind the Greek orthodox church (?!)), but there we could only find a Greek restaurant, where life was in full swing. When we inquired about the Chinese brothers, they pointed to an obscure building, and said “Ils n’ont pas d’electricite!” We were not quite sure whether this was sabotage a la grec, or whether the poor Chinese really didn’t have money to pay for their power bill, but we did get out of there and drove to another Chinese restaurant on the main boulevard.Unfortunately, by the time we got there the cool things on the buffet were mostly gone, and while waiting for the second round of cossa-cossa to come up I stuffed myself with some rather bland sweet-and-sour pork and rice. Luckily, delicious steamed dumplings arrived in the meantime, and I pretty much claimed the whole pot to myself (in repeated trips to the buffet table, under the rather disapproving looks of the unfriendly Chinese serving staff).
The second culinary extravagance started one late weekend evening, by an amazing pool, where I ordered croquettes. I am never quite sure what they are made of (in Romania they would be mashed potato-based, while in Spain I had them ham-based). Of course the Congolese staff had no clue, so I was served these three mysterious little balls for 10 euros (bizarre even that the menu was priced in euros, not dollars, like everything else is in Africa.) From inside the deep-fried coat, some delicious saucy contents reversed onto my plate, and with the obligatory pilly-pilly (chilli) sauce a cote the croquettes were actually very tasty.
We then moved for the main meal, in a posh restaurant, where I just took some over-fried spring rolls and beer, while my friend tasted the Antelope a la Portuguese (?!) -- which resembled veal in some undefined Asian cuisine, apart from the fact that it was drowning in cheap red wine. The African counterpart -- Antelope a la Congolaise -- would have been served, instead, with sauce béarnaise (again, we had to pause and wonder what the connection was?!) In the end it didn’t matter so much, as I was more interested in the Real-Barca game we were there to see, and which, for the …th time, was going to make me supremely happy.
The next interesting food experience was over a business lunch at this Lebanese place called Belle Vue. I assumed it would be ‘just’ a restaurant, but I discovered that in fact it was a whole upscale compound, clearly belonging to some VERY rich people. Apart from several tennis courts, a grand swimming pool, residences and beautiful gardens, the restaurant itself seemed like a castle out of some Middle-East fairytale: a huge banquet hall, with velvet-clad chairs and heavy drapes, where the AC was obviously blasting; some extravagant chandeliers, dropping almost to the marble floors; ceiling-high paintings and carpets, all telling of some heroic tales hundreds of years ago and thousands of miles away; and an out-of-this-world staircase, rolling up to the first floor, where huge mirrors dwarfed me … All quite surreal, of course, in the middle of a hot, dusty, traffic-alienating Kinshasa day… The even more surprising thing was the menu: in fact, a fast-food menu dressed up nicely, where some very regular falafel, tabuleh and mint tea were quite cruelly priced, of course…
After all these random meals I was still yearning, though, for THE food: Japanese. Encouraged after an excellent sushi experience in Nairobi, I started scouting for ‘the best Japanese restaurant’ in Kinshasa, and when several people recommended Acachia I knew I had to try it. I sort of overlooked the second part of the recommendation, though – that this fusion place offered much better Korean than Japanese dishes, since, well, the owner was Korean. I also preferred to forget that Korean food was never really my favorite (I only once LOOOOVED it, in NYC of course, when spicy calamari just made it into my heart FOREVER).
In my craving I was quickly joined by another mzungu sort-of-new-in-town, so we decided we would have a wonderful sushi evening ahead of the return Barca-Real game, a mere couple of days after the previous one. As I was the first to arrive, I was received with numerous awkward bows by the entire African staff, yielding to some approximate Asian polite coutumes, and I was taken into the big dining room, where I discovered I was really the first one. The room was decorated with some giant wooden violin-shaped liquor cabinets (reminding me of Mozart kugelns), a large green painting with some unidentifiable exotic birds, and a big plasma TV showing some English Premier League game, all to the tunes of disco music from the 80s. As I was trying to find the perfect table (i.e. away from the AC), I noticed that the entire polite staff had retreated without a trace. I then remembered that the cool thing everyone professed about this place was the table bell – a button which you would press every time you’d like to be served. And which, by God, was the one thing keeping me in the good mood that night.
I pressed that bell many times, for good or just silly reasons, and I loved every single ring. As for the sushi – well, here’s what I actually got: a rainbow roll for $21 (!), which deserved its name to the fullest, as I believe they rolled in it whatever they found in the kitchen. Among them-not-so-sushi-items: kimchi (the fermented Korean veggies); mayo; coconut flakes (which at the beginning I mistook for Parmesan); and another unidentified sweetish brown sauce. The things that DIDN’T come with it: wasabi and ginger... Following the same model, the sweet potato tempura came without any special tempura sauce (whose missing earned another bell ring, and another ‘Il n’y en a pas’ answer). My friend, instead, went for the tiniest maki roll in the world (the pieces were literally as slim as my pinkie finger) and for some Korean dish, which, he vowed, tasted like the most sordid Chinese food he ever had in NYC (and NOT in Chinatown)… Luckily they had LARGE Skol beers (again, very different from the Romanian Skol, but not bad), so it was not a total $60 fiasco… At the end, I felt the urge to ring the bell one last time, and I gave my friend the occasion to address the waitress who showed up quite bewildered by these very demanding customers (we continued being the only ones throughout the evening). “Could you please give the chef our utmost gratitude for this delicious meal,” my friend said, while I was hardly containing my nervous-liberating laugh attack.
It was definitely time to get out of there and change venues for the game. A new Congolese friend suggested we meet at Bingo, this massive fast-food/shisha-smoke-filled betting alley, where they had Coronas and ice cream! Wow, two other treats that I had missed dearly! Not sure, though, what process these had also gone through, as the Corona tasted NOTHING like THE Corona, and the ice-cream was just frozen colorful icicles… Luckily Messi saved the night again – how else? – and all food woes were immediately put behind us.
The very last night in Kinshasa I gave croquettes another try, at Opoeta, and they were again delicious, although very different from the previous ones (but of course!). Also, as my Romanian friend was indulging in little frog legs, I decided it was finally time to break that last food taboo – and I absolutely LOVED them!!! Together with the surprisingly good moelleux that my hotel Sultani serves, and which I ordered pretty much every night, these were definitely the highlight of the Kinshasa food spree I had - only relatively successfully - embarked on.
Overall, though, I should not complain, as both last year in Rwanda and this year in Congo we have had AMAZING house cooks, who have tried to appease the tastes of us difficult mzungus with ‘weird’ things, such as tender meats, clear soups, plenty of fruits and veggies, and delightful quiches and pies and cakes and soufflés, all nicely garnished and incredibly tasty. I have also been quite lucky to live with and around Italians, so high quality pasta, cappuccinos, and the best risottos of my life have been regulars on my diet.
That said, when you end up in a big city such as Kigali or Kinshasa, diverse cuisines are huge draws. Last year, on such occasions, I would splurge on FANTASTIC Chinese and Moroccan, while this summer I discovered the stunning cossa-cossa - the gigantic Congo River prawns that just about feel like heaven (I keep wondering, however, how come Kinshasa has not given in to a sort of African paella, I bet it would be a huge hit over there…)
In any event, this time around, doomed to spend two weeks in that fascinating but ultimately terrible big city, I thought I would at least indulge in whatever crazy food experiences I could get. Forewarned they would cost an arm and a leg, I was happy I would at least get per-diems to offset some of these costs (and started dreaming even more avidly of New York, and its amazing food scene at a fraction of the prices here…)
The first try was a Chinese restaurant, in the company of a Romanian SECU guy. He thought he knew its location by heart (somewhere behind the Greek orthodox church (?!)), but there we could only find a Greek restaurant, where life was in full swing. When we inquired about the Chinese brothers, they pointed to an obscure building, and said “Ils n’ont pas d’electricite!” We were not quite sure whether this was sabotage a la grec, or whether the poor Chinese really didn’t have money to pay for their power bill, but we did get out of there and drove to another Chinese restaurant on the main boulevard.Unfortunately, by the time we got there the cool things on the buffet were mostly gone, and while waiting for the second round of cossa-cossa to come up I stuffed myself with some rather bland sweet-and-sour pork and rice. Luckily, delicious steamed dumplings arrived in the meantime, and I pretty much claimed the whole pot to myself (in repeated trips to the buffet table, under the rather disapproving looks of the unfriendly Chinese serving staff).
The second culinary extravagance started one late weekend evening, by an amazing pool, where I ordered croquettes. I am never quite sure what they are made of (in Romania they would be mashed potato-based, while in Spain I had them ham-based). Of course the Congolese staff had no clue, so I was served these three mysterious little balls for 10 euros (bizarre even that the menu was priced in euros, not dollars, like everything else is in Africa.) From inside the deep-fried coat, some delicious saucy contents reversed onto my plate, and with the obligatory pilly-pilly (chilli) sauce a cote the croquettes were actually very tasty.
We then moved for the main meal, in a posh restaurant, where I just took some over-fried spring rolls and beer, while my friend tasted the Antelope a la Portuguese (?!) -- which resembled veal in some undefined Asian cuisine, apart from the fact that it was drowning in cheap red wine. The African counterpart -- Antelope a la Congolaise -- would have been served, instead, with sauce béarnaise (again, we had to pause and wonder what the connection was?!) In the end it didn’t matter so much, as I was more interested in the Real-Barca game we were there to see, and which, for the …th time, was going to make me supremely happy.
The next interesting food experience was over a business lunch at this Lebanese place called Belle Vue. I assumed it would be ‘just’ a restaurant, but I discovered that in fact it was a whole upscale compound, clearly belonging to some VERY rich people. Apart from several tennis courts, a grand swimming pool, residences and beautiful gardens, the restaurant itself seemed like a castle out of some Middle-East fairytale: a huge banquet hall, with velvet-clad chairs and heavy drapes, where the AC was obviously blasting; some extravagant chandeliers, dropping almost to the marble floors; ceiling-high paintings and carpets, all telling of some heroic tales hundreds of years ago and thousands of miles away; and an out-of-this-world staircase, rolling up to the first floor, where huge mirrors dwarfed me … All quite surreal, of course, in the middle of a hot, dusty, traffic-alienating Kinshasa day… The even more surprising thing was the menu: in fact, a fast-food menu dressed up nicely, where some very regular falafel, tabuleh and mint tea were quite cruelly priced, of course…
After all these random meals I was still yearning, though, for THE food: Japanese. Encouraged after an excellent sushi experience in Nairobi, I started scouting for ‘the best Japanese restaurant’ in Kinshasa, and when several people recommended Acachia I knew I had to try it. I sort of overlooked the second part of the recommendation, though – that this fusion place offered much better Korean than Japanese dishes, since, well, the owner was Korean. I also preferred to forget that Korean food was never really my favorite (I only once LOOOOVED it, in NYC of course, when spicy calamari just made it into my heart FOREVER).
In my craving I was quickly joined by another mzungu sort-of-new-in-town, so we decided we would have a wonderful sushi evening ahead of the return Barca-Real game, a mere couple of days after the previous one. As I was the first to arrive, I was received with numerous awkward bows by the entire African staff, yielding to some approximate Asian polite coutumes, and I was taken into the big dining room, where I discovered I was really the first one. The room was decorated with some giant wooden violin-shaped liquor cabinets (reminding me of Mozart kugelns), a large green painting with some unidentifiable exotic birds, and a big plasma TV showing some English Premier League game, all to the tunes of disco music from the 80s. As I was trying to find the perfect table (i.e. away from the AC), I noticed that the entire polite staff had retreated without a trace. I then remembered that the cool thing everyone professed about this place was the table bell – a button which you would press every time you’d like to be served. And which, by God, was the one thing keeping me in the good mood that night.
I pressed that bell many times, for good or just silly reasons, and I loved every single ring. As for the sushi – well, here’s what I actually got: a rainbow roll for $21 (!), which deserved its name to the fullest, as I believe they rolled in it whatever they found in the kitchen. Among them-not-so-sushi-items: kimchi (the fermented Korean veggies); mayo; coconut flakes (which at the beginning I mistook for Parmesan); and another unidentified sweetish brown sauce. The things that DIDN’T come with it: wasabi and ginger... Following the same model, the sweet potato tempura came without any special tempura sauce (whose missing earned another bell ring, and another ‘Il n’y en a pas’ answer). My friend, instead, went for the tiniest maki roll in the world (the pieces were literally as slim as my pinkie finger) and for some Korean dish, which, he vowed, tasted like the most sordid Chinese food he ever had in NYC (and NOT in Chinatown)… Luckily they had LARGE Skol beers (again, very different from the Romanian Skol, but not bad), so it was not a total $60 fiasco… At the end, I felt the urge to ring the bell one last time, and I gave my friend the occasion to address the waitress who showed up quite bewildered by these very demanding customers (we continued being the only ones throughout the evening). “Could you please give the chef our utmost gratitude for this delicious meal,” my friend said, while I was hardly containing my nervous-liberating laugh attack.
It was definitely time to get out of there and change venues for the game. A new Congolese friend suggested we meet at Bingo, this massive fast-food/shisha-smoke-filled betting alley, where they had Coronas and ice cream! Wow, two other treats that I had missed dearly! Not sure, though, what process these had also gone through, as the Corona tasted NOTHING like THE Corona, and the ice-cream was just frozen colorful icicles… Luckily Messi saved the night again – how else? – and all food woes were immediately put behind us.
The very last night in Kinshasa I gave croquettes another try, at Opoeta, and they were again delicious, although very different from the previous ones (but of course!). Also, as my Romanian friend was indulging in little frog legs, I decided it was finally time to break that last food taboo – and I absolutely LOVED them!!! Together with the surprisingly good moelleux that my hotel Sultani serves, and which I ordered pretty much every night, these were definitely the highlight of the Kinshasa food spree I had - only relatively successfully - embarked on.
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Spicing Up the Dusty Life
Across this mega-country, between Goma and Kinshasa, and the craziest 10 days at work so far, a couple of random episodes certainly stand out.
THE PARTY. Goma is famous for its party scene, especially in the summer, when all the cool Congolese and metisses descend upon town from whatever fancy places around the world they live in. This August would be no exception, and last couple of weeks’ buzz was all about this legendary annual party, ‘which you MUST go to’, if only just to see the place. From the outside, of course, it was no more than a horrible gate, wrapped in barbed wire, on the most unassuming, lava damaged street I had ever been on, but once we penetrated the walls the stylish mystique began to unveil. First, we had to drive for a few minutes through this mesmerizing park (the classic park idea, which in Africa is not really translated into practice anywhere), and then start on foot on a long row of steps down towards the lawn and the water. WHAT A PLACE! It is sooo hard to reconcile a property like this with the derelict plage du people, which is just down the lake, and where poverty and filth are thriving. Here, we were all of a sudden thrown into the Hamptons-like water front, with a cozy pool, a dance floor, a huge lawn, and, of course, a very rocky, inviting beach on Lake Kivu (the largest I had seen on either this or the Rwandan side). With the barbeque and open bar in full swing until dawn, and some of the most beautiful people I have ever hung out with, it was certainly the night to remember…
However, as much as the place was fabulous, to me the story behind it was even more captivating. The Belgian owners - apparently the most successful businesspeople in town – had bought this place for almost nothing from the family of another Belgian owner – who was so extravagant, that he was flying his private jet drunk all over East Congo, until he managed to crash into the lake never to be found again. In more recent times – i.e. this year – the property has, however, changed hands again, as apparently the president’s wife spotted it while on a trip to Goma and decided it would be hers for the modest price tag of $5 million. I am certainly curious now what the next party there will look like (assuming I will be THAT important to ever be invited back :D)
THE MOVIE. One of the things you have to forego when you come to this part of the world is going to the movies. Surely, movie evenings are organized on a regular basis, on cool screens in nice gardens, but the whole movie theater experience as we know it from back home is not a given here. That is why I was totally taken with the suggestion of a new friend I made in Kinshasa to go to the movies on Sunday at 3 p.m. When she only picked me up at 3.15 I was wondering what had gone wrong, but then she explained there was a twist (or rather several twists) to this ‘2nd floor underground’ theater as well: advertised only online, so that they would not pay taxes, it would basically suggest a time and a movie, but then be open to any kinds of changes desired by the audience. Since the two of us and another two friends WERE the audience, we had no trouble showing up almost at 4 p.m., buy the $10 a piece ticket, and then be served Arthur in French – which none of us found amusing in the slightest… When we inquired what else would be available – well, they pretty much had every movie on the planet, all dubbed in French, so we had to make do with the only choice in English – The Adjustment Bureau. Cool Matt Damon provided our entertainment for the hot afternoon,in what would be THE movie memory of DRC in 2011.
We then chilled on another amazing property, watching the sunset by a fabulous pool, over expensive G&Ts and even more expensive croquettes, constantly warming up for the Real-Barca game late evening (which we watched in a hip restaurant, while trying out ‘Antelope a la Portuguese’?!). If only Kinshasa were not as dusty and just exhausting altogether this could certainly have been a slice of life in any big city I have ever visited before.
THE PARTY. Goma is famous for its party scene, especially in the summer, when all the cool Congolese and metisses descend upon town from whatever fancy places around the world they live in. This August would be no exception, and last couple of weeks’ buzz was all about this legendary annual party, ‘which you MUST go to’, if only just to see the place. From the outside, of course, it was no more than a horrible gate, wrapped in barbed wire, on the most unassuming, lava damaged street I had ever been on, but once we penetrated the walls the stylish mystique began to unveil. First, we had to drive for a few minutes through this mesmerizing park (the classic park idea, which in Africa is not really translated into practice anywhere), and then start on foot on a long row of steps down towards the lawn and the water. WHAT A PLACE! It is sooo hard to reconcile a property like this with the derelict plage du people, which is just down the lake, and where poverty and filth are thriving. Here, we were all of a sudden thrown into the Hamptons-like water front, with a cozy pool, a dance floor, a huge lawn, and, of course, a very rocky, inviting beach on Lake Kivu (the largest I had seen on either this or the Rwandan side). With the barbeque and open bar in full swing until dawn, and some of the most beautiful people I have ever hung out with, it was certainly the night to remember…
However, as much as the place was fabulous, to me the story behind it was even more captivating. The Belgian owners - apparently the most successful businesspeople in town – had bought this place for almost nothing from the family of another Belgian owner – who was so extravagant, that he was flying his private jet drunk all over East Congo, until he managed to crash into the lake never to be found again. In more recent times – i.e. this year – the property has, however, changed hands again, as apparently the president’s wife spotted it while on a trip to Goma and decided it would be hers for the modest price tag of $5 million. I am certainly curious now what the next party there will look like (assuming I will be THAT important to ever be invited back :D)
THE MOVIE. One of the things you have to forego when you come to this part of the world is going to the movies. Surely, movie evenings are organized on a regular basis, on cool screens in nice gardens, but the whole movie theater experience as we know it from back home is not a given here. That is why I was totally taken with the suggestion of a new friend I made in Kinshasa to go to the movies on Sunday at 3 p.m. When she only picked me up at 3.15 I was wondering what had gone wrong, but then she explained there was a twist (or rather several twists) to this ‘2nd floor underground’ theater as well: advertised only online, so that they would not pay taxes, it would basically suggest a time and a movie, but then be open to any kinds of changes desired by the audience. Since the two of us and another two friends WERE the audience, we had no trouble showing up almost at 4 p.m., buy the $10 a piece ticket, and then be served Arthur in French – which none of us found amusing in the slightest… When we inquired what else would be available – well, they pretty much had every movie on the planet, all dubbed in French, so we had to make do with the only choice in English – The Adjustment Bureau. Cool Matt Damon provided our entertainment for the hot afternoon,in what would be THE movie memory of DRC in 2011.
We then chilled on another amazing property, watching the sunset by a fabulous pool, over expensive G&Ts and even more expensive croquettes, constantly warming up for the Real-Barca game late evening (which we watched in a hip restaurant, while trying out ‘Antelope a la Portuguese’?!). If only Kinshasa were not as dusty and just exhausting altogether this could certainly have been a slice of life in any big city I have ever visited before.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
First Curfew
After a month to the day in the DRC I finally went to my first field assignment - one that did not involve hanging out with VIPs in luxury hotels, but that was to include visits to remote sites in the North Kivu Province to see how the programs are actually acted out. My adrenaline was certainly mounting, building on an already high doses, due to the brilliant long weekend that I had spent half playing basketball half indulging in great foods and beers – all by the side of the beautiful lake, mostly in the company of the enchanting metisse Congolese.
So come Tuesday morning, rested and certainly curious, I joined our party of five and took off from Goma at about 10 a.m., in a convoy of two Land Rovers. The road north – which meanders through and next to the mighty Virunga National Park - used to be goudron in some better ages, but is now just one DEEP pot-hole after another. Yet, as it counts as the ‘main road’, it is quite heavily trafficked, as well as patrolled by the army up and down. The one thing you do not want – to be stuck behind some other vehicle, as the dust is really just overwhelming. We advanced however quite steadily for some 70kms., during which the biggest problem was losing phone reception in a couple of spots.
The most remarkable thing of the day, actually – passing through a Centre de Brassage at Rumangabo – where men of different armed groups (there are SO many in this region) now and then come to be integrated into the regular army (the barriers delineating ‘the good’ and ‘the bad’ armed people are quite blurry on many occasions, as slip-ups are certainly not uncommon). However, this center seemed like quite the established place – with dozens of living blocks (from the Belgian times, of course), where the military have brought their extensive families and now live in VERY large groups. Yesterday no one had any issues with us passing by the instruction camps (?!), so we continued on to ‘our’ villages, to visit local health centers.
It is one of those things that will just stick to your mind forever – the maternity and the post partum rooms. And, by God, if I had to give birth in one of those places I would definitely forfeit having children forever (of course, not an option for your regular Congolese woman…) We actually stumbled upon a whole pregnant-women gathering, and they were all so happy, and the small babies up on their backs so cute, that one could almost be mislead about the kinds of lives these people live…
Zigzagging through incredibly beautiful landscape we spent a few hours in different communities, only with a small break in the meantime, to have lunch at our beautiful house (yes, another beautiful house…) When we finally arrived to our regional office I found an email immediately requesting me to Kinshasa – so frantic calls back and forth resulted in a compromise: I would go early next week, and in the meantime take it sort of easy with my field work and go crazy with preparing materials for this mega-event coming up in Kinshasa.
The greatest part of the day was still to come though: the first curfew of my life. Scary and exciting at the same time, it conjured in my mind memories of a distant past in Romania, when all of us were gathered home, in the long winter evenings, without electricity. I came home on foot at 6, but since everyone else was still out and the only key to the house with someone else, I hung out with the guards among pomme-granate trees, learning some Swahili and giving solicited advice, in French, on contraception, to a guy who has 9 kids and would like to stop there...
At 6.30 we all got into the house, barred all doors, and prepared for a long evening, calling in with the radio room every so often to report that there is nothing to report. However, in all honesty, I was expecting something a tad more dramatic, but this curfew was actually just one fun, big evening, with colleagues from Italy, El Salvador, France and Guinea: an impromptu gym on our beautiful terrace (where I toned my muscles, aggravated an ankle twisted over the weekend and further injured my right knee), some Amstel sessions complemented with some Congo-style Spanish tortilla, a long chat with my Italian colleague (he is my house mate in Goma as well, but somehow we had to come all the way here to actually bond), and a fascinating Burkina Faso soap opera on TV (on which occasion I found out the VERY important fact that someone from that country is called a Burkinabé).
At 9.40 p.m. it felt like we had partied for weeks already, so I took to my small, cozy room, and sheltered under my very sexy blue mosquito net. With ear plugs on I slept all through the night – so I would have even been unaware of guns shots around -- which are apparently a common occurrence here, and therefore a main reason for our curfews…
So come Tuesday morning, rested and certainly curious, I joined our party of five and took off from Goma at about 10 a.m., in a convoy of two Land Rovers. The road north – which meanders through and next to the mighty Virunga National Park - used to be goudron in some better ages, but is now just one DEEP pot-hole after another. Yet, as it counts as the ‘main road’, it is quite heavily trafficked, as well as patrolled by the army up and down. The one thing you do not want – to be stuck behind some other vehicle, as the dust is really just overwhelming. We advanced however quite steadily for some 70kms., during which the biggest problem was losing phone reception in a couple of spots.
The most remarkable thing of the day, actually – passing through a Centre de Brassage at Rumangabo – where men of different armed groups (there are SO many in this region) now and then come to be integrated into the regular army (the barriers delineating ‘the good’ and ‘the bad’ armed people are quite blurry on many occasions, as slip-ups are certainly not uncommon). However, this center seemed like quite the established place – with dozens of living blocks (from the Belgian times, of course), where the military have brought their extensive families and now live in VERY large groups. Yesterday no one had any issues with us passing by the instruction camps (?!), so we continued on to ‘our’ villages, to visit local health centers.
It is one of those things that will just stick to your mind forever – the maternity and the post partum rooms. And, by God, if I had to give birth in one of those places I would definitely forfeit having children forever (of course, not an option for your regular Congolese woman…) We actually stumbled upon a whole pregnant-women gathering, and they were all so happy, and the small babies up on their backs so cute, that one could almost be mislead about the kinds of lives these people live…
Zigzagging through incredibly beautiful landscape we spent a few hours in different communities, only with a small break in the meantime, to have lunch at our beautiful house (yes, another beautiful house…) When we finally arrived to our regional office I found an email immediately requesting me to Kinshasa – so frantic calls back and forth resulted in a compromise: I would go early next week, and in the meantime take it sort of easy with my field work and go crazy with preparing materials for this mega-event coming up in Kinshasa.
The greatest part of the day was still to come though: the first curfew of my life. Scary and exciting at the same time, it conjured in my mind memories of a distant past in Romania, when all of us were gathered home, in the long winter evenings, without electricity. I came home on foot at 6, but since everyone else was still out and the only key to the house with someone else, I hung out with the guards among pomme-granate trees, learning some Swahili and giving solicited advice, in French, on contraception, to a guy who has 9 kids and would like to stop there...
At 6.30 we all got into the house, barred all doors, and prepared for a long evening, calling in with the radio room every so often to report that there is nothing to report. However, in all honesty, I was expecting something a tad more dramatic, but this curfew was actually just one fun, big evening, with colleagues from Italy, El Salvador, France and Guinea: an impromptu gym on our beautiful terrace (where I toned my muscles, aggravated an ankle twisted over the weekend and further injured my right knee), some Amstel sessions complemented with some Congo-style Spanish tortilla, a long chat with my Italian colleague (he is my house mate in Goma as well, but somehow we had to come all the way here to actually bond), and a fascinating Burkina Faso soap opera on TV (on which occasion I found out the VERY important fact that someone from that country is called a Burkinabé).
At 9.40 p.m. it felt like we had partied for weeks already, so I took to my small, cozy room, and sheltered under my very sexy blue mosquito net. With ear plugs on I slept all through the night – so I would have even been unaware of guns shots around -- which are apparently a common occurrence here, and therefore a main reason for our curfews…
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