Blog Post:  Posted September 8, 2007, 4:35 pm by Matthew De Galan

A Day in the Office

Country: DR Congo

Mugur came back from a security briefing at the UN with the following updates:

• In Ruthuru, 40 miles north, rebel troops took out the radio and cell phone tower, cutting off communications to the FARDC garrison there. In the old days, you took over the radio and television stations. Now, you just blow up the cell phone tower.
• Several incidents also occurred right in town:
• A hand grenade was tossed into a home in Ndosha, a neighborhood right in town, where we've done 100 surveys. Four people were injured.
• Police engaged in a day-time shootout with "bandits" in downtown Goma. Several were killed.
• Armed bandits raided and looted six homes on the eastern edge of Goma, raping several women.
• Finally, a Russian cargo plane crashed on the runway in Goma, which has a lava flow at the end of it. First report was that it was a passenger plane and all aboard died. But then it was reported it was a cargo plane. All aboard still died. Five in all. Some obnoxious Russians and their Congolese "girlfriends" were having dinner in the hotel the night before; one of the Russians was brutally berating Robin, one of our favorite waiters, for getting the order wrong. Chelsea and I were fuming. Could he have been on the plane? Is this how karma plays out in the DRC?

* * *

Pierrot, the Italian journalist, turned up today, quite alive, at the Ihusi Hotel. He was doing a story about the genocide of the pygmies, way up near Ituri. He drove back by motorcycle, 12 hours. He was quite amused by the reports of his demise.

Blog Post:  Posted September 7, 2007, 4:31 pm by Matthew De Galan

Rain and IDPs

Country: DR Congo

A strange couple of days. Yesterday, Thursday, the fighting intensified. Pretty much the whole town of Sake emptied and came here, and they are still coming. Now there are some 30,000 IDPs in Goma, most up in Mugunga.

Late Thursday afternoon, Oxfam decided to evacuate over the border into Rwanda — we thought about it, sitting up in the breakfast room, but called around and no one else was leaving, so we stayed put. Lots of helicopters flying all night. We were advised to have a small bag packed, and be ready to move. And no movement outside the hotel. Then it started pouring rain, the third night in a row — as if it wasn’t bad enough for the battered, terrified people walking into Goma. Thunder, lightning, rain as thick and hard as rain can be. Misery.

I hardly slept. In the middle of the night, strange sounds. Helicopters, but not flying north, as usual, but flying low and circling. Searching for something, perhaps. Then I heard a door in the hotel open and someone running fast down the hall, toward the steps. It was 4 a.m., dark. I went to the window, looked out. Saw no one, but heard a click-click-click of paws on stone and saw a low-slung dog with strange round ears totting at half speed down on the courtyard path, toward the security gate. In his mouth was something big. I feared for Bridget, the hotel cat, or one of her four kittens, who Chelsea feeds each day. I wonder if feeding them, petting them, has lowered their wariness, made them easier targets. The best intentions gone bad. Compassion, dependency, weakness — and then the jaws clamp down. Let’s spin that metaphor out, for the whole benighted country. In any case, Bridget was there in the morning, as were the kittens. Must have been a bone.

Blog Post:  Posted September 6, 2007, 4:24 pm by Matthew De Galan

Chanceline

Country: DR Congo

One day last week I visited the health centre in Muja, a town 15 miles north of Goma, just west of the army checkpoint. It is a place of crushing poverty, even by DRC standards. Three-fourths of the children are undernourished. People earn less than a dollar a day. Water, jobs, food — everything is scarce or simply unaffordable.

There was but one patient in the centre — most of them are empty, as people can't afford the fees — and it was a new mother. This was a Friday, and her daughter had been born on Tuesday. Three days old, tiny and beautiful. The mother is the wife, or girlfriend, of a soldier. Some of his gear was in the corner — no weapons, just a backpack of sorts. Apparently, the wives and girlfriends of soldiers don't have to pay — thus her presence. Is this a formal Ministry of Health policy? Or is it simply impossible to demand payment from a father with a gun?

The mother was young, maybe 18, and pretty. She sat smiling, looking at her baby, quite alone until we came into the room, which had half a dozen simple beds. She looked up at us — myself and Honorine — and seemed a bit bewildered, but smiled. We chatted with her for a bit and I asked the baby's name.

"Chanceline," she said. "Parce qu'elle va avoir de la chance."

Lucky. Because she will have good luck.

* * *

Mugur heard at a WFP meeting that Pierrot, the Italian journalist we had dinner with, has gone missing in Sake. I call him, but get no answer. Later I am at the Ihusi Hotel and stop by the Internet room, where he sends his files. No sign of him. The attendant says he has not seen him for three days, that he was due back two days ago but has not shown up, not called. I try again later, but his phone is turned off.

Blog Post:  Posted August 23, 2007, 2:38 pm by Matthew De Galan

Questions

Country: DR Congo

Spent today conducting assessment surveys with Fernand, one of our Congolese staff. Basically, this means going door to door and asking people 61 questions ranging from how much money they earn and what they eat each day to where they go for health care. We'll use the data we collect from 500 interviews to help design our programme.

Fernand and I were walking through a shaded part of Mugunga when we found our next subject. Francine Ancirite. Beautiful, with a sad beautiful smile. She is 17, and if she was in the US she'd be running for homecoming queen this fall. When we find her she is sitting in the yard, chatting with some neighbors, older women, mothers. Young children run around the yard, playing - beautiful kids. Are they Francine's? No, surely she is too young. Slowly, we walk her through the questionnaire and get her story.

Last November, just north of here near the town of Sake, fighting erupted between the Congolese army and troops loyal to the renegade General Laurent Nkunda. Nkunda was threatening to take Goma. Somewhere in the middle of the fighting, there was an atrocity in Sake and dozens of civilians were killed. Among them were Francine's parents, who have a piece of land near there - this is only 7 miles up the road from Mugunga. At age 16, Francine suddenly found herself in charge of 4 children, three of them under five. It is a heavy burden. She seems tired, listless, sad, perhaps traumatized. She left school after her parents' death so she could watch the children. Her siblings also left school, unable to afford the cost of books, uniforms and the $3 monthly tuition.

What are her hopes, we ask? Does she want to go back to school, get married? She is realistic. School is impossible. Marriage unlikely - who will want to buy into 4 young children? Her hope is to start some "petit commerce" - sell things along the main Goma road, which runs just outside her house. Proximity to the road, it seems, is her one piece of luck.

When I got back I looked through the survey, looking for clues, insights, a bit of reality there in the data. Here's what one learns:

Question 14: Did you eat anything yesterday morning? No. We skipped the meal.
Question 15: Did you eat anything yesterday at midday? No. There was no food.
Question 16: Did you eat anything yesterday in the evening? Yes. Manioc, corn and peas.
Question 18: How many times per week to you eat animal protein? 0.
Question 19: How long do your food stocks last? N/A. We have no food stocks.
Question 20: List your sources of revenue for the household: Agricultural day worker, 400 francs/day (about 80 cents).
Question 26: In the last six months, have you borrowed or been given any money? Yes. 1000 francs to feed my brothers and sisters.
Question 34: What livestock or fowls do you possess? None.
Question 38: Do you have access to the quantity of water that you need? No. Because we have to pay and our means are insufficient.