Save Nuba

Darfur (and all the horrors that this place-name is capable of invoking) is happening all over again.. just next door, in a beautiful place called The Nuba Mountains. Ethnic cleansing, hidden away from the eyes of the world by a guilty government. A repeat of performance of previous atrocities committed there in the 1990's. And somehow it can happen again, despite the UN watching on and the repeated requests by local NGOs for international monitors to be allowed in.  Aerial bombing and denial of humanitarian-aid access are their chosen tools. (I would go in, if only I could..) Sudan certainly has a talent for genocide.
                                                  
I asked a Nubian colleague of mine how his family are doing. He smiled and said they were fine. I asked where were they and he said they were hiding in the caves in the mountains and not coming out in the day time, to avoid the bombs. That is why they are fine. For now. 

(I'm sorry, but some images in the clip are horrific. War is horrific.)

So, you see, while the world blindly celebrates The Republic of South Sudan, war still plagues other parts of this broken land. The strategic segregation of separate peace deals across this country has its critics. John Prendergast makes some suggestions to US Policy interventions here, worth a read. 

In his words:

"This is a dynamic time in international relations and should allow for a re-examination

of what is possible in Sudan. The international responsibility to protect civilian life

is making a comeback and aggressive measures must be deployed in response to the

crimes against humanity in the Nuba Mountains. The Arab Spring has opened the door

to sweeping reform that should not leave Sudan untouched. And the stove-piped policy

of mediating individual Sudanese conflicts—marked by continuous accommodation of

the Bashir regime’s international neutrality—has failed the people of Sudan. It’s time to

try something else."

From one girl to another.

I look at all these young girls in the camp each day. And I question their future. I hold hope in my heart for each and every one of them. I wish I could reach out to every one of them and say to them "Tell your father you must stay in school! You must not be married off at the age of 15, you must be given the chance to live your life"..  I wish I could somehow communicate to the men that it is now proven that if a girl can stay in school until at least age 15, she has will have 2.2 less children, be  3 times less likely to contract HIV/AIDS, will earn 25% more income and will be willing to invest 90% of her earnings back into her family. But of course it is more complex than that. If a daughter is in school, who will collect the water? Bring in the livestock? Care for the babies? Earn some extra income for the family? That was her birthright. Not school. Not a different kind of future to her mother. Not a life like my own. More Notes on girls here. 

p.s. for astounding facts on the effects of targeting girls in poverty, check out Half The Sky. 

A Displaced Childhood

There are a lot of kids in Darfur. And a lot of little fingerprints that are being added to our database so we can keep track of them.  It would be easy to say 80% of people living in these camps are under the age of 8. Everywhere you look there seems to be children. And new babies. And pregnant women. And while it makes me smile, to see so many cute little faces, (despite the fact that many of them scream or cry when they see me because the last time saw a white person was in the vaccination centre, ouch!), it also makes me incredibly sad to think about this generation and what their future may hold for them. Especially for the girls.  

               

There are few men turning up for the verifications as there are few men still living here in these camps. They have all left for the city or the towns or the farms. The women stay behind, with the few elderly who manage to make it that far, and try and make some kind of living to feed the many children.  (the men obviously pop back for visits..). What is it about emergencies and displacements and having more kids?! I witnessed the same in Nepal in the floods. Boredom? Contingency planning for losses? Populate or perish? In relation to food security, it makes no sense at all and it frustrates us working here to witness so many children being born into poverty, to parents and to community leaders who will not be able to give them a life every child deserves.  But perhaps that is because they do not even know what that is..

 

Plastic bag free! Yippee!

I am so proud of my Darfur town. No more plastic bags in the market for any trader. And it has been impressive how quickly everyone is abiding to these new rules! Paper bags all round! (or cheese wrapped in yesterdays newspaper as I was handed today).  My friends at Dear Plastic would be pleased. No more hideous 'plastic trees' that scar the landscape. No more plastic flags waving from every barbed wired compound wall. No more choking donkeys... (or at least there will be no more, once they finish eating all the current plastic).

This is what my days are looking like

Six years ago, the humanitarian community working in Darfur re-verified all the displaced families in need and re-distributed ration-cards, entitling them to continued food, NFI and health services while they were forced to live outside their villages. This was meant to then be done every couple of years to re-confirm the legitimate need of each and every IDP. But this is Darfur. And for multiple reasons, this was impossible. Until now. So this is what we are now doing, 6 days a week. We need to check each and every person - removing the absentees, and adding the newborns (and there are many!!). We have almost 2 million people to get through across Darfur. Many of whom are now doing much better and do not need so much assistance. Others are struggling. And we want to make sure we channel the assistance into their homes, where it is really needed. 

Everyone is getting finger-printed. Even the smallest. Even the cutest.

Oh Sudan...
I have not forgotten you..
Brinkmanship in Sudan.. 

Especially not Darfur..
Darfur in the Shadows, Human Rights Watch

Tabaldi Tree of Darfur

Desert smiles

And this is what I will miss about Darfur..

These kids have spent their entire lives living in one of the worlds biggest IDP camps and yet... they smile. 

Farming: Desert style

Last week on our field mission we had a look at some farming areas where a small number of people are doing quite well, with good water supply all year round from the ground-water running off the wadi's (the seasonal rivers). For now only the few lucky families that have access to land and water combined can grow their own food. The majority of displaced Darfurians (over one million), are yet to go back home due to fear of re-attack and consequently struggle to farm  the land they are essentially occupying as 'squatters'. Many resort to the most basic of livelihoods just to survive day to day, cutting down trees and making charcoal to sell as a cooking fuel, for example. Deforestation is now at crisis level in Darfur.  Access to land, water, seeds and tools are the main limiting factors for getting people back on their feet and weaning them off food aid.  We are trying to assist this. And although it sounds fairly simple, unfortunately there are many compounding challenges in our way. The safety of women and children out tending to their crops and animals while fighting still continues, for example. Yet we remain hopeful.  How can we not... 

Vegetable cropping near the river

Onion crop being hand-harvested

Orchard of various fruit trees

Solar-powered Village water pump,
built by an NGO.
Who will build them now?

Livestock watering point,
 many of these were destroyed during village raids, many more are needed. 

Checking out new cash-crop just planted
(yes I was the only girl on our trip...whats new.)

Desert Lives

I finally got back out into the field this week, al Humdulilah!

Looking for that summit again...

I have been a bit down lately.  In my core I know this has been unjustified and indeed, self-indulgent.  What right do I have to allow melancholy into this wonderful adventure that is my life?  But these last couple of months here in South Darfur have been challenging for this lover of the outdoors..  As I have been trapped indoors.  The security situation around these parts has gone from dismal to.. worse? And consequently, my freedom of movement has gone down with it.  No more trips to the camps (did you notice a distinct lack of photographs of late??). No more field trips, helicopter rides or interacting with people and places that inspire. Not even walking outside is allowed, so we sit in a mini-van to commute the 3 minutes to the office.  Just office and home, home and office, office and home...and so forth, on and on....

I am struggling. And I am starting to question. Everything.  What are we doing here? Why are we here? What is our role? And then of course the big life questions... Should I be here? What else could I do? Where should I go? Who should I go there with ? Do I even have a home anymore? In the real sense of all that comes with that illustrious word 'home'? Where exactly is my heart these days? 

So what do I do?  Please tell me? Do you ever have these moments in life where you feel trapped?For now, I tend to look to my beloved mountains. And I let my mind wander to far away lands, to my past lives, to all the places my feet have trodden... Remind myself of my fortune that I possess - my past adventures. 

Machapuchare, 2007

I go back, back to a quiet cool of dawn run through the rice paddies in eastern Cambodian province. Or to crossing mountain passes that feel like a gateway to another world. Where the freshness of a Himalayan wind touches my face - winds that may have just danced off the face of Sagarmatha. Or back to galloping horses across Namibia, feeling wild and exhilarated and free.  Or simply to a bush campfire, as the Eucalypt's spark and crack into the night air..

We do not summit every day. Sometimes we are weak and the climb is arduous.  Sometimes the view is hazy and unclear, shielded in clouds.  But there is always promise for tomorrow.  And sometimes the clouds part and I think I can see the summit on the horizon.  And it is beautiful. 

Annapurna's 2007

"The paths we're walking on, they crumble behind us

But if we leave now, they will never find us

And if this crazy world spins itself down to dust, I want to be with you in the colours

When you again start hoping, with your arms wide open, 

Come on, dance with me, dance with me into the colours of the dusk. 

And all will be right, dancing like water with the light. 

Dance with me, won't you dance with me into the colours of the dusk? "

                                                          - Ben Harper, Into the Colours.

A day of mixed emotions.. Another day in Darfur..

Today I went and assisted UNHCR with some 'returns'.

In this case, internally displaced persons (IDPs) voluntarily leaving the IDP camps (the infamous Kalma Camp in this case), and returning to their villages, deemed safe by the UN agencies. 

We provide them some food rations, usually enough to last them about 3 months. Just enough time for them to get settled and re-established in some kind of livelihood. 

UNHCR makes sure they get other good things, like blankets, sleeping mats, jerry cans for water and, most importantly, safe transport back home - in this case, 3 days drive on the back of a truck. 

So I went out there to the 'transition site', not quite knowing what to expect. 

There, with the cool winter winds blowing desert sands over us, I found hundreds of women mostly with very young children. They had lived in these camps for some 6-7 years. Most of their children had been born in these camps. Some had been married here. They were now  ready to return to the village they had once called home. 

I helped out here and there, where I could, mostly directing the people to their transport, buses for the vulnerable and trucks for the strong, checking their cards, carrying their items for them, carrying their babies for them - as they already had their hands quite full, before they even got their blankets, mats etc.

I looked into the eyes of the children who stared up and me. Mostly less than five years old. I never know how to feel... sad for them and what their future holds, out here in this desert..or happy that they are the ones we can attempt to help..?

The people started arguing at one point, as the truck-bed was too high up for them to climb up onto.. So I pushed through the crowd, grabbed the side of the truck and jumped up.  Everyone stopped and looked at me, then began to laugh, and one brave woman came forward, handed me her belongings, I took them and took her hand and pulled her up.  Pulled her up to her future life, took her babies from her arms, settled her into the truck for the three day journey into her new life. 

Right there in that moment,  I felt like I had her future in the palm of my hand.. I was playing a part in her life. Her new life. 

And then, one after the other, men and women and children started coming forward, handing me their belongings, looking up at me, holding out their arms for me to take. And then before I knew it, we had put the last woman and her three little babies on the busses  and the army escort were blowing their horns, anxious to get away as quick as possible to make it to the first check-point before curfew. I watched them go, watched them leave for West Darfur, watched those lives I had just played a small part in leave mine. They may return to Nyala one day. But I knew they would never to return to my life.

"Masalama"... 

In the News...

You may have read about recent events related to Kalma Camp - one of our biggest IDP camps that has erupted in violence and is now blocked off from humanitarian Aid. It's worrying. And it is political and simple and complex and unjust, all at once.  For me sitting here, for all of us out here unable to do our work in the camp, it is frustrating and it is a destroyer of hope for the future notion of peace of Darfur. 

Girl in Kalma plays with old USAID oil tin. 

" 'Cos if you're not angry, then you're just stupid, or you don't care. 

How else can you react 

when you know something so unfair?

When the men of the hour can kill half the world in war,

make them slaves to a super power and then die poor.."

'Out of Range' - Ani diFranco

Dark Darfurian Days...

It has been three months since I arrived here in South Darfur.

And it has probably had more of a profound impact on me than an entire year I spent living and working in our head office in Khartoum. But I think thats probably natural. And it is appreciated. In abundance.

But I will not say that it is easy. This month particularly has been flooded with real challenges: A changing political context, deterioration of the ongoing Darfur Peace talks being held in Doha, insecurity in the camps, inaccessiblity to the people who need us, and, most worryingly, targeted attacks at our own staff.

The consequences?

Heated pollitical debate at all levels - including right here in our offices. All resulting in a frustrating lack of action and acountabilty. Humanitarian actors are being backed into corners or simply hung out to dry... My colleagues and I are trying to avoid being put in this position - but we need to stand together, with the other agencies, as a body of strength and conviction. But sadly for some of those agencies, it appears it is not so easy to stand by their mandates when the pressure is on and without the them - we may fail.

There has been much targeting of humanitarian workers in Darfur in recent years. But when one of those involved in a violent attack is a colleague, a close friend, it awakens a new form of anger deep in my soul. One I am not used to feeling. 

I know the innocent should not be punished for these senseless attacks, the hungry women and children of Darfur. But when we come here to help, leaving our family and loved ones and cultural comforts of home,  and are then treated so poorly, with such malicious intent - it eventually reaches a point where you become what you always feared - angry and disheartened. Where you think of taking away the most precious thing in these peoples lives - their food. The food we deliver. The greatest form of punishment you could ever deliver to a person in desperate need.

I do not know what will happen here, in this place, to these people. But some days I really do lose my hope for them ever finding that illustrious, sought after goal so many of us take for granted - Peace. Hundreds of years of fighting have imprinted this land to its core and I do not even know if the children I see playing in the camps will ever see a life without loss and suffering...

"I would dig a hole all the way to China, unless of course, I was there, then I'd dig my way home, if by digging I could steal the wind from the sails of the greedy men who rule the world.."

'Dream Girl' - Dave Matthews Band

Motherhood

I was at a supplementary feeding centre for pregnant women and babies this week and some of the women drew my attention to a woman sitting over under a tree with three small babies. Through my Sudanese colleague translating, the other woman explained she had been in hospital, giving birth to twins (two of the small, underweight babies that were with her) on the day the ration cards for supplementary feeding in her sector were handed out. Without a ration card, her babies were not eligible for the highly nutritional supplement.  

I asked her how old the babies were, the twins were around 6 months and the third, quiet child in her lap was apparently 3 years old but looked much smaller.  As we stood there and discussed the situation with the other women around her, the more I could not take my eyes off the child in her lap. I then realised the little boy was blind. I asked my colleague to confirm this and indeed he was, and consequently seemed mentally and physically under-developed for a 3 year old.

I thought about a mother with a blind child in other contexts, always hard, but definitely manageable, given support services and modern technology. But this was a Darfur IDP camp. And this woman had 6 month old twins. And no ration card. My heart surged with pity. And admiration, for this woman's strength, strength to just get through another day.

We arranged with our partner agency staff to give her any left over rations from the days distribution and get her registered for next month. We left the camp, but I could not stop seeing the face of that baby boy in my mind all evening. The face of a blind child has such beauty and sadness coupled in it I always thought. What does his future hold for him? It made me sad to wonder.. but at least for now, he has food in his belly, and I suppose thats what matters today.

Birth

These were three mid-wives I met in North Darfur.

I was visiting an IDP Camp called 'Zam Zam'. I popped into a mother-child healthcare centre, where women can take babies for therapeutic feeding (to treat malnutrition). My organisation assists with these kind of programmes because we are all about Food. I wandered around (ashamedly looking for some shady respite from the 40+ temps, i am no tough Darfurian) and ducked into an empty tent. When my eyes adjusted I found I was looking a chair with some home-made 'stirrups' attached - I was in the birthing tent. A place of new life.

At first I felt a deep sadness. Lives entering the world - displaced. With no home or village. Born into a world with no food, into overflowing families. Born into the horrors of Darfur. But the midwives wandered in and were full of smiles. They made me smile. And made me see that the lives starting here in this tent were the lucky ones. With far-higher chances of survival, right from the first breath. It was clean and, most importantly, it was Safe. My perceptions of the world these days are far from static..