August 23, 2007 2:08 pm
Questions

Francine's parents were killed in the war last year. Photo: Matthew De Galan/Mercy Corps

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 program.

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.

August 26, 2007 8:37 pm
The Water's Fine!

Today I went swimming in Lake Kivu, the sixth largest lake in Africa. On one side is Rwanda, on the other Congo. The water was a perfect temperature - refreshing but not too cold. And just enough waves to bounce you around a bit. Supposedly, there is methane gas under the lake, which at anytime could burst forth and wipe out the population of Goma. But then, you could get hit by a Land Cruiser crossing the street.

Later in the day, at dinner, I learned the lake was a dumping ground for bodies during the Rwandan genocide in 1994. More recently, contaminated lake water has caused cholera outbreaks in Goma.

August 27, 2007 2:57 pm
Amani!

We do focus groups to supplement the survey work. We are looking for richer detail, more context, rather than data that can be entered, tabulated, analyzed. I like both processes. Either way, you get stories.

One methodology we use in the focus groups is to pit one expressed need against the other. We ask the community to name a few of its most urgent needs. In Muja, for example, a small town just north of Goma, the group named these needs:

• Water
• Maternal health care (i.e., a better place to give birth)
• Seeds
• Medicine
• Jobs/income
• Livestock/poultry raising
• Peace
• Education

Then, we ask them to choose between Water and Maternal health. Then between Water and seeds. Then between Water and Medicine. And so on, until, in the end, they have pitted every named need against every other. It's like the NCAA tournament if they used a round-robin format.

The order in which they state their needs has no bearing on how, in the end, they prioritize them. Indeed, the methodology is designed to make them think hard about what is really the most important. Instead of a laundry list, you get a collective analysis, born of hard head-to-head choices. Sometimes groups would pick five needs, sometimes six; one picked 8. If the group splits, then each need gets half a point — essentially a tie. But it didn't happen often. I did six focus groups, and only saw two ties. People know what they want, what they need. And, overwhelmingly, what they want, what they need is peace. Indeed, in six focus groups, peace never lost a single head-to-head contest. Peace finished 29-0. And from my observation, most were blow outs. No hesitation, no debate.

Yearning for peace. Photo: Matthew De Galan

In Muja, for example, three men and six women crowded in a house at midday. It was hot outside, but, cool and damp in the windowless home. A few bottle caps were pressed into the dirt floor, perhaps for decoration, perhaps just absently. The bright noon sun shone through the gap between the tin roof and the walls. We all sat, half illuminated in the deep shadows. After 45 minutes of discussion, we launched into the exercise.

Water starts out strong, beating maternal health, seeds, medicine, and jobs, though the later took some debate. I wonder if it might challenge Peace. The question is posed. And the answer is clear and immediate.

"Amani!" the group said. Peace, in Swahili.

Again and again in Muja, and later in Monigi, Ndosho, Mugunga and Lac Vert, the word rang out. "Amani!"

In Muja, the room felt like a church — that same dampness you feel in a dark place on a hot day. The congregants sang out the refrain, as in mass. Peace be with you. And also with you. Each time we asked the question, "Amani" rang out a bit louder, the chorus growing bolder, more determined, finding its voice.

Peace or Maternal health care? "Amani."

Peace or seeds? "Amani!"

Peace or medicine? "Amani!"

Peace or Jobs? "AMANI!"

I don't think I'll ever forget the sound of their voices. If we could harness this yearning, what might we unleash? What beautiful thing might take shape?

* * * * *

The final standings in Muja that day:

Peace	7-0
Water	6-1
Jobs	5-2
Jobs	5-2
Education	4-3
Seeds	3-4
Medicine	1-5-1
Maternal Health	1-5-1
Livestock	0-7

Sorry, livestock. Now you know how Vanderbilt feels.

August 29, 2007 3:10 pm
Smoke-filled rooms

Today in the courtyard at the hotel there are a dozen soldiers, Congolese army, what they call FARDC (Forces Armeés de la Republique Democratic du Congo). Fully armed with assault rifles; one guy even has a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. Why so many? I go up the stairs to my room, and one stands guard over the breakfast room, eyeing me with bored suspicion. In the back corner sits an officer — a general maybe? Lots of epaulets and badges and medals, a man in his 50s. He sits with two aides and two Chinese men in suits, smoking cigarettes. The room is entirely empty but for them. I walk past, get a spare computer battery from my room, and go back downstairs to the bar, our de facto office. An hour or so later, they all leave, the soldiers suddenly rousing from their torpor, running to their unmarked 4 wheel drive vehicles, jumping in, speeding off. I never see the Chinese guys leave. They vanish like ghosts.

August 30, 2007 11:12 pm
'A Fact-Finding Mission'

This morning we had a brief security meeting. Laura told us there was more fighting just north last night. Goma is safe, although there have been some political assassinations, including a journalist last month. We sent our assessment teams in another direction, but will avoid Mugunga and Lac Vert, which are just a few kilometers from Sake. Indeed, one day we missed our turn off and came to a makeshift army checkpoint. Laura said that more people were streaming in from the countryside, displaced from the recent fighting and coming into the relative safety of Mugunga and Lac Vert.

* * * * *

At dinner we met an Italian journalist named Pierrot who said that some Americans named Russ Feingold and Al Sharpton were here in Goma. A fact-finding mission. Could we explain who these gentlemen were?

August 31, 2007 10:01 pm
A soldier's tale

Yesterday we went up north to Kibumba, a market town in rolling hills, between three volcanoes, two in Congo, one in Rwanda. It's a beautiful place, mysterious, with the volcanoes jutting up into the mist and haze. On the other side of the volcanoes to the east are the famed mountain gorillas. All along the road up, there are soldiers. We passed a checkpoint, and were let through. Then we passed a base on a hilltop, then another along the road. Then, a soldier, maybe two, is posted about every kilometer the rest of the way up.

On one side of the road lies the national park surrounding Nyiragongo volcano; on the other side, is agricultural land, and that's where we are heading, with all three vehicles, the whole group together, our objective to conduct focus groups on agriculture, water and sanitation, health and food security.

When we arrived, the town was alive and buzzing. The market was in full force. People were arriving with huge bales of cabbage, green onions, potatoes, manioc. Some carried them on their backs, the produce stacked impossibly high, holding two strips tight to their chest, and with a strap wrapped around their foreheads, slumping forward, walking uphill and fighting gravity. Others, in groups of two or three, pushed bicycles piled high with produce.

It was toward two when we went into the market for our second focus group. Our goal was to find 10 market women and talk to them about food prices and consumer difficulties. Three soldiers were in the market place, and greeted us. One was drunk. He spoke in halting English, smiling the drunkard's smile. When he learned I spoke French, he greeted me warmly, shaking my hand in multiple variations. When he learned my name, he said "That was my little brother's name! You are my little brother! My little brother from another mother!" He said this all in French — Mon petit frere d'une autre maman. He immediately vows to help us, and says he will round up some women for us, right away. So many soldiers here steal, extort, rape women and girls. Is he one of them?

He kept talking to me, his French impossible to understand at times. I called Laura, our team leader, and told her I think this is a bad idea — what kind of a focus group can you have with women when they are rounded up by the same guys stealing their food and raping them? She agreed, and we decided to make a graceful retreat. I would explain that we had run out of time and had to leave, but thanks so very much for your help. You've been great. So nice to meet you. But by then, he was back, with 9 women trailing him, and they filed into the office, looking a bit nervous.

I called Laura again, and we decide to go ahead, as long as he leaves. After a bit of a fuss, he agreed, giving me a drunken salute, feet locked together. The focus group went on, but I couldn't focus. I looked around the room, and in the room next door a boy of 14 or so was cutting up a chicken with a long, sharp knife. He looked at me, unsmiling, and looked away. Midway through, the soldier was back, drunker still, though now he carried no assault rifle. He smoked a tiny black cigarette.

"I have to return to my post. But I would like to have a little talk with you. Can you come with me?" I said, no thank, you, that's very kind. I appreciate your help so much, but I must finish my work here. Perhaps we can speak later?

"But I must return to my post, and you are my little brother, Muteyi. I must talk to you. Please, come with me."

You've been so helpful, thank you. Good luck with your work. Thank you so much. You've been so kind. Now, I mush finish my work Thank you, thank you.

His voice gets louder, more insistent. I think he might get angry, but I keep smiling. It's harder to shoot someone, I imagine, if they're smiling at you. He leans in toward me, and I think he is going to kiss on the cheek, French style. He reeks of alcohol, his eyes bloodshot.

"The women," he whispers slyly, in my ear. "I could tell you about the women." He says something else about the women, but I don't understand it. Finally, he salutes and leaves. The room returns to normal, the women laughing at him, at me, at the tension relieved.

September 2, 2007 3:26 pm
Driver's Ed

Don't leave home without them. Photo: Matthew De Galan

After my encounter with the soldier, I am hungry for tips on security. So at dinner I turn to Mugur, a Romanian who heads our emergency team here and has worked in some of the world's most dangerous places — Chechnya, Liberia, Darfur, Bosnia. Tonight's lesson: staying safe on the road in hostile environments. Some key points:

• Keep the windows rolled down and the radio off. This enables you to hear better — sounds like gunshots in the distance, guards shouting orders or a rifle being prepared for firing.
• Keep the interior light on when driving at night. You might think it makes you an easier target, but it actually gives people information — namely, that you are not military personnel and are not armed.
• When you approach a checkpoint, keep your hands visible on the dashboard. Make no sudden movements. Cooperate and do what they say. If they ask or your papers, ask them if you can get them from your pocket, and move VERY slowly. Don't volunteer anything. Just wait for them to tell you what they want.
• Don't use your radio or cell phone at a checkpoint. Do nothing. Just sit and wait.
• If they make you leave your car, roll the windows up and lock it. This helps prevent them planting evidence — a bullet in the backseat, for example — that could be used as justification to steal your car or, worse, arrest or shoot you.
• While driving, though, keep the windows down — not only to listen, but it also helps distribute pressure if you hit an anti-personnel mine. If you hit an anti-tank mine, well, it doesn't really matter whether the windows are up or down. You're pretty much dead.
• Watch for fallen trees or people on the side of the road looking injured or in need. Sure signs of an ambush. If it's a tree and you can't get by, wait. If it's a person on the road and you can keep going, then don't stop. No matter how bad it looks.
• And if you forget everything else, remember this: Always carry a pack of cigarettes — opened. You can offer them to soldiers and diffuse a situation. If the pack is closed, they'll take it all, leaving you empty handed for the next checkpoint. "This is life saving stuff," Mugur says. He is dead serious. On my way to bed I buy a pack of Sportsman's at the front desk.

September 3, 2007 3:33 pm
Widow's Walk

An illness took Jacqueline's husband last year. Photo: Matthew De Galan/Mercy Corps

Today we visit Monigi, another town north of Goma. It's a beautiful, cool morning when we set off, working down one street. I ask Christophe if the street has a name. It does — Kesenyi. In the course of the day, we interview six people. Five of them are widows. The sixth is a young man whose brother was killed in the war and, following tradition, he married his brother's widow, and instantly inherited six children. The people here are poor, but not nearly as bad off as the folks in the IDP camps. Still, it is Congolese boulevard of broken dreams, a microcosm of the life and death in North Kivu.

Our first stop is the home of Jacqueline Nyirajuba. One strange thing about Congo — at least this part of it — is that people often look much younger than they are. This is much different than, say, Central America. I pegged her at late 30s. She was 47. And I have the photo to prove it. As always, the first thing that happens is a boy is sent to fetch a chair. They come running with it, set it down for me, in front of her house. It is solid, almost Adirondack style, a chair you almost have to lean back in. Almost too comfortable, especially as I slept badly the night before and feel sleepy. I have a horror of dozing off. But I don't. No chance of that. Jacqueline is far too engaging.

She is, I decide, a born actress, a born flirt. She is tall and lean, with a high forehead and high cheekbones and long elegant hands. She gestures, throwing her hands out (excitement), slapping her hands (disgust), folding them silently across her chest (solemnity), bringing them gently up to cup her face (a melancholic fatigue). Maybe 25 people crowd around us, but she shows no signs of shyness. Quite the contrary, she joshes with Christophe, playfully throws the questions back in his face, flirtatiously unwraps the blue head scarf, shakes her hair, reties it with a flourish. She is on stage, and she is loving every minute of it.

What do we learn from our 61 questions? That she farms a small plot of land, but that soldiers from a nearby military base stole her beans and manioc. That she also carries wood, which earns her 40 cents a day. That she has three children, ages 2 to 7. That the latrine is only 15 yards away, but is shared by three other families. That free water is a two hour trip roundtrip and the alternative is to pay 20 cents — half a day's wages -- to buy 20 liters from the bicycle water vendors. That her husband died last year of an illness, perhaps malaria — she wasn't sure, or wouldn't say.

September 4, 2007 3:41 pm
Widow's Walk, Part II

In Monigi, as everywhere, the children wear the cast-off clothes of America and Europe. Especially the boys. Last Monday I saw a boy in a Superman T-shirt, then another with a Spiderman shirt, then a Batman, and finally another Superman. How many superheroes, I wonder, would it take to save Congo? Perhaps one of these four will light some new torch.

One of these young superheroes is named David, a stout young lad of 5, who totters regally around the dirt floor of his father's small house on the far end of Kisenyi street. His mother died earlier this year of malaria, and now it his father, Jean-Pierre, and his 13-year-old aunt who take care of him. The father, Jean-Pierre, invited us in, sending a neighbor running for chairs — the same ones we used in the last interview. The street, apparently, has one set of nice chairs for visitors

One thing I look for in a house is windows. If you have windows, you have money — it takes money to put in bars or glass or even a simple window frame and wood shutters. On Kisenyi street, a couple of homes have small, simple windows. Jean-Pierre has none. The next thing I look at are shoes. Jean-Pierre has shoes, and relatively new ones at that. He is, in fact, dressed pretty sharply — he looks more like he heading to the office than working in the fields.

Jean-Pierre, 22, makes 50 cents a day, essentially share-cropping on someone else's land. Some days, he hires himself out as a porter, hauling wood or charcoal into town. Sitting in his home, holding Davide in his arms, he looked bewildered, lost at sea. His responses were polite, complete. But in his eyes there was some terrible sense of loss and confusion. .

Perhaps the most revealing part of any interview, and the saddest, is question #26 — "Dans les derniers six mois, avez-vous emprunte ou prete de l'argent/les biens?" In the last six months, have your borrowed or been given any money or goods? About half say yes. A few examples:

• $5 worth of flour, $5 worth of fish, the repayment date is past — menace (being harassed)
• $15 for medicine, repayable in 4 installments.
• 300 francs (60 cents) of manioc flour borrowed a week ago, but not repaid.
• $5 payable to the Sake Health Center, due since June 2007
• $5 dollars borrowed in order to survive (menace)

A few months ago, Jean Pierre borrowed $20 from a money-lender to purchase some goats. He hoped it would provide a new income source, as well as protein for their diets. But as so often happens in Congo, things went awry. First one goat disappeared — one morning it was simply gone. Then soldiers came and took another. The third goat became ill and died. Now, he owes $20, plus accruing interest, and has no way to repay it. "Now he is being menaced," Christophe explains. "and he is very much worried."

If I were a money lender, would I lend him anything? I looked around the house. Three yellow jerry cans. A green plastic basin for water. Some clothes hanging on the walls — shirts and underwear. A few lava rocks prop open the door. The roof is tin, a good sign, as is one wall. Tin can be sold. Tin can repay a debt. And, he has nice clothes, and those, too could be sold. Three days later, in a food security focus group, I hear that, yes, people really do sell clothes, utensils and even their roofs to buy food or seeds for planting. I decided that Jean Pierre, father of the young Superman Davide, who intently rolled the plastic wheels of an office chair across the cool earth, was a good risk. Sixty dollars sits in my pocket. I can wipe out his debt, give him money for three new goats, and still have enough for dinner at the Ihusi. But our rules are clear — we can't give money, no matter how sad the story. Word would spread quickly. Everyone would expect something for talking to us, possibly even make it a condition. In the end, it would do more harm than good. That is what we tell ourselves. That is how we are able to say thank you, thank you so much, and good luck, and walk away.

September 5, 2007 3:46 pm
Rumors of War

Imagine living here when it rains all night. Photo: Matthew De Galan/Mercy Corps

We are strangely isolated here, and we get our news from the front — just 15 miles away — in strange ways. Sometimes, friends at home text or email us. They seem to know more than we do. Sometimes, though, we hear from local sources, in random ways. Take today.

We spent all day in a planning workshop, talking about goals, objectives, activities, indictors. Chelsea, our food security officer, and I were walking back to the hotel when we ran into the woman who heads the World Food Programme office here, finishing up her evening jog along the lake. She told us that rebel troops had attacked and taken Sake, just 15 miles north, and 10,000 displaced people were flooding into Mugunga and Lac Vert, the very places where we spent so much time last week.

Mugur heard the same story from the MSF Holland security chief, and also from perhaps the best source of all — the drivers, who, no matter the country, always seem to know everything.

We were advised not to go past Mugunga, and to take caution even there. A bit later, the Mercy Corps team met in the bar, with the rain pouring down, and reviewed our security plan. The most extreme option is evacuation, but no one thinks it will come to that — there are a couple of thousand UN peacekeepers here in Goma. No one imagines the rebels want to take on the UN and its well-trained and well-equipped troops from India, South Africa, Denmark, Bangladesh, Turkey and elsewhere.

The rainy season has arrived, with torrential downpours each night. What must it be like for IDPs? About 2,500 have taken shelter at the school in Mugunga. I saw that school. It's not that big. I imagine many are sleeping outside, in the rain, and it's quite cold at night. Even the displaced with huts will be miserable. Some have plastic sheeting; but many more do not; last week they asked us for more sheeting, they said the rain was coming and without it the water would pour into their shelters, pour onto the dirt floors and turn the floors to mud. Now there are 10,000 more of them, and still more coming in, and the rain is plummeting from the sky.

September 6, 2007 3:53 pm
Chanceline

One day last week I visited the health center 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 center — 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.

September 7, 2007 4:00 pm
Rain and IDPs

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.

September 8, 2007 4:04 pm
A Day in the Office

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.

September 9, 2007 8:08 pm
Instructions

Finally, some real work! Actually helping people instead of listening to their stories and driving home. Mugur has found us a niche. He's been frantically working every angle and contact as the IDPs flooded into town this week. Being new to Congo, it's been tough to break in. At first, we heard that the UN had everything covered. We feared being stuck on the sidelines. But yesterday Mugur ran into the team from Solidarite, the French NGO, at Doga, the expat watering hole, and over cigarettes and beer he got us into the game. In just a few minutes we'll head out with a 12-person Mercy Corps team to help distribute water to displaced families in Lac Vert. The Congolese staff that's been helping us with the surveys has just been conscripted as aid workers. And they are tremendously excited. So am I. Our instructions are to report to an Italian named Eduardo.

September 10, 2007 4:15 pm
'L'eau, c'est la vie!'

Mercy Corps' Muteyi and Elena from AVSI at the water distribution. Photo: Matthew De Galan/Mercy Corps

I never found Eduardo, but the distribution was exciting. Mercy Corps' first work in Congo. We helped AVSI, an Italian NGO, set up and distribute water to 2,500 families. It started off a bit rocky. The tanker truck was late, and then the hose connecting it to the three portable water taps (each with six spigots) was chock full of holes. Desperately, as hundreds of thirsty people waited in line, we wrapped the pipe with rubber strips, trying to stem the flow. You could feel hundreds of eyes on you, watching the water seep away into the lava rock. So close, so tantalizingly close. Soon enough, it was fixed, and a group of children — 4, 5, 6 years old — toddled into the area, which was taped off like a crime scene, with two entry points and two exit points. MC and AVSI staff were posted at each entry and each exit, and we had maybe two people at each tap to help the kids and elderly fill their jerry cans. You might think folks would be excited, but mostly they seemed worried, deadly serious. As if they might not get their full measure, as if their turn might not come. But it did, and soon enough about 400 people were coming through per hour, filling 10 or 20 liter containers. By the end of the day, we had distributed 40,000 liters, and no one was left in line.

The amazing thing is watching the kids — 4 year olds come in, wobble over the rocks, fill their containers and then, impossibly, hoist it up and walk home. Some loop a long scarf through the handle, tie it tight, and then sling the looped fabric over their head and hunch forward. They are masters at carrying things here. If there was an Olympics for transport, Congo would dominate. Some women balance the containers on their head. The kids who didn't have scarfs, usually the boys, simply hefted them in both hands, walking a few steps, setting it down, picking it back up and walking some more. With the really tiny kids, we'd help them carry it outside the perimeter, sometimes beyond, once or twice to the door of the dwelling.

* * * * *

After a couple of hours things calmed down, so I pulled Christophe aside and proposed a tour around the camp. It was hot, the sun out in full force. I wanted to talk to people, ask them how they came here, what had happened up in Sake. We talked to a few families — pretty much the same story. Shells started dropping into the city from the hills above, and they all fled. Some on Monday, some waited a couple of more days.

It's a three-hour walk or so, and even Sunday the road was packed with new arrivals coming in. We talked to one woman who wouldn't give her name, her age, the number of children she had. Who can blame her? So we decided to try the kids. That's where I met Giselle, whose photo and story now grace the Mercy Corps website. She is 12.

She looks at you with no emotion, no expression, a face rigid with non-emotion. There is no fear in looking at you — she doesn't look down, or away. She looks right at you, with a quiet intelligence. But not a trace is revealed, no hint of mirth or a smile or mischief; no sadness or tears or remorse. Perfectly still and self-contained and controlled. But somehow the life has gone out, or lays repressed behind some wall of fear or pain or reticence. I am assuming too much, perhaps. The writer's mistake. Thinking you understand, when you don't. When you can't.

Here she is, a girl whose father is missing in the war, who was shelled and shot at, who can't walk to get water or wood without going with 10 others for fear of rape. And now she is here, living in a hut that the rain pours through each night, swarmed by mosquitoes, without food or water or latrines or school. Nothing, really, but her pale purple dress with big white flowers, and a bracelet with the key to her home back in Sake.

September 11, 2007 6:18 pm
It's nice to be wanted

The friendly hotel staff is always in good humor. Photo: Matthew De Galan/Mercy Corps

Everyone at the hotel wants to work for us, sell us something, get something from us. They approach the matter politely, with deference. Feliciane wants to work in admistration. She also raises chickens and submitted a proposal to us, asking for $70,000 to launch a larger enterprise.

The tall young man with the Good Humor Ice Cream shirt that says "Robin" on the nameplate wants to be a driver. The cook here, who also waits tables, has offered his services as our cook, should we rent a house. A short young man whose name I do not know asked me, three days, running, if I had an extra flash drive. He kept explaining that this was his last day at the hotel, but that I could give it to his brother before I leave. But he's still here, every day.

Finally, another tall young man with the Good Humor Ice Cream shirt that has Tasha on the nameplate asked if we would be interested in purchasing "un petite animal du foret." As a pet, a curiosity. It turned out to be a turtle.

September 12, 2007 11:22 pm
Lost and Found

Fernand, the hero, with a new friend. Photo: Matthew De Galan/Mercy Corps

Yesterday I went out on the food distribution, our first. We got lost, somehow, driving the minivan over the rough farm paths of Lac Vert. Other NGOs have Land Cruisers and Range Rovers with flags and big radio antennas; we creep along in our minivan, a piece of paper with the logo printed on it taped to the window. We are the soccer moms of Goma. But (and donors, please pay attention) the minivan rents for a third less, holds more people and burns less fuel.

Caritas and WFP were in charge of the distribution, and they are delighted to see us. The site is roped off with the thinnest of twine. On the other side are thousands of people, looking in grim-faced, waiting for their turn to enter the distribution zone, for their chance to eat. Just inside the twine was a mid-sized truck; workers carried 50 kilo sacks of wheat flour and stacked them next to the wall of a school — three high, five deep and 15 across. The workers are already covered in flour dust and look like bakers coming from a chaotic kitchen. I snap pictures and soon I have flour on my pants, shirt, face. I'm a baker, too, perhaps.

There are smaller sacks of beans — lentils, I think. And white plastic jugs of cooking oil. Each person receives 20 kilos of flour, 6 kilos of beans, a third of a jug of cooking oil and 5 grams of salt. To speed the activity inside the distribution zone, people are formed into groups of 15. Each group carts 6 bags of flour, two bags of beans, five jugs of oil, and then they leave the exit point and divide the goods. Most do so methodically, peacefully. But, inevitably, a few groups break into arguments. My share is short! You're cheating me! You bastard!! I saw a man in a wheelchair flailing with his arms at another man, and the man striking back. Another group was squared off, two men chest to chest, two woman gesturing wildly, screaming. But these are the exceptions. Some 2,500 families received 10 days of food rations — that's about 167 groups of 15 — and I saw two arguments. Statistically, not too bad.

Inevitably, human dramas come our way. An old woman has lost her food coupon, which you get when you register as an IDP. She kept trying to talk to each of us in succession, looking at us helplessly, hoping someone would give her a better answer. She was 70 or so, my mom's age. She seemed utterly alone.

A few minutes later a woman of 30, tall and dressed sharply in a colorful dress and matching head scarf, came to us, in tears, literally shaking. She's lost her baby. Cannot find him anywhere. I call Fernand over, ask him to translate French into Swahili.

Boy or girl? Boy.

Age? Less than one.

Wearing? A black t-shirt?

Last seen where, when? Right there, just out side the exit point. 15 minutes ago.

How did he disappear? I was dividing my food. He disappeared.

Where was he when you were dividing? I handed him to a boy.

Describe him? About 9, wearing a beige t-shirt.

Do you know him? No, I had never seen him before.

Your boy's name? Espoir — Hope.

I ask Fernand to get one of the Caritas bullhorns. We leave the distribution zone and walk around — me, Fernand and the woman, now more hysterical, beside herself with grief. For 15 minutes we walk through the IDP site, Fernand explaining the situation, asking if anyone has seen the baby. I think about all the police dramas I've watched — the first few hours are the most critical. Does that even matter here? Who would steal a baby in a IDP camp? Who would want one more mouth to feed? But then, if you've lost a baby … maybe you want one back.

It's hot, and getting hotter. We walk up to the road, past the UNICEF tent. The tanker for the water distribution is pulling in off the main road. We jump out of the way. Kids trail after us, some wanting to help, some seeming to laugh at the woman. Other women shout out advice, look concerned, shake their heads solemnly. I wonder if my presence will help or hurt? Do I project some authority that will aid in the return? Or will people think, hey, this baby might be worth something. The foreigner will surely pay for its return!

I start to wonder, just a bit, if the woman is slightly mad. Perhaps there is no baby. Finally, Fernand suggests that we go back where the boy disappeared and wait. Surely, the other boy will return the child there. We head back, slipping inside the twine barrier, and immediately the woman gives a cry of joy and relief. A sheepish boy in a beige t-shirt holding a smiling baby in a black t-shirt. She runs and takes the baby, hugs him close, cries some more, and says something that might be thanks or might be an admonishment to the boy in the beige shirt. Then she hands him a cookie.

Fernand smiles and laughs. We both do. We have done our good deed.

"You are the hero of the day," I tell him. Fernand explains that, in fact, his family name — Bingwa — means "hero" in Swahili.

"You see, he is a hero everyday," Christophe says, and slaps his friend on the back.

The woman, still crying, turns and thanks us, takes her child, holding him very closely, very carefully, and walks down the hill into the camp.

Please give a generous donation to our Emergency Response Fund to help Congolese families.