We had a bit of a non-incident yesterday by which I mean we were pseudo-non-evacuated from Kiwanja – a careful precaution.
Nothing actually happened. A little tiny part of a marginal section of a minority of the nearby community made several crazy accusations against our NGO. (Truly crazy stuff, e.g. that a hospital we support doesn’t even have sutures in stock and so once after an emergency caesarean section doctors just bound up the new mama’s stomach with scotch tape and she died. Horrible. Terrible. Completely false and not at all true.) Anyway, this little tiny part of the marginal section of the minority of the community declared things like this on the radio and in a threatening letter dropped in our mailbox, cold copied to the local government.
The entire non-incident? Kinda boring. First I sat around thinking about all the work I should be doing. Then I walked here and there following orders. Then I sat in the car. Nothing happened. We were driven back to Goma. La di da, that was that.
Even our national colleagues were just given money and asked to blend in on buses going back to Goma, and to stay there for the weekend. It was thought public transportation would be a better option than having tons & tons of our cars on the road with our big bright NGO stickers on them.
MONUC told us in a meeting that, hey, if we wanted, instead of leaving Kiwanja, we could just come hang out on their base for the weekend. That was very nice. But we demurred.
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2 comments:
its at times baffling to know why people act in such an ungrateful way to service being provided by people like you.even we often are faced with such illogical accusations and it really makes it sad.some how the war and miseries have taken its toll on the people.
I think it must be very difficult to be a youth in this context. If I were a youth here, I would be angry, too, about so many things, and I wouldn't necissarily know how to focus it/deal with it. I feel bad for them. It makes out lives difficult and uncomfortable, but I am sorry for them, too...
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