Sad News

Some of the countries that I have spent some time working in, have captured my interest a little more than others and I like to follow what happens there a little closer. Today almost all of them made it to the headline news. Unfortunately not in any positive manner. In the Philippines a ship stranded and lot of people died and at the same time a typhoon is making others homeless and probably kills more. Zimbabwe is sinking even deeper into chaos and despair and the opposition is being cracked down on even harder. And well, I sit and watch it all on BBC in my hotel room in Afghanistan that makes it to the news almost every day, but hardly ever any good news.

Of cause one can not really compare disasters and say one is more tragic than the other, but somehow what is happening in Zimbabwe makes me the saddest. Floods and powers of nature are hard to completely avoid and the situation in Afghanistan is so complex that it is difficult to see a feasible solution. But what is happening in Zimbabwe just seems so unnecessary. I am sure it could be such a nice country. Right now there is a longer reportage on BBC on the situation in Zim and they were just talking to a group of people that had been badly beaten and harassed to the extent that they had fled their homes and hid in the bush, but still they were all convinced to vote for the opposition. That is impressive and brave!! Unfortunately Tzwangirai has now decided not to run in the elections as there is no chance that the election will be fair, so what choice do the poor people have??

The Great Game

Anyone who takes an interest in the historical and political development of Afghanistan will come across the expression The Great Game or The New Great Game. It refers to the fight between Russia and Great Britain over influence over the region in the 19.th century or the struggle for power after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989 respectively. The person accredited for coining the expression is normally Rudyard Kipling in his novel Kim, although it was actually the British Captain Arthur Conolly and Kipling only made it more well-known.

Therefore I felt obliged to read Kim and I did a while ago. It was indeed interesting and exciting although the fact that it was written in rather archaic English made it a little hard to digest for me. However, I am now reading another book on the same theme that I can highly recommend to anyone interested in the matter.

It is Peter Hopkirk’s book “The Great Game; The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia”. This is not a novel but is the story about the real players of the Great Game, such as Arthur Conolly. It is more exciting than any spy or agent story. I don’t even think you have to be very interested in either history, politics or military or diplomatic matters, although it contains very interesting details on all those areas. It is truly enjoyable reading and I think you can enjoy it also simply as a fascinating agent story. It is also a proof of that fact often supersedes fiction.

Time of Change for Zimbabwe?!

I only want to send a word to the brave people of Zimbabwe!! My heart is with you!

The news from Zim these days are deeply worrying, but also somehow exciting. Maybe this it the time for change!? I just hope Mugabe will not hit back hard and brutally as we know he is able to. Can not the old man see his time has come?! The time to step back and let his poor people free!? The country and the people deserves better!

Kabul Lives..

I am now back in Kabul again. It feels good to be able to take a good proper shower and to be able to close the door behind you for some privacy, but at the same time I kind if liked to be on the camp and it almost felt a little bit sad to leave, I can imagine what it feels like for those who stay there for six months.

It is a bit frustrating though not to be able to go out more. A part from our meetings I haven't been anywhere on the town. And that there are a very different side was just shown to me on the tv. I guess the program is still running, but we just had a power black out so I can not see it. Anyway, it was a program on Al Jazeera (fantastic channel!!) on heroin addicts in Kabul. Because not only is Afghanistan the worlds biggest producer ob heroin (opium) but the number of users has increased a lot the last couple of years.

I guess the life of heroin addicts living on the street is not very nice anywhere, imagine that what it looked like in a place like Kabul... It was truly horrible pictures, so depressing.

The whole trip here has been very rewarding. We have met a lot of interesting people and recived a lot of information and input. At the same time it is depressing and a bit discouraging. I never thought anything here would be easy, but still... where the hell to start?!?

Security Matters

It is diffucult to say how safe or how dangerous Afghanistan is. Generally I don't feel insecure or afraid here and all the security measures mostly feels annoying and irritating. But on the other hand, it felt a bit scary when we on our way to the airport passed the crater in the road where a suicide bomb killed seven people the day before.
And yesterday I was asked if I wanted to join one of the Swedish MOTs on a patrol to three villages together with the commanding officer, which I of course agreed to as it was a bit frustrating to be stuck at the camp and not seeing anything and would be very interesting to get out and see something else. But at the morning brief just before we should take off, we were informed about a Dutch NGO being shot at not so far away and onw person got killed. The MOT had to change their plan and go to the police instead and we stayed in the camp. It is so tragic.
Today we went back to Kabul and on the way from the aiport I was considering the modus operandi of the attackers and thought about how easy it would be for a MC to drive up next to us and just shoot into the car and, we were not in a armoured car.
At the same times it feel so wrong to isolate one self from everyting around and how can the international commonity ever win the respect and confidence of the people that way? But how can you do any proper work if you risk being killed any time? It is a real catch 22 situation..

Serbian Chaos

Just saw the pictures from the huge demonstration in Belgrade. Saw how people managed to break in to the US Embassy and even set fire to one of the offices. The whole street outside the embassy was completely covered with people. It felt very strange! The street is one of the main arteries in Belgrade and it was my way to work every day for a year, and I passed there on my way to tennis, to the horseback riding, to the jogging, to the beach, to the airport and, yeah almost everywhere I went I passed there.

Of course the happenings came as no surprise. Everyone knew this could/would happen as Kosovo declared independence and the demonstration was announced in advance. And I have seen many pictures from big and sometimes violent demonstrations from Belgrade before, but the year I lived there it was very peaceful and it was one of the happiest in my life. Therefore it feels so strange and so sad. The whole situation is so sad. I am sad for Serbia. Not for losing Kosovo, but for making so many wrong choices, take the wrong turn at so many crossings and for putting itself in impossible situations.

Accepted Trade in Humans??

Obviously the TV-documentary I saw last week about sex-tourism in Thailand was just one in a series of documentaries on the theme. Today it was about sex-tourism on some Caribbean Island where I think most of the women working there came from Venezuela and most of the men were US-American tourist.

It was just so disgusting!! The men could book a “girlfriend” in advance so she was waiting for him on arrival. Or when they arrived the girls were lined up for a “casting”. If he was not satisfied he could complain and have her exchanged for a new one or maybe even get two for the price of one!!! And when one of the girls got her period the customer got really upset and complained until he got another one. How the hell do these men work?!!?!? Most of them even seemed to think what they did was ok enough to have their face and names shown on TV. And of course most of the men were terribly obese, ugly and disgusting in every way and the way they talked about the girls, as things… Horrible!! What is wrong with these men?!!? And what is wrong with our society that lets people treat people that way??!?! I did not believe slavery was still allowed.

I remember when I read Platform of Michel Houellebecq, I found it rather provoking, but now I realise he more or less only described what is already reality, although in his book it was more of a mutual thing. This was not!

Zimbabwean tears, again

It is amazing how far and fast country can sink. I somehow thought Zimbabwe had reached the bottom and would soon start moving upwards. I mean from the bottom there is only one way…
From having been the second riches country in Southern Africa in year 2000 it is now one of the world’s poorest countries, and it has the world’s fastest sinking economy, 30 % of the population is living off less than 1 USD a day, from having been a net exporter of agricultural products it can now hardly feed it’s own population, the inflation is over 1200% and there is a constant lack of foreign currency leading to ever more frequent power cuts, cuts in water supply, deteriorating water quality and constant fuel shortage. As if the country was not already pretty isolated it seems to get worse by worsening connections with the rest of the world as internet and mobile phone network providers are cutting down on their services due to lack of foreign currency.
I thought somehow that the land invasions, that really kicked off this down going spiral, had stopped, but recently I read that those few white farmers how still remain on their farms (I think there are just about 400 left) are threatened by prison if they don’t leave. I also heard the government had brutally stopped another demonstration by the opposition. So it seems they have not yet reached the bottom. It feels so hopeless. This is a country that could have had all the chances, but is so completely mismanaged and ruined. I know it is not the only one in Africa (unfortunately not), but as I have been there and know people there whom I care for it feels so frustrating. Maybe there is some kind of Zimbabwean action group I could join?! To support the local opposition?! Any suggestions?

Problems of the developed world

I have now been back in Sweden two days and already feel terribly restless. But I will have to start get my life going again. New challenges wait around every corner! Or..?? Not..??

Being back I have confirmed something I have been suspecting for some time. For the first time in my adult life I have gained weight!! Not too many kilos but I feel really bad about it. Not about the kilos themselves, they will soon go away once I am back to normal life, but I feel sincerely bad about gaining weight in an extremely poor country!

But maybe that is symptomatic. If overweight is a welfare problem of the developed world it is telling that I gain weight when I am relatively rich. It is not as if I cannot afford to eat in Sweden, but what I think makes the difference, is that in Sweden I walk much more and thereby get more exercise without thinking of it. In Harare I always drove a car wherever I went. In Sweden I don’t afford having a car but take the train, bus or underground, which automatically mean I have to walk more. And in Harare people always said it is not safe to walk, so, hence the extra kilos.

I went jogging yesterday and I was hoping that I would feel very light and fit after having had some high altitude training (Harare is on 1500 m), but shame on me… I felt very unfit. Now I will have to go to town and buy new jogging shoes, the old ones I left in Harare. I am sure that will make the jogging feel much easier..:-)

The other side...

This far I have mostly written about how nice Zimbabwe and Harare are, and it is indeed a very beautiful and nice place to be and the people are very friendly. But does that mean that life is rosy in Zimbabwe? No unfortunately not, and here comes something from the other side.

Of course you hear a lot about how dangerous Harare can be and how careful you must be and how you should act to avoid robbery and car-jacking etc, but I must say I never felt afraid or un-secure. I mean, how could you? With two guards 24-7, high walls with electric fences on top, three dogs and two separate alarm systems. To me that sometimes felt even a little bit over exaggerated, but who am I to tell? Things do happen, and I guess all this equipment is there for a reason. And all the instructions about how you should avoid stopping at red-light at night if possible and always keep your handbag under your legs while driving probably also all make sense, not only in Harare. The wife of one of my colleagues got robbed during my time there and one of my local colleagues was robbed twice on his way home from work. But things like that happen in other countries too (although we had some suspicion that it might have something to do with the fact that he used to work for a regime critical news paper). Of course you should be careful, don’t do stupid things and keep an eye out, but I refuse to go around and feel afraid. That is such an impediment on my life. If I would have stayed longer in Harare I for sure would have moved around more and more.

One reason for the robberies etc is of course that there are a lot of poor people, who see no other way of getting the things they want. And there are indeed poor people in Zimbabwe. However I find it difficult to relate poverty. Someone recently asked me if there aren’t more poor people in Manila and if it isn’t poorer there. I can’t really tell. Of course there are statistics and measures of poverty that will provide an answer, but how do you compare poverty? In numbers there are probably more poor people in Manila as there simply are more people. To me the poor in Manila seems to have it worse partly because the density and the dirt they live in. The shanty towns often climb the banks of rivers and canals that are absolutely full of garbage and filth as they work as both water supply and sewage. Due to the heat and the humidity it is often very smelly and flies aboundant. In Zimbabwe people are not that crowded and the climate somehow seem more endurable if you only live in a hut, but how can I tell if it is better to have to walk long ways and always worry about how to get water in the dry season compared to living right by the water even if it is fetid and smelly? I really can’t tell! If you only get to eat some rice or sadza every day, probably does not make much of a difference. Some of the “shanty town areas” in Harare were simply destroyed last year. The government decided to drive the inhabitants out to the country side, without providing then with any alternative housing.

When talking about the political system and the economy I am a little more optimistic about the Philippines. Of course you can have serious doubts about the level of democracy and fairness of the elections and the political system there as well, and the corruption is wide spread, but still things seem to work somehow and there is some hope. When regarding things in Zimbabwe I feel much more pessimistic.

The Mugabe government has pushed the country so far down a negative spiral and you really can’t see much light in the tunnel. For us, diplomats and others with access to foreign exchange things are pretty ok. Of course you get annoyed with the constant power cuts. Even more irritating are the water cuts, which recently have gotten worse. The water authority simply don’t have foreign currency enough to purchase the chemicals needed for purification or spare parts for the waterworks, which mean they can not produce sufficient amounts of water. And the quality of the water produced is getting worse and worse. Another nuisance is the constant fuel shortage. Again, as a foreign mission we are lucky and get what we need, but for others there is a big problem. This is also mostly due to lack of foreign currency. When there is some fuel, people of course take advantage of that and sell it to really high prices. The state owned gas stations, which are forced to sell to controlled prices, gather long queues as long as there is still some fuel. Whenever you go for a longer drive you have to think of bringing full jerry cans with sufficient fuel, as you can never be sure that you will be able to fill up along the road.

As the cost of transport soars, so do other prices. This last week the supply of bread in Harare stopped. As far as I found out that is because the price of bread is fixed, but the costs for making it has increased so much it is no longer possible to bake if you can not raise the price. So for the last week there has simply not been any bread in the stores. This is of course a huge problem for the poorest as bread; along with the sadza is their staple food. Prices are constantly rising, the inflation is the highest in the world at over 1200%, but wages do not follow (for a simple example the price of a Snickers bar rose from 460$ to 780$ in one week!). For us with foreign currency it is still ok, but I don’t understand how the average locals manage! The Zim-dollar is pegged against the USD at a heavily overvalued rate of 250, this of course creates a huge parallel market (they don’t even call it black market any more). The rate at the parallel market is between two and four times the official rate. Unfortunately the prices follow the parallel rate, which makes things very expensive.

The low wages is one of the main things the trade unions wanted to protest against in their planned demonstration I wrote about earlier. As I suspected the demonstration never started because the police hit first. Some of the trade union leaders were arrested and some of then pretty badly beaten. This is probably one reason why people don’t complain and protest more, they are afraid. Still I was surprised how often people were complaining about the system and the economy, but of course that was in a “safe” surrounding and I was regarded a safe person to talk to, I guess under other circumstances things are different and people more afraid.

My departure from Harare was spiced by the coincidence that the president was arriving at the same time. He had been to a meeting with the Non-Aligned Movement in Cuba and was now expected back. My driver told me immediately when we saw all the people at the airport. The driver explained that the people are being paid and driven into town in busses from the provinces to greet the president on arrival, “the poor people do not understand what they are doing” he said. Many of them were sporting Zimbabwean flags and wearing t-shirts with “Vote Zanu-PF” print, some women even wore dresses made out of ZANU-PF printed fabric with Mugabe’s picture on it.

I had just been reading a book called African Tears (can be recommended!), written by a white Zimbabwean farmer woman who had had her farm confiscated in 2000 and telling her story about that. In the book she was also describing how the running up to the elections in 2000 was rigged. There was a lot of paying and bussing and forcing of people to attend ZANU-rallies. So, nothing much has changed!

A none-event

There has been a certain tension about today. The trade union ZCTU had announced that they would stage a big demonstration, between 12 and 14 o'clock today. The demonstration was not approved of by the authorities and the police had announced they would be "prepared".

I noticed this morning on my way to work that the police controlled veihcles going into town. I don't have to drive through the centre, but still had to wait a long time to get to the crossing where I turn right and the cars going downtown go straight.

To check out if there was anything happening I, two colleagues and a driwer went downtown and just came back. There was really nothing to be seen. Ok, some of the main streets were blocked and there were some armed military police standing on the street corners, but apart from that, all quiet. That was quite strange as there has been a lot of discussion about this demonstration. Maybe they did not even make it to their starting point...

Live from Harare

One funny thing about living in a country with no free press is that they still issue news papers and as they still have to fill the papers with something, but can not write about the important things, they write about things that probably never would make it to the front pages in another country. Some of my friends had the pleasure of receiving aricles I clipped from China Daily and sent when I was in Shanghai. Here we have The Herald and yesterday they had a story on the front page about a “Lonely Granny comits suicide”. The story was about a 75 years old lady who had hung herself. The reason stated for the suicide was that she had failed to find a man to marry. I think it is wonderful! Not that she killed herself and not that she could not find a man, but that she kept the hope of finding one till she got 75! Come on! Don't give up hope! Not even at 75!!!

Another less funny thing about living in the tropics are all the bugs and insects that are around. I have just been informed about the necessity of ironing all clothes after drying them in the sun. If you don’t you might have mango flies who lay their eggs in your clothes and they hatch into little worms that crawls in under your skin to grow there until they come out from your skin by themselves, or maybe it is the flies who hide in your clothes and lay egg under you skin, what ever. Just heard about a guy who stayed in a lodge where they hadn’t ironed the sheets. He got 42 worms! I am sure, I will die if I get one!