Ten days ago, I was at Gatwick, eagerly awaiting my flight to transport me to my home for the next 18 months. Now I sit in a make shift field office looking out over nothing but green planes.
I spent two nights in Nairobi, followed by seven nights in Juba (the capital of Southern Sudan, and now I am in the Upper Nile State, in a town called Melut. The past ten days has been a very gradual cultural integration, allowing me loads of home comforts and social niceties.
I participated in three intense Ultimate Frisbee matches, a lovely jog around the enormous UN compound in Juba, a brilliant afternoon and evening playing volleyball at the Red Cross HQ followed by a BBQ, and several squash matches in an old forgotten court previously erected as part of the Grand British Hotel Juba - now semi-demolished and overgrown, showing few signs of its previous grandure. My point is that the culture shock has been very gradual... Until now
There is no mistaking that I am now 'off the beaten track'. After a four and a half hour flight on a six seater MAF plane (Mission Aviation Fellowship NGO), and a 45 minute 4wd trek across unrecognisable roads, I am now at the Medair Melut base. Located right on the River Nile, the compound is surrounded by a 1.5m fence, with guards at all entrances and cats wondering around looking for scraps of food. The compound is littered with accommodation and office blocks, along with separate bucket shower facilities and standalone latrines. Apparently they are great for people who are good at squatting - I will find out tonight.
I have been given the impression from my conversations in Juba, that you have to be willing to entertain yourself in the evenings, as most people hibernate to their bed and mosquito nets before 8.30. Maybe now it the time to give reading another try?
Most of the staff I have met here in Melut are British, with other away on R&R or on various Medair projects located further up the river. There are other Kenyan and Sudanese staff who have an amazing skill of talking their way into anything! I am thinking specifically of the security checks we had to go through before boarding the MAF flight:
1. Load all luggage onto the MAF truck to be loaded
2. Pass all hand luggage through X-Ray machine
3. Walk through the metal detector - although we all set it off, and this did not seem to cause any problems! I had steel toe caps, metal belt buckle, phone and run bag, I was ushered through quickly and into the departures lounge (which was more similar to a British lounge then a departures gate, with sofas and big comfy chairs.
The Kenyan staff seemed to breeze past the army gate in the enormous Medair Hilux, on to the runway, skipped past a big 120 seater UN flight taxiing to the runway and finally up to the MAF plane, where we helped loading. Very different to the UK!
Anyway, spirits are good. I am missing the family lots, but I continue to feel little convictions that this is where I am supposed to be at this time.
