30 avril 2006
Baidoa, the City of Death
Being based in Nairobi has the advantage of providing opportunities for day-trips in some of the strangest places of the planet. I spent my Saturday in Baidoa, Somalia. Baidoa is where Somalia's Transitional Federal Government was established after it became clear that the situation in the capital Mogadishu was not stable enough to host the country’s higher administration.
I was invited, along with other foreign journalists, to cover the launching ceremony of the “District-based Peace-building and Reconciliation Project”, the 14th attempt to bring peace and stability to Somalia.
The country became independent in 1960. In 1969, a coup led by General Siad Barre overthrew the elected democratic government and installed a dictatorship that lasted twenty years. In 1989, a civil war erupted, resulting in the destruction of the infrastructure of the country. Barre left the country in 1991 and the warlords started to oppose each other militarily. For almost 10 years Somalia was left without central government. In August 2000, the Transitional National Government, today called the Transitional Federal Government, was formed.
But conflict between clans continues, especially in the capital Mogadishu, where heavy fighting erupted mid February between a new coalition calling itself “anti-terrorist” and extremist groups running a network of Islamic courts in the city.
The day prior to the trip, we had to assist to a mandatory security briefing at UNDP Somalia’s headquarters. The briefing was done by a UN military officer who had been based in Somalia for years until the day he was kidnapped. He was released 10 days after thanks to a handful of businessmen and to the money they were able to raise. He was relocated to Nairobi but continues to be in charge of Somalia and to travel there regularly.
He started his power point presentation by highlighting Somalis’ personality: a highly independent and individualistic people, they remain greatly influenced by their nomadic heritage. Somalia, an almost waterless country with an arid climate, is one of the most homogeneous in Africa. But there are also deep-seated ethnic differences and inter and intra-clan rivalries, fuelled by competition for resources. Somalis have never developed a strong sense of community that would lead to nationhood. An old Somali proverb sums up the Somali independent spirit: “
The UN officer then moved to the heart of the topic: security in Somalia. We were handed out several documents: a “security in Somalia” guide book, a print out about the major health hazards and how to treat them on the ground, a “Landmine and explosive remnants of war safety handbook”, and the “UN’s post-traumatic stress pocket book”. The day before we had received by email a couple of discharge documents that we had to sign – we had been warned of the risks, the UN was not liable:
"Any travel in Somalia carries a certain degree of risk. Knowledge of local customs and the current security situation (which can change locally by the hour) can mitigate many of these risks. Somalia is unique and your field experience, even prior travel to Somalia, does not ensure your safety. It is therefore advisable to seek the most up to date information from UN Security prior to your travel.
There are several and varied reasons for disputes to occur and they can escalate very quickly with dire consequences. It is crucial to note that the international community has very limited capacity to respond to medical emergencies inside the country. Taking risks must be avoided and it is important to bear in mind possible adverse consequences to the safety of UN and NGO staff members and ongoing humanitarian and development operations."
For all its missions, the UN qualifies the security situation following a five-phase system. Phase 1, the lowest level, means “Precautionary”. Mogadishu is a phase 5 location, meaning “Evacuation”, and indeed the UN doesn’t have a presence in the Somali capital anymore. The rest of the country, including Baidoa, is phase 4, “Emergency Operations”.
The major threats are murder, kidnapping/hostage taking, banditry, accidental involvement in inter-clan fighting, hostage pawn, extortion, road or air accident, landmines, and tensions with local staff.
We were to leave the next day at 7am and spend a few hours in the Parliament before flying back to Nairobi. But the launching ceremony is not what interested us journalists. Marc, the New York Times’ correspondent, David, who works for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and I, were determined in finding a way to sneak out of the parliament and go to the city to meet people and get a feel of the situation on the ground.
We left an hour late on Saturday, which by UN’s standards is not bad, but which was pretty bad for us because it meant that we had lost an hour of work in Baidoa. The flight lasted 2 hours and a half.
In Baidoa we were greeted by some UN staff, a delegation of men and women police officers, and local journalists. As I 
sewas just stepping out of the aircraft, a guy whom I had never seen before literally jumped on me “Marie!!! Hi, I’m Yussuf Assan!!”. “Er… hi” (thinking: do I know you????). “I work for BBC Somali service”. “Ooooooooh, ok. Hi!”. Apparently the detailed list of our affiliations had been distributed to the whole town and Yussuf had decided to come greet his colleague from the French service. “Marie, do you want to take pictures?” said Yussuf, pointing towards the police officers standing in line in front of us. They had just completed their training at one of the region’s new camps, and they were now part of the Somali police. Half of them were women. “Can I? Yes I would like to”.
I set up my tripod, my camera, and 2 seconds later, as I still had the eye glued to the viewfinder, I heard Yussuf saying just behind my right ear “Marie, are you done? The cars are over there, I will follow you with my car to the UN compound, and then we’ll go to the parliament, and then if you want to go to town I’ll come with you”. “Ok but I’m not done, thanks”. Was he going to be glued to me like that the whole day??? Well, if he could take me to town I would have to get over the fact that we had a different idea of what “personal space” meant.
It was soon time to get going. I was supposed to travel in car number 7. There were 9 of them (bulky Landrovers), plus the escort car which was leading the way with 5 armed guards on board.
On the way, all we could see was torn out buildings. Most of them had been built by Siad Barre’s administration and didn’t survive the chaos that followed his departure in exile. The landscape was quite green – it’s the rainy season there as it is everywhere in East Africa. Somalia is a very dry country most of the year, suffering regular and severe droughts. In 1992, so many people died of famine in Baidoa that the city was dubbed “the city of death”. I spoke to some inhabitants who said they remembered corpses littering the streets, people so weak from lack of food and water that they would just fall and die here and there. 
We also drove past several pick-ups carrying heavily armed young men. Somalia is one of the countries with the highest number of weapons per people.
We arrived to the UN compound where we were served some drinks and bananas for breakfast. First tentative from Marc and I to break from the group and go to town. But the UN security wouldn’t let us go. We had to go to the parliament.
The parliament was a recently renovated building, which means that it had four walls and a roof. The room was full with ex-militia chiefs, village elders, government officials, UN representatives, and some women. The men had the typical Somali look that I had seen in Wajir (even though Wajir is technically in Kenya, the region is close to Somalia and populated by Somali tribes): very tall, skinny, the beard dyed in a reddish colour, and often very surprising purple-blue eyes.
They had a very interesting look so I started filming some of them. Then, just behind my left ear this time Yussuf whispered “Marie, these are participants, but the government is over there”. “I know. Thanks” (In my head: Leave me alone).
We met several ministers. The peace initiative was sponsored by the Italian government. The two countries have historical ties that go back to the time where part of Somalia used to be an Italian colony. It was quite strange to see that many educated Somalis over 50, including almost all the ministers, spoke perfect Italian. They were all very warm and very charming. But you have to keep reminding yourself of the fighting that continues under their control and for which they have to bear some responsibility.
A man took the stage. His name was Habsade, and he was the warlord in control of the town of Baidoa. Ex-warlord I should say, because he was now a Member of Parliament. “I urge the UN to revise its assessment of the security situation in Baidoa. It is safe for you to come here, we are taking care of your security and we’re inviting you. You should not come for a few hours only and take a plane back to Nairobi. You should stay here, on the ground, with us, and help us.” The crowd approved loudly.
As Habsade continued speaking, I decided to go outside to see what was going on. As I was getting out of the building,
several cars entered the compound at high speed and stopped abruptly at the door. Policemen rushed out of the first car and opened the door of a black Landrover. A slim, quite young man with an elegant demeanour got out of the car and entered the building, followed by police. It was Ali Mohamed Gedi, Somalia’s Prime Minister. I followed him inside. He shook the hand of the other officials and came to meet us. We all introduced ourselves. Marc and David were quite intrigued by his short-sleeves suit. They wondered if they could pull that off in Nairobi.
The speeches resumed, and I went back outside. I decided to get out of the compound to see if I could find a couple of people to interview. There, I found a group of young men with weapons – they were happy with me filming them. Especially this one, who definitely knew how to play with the camera. All the others rapidly surrounded me. They were surprised to see a young woman holding a camera and they seemed to think it was hilarious. I asked if any of them spoke English.
A young man stepped forward. He was one of the guards. He didn’t really know what was being discussed in the parliament, but he hoped it could bring stability in the region. And then he thanked me for “recording his statement”. “How old are you? What’s your name?” I asked at the end. “I’m 22 years old, and people call me womanizer”. “Ok. But what’s your real name?”. “Abdel Kader. But people call me womanizer”. “Ok. Thanks.”
Another man came forward. He looked older. He also spoke better English. He said he was 23, but that worries made him look old. His name was Ali Abdinur Samow. He was educated but unemployed. I asked him if he thought that this peace initiative (the 14th) would be any different from the thirteen others and if it was going to change anything. “I think so” he said “because you see these young men outside, they used to be militias and fight one another, but today they are here providing security for you foreign journalists, and for our government. People have started coming together, I think”.
I went back to the parliament. More speeches were going on. Word came to us that the “chief of chiefs”, a 104 year-old 
man, was there, and Marc, David and I decided to do a joint interview. The old man definitely didn’t look 104. I concluded it was very difficult to guess how old a Somali was. Marc asked him how he would qualify Baidoa today, did it still deserve to be called the “city of death”? “No, now I would call it the city of peace”, the old man answered. Another optimist.
I interviewed a couple of other people. The speeches were not over yet. We decided to try to go to town – UN security granted us 20 minutes. But not now, the Prime Minister was about to speak, we could go after. Argh. We waited patiently while Gedi was making his speech. It gradually became darker and darker in the room. Suddenly, it started raining – hard. Now we could barely see anything inside, and we couldn’t hear anything because of the tremendous noise that the rain was making while falling on the tin roof. But worse, it meant that we couldn’t go to town anymore – there was no way David and I could take our cameras out under that rain.
We had to get over our disappointment. We still had to survive a short press conference that happened in quite a frenzy as everybody was trying to get a shot of Gedi and one had to shout over the noise of the rain to ask questions. Yussuf tried to help making room for me and carrying my tripod but he was slowing me down. Then he tried to put my mic closer to Gedi but he drew so hard on it that he made my camera, to which the mic was attached, fall. And soon we had to rush to the cars and to the airport. We were almost an hour late on the schedule, and we needed to take off before dark.
In the plane we realised that we had lost the Kenyan ambassador to Somalia, so we had to wait for him to make his way there.
Just before take off, the minister of planning thanked us for our visit and invited us to come back, for longer, next time.
28 avril 2006
A walk in Kibera
Yesterday Andrew and I went to Kibera. We were working on a story about the impact of Chinese demand on the market of used car batteries in Kenya. There’s no central electricity system in Kibera, so everything (tvs, fridges, lights) is powered with car batteries. Once they stop working, they are collected and the lead that they contain is recycled to make new batteries. This used to be a local market. But lately China, which is in dire need of lead to supply its growing car industry, has started importing lead from countries like Kenya. As a result of the increased demand the prices are going up, which in turn makes it difficult for local car batteries companies to buy the raw material.
This story gave me the opportunity to see a part of Kibera that I didn’t know, even though we didn’t go very far inside the slum. I had been to Kibera several times before… because it’s were I service my car. But Kibera is huge. It’s actually known to be Africa’s largest slum. It is home to more than one million people, and it has its own districts, schools, churches, and shopping areas. 
One of the biggest problems in Kibera is that you don’t have any sewage and garbage collecting system. So rubbish just piles up on the muddy streets. It ends up decomposing or eaten by goats. No sewage system also means no toilets. So Kibera residents have invented the “flying toilets”: you do everything in a plastic bag that you then tie and throw as far away from your own home as possible. It will probably end up on somebody else’s roof, but hey, that’s life.
Kibera also suffers from very high HIV/AIDS and crime rates.
But all of this sounds worse than it really is. Kibera is also a place where people live a normal life, run businesses and send their children to school. In the movie the Constant Gardener, Kibera and its residents were shot in a very beautiful way.
25 avril 2006
I have arrived
I gave my first bribe today. So I guess that’s it, I’ve officially arrived in Kenya. It happened at the driving school. I went there to sign and pick up my permanent driving license which had just arrived. The director of the school insisted to hand it to me personally, a pretext to mingle a little with a foreign journalist and show me how efficient he was.
“Ok”, I said, “this was the first step. Now what do I have to do to get an international driving license?”. “Well, there’re two ways to do it” he replied. “The first one is that you have to pay 4800 Kenyan shillings and surrender your Kenyan license. With the second one, you get to keep it, so you can have two licenses. Which can always come in handy, especially if you loose one.” “That sounds good, let’s do that” I said. “Ok, but, you also have to understand that if you want to keep the Kenyan license, you have to give a little something to the person who’s going to give it you, you see, because it’s a favour”. “Oh. Well how much would it be?”. “1500 shillings”. That’s about 20 USD.
That’s how I gave my first bribe. And a few hours later, I was the happy owner of a Kenyan AND an international driving license.
23 avril 2006
Power cuts
When I came back from Zanzibar Friday night, the first thing I did after opening the door was to switch the light on. Except that there was no light. And no power for the fridge, the tv or the water heater for that matter. It couldn't have been a general power cut because I could see light in the other apartments of the compound.
I called the security guard and asked him to check with me what the problem was. We soon found out that my main fuse had disappeared. Stolen? No, just confiscated by the power company, probably because I hadn't paid the bill on time. If some things can take forever here in Kenya (like opening a land line for example), getting one's power cut off is not one of them. I hadn't even seen the bill, which must have meant that it had arrived while I had been away. Very strange.
To make things even more depressing, it was Easter weekend so I couldn't have it fixed before the following Tuesday. What a nightmare: no warm shower, rotten food in the fridge, and above all, no power for my computer.
I was considering how to survive the weekend (going to a friend's house maybe?) when my neighbour arrived and asked me what was wrong. I explained to her and she told me not to worry, that she could put the power back on for me for the weekend. "How can you do that? My fuse is missing..." "Well it happened to me some time ago and an electrician friend of mine taught me how to fix it". In 10 minutes and using a screwdriver and a paper clip, she saved my life.
"Just remind me to take it out on Tuesday because if the power people see this when they'll come to fix it, we're both going to jail!" she joked (at least I hoped).
The worst in all that? It turned out that I had paid my bill. The power people had meant to disconnect somebody else, not me. Oops.
15 avril 2006
Zanzibar
I just came back from Zanzibar where I spent 4 days this week. What is known generally as Zanzibar is actually two islands, Zanzibar and Pemba, also called the Spice Islands. Their name instantly brings to mind exotic and romantic images, but the reason why I went there was a lot less glamorous: I was taking part in a journalist site visit organized by the UN’s Global Fund and aimed at showing us a successful example of malaria control.
I was planning to do a radio story, but also to take my camera and practice shooting – hopefully I would be able to sell some of the footage when I came back.
I knew we were going to be 5 journalists, but I didn’t know any of the others. I met my group for the first time at Jomo Kenyatta Airport on Tuesday morning. There was Louis, the organizer of the trip and a member of Massive Effort, a lobby group that works for the Global Fund, two photographers Thomas and William - Thomas worked for the British agency Bancroft and William was a French freelance photographer – another Thomas, producer of a show on BBC World Service, and finally the other woman of the group was a text journalist for EFE, the Spanish wire service.
We chatted while waiting for boarding time and it felt like we were going to get along fine. We first took a plane from Nairobi to Zanzibar airport. Then we were scheduled to take another plane to Pemba where we would spend 2 days visiting hospitals and households. At Zanzibar’s airport I had an unpleasant surprise: I thought my Kenyan visa allowed me to enter Tanzania at no additional cost (as the lady at the Kenyan embassy in Paris had told me), but it wasn’t the case. So I
had to buy a Tanzanian visa. 50 dollars. But it looks nice in my passport.
Abdullah, a doctor trained in Manchester and the head of Zanzibar’s malaria control program was there to great us. He took us to his office to meet his staff – and sign the guest book, of course. After the formal greetings and introductions, we went back to the airport and finally boarded our plane to Pemba. It was a small Cessna again. The second time was a lot less exciting than the first time had been. I used my recently acquired knowledge of the Cessna-tricky-three-parts-
seatbelts and showed the others how to fasten them. The flight over the turquoise waters lasted about 40 minutes.
We landed in Pemba and as soon as we got out of the plane we were overwhelmed by the humid heat. Pemba is a little smaller and a little less developed than Zanzibar island. We dropped our bags at the hotel in Wete (the town where we would stay for 2 days), which looked a lot like the one I stayed at in Wajir except that it was a lot newer and that it had a fridge and a tv and each room. We then drove to the malaria control program’s offices in another city for a (very boring) briefing that lasted an hour. We signed a guest book again.
The most interesting part of it all for me was the drive there. It gave me a little overview of the vegetation and life of 
the island. I was surprised to see that Pemba (and Zanzibar) looked a lot like Asia: rice fields all along the road, cows grazing, small houses with palm roofs, motorbikes and bicycles.
We came back at dawn and we could see the main reason for our visit flying all around us: mosquitoes. It’s the beginning of the rainy season in Zanzibar as in East Africa in general, and the heat and water combined creates the perfect environment for the breeding of mosquitoes. Zanzibar is also home to the most virulent strain of malaria which is resistant to many drugs.
I was not worried about getting bitten myself, because since my arrival in Kenya I had been taking a very strong anti-malaria drug called Lariam. “Are you crazy??” said Louis “you should stop immediately, it’s very dangerous, now you have many other options that don’t bear Lariam’s awful side effects”. Well, I know. You don’t even need to take anything if you stay in Nairobi because there’s not many mosquitoes, and most of them don’t carry the disease. But the reason why I chose Lariam is because I never know when I will be travelling and where, so I didn’t want to have to worry about mosquitoes. With Lariam, you only take one pill a week and you’re covered. But of course, it doesn’t suit everybody. The main side effect is that it increases your moods. So if you have ups and downs, it’s not for you as it can actually lead to depression. Thankfully I’m not this type of person. As many anti-malaria drugs, it can also upset your stomach. I haven’t experienced that either.
On Wednesday, we went to visit a hospital, were we saw several kids admitted for malaria (and signed 2 guest books), 
and then to a village. The purpose was to see all the new measures that had been implemented with the Global Fund’s money. First of all, the money allowed the malaria control program to purchase enough long-lasting mosquito nets to give one per child under five or pregnant women for free. The long-lasting nets are different from the regular ones in that they last for up to 5 years and that you don’t have to dip them every 6 months into insecticide.
Thanks to the Global Fund’s money, Zanzibar was also able to afford ACTs (Artemisin Combined Therapy), a new and more effective drug. The people of Zanzibar can also get it for free at the hospitals. If you take it in the first 24 hours of the outbreak of the disease, the drug is effective at 98%. Today it replaces chloroquine in many countries where the parasite has become resistant to it.
The air was so sticky that we were all sweating even by just standing there. Then when I started filming it got worse. Carrying my backpack, the camera, a bag with the tapes and batteries, and the tripod was a lot of exercise by that heat and I was drenched. Sweat was trickling down my face and blurring the camera’s viewfinder. The outside light was blinding.
I was the only tv camera in the group, and tv is a looooooong process. You have to take several shots of the same scene to be able to edit a sequence, and of course in the meantime you have to pay attention to all the technical details like focus, exposure, framing, etc. Journalists’ site visits are not really made for tv. First of all you’re not responsible for the schedule, so you can’t decide to stay longer at a place or not go to another, you have to follow the group. Then being in a group means that you have to take turns interviewing people and that you spend time asking the others to get out of your shot. On some of my tapes you can actually hear me screaming “Noooooooooooooooooo… Thomas, please!!!”, and him saying “Oh, sorry sorry”. And then a few seconds later it was my turn “Oh, am I in your shot? Give me 6 seconds and I move”. 6 seconds is the time you’re supposed to stay still on each shot to be able to edit it.
We came back exhausted to the hotel. After a well needed shower (I felt disgusting), I was about to start working on my computer when the power went off. This happens often in Africa, even in my apartment in Nairobi. The only thing you can do is wait. So I waited, waited, waited. My computer battery went flat. More importantly, I couldn’t recharge my camera batteries. I tried to go to the internet café but they had no power either. Turned out that the whole city was operating on one big generator and that it had collapsed. I went back to the hotel and because it was really getting dark and there was nothing to do inside, we decided to make the best out of the situation and go have a drink and relax. BBC Thomas took us to a diver’s bar he had just discovered while walking around the town looking for something to do. It was a surprisingly trendy place for a city like Wete, and there we realised that there were other white people in Pemba (our group was half white-half Kenyans) and that they were all hanging out together in this place. The place, which also included a guest house, had its own small generator so we were able to have some light and cold drinks.
The power was still out when we left the following day. What worried me was that I only had one and a half battery left for my camera and that it was not going to last all day.
We went to another hospital. There we met a mother and her 15-months-old son who had just been admitted for severe malaria. She wasn’t sure how the boy had been infected as he was sleeping under a net every night. He had had fever for about 2 days, and in the morning he had started convulsing, a sign of advanced stage of the disease. At this stage ACTs 
are not effective anymore and the parasite can only be cleared using quinine. Quinine has to be administered by injection, and on a crying and restless child, it’s not an easy task. The doctor tried to find a vein in the right arm. Then in the left one. Then in the right one again. Then again in the left one. Then he dropped the idea and proceeded to put a needle in the child’s head. “Why is he doing that?” I asked photographer Thomas, who translated to the doctor in Swahili. The man replied that the child was moving too much and it was easier to hold the head. Quite a traumatizing experience for a 15-months-old. Even the 25-year-old mother, who had been extremely calm during the whole process, refrained a frown of disgust when she saw the doctor trying to introduce a needle in one side of her son’s head and then in the other.
The photographers and I were taking turns in shooting the scene. Later we wondered was role we played in increasing the doctor’s nervousness. He was obviously not trained enough to perform injections on children, and we asked ourselves to which extent our presence had added pressure on him.
We then went to a rural village to meet with some households who had received free mosquito nets. We were rapidly surrounded by excited kids calling out “Mzungu, mzungu!!” and pushing each other in front of the cameras. They only knew a couple of phrases in English which they kept repeating “How are you? What is my name?” They probably meant what is your name. So I replied in Swahili “Nzuri. Habari gani? Wewe ni nini?” (Good, how are you? What is your name?), which had the effect of spreading large smiles on their faces as they introduced themselves proudly “Mimi ni Yussef Ali”, “Mimi ni Fatima Saleh”.
I couldn’t shoot more that day, first because the houses were very small and not a lot of light was coming in, and then because I run out of batteries as I had feared would happen. Before leaving, the community leader invited us to drink and eat some coconuts. He chopped the top with a machete and handed them to us so that we could first drink the water before eating the “meat”. I usually don’t like coconuts, but there was no way I could get out of this. It tasted better than the processed Bounty coconut flavour, but I’m still not a big fan.
We soon had to leave to take our plane back to Zanzibar town. I was excited to finally see Stone town, the city’s historical center which, I had been told, was beautiful. The first surprise on our way to the hotel was to see that the streets were filled with tourists. I had not seen tourists in months. There’s almost none in Nairobi and they just stay in their hotels for a night or two before leaving for a safari.
For dinner we all went to an open air dining area where skewers sellers line up by the sea shore. There you can get lobster, shrimp and calamari skewers for a few dollars. The downside is that it’s difficult to find a seat and you end up eating standing up. But more than that, you get harassed by homeless, stoned, drooling guys holding on to your arm for minutes before you can get rid of them. We moved to a proper restaurant to be able to sit down and relax a little bit.
On Friday, I had a few hours before taking my plane back to Nairobi. Most of the group was staying behind to work some more or enjoy the Easter weekend on the beach. I didn’t have much time so I decided to get some general shots of the city.
In many ways, Stone Town is more Arab then African. The intricate streets are lined up with small shops offering leather crafts, wooden boxes and jewels, and the days are timed by the chant of the muezzin. Sadly, I wasn’t really able to enjoy all that. I couldn’t spend 5 minutes without being called out “Hey lady photographer, camerawoman, do you need a guide? Or a driver? Come see the inside, look how beautiful! Come here lady photographer!”. Extremely annoying. It totally spoiled Stone Town for me.
I left Zanzibar in the afternoon, looking forward a warm shower and Nairobi’s perfect dry weather.
10 avril 2006
Sunday in the Great Rift Valley
Yesterday was the first World Migratory Bird Day. Nothing to get very excited about, but it gave me the opportunity to see a new part of Kenya. I went to cover the day’s main event that took place in Laikipia, situated about 6 hours drive north of Nairobi in the heart of the Great Rift Valley.
The UN Environment Program, organizer of the event, was flying the guests there for the day. For some lucky journalists (or the best bargainers), the flight was free.
But yesterday morning, it was raining. It didn’t really bother me until I got to the airport and realized we were going to fly in light, 15-seats Cessna planes (like the one in the picture). The roads are so bad in many parts of Kenya or simply inexistent), that many rich ranch-owners have a plane and a private airstrip. But from my days at CNN’s New York news desk, Cessna meant only one thing for me: one crash a week, usually on weekends when wealthy businessmen take their toy out and somehow at some point things stop being fun.
I was looking forward to the trip though, as these small planes fly low and give you the opportunity to really see the landscape and the wildlife.
I was waiting inside, hiding from the rain, when a lady in blue came to see me “Marie? Will you follow me please? Your flight is ready”. On the tarmac, the pilot greeted me and took me to his plane. Dark blond with a short scruffy beard and blue eyes, dressed in his white commander uniform, he looked like he was coming out of a movie. “So what is all this about exactly?” he asked me, referring to all these people dressed in “day smart, white preferred” as the invitation commanded. “Not sure, I’ll tell you when I get there. But it’s supposed to be World Migratory Bird day, whatever that means.”. “Oh”, he said, as if he was expecting something more glamorous and he was a little disappointed.
I hopped inside the Cessna, and soon after I finally understood how to fasten my seatbelt (there were three parts in it, quite tricky), we took off.
It had stopped raining, but the sky was still filled with clouds. Every time we would go through one of them, the plane would shake and I could see the hand of the woman in front of me, manicured and heavy with jewels, anxiously clutching the top of her seat behind her head.
On the way, we flew above green forests, red earth, and silver lakes. I even saw a waterfall. But quite regretfully no giraffes or elephants. Then suddenly, we started to go down and landed, somewhere on the grass. We had arrived. I got out and thanked the pilot. “Pleasure”, he said, lighting up a cigarette.
We were first greeted by a group of the area’s school children who had prepared a few songs and dances for the occasion. Then all the guests were taken to the venue through a rocky dirt road in a procession of old pick-ups.
The event was being hosted by Kuki Gallmann, an Italian socialite who moved to Kenya in the 70s with her husband and now owns a 100 000 acre ranch and nature conservancy, home to the largest reserve of black rhinos in East Africa outside national parks. Her life has been pretty extraordinary. Her husband died in a car accident in the 80s while bringing back their soon-to-be-born daughter’s cradle from Nairobi. Three years later, her son from a previous marriage died at 17, bitten by a snake. She decided to stay and dedicate her life to protecting the wildlife and environment. She wrote a book about her life, “I dreamed of Africa”, which was turned into a movie starring Kim Basinger. According to Kuki Gallmann, the movie is a movie, but the book is the real story.
The setting for the event was beautiful. Local artists, as well as artists from countries as far away as India, Peru or Turkey had made the way there to perform on the small stage overlooking the blue rift valley. It was the first time I was going to try to shoot a story myself, and the colours and music made the whole experience very interesting from a visual point of view.
The purpose of the day was to shed a positive light on migratory birds. With the outbreak of 
bird flu, many people, including some experts, feared that migratory birds’ cross border travels would participate in spreading the disease. But they did not. East Africa, which is on the migratory route, has until now been spared by avian flu.
The event lasted about 4 hours, and I filmed as much as I could. So much that I didn’t realise the sun had come out so strong that my back was burning… I came back with possibly the worst tank-top sunburnt I ever had.
I left at 5:45pm with the last plane. It was a different pilot, and he welcomed us on board by saying “Welcome on board ladies and gentlemen. We have some bad weather ahead of us, but it’s okay, we have our emergency indicators, we’ll see what happens. You have the safety leaflet in the pocket of the seat in front of you, as well as a multi-purpose bag”. Not very reassuring. The sky ahead of us was really black indeed.
But actually the flight back went very smoothly. The pilot avoided any turbulence by flying just below the clouds. This time we passed by a large volcano, so close that we could see all the details of the lava that had once flowed.
I didn’t sleep much that night as I worked on a radio piece that I needed to file the following morning. To listen to it, click here: Oiseaux_migrateurs1.aup. You'll need to download Audacity here.
07 avril 2006
Confusion in the air
Yesterday, a commercial plane coming from Congo and going to Mombasa almost crashed at Nairobi airport. The plane almost caught fire and the 80 people on board almost died.
Almost: we all believed it for about 30 minutes before the Kenyan Airport Authority admitted that the information was not true, that it was just a drill to “alert the media”.
And alert the media it did.
Usually when the police or an airport authority conducts a drill, they make sure to keep the media informed in order to avoid public panic. But not in Kenya. Here, they think it’s a lot more fun to let everybody believe, at least for a while, that there had been a real accident.
The result? Massive confusion. As soon as the agencies heard the news they filed their wires, which radio and tv stations all over the world instantly received with a loud “beeeeeeep” meaning “urgent”. A few seconds later, the (false) information was broadcasted on local and global channels under the banner “breaking news”.
It took about an hour for the information to be corrected, as for some time the police itself was still confirming the crash. Actually, they just didn’t know. They had been fooled by the Airport Authority like everyone else. By the way, the police is not exactly the most reliable source here. Most of the time they’re not aware of what is going on but because they can’t really tell you that they answer “yes yes” to all your questions.
The Foreign Correspondent Association didn’t find the whole incident funny. They sent a letter to the Managing Director of the Kenyan Airport Authority complaining about the misinformation:
These kinds of drills are held almost everyday somewhere in the world, but Kenya seems to be the only country where those in charge mislead the media and it becomes an international news story.
Mr. Muhoho's credibility and that of his authority have been seriously damaged. This fact will severely hamper our ability to report on a crash when ones does happen in the future.
It’s not the first time there’s a “drill scare” in Kenya. It has apparently happened about 3 times in the past few years. Last time when a journalist called the Airport Authority to find out what was going on, the lady at the other end of the line told him “Yes dear, it’s a drill. We just wanted to make sure you were keeping on your toes”.
