Return to Zimbabwe

Monday, 14 November 2005

The flight over was uneventful, and actually seemed to go faster than I remember it being last year. That’s my imagination going because the start and end times for the flight are unchanged. I was one row from the exit row, which would have given me much more foot room. But the guy I was crammed into cattle car class with was a NASA contractor from CA who was going to a conference in Cape Town, South Africa. He was nice enough, and we chatted a bit. This was his first trip to Africa, and they were there to celebrate the inaugural of a big, fancy telescope that South Africa has built. He worked on his presentation a little on the flight, and it was highly technical stuff full of mathematical values that I didn’t understand. Reminded me of all the epidemiological charts that you see on some CDC presentations. Personally, I don’t care how you got there, as long as your methodology was sound. Just give me the results 

The food was terrible on the flight. They gave us this chicken dish that had no taste at all, and our “snack” consisted of a sandwich and cookies. Luckily, you could get drinks whenever you wanted. The little bottles of South African wine were pretty good. I didn’t drink too much though, and it didn’t put me to sleep. I can not get comfortable in those seats, crammed in there as you are. So I didn’t sleep at all until I got to Johannesburg (Joburg). My layover was only about an hour or so, but I went and had some lunch and checked email. Let everyone know I was in Joburg safe and sound. Also let them know to not expect to hear from me until Monday, and hopefully that will mollify my mom.

On the Joburg-Harare flight, I passed out and slept the whole way. Going through customs was uneventful, and my luggage came out without problems. My WHO driver was waiting for me, and he took me to the Meikles. The Meikles is a nice place, and I can see how it’s one of the nicest hotels in Africa. Of course, it’s not as nice as the Sheraton Addis, but I’m not sure many hotels in the world match that level of opulence  But there many similarities. You have a grand foyer, and the bellmen are all over you like white on rice. They checked me in, and gave me room 654. The bellmen took me up, and it was nice. You could tell that like most things in Zimbabwe, it hasn’t been updated in about 20-30 years. Still, the Meikles has held up over time. The room is spacious, has a mini-fridge, a TV (you can hear the sound in the bathroom when it’s on through speakers in the bathroom), and has the full complement of amenities you’d expect from restaurants to shops to a pool, sauna and gym. I didn’t get to see the pool, sauna, or gym b/c I wasn’t awake during the operating hours 

I had about 1.5 hours to nap before I had to be ready for this Marine Ball. I’d heard so much about these Marine Balls, which celebrate the founding of the US Marines in 1775. I was glad to buy a ticket and go this year. Plus, I knew I’d get to see Marines in dress uniforms which are always a delight for the eyes. Well, not so much this year. The marine contingent is completely changed from who was here last year. The change was not an improvement either. Only two of the marines could be classified as attractive, and word is that one of the attractive ones is about as smart as a box of rocks. The guys in last year’s group were all pretty attractive, friendly, outgoing, and could hold a conversation. This year’s bunch pretty much stuck to themselves the whole night with some interaction with the ladies who work at the embassy. Apparently, they aren’t as familiar with the CDC people assigned here. Not sure if it’s due to a lack of effort from both parties or what. The food was horrible, and the music was odd. They played all these REALLY old songs from the 60s and 70s. Then you had some Zimbabwean music which was OK, but not my cup of tea. The party broke up around midnight, and Casey dropped me off at the Meikles. I went up to my room and died, not waking up until 4:30pm on Sunday afternoon.

I read the Zimbabwean newspaper, which was entertaining. It’s run by the state, so the propaganda is thicker than what you get even from FOX News in the USA. Then I went downstairs for dinner. I had French onion soup, chicken with veggies, chocolate mousse, 3 servings of Coke, and an after dinner tea. All this cost me $870,000 Zim, and with tip, I shelled out $1 million Zim. I can now say I’ve had a million dollar meal  Actually, the exchange rate is about $88,000 Zim = $1 US, so that dinner cost me about $11 US. The inflation rate is out of control here, and it’s only going to get worse from what I understand. I changed out $300 with the black market guy who works WHO, and got $26.4 MILLION Zim in return. Damn shame that I can’t magically turn this Zim$ into US cash $1Zim = $1US  But once again, Africa has made me a millionaire. I did a little calculation of what my US salary would be in Zim$. Turns out I’d be a billionaire, and comfortably so. Of course, when dinner sets you back a cool mil, you need to be a billionaire.

I then went back to my room and read a while before going to sleep. I awoke at 4:30am unable to fall back asleep, so I got up and read some more. Then it was time to get up at 6:30pm, have my morning coffee, and dress for work. The WHO van came to pick me up at 7:30am, and drove me to the office. I’m sitting in the same office I had last November when I came to do this financial report stuff. If only I could connect to the internet, it would be fine.

It’s now 3pm, and still no internet. Of course, without it, I can’t access the files I’m supposed to be looking at and turning into a report. I actually got rid of everything I did last year, which in hindsight was stupid. But I know they have an electronic copy somewhere; I just have to find it. In the meantime, I’m not really able to DO anything. The internet help desk guy came in, and discovered that my user ID had been deleted from the system since I had not been here for a year. So they have to redo it. He ran off saying he had to print something. I presume he has what he needs. I sure hope so, b/c this being locked off the internet sucks.

Casey took me to lunch. We ate the fast food court that’s not too far from here. It has 4 stores: a bakery, a pizza inn, a burger king wannabe called Steers, and a spicy chicken place. I got a pizza, and three “Mr Juicy”. It’s kind of like Hi-C or Capri Sun. I was a lot thirstier than I realized. Casey took me to the grocery so that I could buy some water. I got 6 liters, which should get me through midweek. I also had to buy a toothbrush ($224,000 Zim) b/c dummy me ran off without packing the charger to my toothbrush, so it will die in a day or so. I can’t go a week without brushing my teeth. Luckily, they had some good old Oral B US toothbrushes that will do.

The late spring weather here is just as you’d expect: HOT. Actually, Atlanta about about this temperature last week when we had 80F weather. But in Atlanta, I have air-conditioning. Here, I don’t…at least when I’m not in the Meikles. So I’m nice and grimy by the end of the day, and I just feel gross. I hate being hot! I’m not a crazy fan of winter weather, but you can survive winter weather…this having to dress up with a coat and tie for work when it’s 80F and no air-conditioning sucks. I don’t even have a fan to circulate air.

Whine, whine, bitch, moan, complain. I know it seems that is all I do when I come to Africa. There are plenty of beautiful and interesting things in Africa. Where it not for the financial problems of Zimbabwe and its dictatorial, semi-communist government, this would be a fine place to live. Even Ethiopia was breathtakingly beautiful from the province I was assigned to monitor. Africa, however, is very far behind the rest of the world in development, and reminders of this are never far away. It’s probably good that you can’t help but see the suffering no matter where you go, b/c you shouldn’t forget it. It would do the US all sorts of good if the middle class and wealthy could not escape from the harsh realities of poverty. You can structure your life so that you rarely if ever see the worst that poverty has to offer. Here, when over 80% of the nation lives below the Zimbabwean poverty line, you can’t escape it.

I understand the allure of Foreign Service. When you are from the USA, you will be well paid in US dollars to work in less than ideal conditions. You get your housing and utilities paid for, as well as other rights that accrue as you stay overseas. To accept an overseas post, I would basically have to back into the closet, something I am not willing to do. I worked too long and too hard to “come out” to willingly go back into the closet, rebuild the door, and shut myself in. There are plenty of people who have done that. In the State Dept, it doesn’t seem to be a big deal if you’re gay. They will even move your partner over with you, although finding them a job could be difficult. Still, in most places that CDC works, being gay is illegal. You can be put into jail and/or expelled from the country if the “wrong” people found out. I’m not sure how others reconcile that. I know one guy with CDC who is stationed in Nigeria has a hankering for African men, which is good since he’s been in Africa for about 6 years and would like another African post. He basically meets closeted gay Africans, seduces them, and has a string of fuck buddies. It seems awfully dangerous considering the prevalence of highly virulent HIV in Africa. Even if this guy’s a top (which would surprise me), he has played Russian roulette for quite some time. Of course, that’s assuming he hasn’t caught HIV. I’m not sure that he could pass the State Dept health examination if he was HIV+. Other people, like the guy I know stationed in Egypt who is of Palestinian descent, just goes into the closet. Locks his door tightly, and waits for trips to foreign lands or the US to “play”. I can’t imagine a more lonely existence. I know we all make choices in life, but to consign myself to a life alone consciously because of a job doesn’t make sense to me. Others like the Nigeria assignee, are more open about whom they “date”, but even if you fall in love and set up housekeeping with someone while overseas, you’re SOL when it comes time to return to the USA thanks to our immigration laws. So no matter what you do, it always ends in heartache, and you being alone.

There is one other alternative. If I had someone who wanted to go on this international “adventure” with me, knowing that finding jobs would be difficult, then I’d consider it. Already having a spouse seems to be the secret of surviving. Lord knows in the places where I’d have to work, there’d NEVER be any worry of straying  But while I’m still single, taking a job overseas is a non-starter for me. Plus, taking a job overseas means I’d be disconnected from one of my true loves: politics. I’d always vote, of course, but not being involved in the “good fight” would be disheartening.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

Last night, I had to cram into a bus to get back to the Meikles. It was OK, except for the lack of deodorant among the other passengers. As soon as I got back to the hotel, I ran to my room, stripped off and put on my trunks, and went to the pool. The water was kind of cold, but it felt SO good. By the end of the day, I had felt so grimy and disgusting. After a little swim, I went back to my room, dressed, and went down to the lounge for a snack. I had this filet salad which was pretty good. I know I shouldn’t eat salad, but I did. I’ll probably end up with a parasite or two from this trip, but in Africa, what else is new? I also had tea. Then I went upstairs for a cocktail before having dinner. It was another $1 Million Zim dinner, but it was good. I had salmon, but was kind of dry and tough, but overall not bad. I read a book the whole time, which was nice. I’m sure others either think me rude or weird, but I don’t care. When I left the dining room, I passed by an apparent karaoke night where someone was singing John Denver’s “Country Roads”. They played that at the Marine Ball too, to great fanfare. I don’t know what it is about John Denver that is so popular here!

I slept pretty well last night, although I keep having weird dreams. The WHO truck that picked me up yesterday arrived again at 7:30pm. I discovered that to get home, I really should meet the vans at 4:45pm to get back to the Meikles. Otherwise, I have to make special arrangements. Fine by me. Especially if they don’t get me internet access SOON here. Yinka is bringing me last year’s report that I worked on, since I don’t have a copy. So maybe I’ll be able to get something done. Who knows? I hope it’s an electronic copy that I can just update. If I have to start from scratch, I’ll rebel. I’ll make Julie do it 

I had my security briefing at the embassy today. Pretty much the same information that I’ve received in my previous trips. Turns out that while the Marines aren’t all that attractive this year, the embassy guys are HOT. The security officer who briefed me and two others was drop dead gorgeous. It was almost distracting. I wish I had seen him at the Marine Ball! He probably was there, but I don’t remember seeing him. Of course, after the Marine disappointment, I wasn’t really looking anymore. The embassy medical guy is also quite attractive. Either one could visit me in the Meikles anytime! LOL

I finally got the items that I needed to start my project. Luckily, Yinka had the documents we produced last year on disk, so I’m now just updating. It’s going a lot smoother than last year, but then again, I remember some of the lessons I learned. Lessons like, “Just because something says it’s for ‘ops cost’ doesn’t mean you should PUT it under ‘Ops Cost’.” Basically, it’s a way to make overhead look smaller than it might be in reality. Overhead is a tricky thing anyway. WHO takes 13% of any grant it gets as “overhead” which pays for secretaries, travel, communications, logistics, etc. These things don’t always touch an immunization day, but they are necessary to carry those days out. By US government standards, though, WHO still uses a lot of overhead. Poor Bush would swoon if he understood the numbers.

Discussed career options with Yinka and Casey today. It’s kind of a wait and see pattern. This is another reason I don’t want an overseas post. Once you no longer “fit” into the scheme of things, you are either forced into a bad situation or you have to return to the US and look for another job. Granted, GID will keep you employed while you look, but it’s kind of a shabby way to treat someone who’s given you some of the best years of their lives. We just don’t have the FTEs to welcome back field people to Atlanta-based positions with open arms.

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Today, I finally got internet connectivity! They’ve totally revamped the system here, so there are more checks before you can log on. What a pain. The good side is that without any distractions, I’ve been able to finish a lot of my work, so I’ll have more time to be “leisurely” than I might have otherwise. Today was uneventful, until we had this mandatory security briefing for all WHO employees. Since I’m a consultant, I had to go too, and Yinka drove me over.

The WHO-Zimbabwe office is in this hospital complex that is quite nasty looking. They have this coal plant on the premises, that I can only imagine is used for power in the hospital. The morgue was right next to that, which is a juxtaposition I found disturbing, almost like a concentration camp. I can tell you one thing, if I was in Zimbabwe and got seriously ill, you wouldn’t find me in one of these hospitals. I’m not even sure they’re that sanitary. We passed by the “nuclear medicine” department on the way to this meeting, and I remarked that if I had cancer, I’d be demanding that CDC bring me home for treatment. No way would I rely on African medicine and hospitals with my life on the line.

The meeting on security was a waste of time. We all thought there was going to be special information shared about the upcoming elections, but they barely touched on that. The security officer for WHO-Zimbabwe has no public speaking skills, and apparently had no real plan for this “training”. He was also missing one of his front teeth, which I found terribly distracting. It is hard to take someone seriously when they present themselves like that. He started talking randomly about various topics, on of which was a “warden system” which is something to do with UN residential security. Turns out the wardens haven’t been doing their jobs, and this guy was stunned when the crowd turned on him over this issue. Other things came up, like access to the UN doctor and clinic. The funniest thing was seeing it turn into a virtual free-for-all with the security guy calling out the management people and other departments. I’ve never seen people be so insulting to each other at a management level in an open meeting like this before. One lady was hilarious when she said, “Since your meeting with the wardens is next week, perhaps you will remember what you have promised here, since it should still be fresh in your mind.” There was no “sister roll” or snaps, but the intent was certainly there  Once that worthless meeting was over, I was able to get a couple of things done before heading back to the hotel. I had a “traditional tea” for my dinner, and then went back to room to watch movies before going to bed.