Vehicle registration and tents

Yesterday and today in Juba the traffic police went around ticketing everyone that had 'NS' license plates as opposed to 'SSC' license plates. The deal is that originally when the gov't was set up they made everyone register their vehicles. Fine. No problems. Then each state wanted to have their own number plates (wouldn't you? great way to make money) so you started seeing cars registered with 'SSC' for the capital (Juba), 'CE' for Central Equitoria, 'WE' for Western Equitoria and so on. But none of this was required. Now, a week and a half ago, they decided to make it a requirement for everyone to have state plates.

Apparently either a) the traffic police hadn't received their salaries for the month of May, or b) the officials in charge of the Ministry of Transportation decided they needed to build a new mansion, because they thought that it was time to stop vehicles on the road, fine them (with a receipt that says it is from Jonglei state even though we're in Central Equitoria), and require them to pay $700 USD to re-register each vehicle with the state. Apparently a week and a half was sufficient time for the state to communicate this fact as well as register and change every single vehicle over to their plates.

We have 6 vehicles, so that's $4,200. I know another organization that has 16 vehicles, so that's $11,200. And I'm sure that there are companies and organizations that have more than that. So that means millions of dollars are going to be pouring into the Ministry, and thousands more into the pockets of the police who "fine" the vehicles as well as giving them an official ticket. Yet another reason why Juba is becoming yet another typical, awful, East African city.

The other main reason Juba is becoming yet another awful, typical, East African city is the rise in armed robberies. The past several months groups of men, some in uniform some not, all armed with AK 47s, have been targeting NGO and UN compounds asking for the Khawajas (white people) and demanding money, computers, satelite phones, etc. There have been over 30 attempted/actual robberies, but luckily no one has gotten killed, just intimidated and in a few cases hit. This NEVER used to happen here - it was a sleepy, dusty town. But now it has grown exponentially and with it comes crime.

I was supposed to move into a house but 2 days before I was to move in there were a string of attempted break-ins 2 blocks down. So I am no longer allowed to live there, so instead I moved out to the equivalent of the suburbs and am living in my very own, spacious and airy TENT! I LOVE my tent. It's huge, one of those big platform green ones, with 2 - count them - 2 rooms, a queen sized bed, and a view of the hills. I now wake up to the sun rising and birds chirping, having tea on the veranda instead of dust, loud music blaring, sweltering heat, and traffic. And the security is good with armed SPLA soldiers and an electric fence. Plus is doesn't hurt that Simba is the manager there and runs the operations of the site. No, we're not living together, and no, I'm not getting a special discount. Get your minds out of the gutter, people! But overall I'm definitely safer (and happier!) than in town.

So that means you will be getting much happier blogs from Petunia in the future.

And CONGRATULATIONS MONICA AND KEIR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My Beatrice and her Beau were married May 31st in St. Louis, MO. I am completely bummed I couldn't be there for them on such an important day, but will be visiting them in the UK in August. It's something that's part of this career - having friends all over the world, but missing out on a lot of the important stuff.

Peace

The US Presidential Elections - An Arab View

CNN just aired an interesting piece where they held a forum for Arab News Networks about their coverage of the US Presidential Elections. Networks represented include Al Arabiya, Al Jazeera, Abu Dhabi TV, and LBCSat. Somewhat obviously, the US election is considered extremely important for the Middle East and is seen as affecting the personal day to day life of Middle Easterners. There were some interesting perspectives, and here are some of the statements that struck me:

According to Al Arabiya, their network is viewing the US elections as a product to be packaged in a dramatic way to increase viewership. For example, they latch onto "Hilary Clinton when she is crying" to stretch out the drama and increase viewership. They mentioned "we have the the opportunity to deal with the US elections like we deal with the world cup" and "people are interested in how Hilary Clinton dresses up, and also about the foreign policy."

However, the rest of the networks had more of a sense of resignation about the race. "People don't believe that any of the 3 candidates candidate will make a big difference in foreign policy. The USA will not dramatically change the foreign policy towards the middle east." LBCSat's view based on the comments from their viewers is that "nobody believes either of the democratic candidates will win - it's the Arab mentality. An African American cannot win the presidency and neither can a woman. So all eyes are on John McCain."

Some highlights from the comments offered by the audience supposedly made up by viewers include:

"Not a single question about the Israeli-Palestinian issue has been raised in any of the debates and there have been dozens of them. So no one knows how Barak Obama or Hilary Clinton feels about the conflict." (From a Rep from the Arab-American League)

"I'd like to believe that someone like Barak Obama could be elected as President, but your country has let me down so many times before that I don't want to hope anymore."

"People see themselves in Barak Obama - they think that if it is possible for an African American, it could be possible for an Arab American."

All in all CNN pitched the show as this great debate, and it most definitely was not (of course the US news networks are guilty of dramatization too, although they would never admit it as frankly and proudly as Al Arabiya did), but I wonder if this piece was aired in the US or only in the international broadcasts? Anyone know?

And to end this post on a completely inappropriate note, watch this video. Akhmed the Dead Terrorist. Friggin hilarious. I'm totally going to hell, but at least I'll be going there laughing :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lqv52JQ61KM


Peace

Violence against women - Sudan vs. the US

Maybe it's because at the moment I've been working on writing a section for one of our peer education manuals on the link between Gender Based Violence and HIV, but I'm feeling rather militant today so you all now have to deal with it.

Here's a stat for you: In Sudan, a girl is more likely to die in childbirth than to complete primary school.

Think about that for a moment.

In Sudan:
91% of women have no formal education
94% of women cannot read or write
99.8% of womenhave no electricity
87% of women do not have running water
40% of women report having been beaten
93% of women have lost at least one family member
68% of women of married women live in a polygamous marriage*

I consider this to be violence against women.

I've also felt the need to put up a few more annectodes that I think point out the attitude towards violence here in Sudan - especially violence against women. The same person who was involved in the lashing story from last year left the office for about 4 hours yesterday without letting anyone know where he was going. This is the second time this has happened so when he came back I asked him what was up. His story was this:

His sister was 5 months pregnant, and is not on good terms with her co-wife (it is very common here for people to have up to 4 wives). Yesterday the co-wife called his sister up on the phone and started insulting her and they had a fight over the phone. I don't know about what. So his sister then went to the house, where the co-wife proceded to beat her up, even though she was pregnant. She ended up miscarrying the child. The reason why he left the office was to help her file a court case against the co-wife. This is incredibly sad, but then he was calling his sister "not smart" and blaming because she went to the house to confront the co-wife even though she was pregnant!!!

Thank God that at least in the US, biggest donor of aid to social justice programs around the world, they have equal rights and respect for women everywhere. Oh, that's right, NO THEY DON'T!!! It's easy here in Sudan to think that these problems are unique and that women in more "developed" societies have it made. In a lot of ways, it's true. At 25 years old I am able to choose my partner and whether or not to get married, I am well educated, I have a job in the field of my choice and am financially independent, and can do pretty much whatever I want with my life, wherever in the world I fancy. Would I have this choice if I was born in Sudan? The answer is a resounding "no". If I was a Sudanese woman, I would be married with at least 2 or 3 children, my husband would have at least 1 other wife, I would not have gone to school so would probably not be able to even write my own name (many people's signatures here are actually their thumbprint). I would be expected to run my household and raise my children with the little money left over on pay day from my husband's drinking sprees. I would never have even seen a doctor or other trained medical provider other than a community health worker - that is if I was allowed by my husband to see one - and would probaly be born, live and die in the same town.

But there are also stories of hope here. Last week we had the launch of one of our programs in Yei, Lainya and Morobo counties, which included training people living with HIV as peer educators. As we were standing in the yard before the event, one of our facilitators pointed out a woman wearing a red dress with yellow flowers who was seated with a few other women. She said this woman was one of the peer educators who participated in the workshop, she was HIV positive and so was her 2 year old child. Halfway through the workshop her child passed away while being carried on her back. The child was literally fine in the morning, seemingly healthy and laughing, but by the afternoon had passed away, with no indication of how. After only 2 days of grieving, this woman returned to the workshop and participated for the rest of the sessions, determined to get all the information about staying healthy that she could so she could pass it on to others in her community.

Today Washington University in St. Louis, my alma matter, is holding the commencement ceremony for the Class of 2008. Also today, they are awarding Phyllis Schlafley an honorary doctorate, and Chris Matthews is the commencement speaker. Hear that? It's the sound of my head exploding. Read this excellent piece by Katha Pollitt published in The Nation which echoes exactly how I feel about the situation.

Backlash Spectacular
by Katha Pollitt
The Nation "

Washington University is giving Phyllis Schlafly an honorary doctorate. Let me run that by you again. Washington University, the distinguished 155-year-old seat of higher learning in St. Louis, is giving an honorary degree to Phyllis Schlafly--archfoe of the Equal Rights Amendment, the United Nations, Darwinism and other newfangled notions, and the promoter of innumerable crackpot far-right conspiracy theories who called the Bomb "a marvelous gift that was given to our country by a wise God." Her eighty-two years haven't mellowed her one bit: last year she blamed the Virginia Tech massacre on the English department; called intellectual men "liberal slobs"; advocated banning women from traditionally male occupations like construction, firefighting and the military; and defended men's property rights over their wives' vaginas ("by getting married, the woman has consented to sex, and I don't think you can call it rape"). The campus is in an uproar, and no wonder. After four years of hard work, female seniors get to watch their school honor someone who thinks they should park their diplomas in the kitchen sink. Washington U might as well bring in mad misogynist Chris Matthews as commencement speaker. Oh. You mean...? No!Yes.

Tell me the backlash against feminism isn't crackling up a storm. I tryto keep my eye on the big picture and the bottom line: education, employment, autonomy, power. Surely, I tell myself, the fact that half of all new med students are female is more important than Paris Hilton's omnipresent visage; that a woman has made the first viable run for the presidency says more about the United States than that media clowns like Matthews basically call her a crazy castrating bitch on a daily basis; or that Caitlin Flanagan, smarmy enemy of working mothers (and another big believer in compulsory sex for wives), won a National Magazine Award for reviews and criticism.

But sometimes I think we're truly going backward, as Republican hegemony, conservative Christianity and anti-feminist media propaganda take their cumulative toll. All those judges, all that money, all that shock jockery, all those magazines obsessively following stars' weight and baby bumps: it would be strange if they had no effect. As far as concrete setbacks go, look no further than the case of Lilly Ledbetter, whose right to sue for pay discrimination was denied by the Supreme Court last May. In a 5-to-4 decision, the Justices overturned the standard interpretation of existing law to declare that Ledbetter was twenty years too late: the victim of pay discrimination must sue within six months of the initial discriminatory act--never mind whether she knew about it (many employers, including Ledbetter's, forbid workers from discussing their salaries; she found out she was paid less than any man at her level from an anonymous tip). Given the realities of life, the Court has given employers the nod to pay women less, as long as they can keep the women in the dark for 180 days. In April a bill to restore women's right to sue failed in the Senate, 56-to-42, because for some reason everything now needs sixty votes to become law. John McCain said the bill would lead to too many lawsuits (hello? all it would have done was restore the law we'd lived with for forty-four years); what women needed was more "education and training." Because right now, women are just too dumb to merit equal pay. As Dahlia Lithwick wrote in a coruscating piece in Slate, if women take this sitting down, maybe they really are dumb.

The suspicion that women are dim would explain why Oklahoma has just passed a law requiring not only that women seeking abortions be forced to view sonograms of their fetuses but that the picture be taken in the way most likely to reveal the clearest picture--often up their vaginas. In other antichoice news, an abortion ban will be on the ballot again in South Dakota, this time with narrow exceptions for rape and incest. And mark June 7 on your calendar--it's Protest the Pill day, brought to you by the American Life League and other antichoice groups, which claim, despite the evidence, that "the Pill kills babies" by preventing implantation of fertilized eggs. Maybe it's good that the antichoice movement is outing itself as opposed to contraception, as prochoicers have long maintained and not many pundits have noted--but it also shows that they believe they can come out of the closet and not be dismissed as lunatics. Look for more struggles over government birth-control funding--already way down, thanks to budget cuts and inflation--as the antichoicers move the goal posts of how "life" is defined.

Yes, women are still making gains in education and--slowly--in politics and other areas. But long standing feminist gains are eroding: battered women's shelters, for example, are closing for lack of funds. And the advances haven't made the difference once hoped for. There are more powerful female Hollywood executives than ever, but as Manohla Dargis pointed out in a splendid rant (her word) in the New York Times, the movies are relentlessly male-focused: the conventional Hollywood wisdom is "Women can't direct. Women can't open movies. Women are a niche." Culturally, there's misogyny wherever you look: Grand Theft Auto IV, which offers players the opportunity to have sex with prostitutes and kill them, got rave reviews and is expected to have $500 million in sales its first week out. If there's a pro-woman cultural event with that kind of reach and impact, I'd like to hear about it. It certainly wouldn't be Vanity Fair's photo of tween icon Miley Cyrus, clad in nothing but a bedsheet at all of 15 years old--or the daily media onslaught urging women to focus on their babies like a Zen master contemplating a rock--when not taking pole-dancing lessons, getting Botoxed or catching up on the latest "studies" purporting to prove that they lack the drive and brains to do anything better with their brief time on earth. Feminism, please call home!"

*Source: Women for Women International

Yei for Free Rice

Yei is a town about xx kilometers southwest of Juba, and it is absolutely beautiful. The rains started there long before they started here (speaking of rains, they are very slow this year in coming to Juba!), so everything is lush and green. The dirt airstrip was so small that you can't even see it properly from looking out of the side of the airplane, so it is a bit disconcerting when you are decending what seems to be directly into the jungle. Highlights of the trip included feeding a lolipop to a pet monkey named Max, finally getting to walk around instead of being driven around in a land cruiser, actually having a fabulous night's sleep because it is cool enough, and learning that if you crush the leaves of a teak tree, it produces a red dye that you can use as nail polish.

On the drive back to Juba we passed the first primary school built in Southern Sudan, the place where the late John Garang went to school. It didn't even look that old. It's crazy to think that schools are considered a modern invention here in Sudan.

I saw Salva Kiir this morning, the President of Southern Sudan driving by us on the way to a meeting at the Ministries - his caravan is only a few cars long, and although he has bodyguards that hang out the otherwise tinted windows of the SUVs, he keeps his own window open and his trademark hat on so that he can wave to people. So you can literally see the President, not just the motorcade, when he passes. Given the history of the country I personally would be crouched down in a ball on the floor, but you have to give the man props.

Right after seeing the Prez, I got a call that Simba had to be flown to Nairobi to go to the hospital. He has typhoid for sure (two tests came back positive), but there's something else wrong as well because he had a killer headache and fever that wouldn't go away. So off he goes for a week in Nairobi to rest with his family. I have to admit I'm just a little bit jealous :)

My mom sent me this link - www.freerice.com - where you can play a multiple choice vocabulary game and for every word you get right the sponsors of the website donate free rice to the UN World Food Program. Pretty cool!

stand up and be cunted!

Ok, I know this is of questionable taste, but seriously, I couldn't restrain myself from posting this photo. I mean, at least they finally got it together enough in Sudan to have a census. They just need to sack their current translator or focus a little on their spelling...

who can throw a stick closest to that big stone over there

so i've been stuck in this horrible downward spiral of guilt - i haven't posted, so i need to post something, but it has to be really big and worthwhile, but i don't know what to write, so i haven't posted, etc. so here's my attempt at pulling myself up out of that ridiculousness.

it's April already, and i've been in Sudan awhile now, and have settled into the pace of things. unfortunately that pace includes being sick about once a month (this time it's tonsilitis, or strep throat, they can't do a throat culture here so they're just treating it with antibiotics anyway), going to the same 4 or 5 bars with the same group of people every weekend, and still not having a permanent place to live. although that was promised in November. however, there is light at the end of the tunnel, and i am moving into a house this weekend, as soon as they put screens in and locks on the door. there are trees in the "courtyard" (i'm trying to make the fact that we have to have a 10' high wall around the compound seem a bit more appealing), and my room is painted bright aqua! i don't have pictures yet, because my camera, ipod and external hard drive were all stolen from the other place i am staying by the weekend guards (my roomates had stuff stolen as well - we narrowed it down to a 6-hour time slot), but when i get a new one or borrow someone else's this blog will be graced by photos once again.

things with the boy are still going really really well, and it's time to bestow on him a code name for this blog since, as you may have noticed, i don't use people's normal names very often. from here on out, his Petunia in Paradise name will now be Simba. Simba means "lion" in Swahili. for those of you who know him (or have heard me talk about him) in real life, it will become instantly clear why i chose this name.

anyway, simba and i went to pemba, mozambique for my R&R, which was which was absolutely amazing, incredible, relaxing, gorgeous, etc etc etc. had a hard time leaving. the week was perfect. we stayed at a campsite in our own chalet, rented a motorbike for the week, cooked fish, sat on the beach, got drunk on the beach off of liquor made from sugar cane (we never actually figured out what it was) by playing the riveting game of "who can throw a stick closest to that big stone over there". good times. seriously, it was amazing.

work is going well, i'm much more confident about things now, and my department is growing from 9 people to 15 people as of next week. very exciting!!!! and more travel coming up - Mundri in 2 weeks, Yei the week after that, and probably Yambio in the near future as well.

and to close, i will leave you with my favorite moment of the day: Sudan's version of an ice cream truck - a man peddling a rickety old bicycle with a dusty orange water cooler strapped to the handle bars, neon plastic flowers tied to the handle, playing "santa claus is coming to town" from a doorbell he keeps pressing which is attached to a speaker.

always something to brighten up the day :)

Allergic to Dust

Yes, it's sad but true. The itchy eyes, runny nose, cough and irritated throat tell an all too familiar tale. Sigh. I also think going jogging at the airport this past week when they were burning all the grass next to the runway didn't help matters any. For some perspective, here are 2 pictures of the same view - looking out the front of my office - the first one was taken in October and the second was taken last week.Crazy, right? That's not fog you're looking at, it's dust. It's all I can think about. Dust everywhere. After showering I have to make sure my hair is dry before leaving the house because if I drive in a car or walk when it is still wet the dust sticks to it and makes it feel like straw by the time it is dry. No amount of conditioner can help that out. And oh my poor computer! It's going to need a serious cleaning next time I go to Nairobi. Unless you sweep the floors every day it just piles up and there's a layer of sediment over everything.

Enough kvetching about dust. For something slightly more interesting, a shipment of mosquito nets came in (not my department, but still for my organization) and had to be transferred from a warehouse to other trucks for distribution, so I went with a colleague to check it out and take some pictures. Here are a few of my favorites:

I had a very lonely/homesick day last week so I just want to say I love and miss everyone at home and am hopefully soon going to have a vonage phone so calling me in Juba will be just like calling anyone else in the states. Imagine that! I'll be able to pick up the phone anytime (anytime our generator is on at least) and have one of you on the other line. Fabulous. And it won't be finicky and unreliable like skype. I can't wait!

Peace y'all