Rotary convention and life in Bradford

A familiar sign in some English towns

Aiden in Rachel's lap listening to instructions on our stage entrance and exit (A pic of him waving a, um, Canadian flag will hopefully be forthcoming!)

Big Bday celebration -- And no, we didn't ALL plan to wear red!

Me and my fellow Fellows at the Rotary District Convention

Aiden socializing with two Iraqi women at the University's atrium

Pyjama party at the Library!

Mercury goes direct!

October 2 and my mother tells me that Mercury is finally exiting out of retrograde and going direct. I certainly hope so! Not that I pay much attention to this stuff, but if anything can account for why everything has been so difficult, then maybe it’s that. And hopefully now that Mercury is going direct, things will start to get easier. Right? Right? Among the frustrations was that my new/used stroller broke (no wonder he knocked 10 lbs off the asking price!), my internet stopped working in the eves, and babysitters are falling to the wayside.

So Aiden has attended his first Gender class, and should know the Bradford Library system by now. The babysitter cancelled for the morning's class the night before at 11:30 PM while I was sleeping, of course, so instead of skipping classes I just wheeled him in. He was great! definitely aware that he was getting to do something special. It was the second day that I had to push him in and out of classrooms so I must be the butt of a lot of people's jokes by now. Hopefully, gaining a bit of respect or admiration as well! Aiden is getting over some of his shyness and for better or worse now introduces himself to everyone with: “Hi, I’m Aiden. Pleased to meet you. I’m not shy.” he loves the atrium at school where he can run up and down ramps and run his stroller into any number of pretty Asian girls.

I will have you know that I am the first of the fellows to host a party, and so tonight will be serving tortillas and... something to new friends. I went to the nearby Tescos tonight for supplies (similar to Sam's club) and was so overwhelmed that I left with only a chunk of cheddar cheese and a giant inflatable spaceship for Aiden!

In general, the upside is that Aiden seems to like his bohemian existence out of daycare and free of anything resembling structure. The downside is that I've hardly been able to pay a second of attention to classes/academics/reading, and have had to skip a few classes that I wanted to check out during this first week because i just couldn't bare to wheel him into one more room. I'm hoping that by the time the momentum starts gaining that we'll be in enough of a rhythm that I'll be able to study. Maybe even head into the library. This chaos also has my fragmented mind even more fragmented, and focus spitting like a light bulb with a short. It really wants to be on but just doesn't have the juice.

Oct 3 – We spent the day in Saltaire, a World Heritage Site, doing a less than Heritage activity. Instead we found the local Kidzone and spent about four hours there. It was great! Aiden loved it, dashed out immediately and helped himself to toys and climbing equipment without so much as a glance backwards. The place not only had snacks and good seating but wireless internet! Imagine that. I was even able to read my required essay “Weak States, Global Threats and U.S. National Security: A Research and Policy Agenda” between searches for Aiden, chats with other moms (or mums as they’re called here), and eating incessantly. We caught our scheduled train home with just a minute to grab a sausage roll. Back in Bradford Aiden met his second friend: a girl from India named Ashante, whose mother is also looking for playmates for her daughter. She and her family live right down the street from us and the get together possibilities sound very promising. She and Aiden seemed destined immediately. Ok, so maybe there’s something to this mercury direct thing! Back at home (late) Aiden collapsed for two hours, awoke and ate FOUR (yes, four) bowls of soup before heading back to bed. Can you say, “growth spurt”? Mom’s having her own growth spurt. She ate two bowls of soup, a cup of chocolate covered raisins and, get this, a cup (yes, a cup) of vinaigrette salad dressing. This adjustment thing better happen already or I’ll be unrecognizable faster than I can grab another crumpet. And it’s just Oct. Apparently, Nov though Feb are the really “bad” months. Deep breath.

Oct 9th and I spent my BIG birthday with a hundred plus Rotarians at a quasi sea town (quasi because there was no view of the water). The conference was a challenge with Aiden but we managed quite well despite it all. (Becasue Aiden is a champion. Full stop.) With my fellow fellows we ate Indian food and toasted my new decade. A lovely time indeed. Maybe there is something to this Mercury thing... :)

First weeks in Bradford

Photo captions:

Aiden is NOT a happy camper

Aiden feeding ducks o the canal in Skipton. Note little black duck with white neck, Aiden's "friend"

Aiden enjoying the canal.

Aiden in the Bradford park. Behind him girls celebrate Eid.

Sept 14, 2009

So after that last update, some THREE months ago I’ve had to do some serious reckoning. The truth is that I was a bit horrified (understatement) by Bradford, England and its serious lack of anything kid friendly. I dipped into depression. Then I tried with all my power to switch campuses. Still nothing. My depression deepened. My lung funk kicked in. I fell sick for a week. Depressed, depressed, depressed. Finally I decided that I’d gotten this far, was this close to a Masters degree, and really, it couldn’t be THAT bad, could it??? Chin up, missie. And on Sept 9^th I boarded a plane to Bradford, England. A week and a two days later we moved to our flat, in the center of downtown Bradford – Uber urban jungle, with not a blade of grass for miles. Our flat is really quite nice with light wooden floors and lots of light, a definite necessity for those long, dark, cold days that await us. “Flat”. Note the Britishism already in full swing. After Aiden’s first visit to the nursery he ran to tell me he’d eaten a chocolate “bisquit”. read: cookie. Beware fellow Yankees: it happens fast. Aiden has had his own struggles with adjustment, which are manifesting mostly in the physical. Within a day or so of our arrival Aiden started to develop a crazy itchy rash on his torso that eventually made its way down to his feet. The doc said he had tonsillitis and recommended antibiotics cause that’s what they do here for most stuff, she said. On advice from home docs I gave him ibuprofin, Tylenol, Benadryl and spent hours rubbing calendula gel on is back at night. Once the itching stopped the vomiting began. Poor guy should be immune to it all by now! And that’s just his physical state. I never imagined that a two-year-old could show depression but Aiden did, and it took some time to get him out. In fact yesterday was the first day when he acted like a normal, happy kid again. Hallelujah. So I feel like we’re finally on course again. Tomorrow we begin our nursery visits, which were delayed due to Aiden’s illness. The setting looks good and the children quite baby-like next to Aiden, but fine for company. Meanwhile, I’ll begin the project of looking for missing homeware, signing up for medical cards and on Thursday registering for classes. Don’t know which ones as there is no information about this Masters course. Nothing. It’s crazy. I’ve been known to jump feet first into things I know little about but this tops most everything that’s come before.

A nice note is that one new friend here who I can see may become a dear friend is from Basra, Iraq. Aiden is in love..

So that’s it for now. And no telling when I’ll have internet to post all these. Already we are behind. Such is life.

A few things I found: that when things say “No Sugar Added”, it only means there’s sucralose or some other nasty sugar substitute involved.

When we were invited to “dinner” somewhere I said it was too late and we had to go home. But they meant lunch. So what does one say for the meal at night, I ask? That’s “tea”. In my country tea is something we drink… and speaking of tea, try finding some lovely herbal bedtime tea and you're out of luck!

Sept 22

First official sighting of wildlife: a squirrel, running near a tree, in a park. A real park! Soon after followed by Aiden’s first big rat sighting. Is that also considered wildlife? Will have to consult.

Sept 25

Oh boy... well, Aiden's visits to daycare have gone from bad to worse. Today he screamed hysterically for 45 minutes until they ran to get me in the waiting room because he had turned purple. Let's just say it's not working very well. Part of me just wants to trust Aiden on this one, but I'm not entirely certain where to turn next, and I'm trying not to freak out that classes start next week. That said, he has fallen head over heels in love (wanda style) with this wonderful Iraqi woman we met so I'll try to register her help. She stayed with him while I signed up for classes (for a small fortune, I might add) and within a day Aiden was saying he loved Lubna (or Luna as he calls her), and "missed her." Amazing. So I'd love for her to do more, even though she has no experience with kids. And not sure where the funding will come from. But she's very Christian and says that God will find a way. More likely I'll find a way, but I'm sure there's a little God in there somewhere!

Otherwise, my fellow students seem pretty cool. I think there are a couple other Americans in the mix of 100 or so, but most others are from Africa and Asia (Pakistan). In fact “Asian” here refers to Indian, Pakistani and Middle Easterners. What we call Asian, they call Oriental. I thought Oriental was a rug, but whatever.

Our apartment is still sweet but feeling very far away from everything. Good thing is today I was able to get a new buggy to replace my fabu jog stroller destroyed in transit by the airline. This will make hoofing around Bradford a bit easier, especially when those frigid "sleet storms" kick in. The recent winds have given a hint of what's to come and it's NOT pretty.

Wish I had time for a run to London but the cost and time to get there makes it less feasible than I was initially imagining. Guess those weekend runs will be fewer than expected. But already feeling the time pass, and if Aiden can get comfortable with someone I know I'll jump in with both feet and love it. And then we'll pack up next summer and head off again. Ugh.

Sept 27

Today is another day and I’ve decided it’s all going to work out. Not sure how, but it’s going to work out. Lubna will stay with Aiden tomorrow while I attend a library visit and a meeting with my advisor, and then the following day classes begin in earnest.

I’ll try to visit another nursery but the email I received was in very poor English so wondering how the spoken language will be. Then again, I’m looking for warmth and comfort for aiden. Right now that feels more important than anything. So what if they don’t speak English? Urdu may come in handy in a couple of years.

As the wee one sings from the bedroom (it’s 9:30 at night and he refuses to sleep) I’ll update the weekend. On Friday we had our first big night out. I strapped Aiden to my back and headed over to campus to celebrate 20 years of activism on the part of Chris Howsen, a local Reverend and our hands down best friend and resource since we arrived. The room was full of lovely people, and amazing stories. Chris is very involved with helping refugees and asylum seekers, and he doesn’t seem to have a moment of calm with all the people who seek him out. I feel a little guilty also seeking his time, but he and his wife are the only other parents I know of with small children and so we spend as much time at their pad as possible. Aiden is quite fond of his two girls.

We made it to a puppet festival on Saturday where the highlights for A included a giant paper mache musk ox, and a cup of reconstituted giant prawns with garlic. Ew. I’ve decided that Skipton is a wonderful little town and I’m so glad I’m now familiar with it. A was thrilled to see his old friend the little black duck. (long story)

Oh! How could I forget? we ran into our first full on gang fight type thing! A group of kids were coming back from a football game in Leeds and another group was waiting in Bradford. Usually there are police officers at every station following a game, I was later told. Unfortunately, there was no such security at bradford. So when the train stopped a flood of guys streamed out of the parking lot with bats and broken bottles and attacked the kids getting off the train. Aiden and I arrived just as the fury had abated and the yelling seemed ordinary enough that I just gingerly stepped around the confrontation. I even brushed aside the fact that pools of blood covered the floor of the train (“I recognize the look of that liquid,” I thought to myself. “Maybe that’s just common in Bradford trains…”) and tried to navigate Aiden’s stroller into a dry patch. When I finally focused and took in the drama around me I saw a victim holding his head and his friends calling for an ambulance. I think just a surface wound but quite a dramatic result. Police came, testimonies were taken, my train was more than a half hour late and on we went to our puppet festival. Welcome to Bradford.

New year, new life -- Off to England!

While it seems a bit odd to still have the title "Baghdad Project" for this blog, it also makes sense. Because it was Baghdad that changed my life forever. The place and experience redirected me to the life I am now living and the work I am doing. The suicide bombings on the streets of Baghdad made me realize that more than documenting war, I wanted to start working for peace. All of the adventures previously posted make up who I am and were i am going, and for that I am grateful-- and feel blessed.

My fellowship in Bangkok, Thailand, in 2006, introduced me to dozens of amazing individuals around the world doing the kind of work that I found inspiring and important: They worked to help child soldiers in Africa; provide support for Tamils in Sri Lanka; stop the sexual exploitation of women and children on the Burmese border; and help victims of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. I wanted to be part of that tribe. I then applied to become a Rotary International World Peace Fellow and am so fortunate to announce that I was chosen for this prestigious program. I will be attending university in England this year with my darling boy Aiden. Our adventure continues!!

Aiden is now over two years old (yes, it's been two years since I've posted! gulp). He is my greatest joy and inspiration, 

and I hope that he too will become an Ambassador for peace.

Please follow us here as we report on the logistical ups and down of moving overseas, (finding daycare and suitable kid-friendly sites, restaurants, housing etc) and the amazing experience of meeting Rotarians who are doing incredible work in the world, and supporting those of us who really do aspire to change the world for the better. Here we go!!! xo

My Biggest Adventure Yet!

So graduate school took a backseat to a more pressing, and ultimately much more difficult and rewarding, project: my son, AIDEN DANIEL POLLON, who was born on March 22, 2007. I'll try to keep my blog from becoming an all baby all the time outlet, but no promises. At least not in the beginning.


Z at 8.5 months pregnant


Aiden at three days. My little zen baby.


At one week flashing his big blues.


At 2.5 weeks. Uh oh, might have grandma's ears...

Thailand photos in no particular order

Well, I'm not sure why my photos are so terribly out of order but perhaps it reflects the way I feel at the end of the Rotary Peace and Conflict Studies Program: like it was a three month blur that I'm just now trying to sort out. Below are some of my sweet memories from a wonderful three months with great new friends. I'll post more soon, including some of our numerous Rotary functions and class activities.


A little elephant love for mattias in Chiang Mai


My Kohsamet beach friends, the soi dogs


My favorite spot in Thailnd: Kohsamet


near the end of our program we decided we needed more more out of class time together. This was one of several "block parties" held in alternating rooms.

One of my favorite field trips was our journey to the Burma Thai border to look at a gas pipeline. The sign in the background marks the dividing line.


"Miss Universe" and the future president of Liberia at a very fun evening Rotary function.


Our last field trip was to the south. This mermaid is the symbol at Songklah.


Deft and Kim, from Thailand and Korea respectively, hamming up over the river Kwai.
















The Colonel tries out a little spontaneous aerobics in Lumpini park.















During one of our trips we stopped at this Khmer temple, similar, though much smaller, than Angkor wat in Cambodia















This was the fine bus we traveled in for hours on end for our first trip to visit dams all over the northeast. Good colors, no?















I was so thrilled to finally discover the presence of oxygen in Bangkok! we were so happy, we went on a boat tour of the lake.














Well, it didn't take long for me to tire of Thai food, so you can imagine my joy when I discovered a Mexican Buffet held every Tuesday night. This night I even found a few converts!



















One of our group outings in Bangkok was to the Grand Palace.














Because world Cup soccer played such a big part of my early days in Thailand, I had to include this one shot of the World Cup final at an outdoor space near the trade tower. I walked home at 4 a.m. as the revelers were getting wild!














But most of our time was spent in this room listening to lecturers from around the world. The great info made up for the bleak decoration scheme! :)

By the end of our time, even I had become a convert to the school canteen where we could get a great stir fry for only 15 baht (about $ .50)

Nothing like a good coup!

I guess it takes a political coup to get me excited enough to write these days. I’ve been in Thailand almost three months now, watching this “calm, peaceful democracy” at work and wondering at what moment the hairline crack will open, sending the country into chaos. It is peaceful here – and calm, held together by a king who is revered to the point of piety. As we celebrate his 60th year on the throne, the streets of Thailand swarm with Thais clad in yellow T-shirts, yellow apparently being the king’s favorite color. Mondays - the day he was born - are an especially golden day. Twice a day everything stops to sing the king’s anthem; every movie begins with the same standing song. But the king is getting older and – God grant him good health forever – no one knows who might follow. His son is not as popular as his father and despite a change in law to allow his daughter – a very popular and smart MIT-educated woman – the possibility of ruling, people say the son will be the likely heir.

At the same time the country since 2001 has been led by a prime minister whose conflicts of interest are extraordinary; they make Dick Cheney’s Halliburton connections look almost ethical! Thais accuse him of using the country to amass extreme wealth, which some say was first multiplied during the market crash in 1998. Conspiracy theorists suggest he knew of it beforehand, tipped off by the Finance Minister who – surprise – remains in a plush government position. This is speculation, of course, but what we do know is that he sold his massive telecommunications company to Singapore to avoid taxes – that is, after changing the laws to allow foreign companies to own Thai telecommunications businesses.

Dr Amara, the head of this Rotary program and the previous dean of the Political Science Department at Chulalongkorn University, was one of the first to publicly speak out against the Prime Minister, calling his actions unethical and bad for Thailand; she and a collection of academics called for him to step down. That was the beginning of the ground swell against him that led to a discussion of new elections to be held this October or November. It culminated Sept 19 in a political coup led by the combined military and police forces of the country, and with the blessing of the king. PM Thaksin, or Toxin, as one pronouciation-challenged Indian participant always calls him (truth be told, it’s catching on!), was in New York at the United Nations General Assembly at the time, one stop on his whirlwind PR tour, despite his own call for no campaigning before the October elections.

The news flashed on BBC around 9pm, just as Kofi Annan was preparing to address the General Assembly. Tanks were gathering in front of government offices in Bangkok, the headlines read. Thaksin, who got wind of something happening back home, fired his head of army and immediately declared a state of emergency. Dr Amara got a call that members of the armed forces had earlier entered an extraordinary session with the king. By 10pm it was official: a military coup was underway. Thaksin said he would return from the US early, but if he does he risks being arrested for corruption upon arrival. His bank assets – hundreds of millions of Baht and only a fraction of what he really owns – would be seized.

At this point, all I wanted was a one-way ticket back to Bangkok. Imagine, I’m just an hour away from a real live military coup. Who knew a girl could get so lucky? By 10:30pm the Thai “democratic” government cut off satellite TV – i.e. BBC – and on all channels ran continuous coverage of the king and his good deeds with a backdrop of every patriotic song in the book. Finally, one statement was issued declaring that a “political reformation” was underway, supported by all arms of the military and police, but not signed. At the time no one knew it if was led by anti or pro Thaksin supporters. By 11:30pm the statement appeared with a signature by an anti Thaksin official, but still no one knew who would lead the country. By 9:30a.m. the next morning there was an official appearance by the military and police leaders of the coup, led by Thaksin’s head of the army. But still no word on who would lead the country. We waited until late that night to hear which interim leader would be put in place until elections could be held. Still no word.

The next morning we were asked to cancel all travels and stay inside the hotel; we weren’t in Bangkok, but in the notorious “deep south” conflict zone and no one knew what the coup would inspire. With the country now under Marshall Law, no more than five people were allowed to gather in one place at a time. So we invited two speakers into the hotel and crammed into our professor’s room. During a session on helping trauma victims of southern conflict we got word that Thaksin might try to enter the country through Laos in the north where his strongest support base had always been. It appeared the coup would not go over without some resistance. But Thaksin underestimated the support the coup had among Thai people.

By evening the army leader, one of the few Muslims in a high government position, announced that a new leader would be appointed within two weeks, and that leader would rule until October 2007 when the next elections could be held.
Otherwise, the coup was already shunted to the back pages. It was bloodless and had hardly a resister. In fact, regular Thai citizens were seen giving soldiers flowers as they passed the guarded buildings. Go Go dancers pulled up a truck and performed for the soldiers; parents snapped photos of their children on the tanks. For someone studying conflict this was a very odd coup. But as numerous people would tell me: “This isn’t the way we would have wanted it, but it’s the only way it could have happened.”

And maybe they’re right. It’s a peaceful government transition claimed through a military coup. How do you define that one? It’s not as if this is new to Thai politics. Though it’s the first coup in fifteen years, the country has gone through more than a dozen military coups – some not quite as peaceful as this – and had numerous different constitutions. Not amendments, entirely new constitutions! People worried about the continued presence of the army but within two weeks, as promised, a new leader was chosen and the tanks were put back in storage. The man chosen is a retired military General but I suppose it’s the closest thing to a civilian they could find. And the most important thing is that he’s respected by the king and by the Thai people. Can’t ask for much more than that I suppose. But no one will say that Thaksin is out for good. He’s too smart and too resilient; most Thais I spoke to were certain he’d be back in the future. Stay tuned…

(P.s. I will start to work backwards and detail what's new, and as always, a lot is new!)

Grad School, Fellowships and Debt, Oh My!

Change is always afoot and this summer is no exception. The big news is that I’ve decided to join the debtor nation and I’m going to grad school. After looking at several International Relations programs around the country I decided on Johns Hopkins SAIS, and will be starting on their Bologna, Italy campus in late September. My second year will be in Washington, D.C. SAIS was kind enough to let me start a month late so I could finish a Fellowship program in Bangkok (Guess the exorbitant tuition cost is all that matters!). So that’s the other big news: I received an international Rotary Fellowship to study Peace and Conflict Studies in Bangkok, Thailand. The three-month intensive course is for mid and upper level professionals who work with conflict in one way or another. I am currently the only American to be chosen for the program and because I’m a dual citizen I’m apparently also representing France! I find that very funny… and also disconcerting. While I may be the only American this time around, this has to change. Now more than ever it is important for the rest of the world to see that there are Americans who are dedicated and in fact devoted to finding peaceful resolutions to world conflicts. Research this fellowship, apply or find other worthy applicants, and follow this blog site. I hope to be updating it on a consistent basis.

For better or worse, the Rotary website has posted the mugshots of the 17 participants. http://www.rotary.org/foundation/educational/rpcsp/index.html. It’s a pretty grim looking lineup photographically (except for Patel. Good going!) but I’ll be sure to add a more human touch soon. Perhaps the karaoke night shots, the field trips, the heated classroom discussions... I’m looking forward to it all.

I’m also looking forward to my pre fellowship adventures: En route to Thailand I’ll be stopping in Beirut, Lebanon for five days where I’ll catch up with Nadeem and the boy band!! and then a day in Dubai with my friend Chris, a diplomat I met in Baghdad. Chris will be heading back to grad school as well -- coincidentally, to SAIS. Great minds, etc. etc. But he’ll be in DC.
So you see, the world really isn’t so big afterall.

A brief aside: Given the above described projects, as well as a small family matter, I was forced me to cancel my trip to Nigeria, which would have been my second venture into training African journalists. The “Great Black One” or GBO, and I (the “Great White One” or GWO) will certainly reunite at a later date for there is much work to be done in the creation of true democracies.

Training Journalists in Africa

I almost jumped. I know it’s a desperate move but I didn’t see many ways out. Journalism was killing me, or perhaps I should say, the lack of journalism I was seeing, feeling and writing was depressing me to no end. I felt that no one wanted to read real stories, and when they did – only when they had no other choice -- they simply didn’t care. They didn’t care about Iraq or war, or corruption or the destruction of this country’s natural resources or the dissolution of its hard won freedoms. I couldn’t take it and I saw no other way. I applied to grad school. Heck, I even applied to a business school. I considered a day job.
But then something completely unexpected happened. I was asked to go to Cameroon to help a Nigerian colleague train other journalists in that country. At first I didn’t believe him. Why would he ask me and what would I have to say to other journalists in a country I knew very little about? In fact Africa is one of my last frontiers. I’ve always been a bit intimidated by the huge expanse, the level of violence in various areas (despite the snarking, I don’t have a death wish) and, to be quite honest, the specter of AIDS. I’ve traveled alone most anywhere but in Africa, suddenly the possibility of an assault could be considered deadly.
My colleague Ndaeyo, who I first met at the Neiman Conference on Narrative Journalism at Harvard when I crashed one of their elitist speaker dinners, insisted that anything we had to share would be welcome. “It’s the most important work I’ve ever done in my life,” he told me of his newly formed organization the International Centre For The Advancement of Journalism, ICAJ. “You must come see for yourself.” We had bonded a bit at the Harvard conference. I felt his newly formed organization to train African journalists was an amazing idea and I was sure it would be funded. More importantly, I told him how distraught I had been and continued to be in Iraq, where efforts (whether real or perceived) to create democracy were laughable in the best of moments and in the worst were terribly, tragically dangerous and off base. Training journalists as a means of promoting democracy, free speech and community, was something I could finally get behind. I told him I would do whatever I could to support his efforts.
And so our conversation continued and within a matter of months he asked if I would join him on one of his trainings, this time in Cameroon where we would be joined by a third trainer from the Cameroonian town of Boue. Far be it from me to turn down a chance for adventure, so by the end of the month I had a ticket in my hand, and malaria pills burning a hole through my wallet. I was heading to Africa.

Ndaeyo was right: the training was amazing. Hand chosen groups of journalists from around the country, and representing all forms of media, sat before us for the day-long sessions that we led mostly though personal anecdote.
Ndaeyo was energetic and engaged, talking of his history covering Nigerian politics and dealing with government pressures. I started slowly, still unsure what a white woman from America could possibly offer this group of people. The answer came quickly. They were eager to learn anything and everything we had to offer. They wanted to know how to conduct an interview, how to write a lede, how to cultivate sources and how to identify a story. We talked about the basis for our devotion, which was a responsibility to truth, to representing those who had no voice, and to warning and educating communities of what actions would impact them. I repeated the mantra as if it was news to me, and in a sense it was. I had forgotten what I loved about journalism. I had forgotten its importance and its power in shaping and informing society.
Our most frequent discussions were around the issue of gombo, or bribes. Gombo is intrinsic in Cameroonian culture, and particularly where it comes to journalism. In fact journalism listed just after government, military and police as best occupation to receive money through bribes. People weren’t going into journalism because they believed in the intrinsic value of reporting but as a way to make illegal money! We have our own form of bribes in the United States, I assured the gathered journalists, but they often take the form of access. Write a story the government/military/corporate interest doesn’t like and you won’t be invited to the next press conference or have your call returned. Same same but different, as we say in these parts.
Regardless the nature of the bribe, its destructive nature is the same. Taking a bribe makes your work illegitimate, makes it impossible to include both sides, and if you later decide to write against the hand that has fed you “you will die,” Ndaeyo said menacingly. ‘They will kill you.”
“At the very least, if you’re going to take a bribe, make it a very big one and then leave and go retire in a beautiful place,” he joked, lightening the moment. But the message was clear. After the session several young men came to Ndaeyo in a kind of confessional, professing their guilt for taking bribes but unsure how to escape the temptation given the low wages of the profession.

The problem of economics is so much bigger than he or me. How could we tell anyone not to take money when they aren’t able to feed their families, or even themselves? This wasn’t about morally vacant individuals; it was about finding a means of survival. There was no clean answer. But the first step was telling people that there was another way to conduct business and to be successful. Journalism could be a tool, if used correctly, to help one rise above.

Another popular, though tense, subject was about homosexuality. A local newspaper had recently published a “Top 50” list of suspected homosexuals, many of whom it turned out were high government officials. But neither the list nor the adjoining article gave any evidence as to why these people were listed, only that the journalist had “sources” proving their “guilt.”
“What’s wrong with this story?” we asked to a room full of blank stares. Apparently nothing was wrong.
“Is it right to accuse people of something illegal, regardless of the crime (it just so happens homosexuality is illegal in Cameroon) without giving any evidence, or without having the accused have his or her say?” More blank stares.
One man reiterated the fact that the journalist had “evidence”.
“What evidence? Where is it? Is it corroborated? Why isn’t it in the article?”
For lack of a better response he said – and this will forever mark me – “Homosexuality is such an evil in our society, I think it is for the better good to have the names out there. Some of these people we knew are homosexual, and even if they aren’t, even if there is no evidence, they are probably guilty of other things, like corruption.”
Now I was the one with the blank stare.

What could we do but remind these people of some of history’s darker moments. From my own culture I could remind them of burning witches, blacklisting communists, or even turning in “terrorists” because they don’t agree with the current government. Adolf Hitler thought Jews were a scourge to society, and Saddam Hussein killed thousands of Shiites for the most minor of offenses, like smiling at the wrong time. Given these extremes, is it such a big burden to allow the accused to have a say? we asked them.

Perhaps it was the disturbing nature of the homosexual attack but by the time the subject turned back to gombo, and during our last day of training, I was not very compassionate or patient.

In a burst of frustration I implored those gathered before me to do whatever they wanted regarding bribes, “but if you take money, then don’t call yourselves journalists.” My voice was weak with emotion. “You have so much power to create democracy, to start wars or move societies. Do it responsibly. Make journalism sacred. Make it a church that you honor. Because there are people who have died trying to write about the truth. Please don’t dishonor them.”

I immediately realized this speech wasn’t for them. It was for me. It was for me to remember the values and promise of a profession that I truly believed could change the world. Those values have been lost in a swirl of advertising, killed stories and lack of public reaction. Though they are true and real.

Participants said they came away from our workshop inspired and enthusiastic. They had come to learn but left with so much more. One woman wrote in her evaluation, “Now I know you don’t have to take bribes. You make me want to be a better journalist and a better person.”

I would agree, the workshop also made me want to be a better journalist and a better person. I felt renewed and inspired to work harder and to improve my skills. Most of all I felt moved not to give up, that I could walk away from the edge and remember, once again, the power of journalism.


Photos to come
Here’s one article about our trip, though wish he had been there for day two, once I had warmed up a bit!
http://allafrica.com/stories/200602160419.html

And here’s an interview with my rockstar colleague Ndaeyo Uko
http://www.postnewsline.com/2005/10/like_beer_a_goo.html