Day 7 - 1/16/08

Ok so maybe I spoke too soon. Classes were going along just fine. During the breaks I’d go off and take care of some of the other stuff that needed doing to get started but today I hit a nice snag that kinda pissed me off.

After dropping off the papers for a bank and email account and telephone PIN yesterday, I found out that none of it was taken care of but that’s not so bad. I have time before I ship off to Darfur. They wanted me to travel Sun so that means 2 whole business days… The main problem was getting a VHF radio.

It turns out that the whole air travel process is completely dependant on having a call sign that must be recorded on an MOP (Movement of personnel) form. To do that, you have to be assigned one when you get a radio. On top of that neat little tidbit (never mind that this form has to be signed by a million ppl and then approved by security), they don’t even let you on the plane unless you are actually wearing your radio.

So I go to the office and they ask me where I’m stationed. When I tell them Nyala, they say I’m in the wrong place and that I need to go to the UNAMID Asset Management office on the other side of the compound. I’m used to running around by now so no biggie. When I get there, this “beauty queen” from some sub-Saharan African country (swear to God you could smell the need to slap her just oozing from her pores) tells me that they have no radios. They were going to import some from elsewhere and they’d be there by next week. Awesome. What am I supposed to do, you might ask? Well aside from a little CYA tactics (cover your ass) nothing but wait. Hahai.

Joke of the day: Another UNV guy from Afghanistan ran into the same problem… the joke? He’s a radio communications officer… double hahai.

I skipped out on the afternoon induction classes. Felt good to play hookie for a bit. Tried to sleep (it’s like 3am now) but my roomie who is otherwise very cool in most respects likes to sleep with his gandu music playing. Now I don’t mind a little while as long as the bastard turns it off. There is only so much gandu music a man can take.

I’m gonna love it when I have my own place again.

They said Nyala is actually supposed to be awesome. Aside from the highway bandits who like to rob you blind. They only shoot if you decide to say no to them. I am not planning on being a hero. Besides, who knows – maybe I can get in good with them and see one of those rebel criminal hearings that Joseph was telling me about (liaison officer for UNMIS who got sucked into human rights in Darfur – I suppose that’s one way to recruit some good guys).

I guess I’ll be in Khartoum a little longer… at least tomorrow is the last day for these classes.

***

I’m writing this on 1/22 but worth mentioning I met an extension to the Egyptian crew. Maj. Yousef Reda is a supply guy but really sweet. He calls himself Mr. Lonely. I cracked up the first time I heard his phone ring and the tone was some song with a squeaky voice singing “I’m so loooooooonelyyy…” Really nice family man though. I tried to teach him some English. He picked a lot up pretty quickly. I hope he meets some friends soon. He gave me some coffee as I left for Fasher. I’ll make sure to stay in touch as much as possible.