FINAL THOUGHTS ON SUDAN
12/26/2004 9:27AM (7:27PM Khartoum)
This is a tough topic for me, because as the minutes tick away, I am torn between getting my final thoughts down on "paper" and gathering my strength for the last few days in Addis Ababa. It's also tough because there's so much I wanted to write about that I've either forgotten about, or have lost the fire of inspiration. So you'll excuse me if this next part is a little disjointed:
- The Sudan has changed a lot and a good example, for me, is the proliferation of eateries and watering holes. While I've discussed restaurants and fast food joints, I didn't really get the chance to talk about cafes, which have also sprouted in Khartoum like weeds. Some of them are quite swanky, and it is easy to forget where you are. My newlywed cousin had been on and on about going to a place called Parliament Cafe, which is found (of course) on Parliament Street in downtown Khartoum . We never seemed to get there, and eventually I ended up going with his brother and sister, and another cousin of ours. Parliament Cafe is situated on the roof of a business center, and bordered by the tall walls of the surrounding buildings. The result is like being in the crater of a volcano. There is a framed rectangle of sky, and the night I was there, I could see the moon clearly.
The entrance to the cafe's small courtyard is done up in an ancient Egyptian style with bas relief figures along the northern wall. The floor is lined with smooth stones from the river, fanning out from the stairs to the doors of the cafe. The cafe is dimly-lit, moodily-lit even, with a dark wood interior and the sort of furniture one usually sees in Ikea showrooms. A large plasma screen television sits up next to the bar playing an Arabic music video channel. Scattered around the room were various couples talking to each other in soft tones, obviously considering themselves the creme de la creme of Sudanese society. The problem of course is that the Sudanese are terrible at service, and so we ended up waiting for a good half hour before a server got to our table. There is a long road ahead before Sudan becomes a tourist wonderland.
- Part of the colonial legacy of the Sudan is the existence of social clubs, typically based on nationality or religion. The Armenian Club, the Syrian Club, the Greek Club, the German Club, the Sudan Club (British nationals only, the presumptuous bastards), the American Club, the Nubian Club, the Coptic Club, and the Catholic Club. All of those had fairly extensive grounds and a variety of athletic and social facilities. We filthy locals were typically not allowed in without a "sponsor", sort of like trying to get a visa into another country but with a little less paperwork. Lately of course, things have changed. The original communities that had established these social clubs have long since dwindled away, and the rules have long since slackened, so I found myself at the Deutcher Sudan Verein (German Club) one night, drinking gin and tonics, and listening to a Soca music. It's strange to see alcohol in the Sudan (nominally a Muslim country), but you know me, I roll with the punches.
I went to the German Club with a friend of mine who kept referring to me as her "childhood friend", and a couple of her colleagues. I certainly didn't expect to see anyone there that I knew. I have a theory though, that I like to call the "small world" theory. In short, my theory is that the world is a really small place, and that depending on the type of person you are and the circles you travel in you are quite likely to run into people you know in the most unlikely places. And so I did. I ran into a guy I went to high school with, and another girl who I've known since childhood along with her husband. What kind of a small world do we live in where you can run into people you know in such disparate places?
- The Sudan is a great test bed for the "small world" theory, especially the less benign aspect of it. In the Sudan you are pretty much related to almost anyone. The familial links between people are not always obvious, but they're there and more intricate than one would imagine. For instance, I am related to members of the current government, and members of the opposition. More importantly, they are both related to each other even more closely than I am related to them. Considering how outspoken I am, you can see that this could pose a problem or two (or more). So I refrain from talking politics, and in the Sudan, religion - at least with my two uncles. That doesn't automatically stop trouble from popping up. In a recent visit, the uncle who was in the inner circle of the current government was holding forth on the differences between the Ethiopian and Sudanese national characters. He made a comment about how Ethiopians are technically proficient at everything they do: if they're barbers, they're great barbers; if they're mechanics, they are great mechanics; if they're diplomats, they excel at languages and the business of diplomacy. At that point I had to leave the room.
If there's one thing I know for sure it's that the Sudanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs was composed, for the most part, of dedicated professionals who excelled in their task - up until 1989 that is. In 1989 a coup installed this current government and they set about purging the foreign ministry (among other venerable Sudanese institutions) of career diplomats. They bullied, humiliated, coerced or directly removed the men and women who made the ministry so efficient, replacing them with party apparatchiks who used the ministry to travel around on the government dime, living it up and making things up as they went along. These are the people who are diplomats with no language skills, and even less diplomatic acumen.
For him to say what he said, in a room where he had to know there were people that knew better just staggered me. The nature of family ties in the Sudan prevented me from saying anything so I just got up and left the room to fume on my own. The man's arrogance and hypocrisy is hard to imagine outside of a caricature. I've been butting heads with him since high school and it hasn't gotten any easier. Being an adult means having to be diplomatic, though, and I am nothing if not a dutiful son.