Update Gabon to Congo to DRC: Part Six. Dodging bandits, bullets, potholes and dust

There was a good reason why Mark had never intended to go to Brazzaville. As mentioned this is the only road between Congo's two big cities , and other than the section already finished by the Chinese, the rest of it is not a very good road – to put it mildly! – and not a safe road. I am aware that a few people in the group pooh-poohed this last warning. After all – we come from big western cities where, if you were to believe all the alarmists, it is unsafe to walk at night or venture out alone, and after all, we have survived these 'bad' places, haven't we? What can be so dangerous about a road through a country? We are a big group of young, strong people in a very big intimidating truck. Who can do what exactly to us?

Perhaps it is the fact that up to now we had really never had any occasion to be wary of our safety here in the heart of black Africa. People have been friendly and smiling and so what that two of our group had been mugged in Bamako and so what if one of our tents was burgled – while the occupant was sleeping inside, in Pointe Noire on the beach, and so what if some people wave their fists at us when we pass or shout angrily at “Les Blancs!” We're OK, aren't we?

Perhaps it is because most of the members of the group were never even aware before they came on this adventure that there were countries called Cameroun, or Gabon, or that there are in fact two distinctly separate countries with the word 'Congo' in their name – let alone being aware that these countries all have a violent history of civil unrest and war and bloody massacres of people simply because they spoke the wrong dialect.

And no one in this group apart from me is old enough to remember the late fifties and the early sixties when there were pictures on the front pages of daily newspapers of piles of bodies brutally murdered with machetes, of white people fleeing or being airlifted with only the clothes on their backs, of Indian traders literally chased into the ocean to drown, nuns raped, pregnant women having their beliies ripped open, of soldiers asking villagers who were supporters of the deposed president or of the opposition party or the wrong tribe whether they wanted 'short sleeves' or long sleeves' – meaning do you want us to chop your arms off at the wrist or at the elbow. Ah! But that is so long in the past, what has any of that to do with us? We are not involved in their politics. We are tourists and only passing through, they think...


But at closer inspection, they start realising that these kinds of things did not only happen a long time before their birth. They have been continuing for the past bloody 60 years, and as recent as two-three years ago, there were still civil wars going on in some of these countries we are driving through. They start noticing the machine gun chains of holes in the walls of buildings, the burnt out houses and shelled schools. They realise that the old man with no arms or the old woman with one eye might well be casualties of the war. They notice the many street children, the empty villages we drive through, the abandoned farmlands. They actually meet street children and youngsters who were orphaned in the war – like Djene and Chris who, as recent as 1997-1998 when the war was still raging in this country, both witnessed the brutal killing of their mothers and eventually made their own way from Brazzaville or Kin to come live on the beach in Pointe Noire – children who fend for themselves, live off the goodness of the people around them who accept them for what they are – street children, and who tell the stories of how they saw their mothers raped and murdered in front of their eyes. Some write this off as stories to attract attention. Others listen a little closer and start realising that this 15 year old has seen more horrors than we even knew existed in this world.

And then we reach Nzinzi – about two thirds of the way to Brazzaville, and for the very first time in the thousands of kilometres we have done, and the hundreds of police checks where we have stopped and handed in our manifesto and passports and waited to be allowed to continue, we accidentally do not see the police, nor do we hear the whistle, and a few minutes later we have a pick-up truck chase us down, an armed, very rough looking man in bare feet, torn T-shirt, rolled up denims, hanging from the side of the truck, brandishing an automatic weapon, flag us down and shouting at us to stop immediately - just as the driver of vehicle swerves in front of our truck and, in a cloud of dust, screeches to a halt, forcing us to stop.

My first thought was that this is a Ninja. Ninjas are the rebels that are remnants of the civil war who were disillusioned with their leader, former president Pascal Lissouba not winning the war and who stayed behind in the Pool Region – a vast area in the south of the DRC where the last civil war mainly was fought until the late nineties. They still have their uniforms, they still have all their arms and apparently enough ammunition to last another decade, and they make their living as bandits. They ambush vehicles on this stretch of road of about 200km, hold people up and take everything they have and if there are women on the vehicles they get raped as a matter of course.

When President Denis Sassou-Nguesso won the city of Brazzaville – with the help of the Angolan army – and formed his new government, he realised that he had to make a few wily moves in order to stay in power. He is from the north and Brazzaville is in the south and to hold on to your position of power in a city which is the stronghold of your enemy, calls for clever manoeuvres. He called in the leader of the Pool rebels, Pastor Ntumi, and offered him the position as cabinet minister of a minor portfolio in the government. Ntumi accepted and brought with him the majority of his rebels – who all were given jobs and homes in Brazzaville. But, a few hundred rebels refused to sell out and remained in Pool – and they today continue to terrorise anyone who passes through.

Although this gun-toting bozo who stopped us very closely resembled a gun-toting rebel, it turned out he was in fact a member of KIMIA – the peace keeping militia who are trying to ensure safe passage for all people who pass through the Pool Region. The fact that our bozo is now part of this worthy group of soldiers – which turned out the be the case when he went to have a shower and change into a proper neatly pressed uniform and polished boots, was probably a good indication that there really is never much difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter. Put him in the right uniform that instils confidence and everyone is comfortable and happy.

Apparently there had been a major attack on unaccompanied vehicles only four days before. A group of trucks came through very early in the morning and did not want to wait for the convoy to form, so set off on their own – and was duly attacked in an ambush.

We were not that stubborn and Mark very much carried his responsibility of the group and the truck squarely on his young shoulders, so, we turned back to Nzinzi and waited in the queue with about a dozen other trucks, big and small, vehicles of every denomination and persuasion, almost all of them laden to the hilt with goods and people, goats and cows, logs and oranges, all hoping to get to the other side of this region in one piece and unscathed.

Once there was a large number of vehicles and one armed guard in each vehicle, the military convoy, with us in their midst, set off. Our guard was a charming young man called Romarque who brought with him a plastic bag with four peeled oranges to share on the journey. It was also him that explained about the rebels and about KIMIA – of which he was justly very proud.

The fact that he was sitting with his chin resting on the end of the barrel of his Kalishnikov did not sit too well with anyone, but he got us safely to the next checkpoint and said his fond farewells

At this point it was getting late and, when Mark explained that we would not be able to do the distance before sunset and that we camp in the bush – which would probably not be a good idea in this region, it was agreed that we would spend the night at this check point – no more than a military camp and a school – and we slept sharing the starry skies with our guardians checking in on us at regular intervals. The next morning when we got back to the main road, there was already a dozen or so vehicles waiting – their passengers having a quick mug of coffee or a glass of Pastis, more people arriving with luggage and bundles and begging to be given a lift. Our new escort, Prince, introduced himself to us and once everyone was back in the convoy, we were again on our way to Brazzaville.

There was one more stop – where Prince got off – to the relief of Mark, as Prince apparently loved Mark's iPod music at full blast and used his loaded rifle to stomp the rhythm of the more lively songs on the floor of the truck. We stayed with the convoy for the next stretch to Kinkala but did so without a soldier accompanying us and arriving safely there, everyone knew that we were out of danger and the relief was palpable.

Perhaps one or two of the boys were slightly disappointed that we had not seen any action, I was exhausted from trying to work out how we would get Emy, Suzanne, Elisa and Tash in under the floor where we keep the barrels of flour and rice in case we did see rebels,

and Mark was hugely relieved that the truck had held up on the bad roads at the much faster speed we had been pressurised to keep up in the convoy. And the entire group shouted with joy when they were at last allowed a much much needed toilet stop!


Soon after Kinkala we hit a tarred road for the rest of the 77 kilometres into Brazzaville – and we flew! The wind was not quite enough to get the days and days worth of red dust out of our hair and pores and clothes, but it went a long way to lifting our spirits and the laughter and chatter in the truck after a tense few days was magic! Our first sight of the majestic – the magnificent Congo River was awesome and for once we all defied Mark's very strict warning that NO PHOTOGRAPHS are allowed anywhere, and we all sneaked our camera lenses over the edge of the truck and snapped away – the river was just too beautiful not to capture the moment on film!

We drove into Brazzaville still laughing and talking about the experiences of the past few days and amazed at this city which we were never supposed to see on this trip. I am not sure what I expected, but whatever it was, Brazzaville was something else altogether!

How to describe it?

Lots of modern high rise buildings like the uniquely spectacular Tour Nabemba towering over shelled and burnt out war casualties. Wide tree lined boulevards with litter strewn potholed alleys leading off them. French in feel, French in character, African in everything else. Masses of colour and noise and people and cars moving at speed. Busy-ness. Movement. People walking with purpose. Large groups of women all dressed the same in their church logo, singing and dancing and holding up the traffic. Men in suits. Women carrying baskets on their heads. Trains coming and going.

Blind people leading each other in long strings. War victims limping on crutches, rolling on wooden platforms, walking on their hands. Children leading old people. Beggars. Funeral wakes that go through the night and continue well into the next day – praises of the dead sung and drummed and preached. Drumming that never ceases for a moment. Jazz music that sounds Brazilian or Brazilian music that sounds African. Portuguese nuns called Soeur Benoite and Congolese nuns called Soeur Mireille. Cold showers and dark bathrooms where the mosquitoes are big enough to carry away small children. Book stores with good books! A chaotic port where the cranes drop pallets and the workers loot the spoils, where the one large ferry across the river to Kinshasa broke down a long time ago and no one bothers to fix this single link with its neighbour.