A Cruel Paradise: Journals Of An International Relief Worker

A Cruel Paradise JOURNALS OF AN INTERNATIONAL RELIEF WORKER This page intentionally left blank A Cruel Paradise JOURNALS OF AN INTERNATIONAL RELIEF WORKER Leanne Olson INSOMNIAC PRESS Copyright © 1999 by Leanne Olson. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher or, in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from CANCOPY (Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency), 1 Yonge St., Suite 1900, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5E 1E5. Edited by Mike O'Connor. Copy edited by Lisa Marshall and Kate Harding. Designed by Mike O'Connor. Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Olson, Leanne, 1963A cruel paradise: journals of an international relief worker ISBN 1-895837-82-0 1. Olson, Leanne, 1963' Diaries. I. Title. HV639.O47 1999 - Diaries. 2. War relief. 3. Nurses-Canada' 363.3'988'092 C99-931678-8 The publisher gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council and the Ontario Arts Council. Printed and bound in Canada Insomniac Press, 393 Shaw Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M6J 2X4 www.insomniacpress.com This book is for Rink, of course, who was with me through it all. And for my family and my friends from the field. You know who you are, and you know I could never have done it without you. Thank you. It's also for Darcy and Mac who gave me the idea to write this book in the first place. This page intentionally left blank Table of Contents Introduction 9 The Beginning 11 Background 15 Liberia 19 Bosnia 77 Liverpool 136 Burundi 138 Zaire 155 Canada 199 MERLIN 201 The Great Lakes, Again... 205 Angola 212 Back to Liberia 222 Albania 228 Liberia, Full Circle 235 Not Quite the End 247 Glossary of Terms 251 This page intentionally left blank INTRODUCTION It is the names I remember, even after this time. They roll off my tongue like pearls off a string; Gbalatuah, Gbarnga, Fenutoli, Sanniquellie, Ripac, Toposku, Doboj, Banja Luka, Bujumbura, Ngozi, Musema, Mweso, Birambizo, Mokoto. They are names I once knew well. The roads I travelled, the homes I lived in. Like cards from a deck, each one is different and each has its story to tell. The massacre in Mokoto, the incident in Birambizo where we were nearly killed, the checkpoint where we were stopped in Topusko, the afternoon in jail in Gbarnga. The first time I came back from a war zone I had so many stories to tell, so much to express. The experience was all so new. Later, after a few more wars and a couple more years, I stopped talking so much. I could still tell a great story, but I stopped trying to explain what it was really like. There were things I had such strong opinions about, issues I could discuss for hours, but only to someone who'd been there, and so few people had been there. So few people could truly relate to the work I'd done. I found out that my family and friends, for all their good intentions, shared little interest in what I had to say. They were unaware of the effects of early UN intervention in conflict areas, knew nothing about the unequal distribution of resources as a cause of famine, drew blank stares when I spoke of businesses and governments fuelling the war effort in Liberia, of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia, or of massacres in Zaire. They liked a good story, but only the CNN headlines — not the truth behind the headlines. To say that I was a bit naive when I first started working as an international relief worker would be