Welcome to my blog! I am hoping to break the curse of keeping a travel diary by writing here on a semi-regular basis. Hopefully my ramblings won’t be too boring for you all!
So here I am Wau, trying to reflect on the last 5 weeks...which at times has felt like 5 months!
Leaving Melbourne was a mission, I wouldn’t really recommend heading off to a 3 day music festival the day before one heads off overseas – chaos (but completely worth it – thanks to the Meredith crew for putting up with my freaking out!!!!). But then after a whole lot of flying I was in South Sudan and I had absolutely no idea what to expect...other than a whole lotta dirt.
Southern Sudan by the numbers :
People : around 9 million...give or take.
Kilometres of road that are paved : 40 kms (and I think I have driven on all of it!)
Traffic Lights : 3 – all of them in Wau (usually only one working at a time.)
I am in Wau working for Unicef in Logistics. The primary work of Unicef in my region is in Child Protection, Nutrition and Water and Sanitation. This means that I am doing everything and anything, from running a warehouse, loading the trucks, identifying where to drop supplies in our states and organising vaccines for a mass measles campaign in the camps of the returnees from the North. In a usual week I am either in Wau or out in the field, which usually means a very bumpy drive for a couple of hours on some lovely dirt roads.
Living in Wau is pretty good. The compound that we live in has a cook and a cleaner so I don’t really have to do anything but work – which we do alot! I am generally working 6 days a week, so have to cram the weekend into Sundays. I arrived just before Christmas and spent it here in Wau with a group of people from a number of different UN agencies. It was all a bit of a culture shock as we had a goat slaughtered and then we had to butcher it – welcome to South Sudan! But it was a really good night that ended up with me making a friend in Johnny Walker – although I renounced the friendship the next day ;-)
Recently we have also had the voting for the referendum to split Sudan into two. No-one was really sure what to expect, but the 7 days of voting went off pretty well. The queues on the first day were immense, some of co-workers waited up to 8 hours to vote – can you imagine having to wait that long in Australia – there would be anarchy!
But it was a nice reminder that voting is a privilege as a number of people were voting freely for the first time in their lives – which is pretty amazing. No post voting sausage sizzle here though – maybe next time?!
So it has been a really exciting time to be here in Wau and I have been loving pretty much every minute. There have been a couple of “oh sh!t” moments, but no patented Peta Barns freakouts as yet – I would even go as far to say that I have developed some sort of Zen like calm....which I must have acquired on the plane as I was definitely not like this at home!
So now the Q&A section where questions that I have been asked will hopefully be answered...this blogs questions are strangely from one source...feel free to send through more!
Mrs K Barns of Perth asks – what do you eat?
We eat reasonably well, there is definitely a high proportion of rice and meat dishes, but it is broken up with the occasional goat or pig. There is even an Egyptian restaurant in Wau now – hurray for Schwarma!
Mrs K Barns of Perth asks – where are you living?
I am living in the Unicef guesthouse which is about a 10 minute drive from the Unicef office. There are 5 international staff and we are all living together in a big house. The compound is pretty secure, we have 24 hour security and a generator which kicks in when the town power goes off (which is often!).
Mrs K Barns of Perth asks – when do you get a holiday?
This week! We work six weeks and then have a week holiday – so i am making the most of not having a Christmas break by heading off to the beach in Mombassa, Kenya. I arrive on Australia Day so will be having a quiet beer or three to celebrate the occasion!
So that is it for the moment, below I have posted some photos of life here....thanks for reading this far – talk to you all soon!!!!
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Christmas Eve in Wau! Check out the Christmas tree in the background, well done to Serge for finding tinsel in Wau!!! |
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New Years Eve before the J.Walker ;-) |
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One of the Rubb Hall Warehouses I am managing...before the clean up! |
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How the Returnees are living when the first arrive back in the South, trees are hot property. |
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Chris Thomas this is for you - when you are ready to leave South Melbourne the hair salons of South Sudan await you!!! |
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Caroline this is for you - there are donkeys everywhere!!! |
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Me and the kids ;-) |