Read Online The Translator: A Tribesman's Memoir of Darfur by Daoud Hari - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Daoud Hari
Tags: General, Biography & Autobiography
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There was nothing she could do except watch her children die. She took her shawl and tied it to a high branch in order to end her life. We found her that same day, a few hours too late.
After these months, we began to see white trucks over on the Chad side of the wadi; the aid groups that respond to crises were beginning to arrive. We could see them in the distance over the hot desert—sometimes great lines of them. It was time to go talk to them. Things would be different with these people arriving. I felt good about this, but my friends didn’t know about these groups and had no sense of what they could do. These groups had saved my life in Egypt, so I felt warmly toward them.
My six friends and I had tea over a dinner fire. I told them we should go into Chad and see what these groups could do now. We could help them.
“You go ahead, Daoud, and help your friends in the groups; you speak English and so that is what you were meant to do,” the eldest of my friends said. In his kind authority I could hear Ahmed. Because of my schooling, my fate would always be a little different from my friends’.
Perhaps because we knew we were about to part, we tossed a little animal bone around in the moonlight, just as we had done as children but a little slower. In the game called Anashel, you have two teams of eight people each. We had three against four that night, but no one cared. Someone throws the bone far away into the sand. Everyone runs for it. If you are the one to find it, you try to run it back to the goal area without being caught and wrestleddown, although you can throw it to your teammates. Children play this game at night, when there is at least a half-moon for light and some cool air and no chores left to do. The girls and boys play it together.
There is another game, called Whee, but we were getting too old to play it, so we stayed with Anashel. But so you will know: In Whee you have eight on a team, and try to get your team members across a goal line, as the other team tries to get across theirs. You do battle in the middle, of course. The challenge is that everyone must hold on to one of their feet, so they will be hopping on one leg. This is a very, very hard but very funny game, and it goes on for several hours; you have to be young and strong. The girls would often win because of the work they do carrying water and wood.
On this night, someone finally got the Anashel bone to the goal and that was it for us forever.
I have not described these men carefully because, if I do, they might be killed for what I am about to say, although some are probably dead now anyway. They decided to sell their camels for guns and defend their villages. It was not for me to argue with them.
On that last morning together, we shook hands warmly and embraced one another. While the sun had yet to rise in a very red sky, they rode east toward El Fasher on their camels, and I rode west.
9.
The Translator
I sold my camel in Tine for what would be about four hundred U.S. dollars and began to move around the refugee camps to help where I could. The fact that I spoke Zaghawa, Arabic, and English made me useful to the aid people who were streaming into Chad. Aid groups are usually called NGOs, which stands for nongovernmental organizations.
I soon had a good network of contacts in these groups and, as a translator, I helped to get refugees to the small amount of help that was at first available.
As far as the Chad government was concerned, the refugees were welcome to come across the border, but they were to remain in the refugee camps, and they were not to work at jobs—even for free as I was doing—since this might take work opportunities away from Chad citizens. This was fair, but it meant I could not be of much help unless I said I was from Chad. So I did this, because it was morally necessary.
As more NGOs came in, and as the camps rapidly expanded, the officials in charge became less willing to look the other way regarding
After these months, we began to see white trucks over on the Chad side of the wadi; the aid groups that respond to crises were beginning to arrive. We could see them in the distance over the hot desert—sometimes great lines of them. It was time to go talk to them. Things would be different with these people arriving. I felt good about this, but my friends didn’t know about these groups and had no sense of what they could do. These groups had saved my life in Egypt, so I felt warmly toward them.
My six friends and I had tea over a dinner fire. I told them we should go into Chad and see what these groups could do now. We could help them.
“You go ahead, Daoud, and help your friends in the groups; you speak English and so that is what you were meant to do,” the eldest of my friends said. In his kind authority I could hear Ahmed. Because of my schooling, my fate would always be a little different from my friends’.
Perhaps because we knew we were about to part, we tossed a little animal bone around in the moonlight, just as we had done as children but a little slower. In the game called Anashel, you have two teams of eight people each. We had three against four that night, but no one cared. Someone throws the bone far away into the sand. Everyone runs for it. If you are the one to find it, you try to run it back to the goal area without being caught and wrestleddown, although you can throw it to your teammates. Children play this game at night, when there is at least a half-moon for light and some cool air and no chores left to do. The girls and boys play it together.
There is another game, called Whee, but we were getting too old to play it, so we stayed with Anashel. But so you will know: In Whee you have eight on a team, and try to get your team members across a goal line, as the other team tries to get across theirs. You do battle in the middle, of course. The challenge is that everyone must hold on to one of their feet, so they will be hopping on one leg. This is a very, very hard but very funny game, and it goes on for several hours; you have to be young and strong. The girls would often win because of the work they do carrying water and wood.
On this night, someone finally got the Anashel bone to the goal and that was it for us forever.
I have not described these men carefully because, if I do, they might be killed for what I am about to say, although some are probably dead now anyway. They decided to sell their camels for guns and defend their villages. It was not for me to argue with them.
On that last morning together, we shook hands warmly and embraced one another. While the sun had yet to rise in a very red sky, they rode east toward El Fasher on their camels, and I rode west.
9.
The Translator
I sold my camel in Tine for what would be about four hundred U.S. dollars and began to move around the refugee camps to help where I could. The fact that I spoke Zaghawa, Arabic, and English made me useful to the aid people who were streaming into Chad. Aid groups are usually called NGOs, which stands for nongovernmental organizations.
I soon had a good network of contacts in these groups and, as a translator, I helped to get refugees to the small amount of help that was at first available.
As far as the Chad government was concerned, the refugees were welcome to come across the border, but they were to remain in the refugee camps, and they were not to work at jobs—even for free as I was doing—since this might take work opportunities away from Chad citizens. This was fair, but it meant I could not be of much help unless I said I was from Chad. So I did this, because it was morally necessary.
As more NGOs came in, and as the camps rapidly expanded, the officials in charge became less willing to look the other way regarding
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