People We Meet

The other night I went out to meet a friend of a friend. The meeting took place at Logali, which, as you may remember, is the hang out for most expats. In his email, the friend of a friend said he would be at Logali at 6:30, but would be skyping “in poor French” with some one in Chad. I could “hover” if I wanted to until he was done.  I chose to stand at the bar with a G&T. They were out of Gordons, did I mind Bombay Sapphire, asked the barman. I said I did not. 

The first part of our conversation was all work-related, mostly his work and my appalling contract with UNESCO. As someone who works within the UN system, he was horrified at the contract I was given. I shrugged it off with a G and T and then a couple of his female friends showed up, so we joined them. We sat outside on a patio, our backs sticking to plastic chairs,  the few ceiling fans failing to cut a breeze through the still air. 

The conversation turned to the other people at Logali. Who was the woman with the long blond dreadlocks? Oh, a VSO volunteer. How did that Lebanese guy with weight-lifter biceps stay in such shape? And oh, here come the refugee camp workers on R&R. Specifically a couple of women who were making a beeline for the Lebanese biceps. There is a big Lebanese crowd here, most of whom are engaged in property: management, construction, sale/rental, and are loosely referred to as the “mafia”.  Not surprisingly, they have the best parties, the best houses with pools and excellent kitchen staff, nabbed from the few decent restaurants here.

I ask one of the women if she knows my landlord, Abbas, also Lebanese. She says yes, but adds that she doesn’t like him. Not surprisingly, really, as Abbas has no love of aesthetics. His sole ambition, he proudly tells me, is to make $5 million. I am supposed to be impressed by this, and also by his incorrigible efforts to convince me to date him, ‘You just need to get to know me better’, he says. I know you well enough, I reply.

Back at the bar, I am enlightened to the different types of relationships that emerge in situations of conflict/disaster. There are, I am told, three main types. There is “emergency sex”; brief, fleeting, adrenaline fuelled and the subject of a book by the same name; there is the “disaster couple”, a slightly more enduring relationship, but which tends to be location specific - refugee camps mainly; and the “contract relationship”, which exists only for the duration of one of the partner’s contracts, most likely between three months to one year. 

At the table next to us, a group of Africans are drinking Jamesons and coke. A bottle sits on the table, and they compete to top up each other's glasses. One turns to chat to one of the women at our table and we learn he is Somali. The guy I came out to meet, an American, turns to him and says, “Oh, I’ll be coming to work in your country.”  The Somali grins, and says, “Then I will kidnap you!” We all laugh, but it’s slightly awkward.

Regardless, with Janis Joplin’s Me and Bobby McGee competing with the loud chatter of a couple dozen expats getting steadily drunker, we fall into a conversation about who is worth what to the Somali pirates. Of the woman who works for the World Bank, he says: “We do not like the World Bank. We would kidnap you. But you are Italian, so your country wouldn’t pay, so we would kill you.”

What about journalists someone asks, are they ok? “Yes,” he says, “journalists are ok”. A whoop goes up round the table on my behalf. “But wait,” he says, almost with an un-pleasant taste in his mouth, “but not if they are the BBC or CNN”.  Boo, says our crowd. 

And then I tell his friend, who has joined us, that I don’t mind being kidnapped, as it would be a great story. He looks at me somewhat confused. “Sure, I  could tell your side of the story,” I say.

“We would let you come with us,” he says, oh so seriously, “on one condition: that you let our government see what you wrote before hand, and if there are any lies, we will kill you.”

I decline the kidnapping trip.