should not surprise anyone. Look at the gulf between black and white health in the United States! No one in the US likes even well-meaning foreigners trying to influence policy on such matters.’
Prim had a sense of concerns being very pleasantly allayed; of the lessons of resignation being taught.
He said, ‘I receive regular reports from village sheiks and policemen. What you have to say was not utterly unexpected. But I cannot myself authorise a survey of Darfur to determine the scale of distress. It’s a huge area with poor roads, and I lack adequate staff. And I cannot myself invite any international relief effort. That is a decision reserved to the president himself, His Excellency President Jaafar el Nimeiri.’
Prim wanted to keep the right aloofness. Everyone said it was easy to be charmed by the Sudanese bureaucracy, by people like Unsa. It was easy, under the influence of the big sky, to go along with what had been said to her and Stoner earlier, something about God knowing and taking whomsoever he wanted. Since God is a being of deserts, of the great one-eyed sky met in deserts, it was seductively easy to take the God-like view; easy – even for a disbeliever – to shuffle the papers and sigh, and wait on God’s will or something slower, a new direction from Khartoum. Prim was dressed in the pure white cotton that stood for Sudanese acceptance of the world as it is, and had to struggle against that tendency.
So she made a self-conscious attempt to summon conviction and zeal. ‘I would like to ask you this. If I or someone else tries to get the permission of the president to conduct a more thorough survey, could we safely say that we have the approval of the governor of Darfur?’ She felt the blood pounding in her throat. How could she make such a plea? A disconnected soul, ten months in the Sudan! ‘And … would you consider putting that provisional approval in writing. For me to take to Khartoum?’
With a handsome smile he asked, ‘That’s Mr Stoner’s idea, isn’t it?’ Then to her amazement he nodded and reached across his desk for a sheet of paper, writing in English a draft letter with an old-fashioned, chubby fountain pen. When he had finished, he read it to her.
Provincial Administrative Palace
El Fasher
Darfur Province
Republic of Sudan
22 April 1985
To whom it may concern
The bearer of this letter brings to the provincial capital intelligence of a supposed food emergency in the Nyala region. Her anecdotal evidence is based on the observations not only of herself but of another experienced aid officer, an officer of the European Economic Community, who calculated that the present emergency may affect as many as 300 000 people or even more. The report is such as to warrant inquiry by Government, and should His Excellency the President of the Republic authorise an assessment and the initiation of an international relief operation, he may depend upon the assistance of the Provincial Government.
He asked Prim whether that did it, and promised her it would be reliably transmuted into Arabic. When she was effusive with her thanks, he held up a hand, salmon-coloured on the palm. He called in a secretary, and chatted with Prim until the letter was copied in Arabic in the outer office. Between them, he and Prim polished off the pot of tea. And even grateful for his generous letter, and not wanting to bite the hand that signed it, she still wished to ask, Are you a slave-holder, you bastard?
She could not understand why the matter pressed on her. Even if she were an abolitionist, she was not even sure slavery existed. Did she want it to? Did its reality suit some fanatic need in her?
They celebrated her success at the palace with a meal of gonnonia , sheep’s stomach stewed with onions and tomatoes, eaten in the Berti’s dining room. Throughout she could not be utterly at ease. She watched Stoner with an excessive, spooky fear that he might try to drag their partnership
Prim had a sense of concerns being very pleasantly allayed; of the lessons of resignation being taught.
He said, ‘I receive regular reports from village sheiks and policemen. What you have to say was not utterly unexpected. But I cannot myself authorise a survey of Darfur to determine the scale of distress. It’s a huge area with poor roads, and I lack adequate staff. And I cannot myself invite any international relief effort. That is a decision reserved to the president himself, His Excellency President Jaafar el Nimeiri.’
Prim wanted to keep the right aloofness. Everyone said it was easy to be charmed by the Sudanese bureaucracy, by people like Unsa. It was easy, under the influence of the big sky, to go along with what had been said to her and Stoner earlier, something about God knowing and taking whomsoever he wanted. Since God is a being of deserts, of the great one-eyed sky met in deserts, it was seductively easy to take the God-like view; easy – even for a disbeliever – to shuffle the papers and sigh, and wait on God’s will or something slower, a new direction from Khartoum. Prim was dressed in the pure white cotton that stood for Sudanese acceptance of the world as it is, and had to struggle against that tendency.
So she made a self-conscious attempt to summon conviction and zeal. ‘I would like to ask you this. If I or someone else tries to get the permission of the president to conduct a more thorough survey, could we safely say that we have the approval of the governor of Darfur?’ She felt the blood pounding in her throat. How could she make such a plea? A disconnected soul, ten months in the Sudan! ‘And … would you consider putting that provisional approval in writing. For me to take to Khartoum?’
With a handsome smile he asked, ‘That’s Mr Stoner’s idea, isn’t it?’ Then to her amazement he nodded and reached across his desk for a sheet of paper, writing in English a draft letter with an old-fashioned, chubby fountain pen. When he had finished, he read it to her.
Provincial Administrative Palace
El Fasher
Darfur Province
Republic of Sudan
22 April 1985
To whom it may concern
The bearer of this letter brings to the provincial capital intelligence of a supposed food emergency in the Nyala region. Her anecdotal evidence is based on the observations not only of herself but of another experienced aid officer, an officer of the European Economic Community, who calculated that the present emergency may affect as many as 300 000 people or even more. The report is such as to warrant inquiry by Government, and should His Excellency the President of the Republic authorise an assessment and the initiation of an international relief operation, he may depend upon the assistance of the Provincial Government.
He asked Prim whether that did it, and promised her it would be reliably transmuted into Arabic. When she was effusive with her thanks, he held up a hand, salmon-coloured on the palm. He called in a secretary, and chatted with Prim until the letter was copied in Arabic in the outer office. Between them, he and Prim polished off the pot of tea. And even grateful for his generous letter, and not wanting to bite the hand that signed it, she still wished to ask, Are you a slave-holder, you bastard?
She could not understand why the matter pressed on her. Even if she were an abolitionist, she was not even sure slavery existed. Did she want it to? Did its reality suit some fanatic need in her?
They celebrated her success at the palace with a meal of gonnonia , sheep’s stomach stewed with onions and tomatoes, eaten in the Berti’s dining room. Throughout she could not be utterly at ease. She watched Stoner with an excessive, spooky fear that he might try to drag their partnership
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