"This never happens"

So it’s kinda cool to show up somewhere new. It’s exciting and shiny and full of possibility. But it’s also pretty nerve-wracking considering you don’t know anyone, don’t know your way around and don’t know where you would go even if you know how to find it. It can make for an iffy start. Some people thrive in these situations – you know these people, the ones that will walk up to anyone and strike up a chat without thinking twice. I, however am not one of those people (at least, not until after about 4 gin and tonics), and therefore must cross my fingers and hope that someone takes me under their wing for a little while.

In my first couple of nights here, this was my new boss. Bless her.

On my first full day in town, still battling jet lag (1 day to adjust for every hour of time difference they say. Man, what a bugger) she took me out to show me around town. It took about 45 minutes. Including time to stop into a couple of shops.

Later that afternoon she took me to see a house that an international colleague was moving out of, that I could move in to if I wanted. After a few calls in the afternoon to the colleague went unanswered, we decided to just show up, but before leaving the office realized that she had never come to pick up the new keys. When we got to her door, no one answered. We circled the house. There was no sign of anyone. The house on the other side of the compound that she was supposed to move in to, remained empty. It was starting to get dark and we were starting to get worried. My first thought was that she had been taken. My boss was more worried that she was inside the house and something bad happened to her. So she got to work, calling around, sending someone to the hospital, the police station and the landlord so we could get keys. As it got darker, the suspense and adrenaline thickened and we would both later admit to the other that I was going to insist that she not enter the house alone and she was going to warn me that I might not want to go in with her.

We recorded the sequence of events as we could recall them, tracing back when she was last seen or heard from, and then called headquarters to get in touch with her emergency contact.

Then we waited some more, as reports came in that she wasn’t found at the hospital and that our driver was still on route with the landlord and the keys.

And then, headquarters called back, having spoken to this woman’s sister. She had left. Got on a plane and left. Was unhappy so she took off without telling everyone.

My boss and I climbed back into the car, grateful that nothing horrible had happened to this woman. “It’s not usually like this” she promised me, “This kinda stuff never happens. Now let’s go get some Chinese and calm down”. I promised that I would never leave the country without notifying someone here, and therefore kindly requested that if I went missing and there was suspicion that I was inside and hurt, they break the damn door down.

That was my second night in the country.

By about my seventh night, I was moved into my house and getting settled. I went out on to our porch before heading to bed to say goodnight to my housemate and her mother (who was visiting), when my first major earthquake hit. It took me a few seconds to realize what was going on, but the shaking lasted long enough that my brain finally processed what was happening and I started to envision our house, which is on stilts, sliding down the cliff that it so precariously notched into. I grabbed for the railing which further intensified my visions of my house acting as a toboggan taking me down into the valley below while (completely nonsensically) conjuring images of the tornado scene in Wizard of Oz.

Then it was over, and we went downstairs to hang out with the guards, listen to the radio and wait out any aftershocks. My iPhone was in my hand and I had it up on facebook within minutes of it happening, and then was connecting to the natural disaster reporting websites which have live feeds when earthquakes hit, at which point my Boss called. “We’re all ok” I offered in greeting. “That was a big one!” She said. “They’re not usually that big, I promise”. “Ya sure”, I laughed, “this is starting to sound a little familiar”. We hung out outside until the mosquitoes drove me crazy enough to want to be back inside. I felt the earth move every night in bed for a couple of weeks afterwards. Not in the good way.

Then, a couple of weeks after that, I was at the office late with a friend. I packed up so we could head out for dinner, and could hear honking at our front gate. The honking continued, obnoxiously, with the driver laying on the horn. By the time I got downstairs the guard was at the door talking to my friend, who explained that a male colleague had mistakenly brought our female colleagues phone home, so had come back to the office to return it. At some point, he had answered a call that was coming through and explained the situation. The man on the other end of the phone, freaked out, and was now at our gate honking abusively, refusing to leave until the woman came out. Only she wasn’t there. So I brazenly and boldly said I would take care of it, and marched towards the gate, while instructing the guard that he was not to leave my side.

The guy yelled stuff at me, mostly that I couldn’t understand. I yelled stuff back, mostly about how the phone was here but not the person.

“Come out from behind the gate” he yelled “I don’t have anything here to hurt you with”

Ha.

After awhile of this, whereby I basically just stared at the car because he was shit faced drunk and yelling mainly in pidgin from the passenger seat of this taxi, they left.

And I went inside to call the Boss to inform her of the incident.

“Sorry to bother you at night, but I’ve got another one of those ‘this never happens’ things that just happened that I need to tell you about” and proceeded to tell her the story, including our concern for our female colleague who has a drunken, irate husband (?) on the war path for her, and she has no idea.

“Ya,” I was told, “this kind of stuff happens all the time here. She’ll probably get the shit kicked out of her tonight”

“Oh”.

Welcome to Honiara. I’m glad to be working on a project trying to eliminate violence against women, since all the other stuff ‘doesn’t usually happen”.

P.S. Although it is upsetting to know that the international colleague who left was clearly in a bad enough state of mind to take off without notifying anyone, it has worked to my advantage. Now, understanding clearly just how fragile us international staff are, everyone has been exceedingly nice to me. Plus, I’ve somehow earned some bonus points simply for still being here, and get to occasionally high-five my boss over the fact that I’m still showing up. If I'm getting props for getting out of bed everyday, wait til they see me in action!