Mogadishu

When I took this job working with the Somalia program, I knew that I would spend a fair amount of time in Somaliland.  I also knew that there was the possibility that I would spend some time in Mogadishu.  For me that was kind of exciting.  It became an even more interesting prospect when I began to spend huge amounts of my time writing proposals for new funding for my organization in Mogadishu and managing a couple of small water and sanitation projects.  I was writing with apparent authority about a place I had never set foot, which has its obvious challenges.

One of the big projects we have in Mogadishu is a hospital.  We'd be working on this hospital with a Turkish NGO.  The Turkish have a major humanitarian presence in Mogadishu right now.  Depending on who you ask, it's Turkey's bid to become a major player on the global humanitarian scene, and so far they have been able to mobilize and gain acceptance much faster than "traditional" actors like my organization.  The downside is that they are not terribly interested in coordinating with the UN and other NGOs and that many of them lack experience in implementing complex humanitarian projects.  My organization got involved with the Turkish NGO because we thought that a pair of a traditional (us) and non-traditional (them) actors might mean the best of both worlds--good access, quick implementation, but also coordination, experience and monitoring and evaluation.  We're the first NGO to try to conduct a partnership like this, and a lot of people are watching.

The opening of the hospital was scheduled for mid-March.  It was scheduled to coincide with the first long-haul international flight in Mogadishu International in several decades, operated by none other than Turkish Airlines (apparently these flights are now fully booked through December).  When we landed at the airport on Tuesday morning, the jet had recently landed and was sitting in the tarmac with a red carpet rolled out to the terminal.  The plane was packed full of journalists and dignitaries, a number of whom were scheduled to come to the hospital for its opening, including the Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey.

The hospital opening had been scheduled for the next morning, but because of security issues was at the last minute changed to Tuesday afternoon, so the opening ended up being the first time I saw the hospital.

Behold, the hospital:

The opening was entirely in Turkish and Somali.  I was the only non-either one of those present.

I toured the hospital.  It was nice to see the reality of something I had just written more than 30 pages about.  I have a lot of pictures of the inside of the hospital, but I'll only share my favorite:  a neonatal incubator.  There's three in the hospital, and I'm fairly certain they are the only three operational ones in Somalia.  I have plans for these little machines.

Leaving the opening was an interesting scene (photos taken within about 15 seconds of each other between the gate and my armored SUV).

For obvious reasons, we had quite a lot of security in Mogadishu as well as limited movements.  Here's the armed escort that goes everywhere you go (as soon from the backseat of the car):

Here's my bullet proof vest:

Here's one of my bodyguards:

If you read news articles about Mogadishu, they all pretty much give the impression of a destroyed city, devoid of any meaningful activities of daily life (except for this one from the New York Times, courtesy of my mother).  In reality, it's a fairly vibrant city; life is very much going on, albeit in a physically destructed environment and with a fair amount of ongoing insecurity.

Now for the photo tour....here's the National Cathedral today:

This is what it used to look like:

Here's where the infamous Black Hawk helicopter went down (look carefully for the rotors):

Here's the K4 roundabout, a busy (and strategic) central roundabout, where things regularly go down.  It's name for being 4 kilometers from the city center.

Here's one of the many, many internally displaced person camps that dot Mogadishu, squeezed into empty spaces.  They're filled with people fleeing famine and conflict around Mogadishu and, depending where Al-Shabaab is at any point, there's flow in and out of the city.  Recently, the transitional federal government (TFG) began an offensive in what's known as the Afgooye Cooridor to the east of Mogadishu, sending a new wave of people into these informal camps in Mogadishu.  There's also informal shelters put up in little patches around the city.

This was Al-Shabaab's last stand in Mogadishu, a hotel (former hotel?)

Here's the beach, it's actually very beautiful.  Maybe in 20 years Mogadishu will be giving Mombasa a run for the tourist dollars.

This is the formerly posh beachside neighborhood, filled with the remains of villas once occupied by Italian expats and wealthy Somalis.

This is Villa Somalia, the Somalia parliament.  It, too, has seen better days.

Here's the Somalia Maritime and Fishery Institute.  It doesn't appear operational right now, but some of maybe the only good news coming out of Somalia right now is that all of the pirate activity along the coast has allowed previously depleted fish populations to revive.  There are now some attempts to get fishermen active again, but there's concern by some that giving these fishermen better boats will just lead to pirates with nicer boats.  There's still a lot of money in piracy.

Here's just some random pictures from around town:

Yeah and there were some meetings and other stuff.  And then we rolled out back to Nairobi (that's Mogadishu from the air).