What is the What

by Dave Eggers

  Everyone in Kansas was looking to protect their interests. The representative originally from the Nuba region of Sudan wanted to make sure Nuba was properly represented. Those from Bor wanted to make sure there were provisions for the needs of those from Bor. But all of this had to be thoroughly discussed before anything actually got done, and thus in Kansas, as at many of these meetings, very little got done. There was a Lost Girl present in Kansas, and she wanted to know what would be done for the female refugees of Sudan. Lost Boys! she said. Always Lost Boys! What about the Lost Girls? This went on for a while in Kansas, and happened frequently in these conferences. No one disagreed with her, but we all knew that her presence, and our need to factor in the needs of the eighty-nine Lost Girls into everything we touched upon, would greatly impede headway on many matters.

  Though the progress was halting in Kansas, I was able to spend time getting to know Bobby, and I came to be one of his advisors on the film and the national network. Eventually I helped as much as I could in the planning of the much larger conference, this one in Phoenix, which took place eighteen months later. This one was organized by Ann Wheat, a sponsor of Lost Boys in that city, and Bobby, who at that point I imagined was as baffled as we were by how deeply he had become involved in every aspect of the Sudanese diaspora. Phoenix was designed to be the largest gathering of Sudanese ever held in America. The city’s convention center would host at least a thousand Lost Boys and their relatives, and in some cases their spouses and children. The conference grew beyond all expectations, at one point holding 3,200 Sudanese in one enormous banquet hall.

  But it was so very hot in Phoenix that weekend. Complaints came from every attendee. This is worse than Kakuma! we laughed. At least in Kakuma there was wind! we said. It was more than 110 degrees in Phoenix, though we felt it only on those rare occasions when we left the convention center. The action, all of it, was held inside, the one giant box of a room, unadorned but for a simple stage and thousands of chairs. The goal was to assemble, to meet on a large scale, and to engineer some sort of congress of young Sudanese refugees here in the United States. We wanted to elect a leadership council, the members of which would keep the rest of our thousands organized and would be the international voice of the displaced youth of Sudan. The weekend would culminate with a visit by John Garang himself. For most of us, it was the first time we had seen him since we were ten, twelve years old, in Pinyudo.

  It was astonishing to see so many of the men of Kakuma there in Phoenix. And suits! Everyone was dressed for business. It was good to see the men, and the Lost Girls, too, who were represented in large numbers—probably three-fourths of the eighty-nine in America were in Phoenix that weekend, and each spoke louder than any three of their male counterparts. The Lost Girls are not to be trifled with, never to be underestimated. They are beautiful and fierce, their English invariably better than ours, their minds more agile and ready to pounce. In the U.S. at least, in that sort of context, they demand and get full respect from all.

  The order of events was logical and august. The mayor of Phoenix greeted us to start the day. John Prendergast, of the International Crisis Group, spoke about the world’s attitude toward Sudan, and what was likely to happen. We had seen Prendergast in Pinyudo in 1989, and at least a few of the men remembered him. Bobby and Ann spent much of their time trying to stay invisible, making clear that the convention, while facilitated by their efforts, was ours, in which we could fail or triumph.

  I am not sure which was the outcome. I believe the triumph was muted by our usual sort of controversy. There were nominations for a national council, and these nominees, about forty of them, were brought to the stage, and each gave a brief speech. Later in the day, these candidates were voted on by the attendees, and when the results became known, there was anger and even a brief melee. It turns out that the majority of those elected were from the Bahr al-Ghazal region, my region, and that those from Nuba felt underrepresented. The controversy was still raging through the evening’s barbecues and the entertainment provided by an array of Sudanese groups, and even through the second and last full day of the convention, when the doors were locked, guards were posted at regular intervals, and we were told to sit and stay seated.

  That was when John Garang entered. This was the man who more or less began the civil war that brought war to our homes, the war that brought about the deaths of our relatives, and set in motion our journey to Ethiopia and later to Kenya, which of course led to our resettlement here in the United States. And though there were many people in that room with mixed feelings about John Garang, the catalyst and driving force behind the civil war and prospective independence walked into the room amid much ecstatic cheering and many bodyguards, and stepped onto the stage.

  He looked absolutely thrilled to be there among us, and when he took the podium, it was obvious—perhaps I imagined this but I bet not—that he considered himself our most important influence, our spiritual teacher, and that he was beginning where he had left off, fifteen or so years earlier, when he last spoke to us at the Pinyudo camp for refugees.

  After the conference, as I tried to untangle all of the demands of and obligations to the various groups, and as I tried with Achor Achor and others to broker an acceptable compromise that would allow the national council to go forward, I worked closely with Bobby on options to salvage the conference. As we talked, we ventured into more personal subjects: how my life was in Atlanta, how school was progressing, what I was doing the upcoming summer. And because he had been so fair with all of us, and because I badly wanted to leave the city for any amount of time, I asked him if I could come to Los Angeles and spend a summer with him, working in whatever capacity he saw fit. I surprised myself by asking this. And he surprised me by saying yes. So I came to stay with him, in his comfortable home, living with him and Deb, his wife, and their family. There were four children, from seventeen years old to three-year-old Billi, and I like to think that I fit in very well and pulled my weight. I swam in their pool, attempted to learn the game of tennis, assisted in the cooking and grocery shopping, and watched the younger children when I was asked to. I learned the limits, too, of what I was allowed to do. I slept on the bottom bunk in James’s room, and one morning I woke up late—I always slept well at this house—and saw that I was alone. Everyone was at breakfast, so I made my bed and James’s, in the manner I had been taught by Gop Chol. When Deb later saw both beds made, she wanted to know why I had done this. I told her that James was my little brother, and that the room looked better with both beds made. She accepted this, but told me never to do it again. James is twelve, she said, and should make his own bed.

  The Newmyers’ generosity was, I believe, irrational, reckless even. It was difficult to understand. They welcomed me into every family activity, including a road trip, in a recreational vehicle, with their family and friends, from Los Angeles to the Grand Canyon. It was then that I acquired, from Bobby’s teenage son Teddy and his friends, the nickname V-Town, and it was then that I almost drove the RV off a cliff. Such was the faith that Bobby had in me. He did not ask me whether or not I had a driver’s license. I had not driven in his presence since I had arrived to stay with him. He did not ask me about my driving skills, nor did he ask me whether I felt comfortable commanding such a large machine. One day in Arizona, he simply handed me the keys, the family piled into the back, and I was left in charge. Bobby sat next to me, grinning, and I started the vehicle.

  When I mistook the accelerator for the brake, he laughed uproariously. When the road was straight and clear, there was not much difference in principle to my Toyota, but when there were turns to make, and cars to avoid, there was a good deal of difference indeed. I do not like to remember how close we were to the edge of the cliff when I finally righted the vehicle, but I can say that Bobby barely uttered a word. He simply kept his eyes on me and when I found my way back onto the road, he went back to sleep.

  I left Los Angeles that summer with plans to return for Thanksgiving,
and still spoke to Bobby frequently on the phone. He and Phil together were assisting me with my college applications, and there was much work to do. I have almost completed the credits necessary to receive my associate’s degree from Georgia Perimeter College, a junior college in Atlanta, and Bobby was helping with a transition to a four-year college. We talked almost daily about it; he sent me brochures constantly.

  But this past summer and fall was not so good after all; it seemed that much of what I had built and that which had been built around me fell apart. Phil and Stacey moved back to Florida, the move necessitated by his work. We still talk on the phone and we send letters over the internet, but I do miss their home, I miss the Tuesday dinners and the twins. The Lost Boys Foundation was disbanded in 2005. Mary could no longer handle the stress, and because there was so much speculation about her handling of the organization, donations had evaporated. Today the foundation administers no scholarships, connects no sponsors to refugees, and assists no Sudanese. Mary still helps a few Lost Boys with their college tuition, but she has moved on. She is currently on a cross-country bicycle trip; when she finishes that, she will leave Atlanta, too, to work as a ranger in the national parks.

  John Garang died in July of 2005, a year after brokering the peace agreement between the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (now the political arm of the SPLA) and the government of Sudan, and just three weeks after being named vice president of Sudan. He was traveling via helicopter from Uganda to Sudan when the machine fell in the jungle and all aboard were killed. Though there was initial speculation that this was some soft of assassination, no evidence has yet supported this, and it has been accepted by most Sudanese, here and around the world, that his death was accidental. We can be thankful only that the peace agreement was signed before his death. No other leader in southern Sudan had the power to broker it.

  Bobby died in the winter of 2005. He was forty-nine years old and his children were still the same ages they were when we shared our summer—seventeen, twelve, nine, three. He was in Toronto producing a film and was exercising in the hotel’s gym. I believe he was on the stationary bicycle when he felt a flutter, a stab of pain in his chest. He left the treadmill and sat down. When the pain subsided, he did not do what he might have done, which was to leave the gym and perhaps seek medical attention. Because he was who he was, he got back onto the treadmill and minutes later collapsed again. The heart attack was massive and he did not stand a chance.

  And after all this, I am still in Atlanta, and I am still on the floor of my own apartment, tied with telephone cord, still kicking the door.

  CHAPTER 14

  It should not have taken so long to cross the Nile. But there were hundreds, perhaps thousands, of us on the riverbank, there were only two boats, and it was too far to swim. At first, some boys tried to make it across, paddling like dogs, but they underestimated the river’s power. The current was fast and the river was deep. Three boys were taken downriver and were not seen again.

  The rest of us waited. Everyone waited. We had been on our journey to Ethiopia for perhaps six weeks and at the river, our group mixed with other travelers—adults, families, elderly men and women, babies. This was the first time I became aware that it was not only boys who were walking to Ethiopia. There were hundreds of adults and younger children on that riverbank, and we were told that there were thousands ahead of us and thousands behind.

  There was tall grass on the bank of the river, and in the grass so close to the water, insects thrived. We had no mosquito nets. We slept outdoors, and we built fires with kindling and bamboo. But that did not help us with the mosquitoes. At night, there was crying. The adults moaned, the children wailed. The mosquitoes feasted, a hundred eating from each person. There was no solution. There can be no doubt that dozens contracted malaria while we waited to cross the water. It took four days to get from our side to the other.

  Once we were across, there was a village, and in that village, we were welcomed. The inhabitants lived close to their sandy shore, and they cultivated maize. They shared their food with us and I thought I might faint from their generosity. We sat in our groups and the women of the village brought us well water and even stew, each bowl with one small piece of meat. Within minutes of finishing the food, boys were everywhere sleeping, so sated they could not stay awake.

  When I woke the orange sun had fallen toward the treeline and I heard a voice.

  —You!

  In front of me I saw nothing but boys, some of them bathing in the water. Behind me there was nothing but darkness and a path.

  —Achak!

  The voice was very familiar. I looked up. There was a shadow in a tree. It looked very much like a leopard, its silhouette all length and sinew.

  —Who is that? I asked.

  The shape jumped from the tree into the sand beside me. I flinched and was ready to run, but it was a boy.

  —It’s you, Achak!

  —It’s not you! I said, standing.

  It was him. After so many weeks, it was William K.

  We embraced and said nothing. My throat tightened, but I could not cry. I no longer knew how to cry. But I was so thankful. I felt it was God giving me this gift of William K after taking away Deng. I had not seen him since the murahaleen came to Marial Bai and it seemed impossible that I would find him here, along the Nile. We smiled at each other but were too excited to sit. We ran to the river and then walked along the sand, away from the other boys.

  —What about Moses? William K asked.—Did he come with you?

  It had not occurred to me that William K would not know the fate of Moses. I told him that Moses was dead, that he had been killed by the horseman. William K sat down quickly in the sand. I sat down with him.

  —You didn’t know? I asked.

  —No. I didn’t see him that day. They shot him?

  —I don’t know. They were about to get him. I looked away. We sat for some time, looking at the smooth rocks by the riverside. William K picked up a few stones and threw them into the brown water.

  —Your parents? he asked.

  —I don’t know. Yours?

  —They told me they’d see me back at home during the rainy season. I think they’re waiting to come back. So I just have to go back home once the rain comes.

  This sounded very wishful to me, but I did not comment. We sat for some time, quietly, and I felt like the trip to Ethiopia now would not be very difficult. Walking with my good friend William K would make it tolerable. I’m sure he felt the same way, for more than once he looked at me out of the corner of his eye, as if checking to make sure I was real. To make sure that all of this was real.

  It took us a surprising amount of time to remember to ask how we had arrived here at the river with the groups traveling east. I told him my story and then he told me his. Like me, he had run that first day, all through the night and the next day. He was lucky enough to come upon a bus taking people to Ad-Da’ein, where he had relatives. He knew that Ad-Da’ein was in the north, but all of the Dinka on the bus were sure that there they would be safe there, for Ad-Da’ein was a large town and had long had a mixed population of Dinka and Arabs, Christian and Muslim. Like the group of elders with whom I had walked at the beginning of my running, they felt that being in a government-controlled town would be most secure.

  —It was safe for a while, William K said.—My uncle and aunts lived there, and he worked as a bricklayer, working for the Rezeigat. It was a decent job and he was able to feed us all. We lived near many hundreds of Dinka, and we were able to do as we wanted. There were about seventeen thousand Dinka there, so we felt safe.

  —The Rezeigat, Arab herders, held the power in the town, but there were also people there from the Fur, the Zaghawa, Jur, Berti, and other tribes. It was a busy town, peaceful. Or that’s what my uncle said. Things changed not long after I got there. Bad feelings developed. Militiamen were in the town more and more, and they brought bad feelings toward the Dinka. The Muslims in the town began to act
differently toward the non-Muslims. There was a Christian church in the town, which had been built a long time ago, with the help of a Rezeigat sheikh. This church now became a problem for the Muslims. The people were angry at the Dinka and the Christians because of the SPLA. Every time they heard about the SPLA winning some battle, they got angrier. In the spring, the Rezeigat came to the church and they burned it down. There were many people inside worshiping, but they burned it anyway. Two people were burned inside. Then the Rezeigat went to where the Dinka homes were, and they burned many of those, too. Three more people died there.

  —We were scared. The Dinka knew this was not a good place for them anymore.

  My uncle brought us to the police station one morning, where many hundreds of Dinka had gone for safety. The police helped us, and told us to gather in Hillat Sikka Hadid, an area near the railway station. We stayed there all night, all of us huddled together. Everyone among us decided that in the morning we would begin to walk back to southern Sudan, where we could be protected by the SPLA.

  —In the morning, government officials, with the police, moved all of us to the railway station. They told us that we would be safest there, and they would transport us away from the town on the train. We would be carried away from the town and would be safe to go back to southern Sudan or wherever we wished to go.