Mercenary workers: China, like the West, was hungry for minerals, growth—instead of democracy, China offered construction. And the effect of those abject workers was clearly visible. Roads, stadiums, bridges—cement structures were creeping over Kinshasa, seeming to renew the city, to offer a way forward, as had, at various moments, the constructions of the Belgians, Mobutu and Kabila, and the ugly imitations of the nouveaux riches. Congo, still an outpost of progress, still with something to offer the powers seeking supremacy, had grown accustomed to such renewal by foreign structures (foreign, even when built by Africans); to this society, in fact, such renewal had become vital.
It was an attitude I had noticed at a party in Kinshasa. A wealthy Congolese journalist had invited me—the party was at his cousin’s house, a Belgian garden villa, on whose large balcony the people mingled. The scene, of young men and women, in Western clothes, drinking beer and martinis—it was without vitality. The youths seemed arrested. Merely to occupy that space, the clothes, the paraphernalia—this seemed the achievement. Inside the house, old, resilient, rain had seeped into the walls. The paint was coming off. The corridor smelled of fungus. The toilet did not flush; a barrel of water was provided, with a handleless rusted tin for a mug.
One could tell those youths were non-évolué: there was that lack of pride, that consumptive wrecking of the structure. It took my mind to photographs I had seen from just after Mobutu’s fall, of Congolese with their livestock squatting in his palaces. And I felt I now understood something of Annie’s fear—that her family, on coming to America, would turn her house into a “camp.”
The pillage—momentary, chaotic, exciting, growing horizontally by razing, leaving nothing material—was also ambience. So were the riots. It was part of the postmodernism, the Congolese excitement that needed to be appeased; and it could hold people in such heightened states. Ambience held together the street children’s existences. It was in the wigged prostitutes at the bars. And it was in the self-flagellation at the churches, where the Congolese listened with rapt attention to the scolding, sweating priests.
One was surrounded, in Kinshasa, by darker ambiences. One did not have to seek them; rather, one could hardly find escape. The ambience could seem an escape, a refuge; but it was itself something to be escaped from—and it seemed as though while the individual pillaged the material, the ambience pillaged him.
Marcel had recently leveled his yard. He wanted to build himself an office cabin. But he was never allowed to: as soon as he bought cement requests came in from the neighborhood—for a wall, a toilet, a broken roof, a sick child. The requests were deemed more urgent than his outhouse office. Marcel lent out his cement. I was at his house when some of the ragged men hauled out his sacks. Marcel was not paid. He did not expect to be: the implicit agreement was that when he needed help (that is, when he became poor like the ragged men) he could ask them to return the favor.
Clementine’s restaurant, next door to our house on Bozene, was frequented by half a dozen men who ate every day for free. She did nothing: the men were of our community, some even of our street. It was their small way of hurting her, she said, so that she did not become “too independent,” “too capable.”
And I had always wondered if Nana’s clothes business had been deliberately, even unconsciously, sabotaged by Frida. But surely Nana must have known that Frida would not repay.
It was the internal menace. Nana, Clementine and Marcel were docile in their misfortune; when I asked why he had given away his cement, Marcel said, “It is our custom.” Coutume: a powerful word. I got the impression that to succumb to custom was in a way to return to the simplicity, the safety of the old ideas: of man as weak, of survival in groups. Jose, perhaps because he was évolué, had the courage to try subversion. He had a little metal box, kept in the master bedroom, that I had seen him take out irregularly and call the “emergency fund” (I had only seen it near empty; still he indicated that I should tell no one). The fund was for Bébé Rhéma’s hospital visits. Even this had to be saved in secret. Marcel later said, in a more reflective mood: “Our customs are without pity.”
Those who built large escaped custom—and existed in isolation. The nouveaux riches who raised mansions on the hills were said to have “eaten alone,” and they spent colossal sums to protect themselves from the societies they had abandoned. It was the price of independence. And besides the historical ideas, for this reason—of becoming menaced by one’s own society, like the wretched on the street, who could die in their dwellings—it seemed also out of a fear of his own rise that the Congolese was pointlessly creative. He turned bottle caps into imaginative, anonymous art; he played endlessly with words, inventing vocabularies; he pillaged; he made sexual art. He squandered his talents on such emotions. His creative activities, stunted, were without deliverance—a sort of wallowing in one’s futility, one’s chaos. One expected only to survive. A common complaint in Kinshasa was that the men in the mansions, eating alone, were “not leaving enough crumbs”: this matter of crumbs was the pressing grievance.
And to arrive at this idea of Congolese smallness is to gain a sense of the overwhelming crisis, of society’s impotence—large ideas must live in smaller objects, acts, fantasies—and to see the urgency of the Chinese offer. The material world—the forest of things that the Congolese had inherited—decayed relentlessly. Society, internally ruinous, and reduced to ambience, was unable to build. The Chinese knew to build, and quickly; they had built before for Africans; their labor was cheap, their terms favorable. For thirty years the Americans, the West, had sustained Mobutu, but had built the people almost nothing. The Chinese, a last resort, seemed to offer to resolve the crisis—to renew the world, fulfill the fantasy. And already they were here; already they were at work—destroying Kinshasa’s Boulevard, expanding its lanes and cutting down the ancient, broad trees on the sidewalks. Gone was the shade; the vendors could no longer squat over their wares. The people could no longer walk. The people were quiet. Such massive change seemed beyond them: a new destruction was being wrought; and the people were further severed, lost, hiding in the small and ephemeral.
The roads were now empty of people.
I had rarely traveled in the ville at night, and I was not accustomed to the sensations. In one section of the road, perhaps recently repaired, the streetlights made a repetitive flashing in the bus, over my lap—the experience, so familiar in a way, here seemed alien. The ville was almost totally desolate.
The Boulevard approached. The taxibus had at one point been full, but now Serge and I were the last passengers. The driver said something; Serge responded. Quickly their discussion became heated.
The driver pulled over and told us to get off.
“You had an argument?” I said, disbelieving.
“He won’t take us any farther,” Serge said.
Apparently no taxibus was running the length of the Boulevard that night. Serge had not known this; and he had become agitated.
It happened too quickly—we got out, and the bus was gone.
The Boulevard, spread out before us, was smoky. And instinctively we moved behind the trees on the side of the street. The first half of the walk was quiet, and brisk—I felt we would reach the commission in time. Then two gunshots rang out from deep within the ville. Serge stopped and held out his arm to block my path. The shots had been single—probably not to kill. We walked along the canal, where it was darker. Someone came up on us so silently that we leaped to one side. It was a pedestrian, in a fur-trimmed coat, like the Congolese often wear at night. We had startled him. Serge watched the man leave, and then looked again. I too felt we were no longer alone. Small bonfires appeared on the side of the road, giving sudden warmth. “Kata-Kata,” Serge said. “We can still get a bus home.” But in the distance we could see the venue—an area of brightness.
“Maybe a kilometer more,” I said.
He agreed. “Inside we will be safe.”
But the guards would not admit him. I
hounded them, saying Serge was my cameraman. I pretended to lose my temper. They said no papers, no entry. But we knew that if Serge had been white it wouldn’t have mattered. Serge pulled me aside. He was rubbing his hands over his head, looking distraught, expecting me to produce a solution. We were silent for some time, on the edge of the road. I could not imagine him having to return that way. Serge said the sooner he left the better. We made a feeble handshake, our palms only sliding—I watched him trudge into the darkness; he looked nervous, and I felt I was to blame.
Armed soldiers, UN, leaned against the compound’s high walls. At the gate was a tank from whose hatch emerged a soldier who looked something like a centaur. Inside rows of cars were parked in the sand. The earth was washed-out, and even small stones cast shadows; the halogen lamps blinded when I looked up. Before me was the hall where the results would be declared. I was told the venue normally served as a school.
The hall was packed with journalists. Dignitaries trickled in, each outdoing the other in tardiness. We looked expectantly at the vacant microphone on the rostrum. The crowd made a low chatter. I had brought along a novel, but it was too hot to read. I began to sweat; my mouth went dry. It was like being in a minister’s waiting hall—I felt returned to another Congo, a place without urgency. We seemed forgotten. I slipped into an agitated half slumber, my hands on my pockets, over my phone, my bag tight between my legs.
It was four hours after the scheduled start when the commissioner was ushered onto the stage.
Old-fashioned cameras whirred on both his sides. Parked outside the hall was a TV van—small satellite dish atop—transmitting live across the country. I took a seat close to an exit.
The commissioner, beneath his dark suit, had worn his tunic; and it was this sheer, collarless shirt of an abbot that more than the suit gave him protection and authority. He cleared his throat; the crowd hushed. His raspy voice echoed on the high ceiling. There was applause when he congratulated the people on the achievement of democracy, and on rising to meet the historic challenge. He then drew a piece of paper from his pocket and slowly unfolded it. In near-perfect silence he called out each province’s name and, in the manner of the tedious radio broadcasts, the number of votes for each candidate; he stumbled while pronouncing the large figures. He kept us in suspense until the end. Kabila had won.
I stepped out of the hall and relayed the news to the editors in Dakar. I was again the AP’s reporter of choice in Kinshasa by this time—the correspondents had stayed for the day of elections and then, the excitement over, had left for other countries. A flurry of activity broke out as I finished up my call. The compound’s gates were flung open and, as a long burst of gunfire emanated from the street, the commissioner’s convoy—five, six, seven black cars, skidding over the dirt—swept away. The crowd, which had surged forward, following the commissioner, suddenly fell back; gunfire responded from elsewhere in the darkness. The UN centaur pulled his tank’s hatch over him. The gate slammed shut.
In the air a shrill humming noise grew progressively louder and ended with a thunderous crash a few feet from the compound: mortar bombs, launched high above us. A soldier yelled that no one should go indoors, so we stood with our bodies flat against the compound wall. Gunfire began to shell the wall’s other side, sounding in our ears like hail. Then there was a shout to look up. We saw the figure of a man clamber over the roof’s point and into a shadow.
The cry “Sniper!” created new panic. I ran with the others, half tripping, into the hall; the stage and rows of chairs were now empty. The bright lights made it impossible to see outside—one felt blind. And the crowd began an excited hubbub that was amplified by the hall’s echoes. A soldier came in and tried to calm the group; but the noise turned into a din. Some of us went outside. We sat not far from the hall entrance, on a stretch of pavement under the building’s eaves. It felt safer here. Before us were the compound’s high walls, which I noticed were topped with broken glass, in maroon, purple, green: the colors of beer and soft drink bottles. And running around the compound, over these shards of glass, was thick barbed wire, twisted in large circles. Other journalists joined us on the pavement, some on the phone, some lighting cigarettes. A few preferred to sit inside their cars.
More troops arrived, with fresh cries. I became fatigued. The tank by the entrance was joined by another. I filed nonstop, via telephone; the AP wanted every last detail. The shooting that night, one sensed, had been less a surprise than a deception. No one knew for certain, but it seemed that Bemba’s and Kabila’s troops were in combat; only the next day would we know that soldiers loyal to the two leaders—all officially in the national army—had overrun Kinshasa.
The violence had paused. A group of photographers made their way to the gate, armed with large cameras. I joined them, tempted to peep out of the compound. There was nothing to see: it was too dark. What streetlights had been working seemed to have been shot out in the battle.
I called Serge at 3:00 a.m. He was still awake. I did not know whether to believe him that the shooting had never reached Victoire. In any case it seemed unlikely that I would be able to make it to Bozene that night.
The soldiers were, at intervals, allowing cars to leave. I moved around the crowd, scanning faces. Richard Bentley was there, looking collected, surrounded by a group of journalist friends who would no doubt sleep at his hotel suite. I skirted them, passed some other groups that also avoided my glances, and came upon two stringers—American and British—who looked equally lost. They asked if I might be willing to share the cost of a room at one of the big hotels. One of them had a car.
The soldier waved his arm. His mouth opened and closed, but I did not hear; our car shot out of the compound and hurtled down the street. The engine beat loudly. From a gap in the window a sharp wind hit my face.
I grabbed the handle above my window and looked out, searching our surroundings for unusual movements. The buildings passed too quickly. Ours was the only car visible on the road. The American turned off our headlights, and I reclined in the backseat. My body was thrown from one side to the other.
The hotel, as we arrived, appeared as a large and silent block. It was in an area of the ville sheltered from the Boulevard. The sky was a faint rose color. We found the main doors barred by an iron grill. I shook them; a guard appeared and directed us to a side entrance. The lights in the lobby were out. There was no music. I passed tall potted plants that looked frail but had been polished. I relaxed. Even without the lights it was evident that this was an environment cared for, tended to; and soon we—unkempt, dirty, tired—would also be looked after, made part of this quietness.
I asked the receptionist, who wore a clean uniform, for a standard room. “We raised prices,” he informed me. When? Since midnight, he said, returning to his register. He tore out the receipt. The stringers had moved to a narrow window in the lobby, where they had lit cigarettes, and leaned out in succession. They said they needed to calm their nerves. I left them for the room.
For many months I had wanted to live in the ville. When I had first arrived in Congo it had stunned me—the wide roads, the skyscrapers; it had seemed so peaceful and ordered compared with Victoire. But the transaction with the receptionist recalled, and in a way confirmed, my decision to not move. The transaction made plain to what extent my safety here, bought, was without compassion, and temporary. Such was the ville: bound by money, unwelcoming, and in a sense unoccupied, exterior to society. The poor saw it as a place to riot, as a route for escape to a better life; for the rich the ville was a shield, a way to keep distance from the menace of the shantytowns. It seemed the most modern part of the city, but the ville was in fact the most lawless: it belonged to expatriates, politicians, and nouveaux riches, people to whom the law—the written law as well as those of the streets, of the Donut Society—did not apply. The ville obeyed only a most primitive law: force. That plant in the lobby had given a false impression: its frailty I had instinctively taken as a sign of protection. But
to exist in the ville one needed iron grills, security systems and guards with guns. The orderliness, the feeling of sanctuary: they had deceived.
My impulse was therefore to get away—and I began to think to the morning, to my next flight.
I got into the elevator with two girls. There was a shudder, and the elevator began to rise. I twitched to every click and movement of the machinery. “Bonsoir,” one of the girls said, in a sweet voice, before looking at her companion. “Would you like to spend the evening with my friend? I would take you myself, but I have a rendezvous.” The elevator doors rolled open with a roar and before me was an open space, dimly lit.
The corridor was decorated with framed pictures of abstract birds and ears of rabbits. The carpet was colored pale mustard. Its floral motifs seemed to glow.
My key-card slotted clumsily into the socket; the lock clicked and buzzed. “Aren’t you going to be lonely?” the girl said, from behind. I had not thought she would follow me. Her top was tight; she looked timid. The handle felt large to my grip. I leaned with my weight to open the door. I told her our bed was going to be full that night.
This bed was large, plush, white. A quilt came down its sides and touched the carpet. The bathroom smelled of disinfectant. I fiddled with the taps. The tub was dry, of a cream color. And the room’s large window opened onto the Boulevard, whose towers rose and seemed to touch the cover of dark clouds. The view was vertiginous.
I tucked myself in, ruffling the cotton sheets against my neck. My limbs slackened. My thoughts eased. The Boulevard seemed distant. The stringers arrived before I was fully asleep, and I rolled to the bed edge. Soon they snored, establishing a throbbing peace. I stared at the clock’s green digits. I meditated on the evening. Gradually, the blinking of the digits became heavy to my eye; and at some point in the night they began to make a soft beating in my mind. The stringers didn’t sleep soundly either. I got up to go to the bathroom. The carpet tickled my soles, and I felt the sensation run in my jaw, over my teeth. There was a scratching on the door. It repeated. I looked through the peephole and opened the door a crack. It was the timid girl. She had taken off her shawl, and thrown back her shoulders exaggeratedly. “I like your physique,” she said, swaying.
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