Good morning

9am, all okay. No soldiers came to visit us during the night. It turns out last night was pretty quiet on the looting front. Of course we still jumped at every noise outside, convinced that someone was prowling around.

After a few final bursts of heavy artillery near N’dolo Airport and the river at dawn, everything now seems to be over. The minivans and taxis are on the roads again, our landlady’s gardener came into work this morning, and the French Ambassador has given the green light for parents to go fetch their kids at the school where they have been stuck for 48 hours.

Meanwhile we have just received a phone call to confirm that the rescue convoy is on its way. The irony.

The snail reflex

For someone who claims she’s not really into this blogging business at all, I was remarkably pleased to find that Fred and I, along with a couple other addicted Kinshasa bloggers, made the headline on the Global Voices website.

Fred and I are now posting from the most inconspicuous room at the back of the house, behind locked doors and windows, curtains drawn, lights out, AC off (pretty hot, yes), ensconced in a single, stuffy room with our kettle, two sachets of powder soup, a couple of bottles of water, a bottle of champagne (style before reason) and our laptops. The aim of the game is to pretend we’re not home, lest our ‘friends’ who came a’knocking yesterday and took several thousand dollars’ worth of money and jewellery from our landlady and neighbours come back for more. This afternoon Fred spied FARDC soldiers helping themselves quite nonchalantly to some goodies across the street.

To be honest, there’s not much I would mind losing – my mother’s pendant, our Syrian carpet and the pictures on this laptop, basically. Even my wedding ring is replaceable – after all Fred lost his in the Bombolomeni rapids six months into our marriage. But I don’t particularly want to meet a Republican Guard or FARDC soldier face to face after dark, merci beaucoup.

Needless to say, the convoy never came. But I was relieved to hear about the 8pm curfew, and I like to think that MONUC APCs will be patrolling our area regularly throughout the night.

Some good pictures on the BBC site.

Final Act?

All is quiet. The last bursts of sporadic shooting are so distant that Fred optimistically questions whether they could be thunder. The first reports of friends escaping the office in which they spent the last 30 hours and making it home down the Boulevard have just come in. I am told the buildings still stand (except the Spanish Embassy); the main victims are the trees. Of course we don’t yet have any real idea of the body count.

The main concern now is looting. Meanwhile, we still await our elusive rescue convoy.

More drama

As I said, I slept surprisingly well in our little cocoon. Except when someone gave us a fright by knocking loudly at our window, then refusing to answer when Fred called out, "C'est qui?" I’d virtually forgotten about the event altogether, but just now when I ventured out to feed the kittens, I was informed by our heroic housekeeper that during the night a Republican Guard soldier came through the 'parcelle' we share with five other households, looting our neighbours and trying to get into our house. She warded him off, swearing that no one was home and that she didn't have the keys to our place (the woman will get a raise!). Apparently he is still outside our gate terrorising our guards, but hopefully our proximity to the police will finally come in handy.

The morning after

The shooting and shelling continues, but it seems appreciatively remote and infrequent after yesterday’s close call. From time to time our police neighbours fire a round from the roof to keep their opponents at bay, but we hardly notice anymore. We can hear tanks firing from the Boulevard, so it must be pretty tense up there.

The Spanish Embassy was hit, the Nigerian Ambassador is hurt, and a number of shops and offices were looted during the night. AFP reports that a container holding 2,500 cubic meters of fuel was hit near N’dolo, which explains the column of smoke observed by fellow bloggers. Bemba has been ensconced in the South African Embassy for the night.

I slept surprisingly well in a little cocoon we put together on the floor of the spare room.


Rumour has it that an armed convoy is being organised to rescue the schoolchildren stuck overnight at the French (and Belgian?) school(s). We may be invited to join. Having got accustomed to my makeshift bunker in the now relatively quiet zone, I am somewhat loathe to join an armed convoy taking me in the direction of the front line, even if it is to the safety of the embassy compound.