I've Moved
Follow my return to Benghazi @ http://jeremyrelph.com/blog/
screwyloot's posterous
Home.
A very stylish friend in Benghazi, Libya.
Toronto, Canada
A friend of mine told me he’s been having dreams of Libya. Waking up, not remembering where he is. I wasn’t at the time.
Slept in my own bed for the first time in weeks last night.
We drove out to this gravel road, big tall trees lining it. There were bullets come from up the hill, through the trees. Rockets. A grenade bounced around like a beach ball and me and some other photographers swatted at it. It bounced down the road and exploded. I wiped away shrapnel. “I don’t need to be a hero,” I said to this photographer and we laughed. We left in a barrage of gunfire, rocket bursts lighting up the sky like pretty fireworks.
I woke up and watched video ITV shot in Misrata, Libya. Dream to reality. I don’t want to stay away too long.
Maclean’s Article:
http://www2.macleans.ca/2011/04/12/theyre-risking-their-life-for-this/
Last few Vice posts:
http://www.viceland.com/blogs/en/2011/04/06/notes-from-a-libyan-lurker-x-on-the-road-again/
http://www.viceland.com/blogs/en/2011/04/06/notes-from-a-libyan-lurker-xi-gimmie-back-my-bullets/
http://www.viceland.com/blogs/en/2011/04/13/notes-from-a-libyan-lurker-xiii-goodbye-gaddafi/
Slow Ride
Leave Benghazi for Cairo in 10 minutes. 15 hours or so. Backlog of post for Vice. Several nights of 4 hours sleep. A few more promised. Links when I have steady Internet. Stopping in London till early mid next week. Have a feeling the front lines could be the exact same in a month. Hope the revolutionaries have an operational shadow gov't in place soon. And selfishly, would like to come back in a month. So if Gadhafi's inner circle could whack him then, or if he could break and take retirement in some other country... Just saying.
Work Station.
Work station, Benghazi
Last night would have been lovely. I got my article in on time. The photos – a little over 10mb for two – actually went through. And then the fact checking. The internet dropped out. What should've been a 10 minute job turned into an hour long debacle. And the deadline passed while I clicked reload in Firefox a zillion times. Suddenly my SAT phone rental became useful. Reminder: always get way more info than you need.
Now if only I had more Pepto Bismol.
More Vice here:
Let the Happiness In
Benghazi, Libya
I have a few days left here and I’m short on answers. I’m tempted to make a run at the frontline but would feel foolish if I wasted half a day driving around and not hitting it. Would feel even dumber if something stupid happened. Will spend most of the evening and tomorrow writing. Doing what God put me on the earth to do.
When food and drink get boring, when the internet doesn’t work, when the girls are few you go shooting. So that happened.
More Vice:
http://www.viceland.com/blogs/en/2011/04/04/notes-from-a-libyan-lurker-viii-p...
Shotgun
DIY Checkpoint, Benghazi
A few days ago:
As I lay in the back of the SUV, fleeing incoming and Gadhafi’s forces advance, I closed my eyes and thought of God’s love. I pictured my sister in law tossing her daughter in the air, my niece in her furry white bear suit. They’re laughing and my niece is lost in the experience. The trust and joy and absolute love disarmed me. It calmed me.
Slow day chasing interviews in Benghazi.
@ Friday Prayers, Benghazi
@ Friday Prayers, Benghazi
I feel pretty useless here. I hang out post morning prayers on the corniche, the surf pounding behind us as it drizzles lightly on us. I eat nice food with welcoming Libyans, inviting me into their home. “Forget us if Gadhafi comes back,” the mother jokes. I love her humour, the family wonderfully alive. I feel guilty for looking forward to leaving next week.
I think of my plans for the next week and they all seem stupid. Why bother going to the frontlines? Great photos? More V signs? The rush of fear as the sides trade rockets? As we retreat? The whole thing seems so devoid of meaning and therein lies its attraction and repulsion, the beauty of meaninglessness. The big nothing. The hopelessness of meaninglessness. The rebels are outnumbered 10 – 1. Gadhafi can crush them at will. He knows NATO is weak and fractured. And then there’s the argument against the globalists and the countries interested in business as though this should have stopped the world from interceding on the behalf of Libyans. But NATO seem to be disinterested in oil given how fast they allowed the rebels to cede Ben Jawad and Ras Laneuf and give up on Sert and the control of 80% of the country’s oil. I watch the BBC for some context. I’m growing cynical over most of the journalism being done here.
Two more Vice blogs:
Church
Benghazi, Libya
I check out a church on Via Torrino in Benghazi. It’s been around since 1872. The door opens up into a small courtyard and a Maltese bishop who’s been napping greets me. 70 year-old Bishop Sylvester Magro is a benign neighbourhood oddity, the only attendees are foreigners (a mix of Philipino, Nigerian, GhanianSri Lankan, Indian and Europeans). He’s been in the country 23 years, splitting his time between Tripoli and Benghazi. His congregation is a fraction of its former size. They no longer hold services. Just prayer groups for the remaining congregation.
And the kids in the neighbourhood ring his buzzer and take off.
He’s a Franciscan priest. They’re there for the suffering. “We abandon ourselves to the providence of God, whatever comes we accept from his hands,” he says. Still, it’d be nice to hear something that doesn’t sound like a guarded, watching his own ass statement. Everyone knows Gadhafi’s a well-dressed bad man. It’s not like it’s debatable. I get that God doesn't side with a party but surely God is against suffering. And against dictators who threaten to kill civilians like rats.
The church prays for peace and reconciliation. “We have made it our point to stay with the people who remain,” he says. He'll stay in the country longer than I will.
New post @ Viceland
http://www.viceland.com/blogs/en/2011/03/31/notes-from-a-libya-lurker-iv-tail...
Retreat
We were all over the place today. Spent most of the day in retreat. If heart and morality meant anything the rebels would win. But today they didn’t count for much.
Mentally and emotionally taxed today. The enemy is unseen but their weaponry can stretch. Gadhafi loyalists retook much of the ground they’d lost just days ago. They’re back close to Ajdabya now. Ras Laneuf, Brega and everything in between, gone.
Also, on Vice:
Hospital, Adjbaya
I’m becoming increasingly skilled at sleeping while sitting up. Spending upwards of 8 hours in the car daily helps. Feeling the slog.
And it’s worth remembering that this is still that special period where a dictator appears to be on the way out, that people are finding a freedom that was unimaginable for 42 years, that the Middle East is surprising people across the political spectrum. So while we’re trekking back and forth from the frontline, yokels firing their guns in fits of bravado, allegations being made, the frontline going back as Gadhafi’s forces hold Sert, as the rebels organize in about the same fashion kids do – as ugly as it all is it seems that morality seems to have trumped battlefield know-how. That as a man said, “the answer is,” pointing at the sky. “Could be coalition, could be Allah.”
New post:
http://www.viceland.com/blogs/en/2011/03/29/my-libyan-getaway-benghazi-or-bust/
