‘We called the office to ask for help from the US and British military. Then the NATO helicopters came and we realized we were at risk of being bombed. We looked the same as everyone else in our disguise. So we decided we had to leave. We waited for two or three cars from the village to come through and we followed them.’
/DRIVING
I am a terrible driver. However, I have been on a few of the courses – driving in a hostile environment (mud) and driving on a skid board – and will tell you that under pressure I am sure we all become better drivers. The key is to remember just a few simple things.
• If you skid, turn the steering wheel into the skid rather than against it and this will bring it under control.
• Lower gears give you more control going up and down hills, and along muddy tracks.
• Listen to your car. It will tell you when to change gear and when to give up.
That’s it, really, the basics of driving in extreme conditions. Oh, and don’t drink and drive – that is one extreme condition that will not make you a better driver.
/PLANES, TRAINS AND AUTOMOBILES
When you are in a dangerous country there are several important matters you must address before you make a journey anywhere.
Decide whether to drive yourself or let others do it for you. This means choosing between hiring a car, employing a driver, or using buses and taxis. This needs to be thought about before arrival (see Local Transport).
If you opt for taxis, use the hotel’s service if possible, and build up a happy mutual relationship with tips. That way there is a limited number of people who know your movements and where you are staying. Also, the hotel will already have trusted drivers and know where they live.
If you opt for a local driver, make sure you choose the right one. An MSF volunteer told me about the checks they tried to make before hiring in Yemen: ‘Did they have any revenge issues? Were they from the right tribe for crossing the area? Would anyone take against one of them?’
Even if you have a driver you trust, you can never be sure about their friends. Shadi Alkasim, a freelance radio producer and journalist, recommends: ‘If you have an interpreter or driver, never give him accurate information about where you will be on the following day. For example, tell him you want to go tomorrow to such-and-such a place to cover the news there in the morning. But the next day tell him you have changed your mind and want to go to another place. Also change your route every day. Someone may be following you, and then you will be a very easy target.’
But even if you are using a local driver and relying on their know-how, you need to stay in control of your situation. If there is something you are not sure of or do not understand, always ask. As Ian Mackinnon told me:
‘When it all goes quiet you’re probably between the front lines in no man’s land. If the local populace has shut up shop, abandoned streets and there are no cars around, take heed. With colleagues from the Daily Telegraph and Independent, I was approaching the southern Gaza town of Rafah, surrounded by Israeli troops and tanks who were waging ferocious battles with Palestinian militants down the road that had already left more than a score dead. Our fixer, accompanied by a driver new to us, blithely announced that he knew how to thread a way through the tank cordon down some back roads through the sand dunes. To our dismay, he then proceeded to yack away on his mobile as we proceeded down ever-quieter roads, without even bothering to ask the one car coming the other way what lay down the lane ahead. Only then did my Telegraph colleague scream at our fixer to get off the phone and stop the car. He rightly expressed reservations despite the fixer’s none-too-reassuring assurances that he knew the way and all would be fine. But, spooked, the Telegraph man asked to be taken back to the main road and life, where he would find a taxi back to Gaza City. After lunch the rest of us decided we’d give Rafah a miss for that day too.
‘The Telegraph man’s decision illustrated, for me, the importance of being in control and doing what you feel comfortable with. Easier said than done when in a group of competitors each under their own pressures to reach the story. He made it back to Rafah without incident, as did we the following morning.’
It’s very important to choose the right car – one that fits into the local area. Tom Coghlan tells you how to do that in Afghanistan:
‘Don’t use SUVs unless absolutely necessary. Toyota Corollas in Afghanistan are almost as durable as SUVs, a fraction of their cost to run and maintain, and the parts are available everywhere. They also attract a fraction of the attention. If you go somewhere dangerous, make sure you are the driver (if you are male). Nobody ever looks at the driver in Afghanistan because he has the lowest status in the car. Make sure the car is dirty. Girls should all wear burkas. Put all your identity documents in the back of the cover of the front seat. Play Afghan music on the stereo. Get a grubby look going and don’t wash your hair. To be honest, if people look in the car, they will probably identify you as foreign, but Afghans are quite polite and won’t harass you.
‘In extremis the best thing to do is pretend to be physically disabled or mentally disturbed. It probably won’t help much, but there are lots of mentally disturbed people in Afghanistan, so you stand a chance of getting away with it. Because of the high instance of very close intermarriage, deaf and dumb people are quite frequent, and that’s an obvious option for the non-Pashto speaker.’
If you must drive yourself, learn how to drive in the local way. Nick Toksvig remembers: ‘We did a lot of our own driving during the 2006 war. What worked best was adapting to the way locals drove, whether through the use of lights or hand gestures or whatever. Adapt and you won’t stand out so much.’
According to journalist Sebastian Junger, though, your driving should be local in all but one way: ‘Wear a seatbelt! Every reporter I’ve ever met is cavalier about wearing a belt in a war zone, which is crazy.’
If you are driving in a war zone, you need to have a plan, make it known to everyone who needs to know, and stick to it. As one MSF volunteer told me, even small deviations from it can get you killed:
‘In Yemen we had strict laws on movement. It would take 4–8 hours to get from one town to another. To avoid tribal checkpoints, we would leave at four in the morning. On one occasion we decided to stop for a cup of coffee – a stupid, simple cup of coffee – so our driver pulled over at the nearest café. We then found we were in one of the most dangerous places we could be…it was a tribal zone with the highest risk ever. About 40–50 armed men surrounded us and they looked at us like we had dropped from heaven. As they were getting their weapons ready, one approached us to say we could leave if they could keep the car. We explained it was an ambulance, but they said they didn’t care – that we were working with another tribe and weren’t curing their people and they wanted it. The local driver told us to go back to the car and he would negotiate. He told them he would race them in the car and if they managed to catch us, they could keep the car. Thankfully, ours was better than theirs and we got away.’