Steven Parker
I am a Canadian Forces Officer deployed in Sudan as a military observer with the United Nations Mission In Sudan (UNMIS).Steve in Sudan
Travel Blog Posts
May 21st 2010
First I must apologize, I put all the pictures for my last entry in the wrong date entry and have not figured out how to move them. As Previously mentioned Julud is located in the Nuba Mountains. One of the first things I asked when I arrived here was if it was safe to climb the mountains. As it was area of intense fighting during the war my concern was potential Landmines and UXO's. The immediate answer I got was that the mountains were considered to be mined, but nobody was able to clarify if they were all mined or just a few of the more accessable mountians. When questioned further as to where this info could be found nobody was to sure it had just been passed on by someone else. When I saw the ... read more
May 9th 2010
My Home for the next few months will be Team Site Julud in the state of Southern Kordofan. Life in Julud is best described in pictures which I will add soon. In the meantime I will do my best to paint a picture for you: Here we often refer to the team site as Julud Paradise. Which carries both truth and sarcasm depending on the person, time and day. It is located in the rugged Nuba Mountains, which at the moment are hot and dry, the daily high is +40 with the low around +25. Since arriving it has rained very lightly only twice, but the rainy season is just around the corner. Julud is a one hour drive from the nearest paved road. And unlike country roads in Canada, the roads here are not gravel ... read more
May 7th 2010
This entry is long overdue as much has happened since my last post. I will give a brief Summary of the last few weeks and will add pictures in the next few days. After completing training in Khartoum, I was tasked to Team Site Julud in the province of Southern Kordofan, in Northern Sudan; it was an area of significant fighting during the war. Upon receiving my tasking I quickly contacted the team site in order to get an idea of what to expect. Only to be told there was absolutely no accommodations available. The other major point was that fresh and decent food was difficult to obtain in Julud. This resulted in my deployment to my team site being delayed as I was not about to deploy with nowhere to live. After several days of ... read more
April 28th 2010
This entry is now over a week overdue. My apologies, I blame it on my fellow Canadian who figured he should give me all the video games he had. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mero%C3%AB As is popular amongst the UNMOs that come through Khartoum, 5 of us along with one of the Canada house security staff (brought for language assistance) made plans to visit the ancient Meroe Pyramids. The adventure begins days before we even leave. First we must get permission from the UN to travel within the country, this requires several documents to be signed and stamped by various people who don’t actually care. Then we were required to get permission from the Tourism Police and the Ministry of antiquities to visit the pyramids and take pictures. A quick aside, taking pictures of anything other than yourself and your ... read more
April 17th 2010
My second week of training is now completed. The work week here in Sudan is Sunday through Thursday with Friday and Saturday being the weekend. The week went by quickly, and has seen a few Canadian UNMO’s come and go. All of our tours are staggered so there is never more than a few people at a time on the same schedule. The classes completed this week were generally more interesting as they were designed specifically for us UNMO’s. I am not sure if it is just coincidence or not but the majority of the lectures were given my military officers and there appeared to be a greater sense of professionalism than during the Generic indoc course for all UN workers that we had last week. It is not hard to determine who has had training ... read more
April 11th 2010
The majority of my time the past week and for the next while has been spent in and around Canada House or around the city. Canada house is a large 5 store house that has been divided into various “apartments” and common areas. The main floor houses our gym facilities and a common area with big screen TV and eating area. A step down from the main floor is the staff area for the national support element of the mission. The four floors above has apartments which each have their own kitchen, bathrooms, common area, and shared rooms with 1-4 beds per room. I am living in one of the two UNMO transient quarters. Currently I have a room to myself but this is likely to change as there are a few guys coming up for ... read more
April 10th 2010
After a relaxing Easter Monday it was time to get to work. First on the schedule was clearing into the UN. This is a process that requires one to march around to locations scattered randomly around the camp, collecting various stamps and signatures to take to the next location. The process and its redundancy were ridiculously yet humorous as I filled the same info on to a dozen of more forms. It was during this walking about when the reality of the +40C weather hit home. Khartoum is indeed a warm place. Wednesday and Thursday was UNMIS indoctrination training. Nothing spectacular there, two days of relatively mundane training, along with some more stamps and signatures. While not particularly enlightening it was a chance to meet a few of the other international military observers. Other new arrives ... read more
April 7th 2010
Arriving Days 1-2 I finally made my way to Sudan on the 3rd of April 2010. After a pleasant morning in Sydney, Miranda and Oliver dropped me off at the airport. It was very hard especially for Oliver as he realized I was actually now going to Africa as we had been telling him I would. We made it quick and said our goodbyes in the car. This made it easier, I think, but it was sad when I looked back and the car was gone and I knew that would be the last time I would see of them (in person) for many weeks. My Itinerary was Victoria-Vancouver-Frankfurt-Khartoum, and had only a total of 7 hours waiting in the airports. I thought this was fairly good considering the distance I was flying. Fortunately the government ... read more
The Journey Begins... soon
Published: April 2nd 2010North America » Canada » British Columbia » Vancouver Island » VictoriaApril 2nd 2010
D -1 I am stepping onto a plan to Sudan on Saturday, which begins my 6 month United Nations Military Observer (UNMO) tour with the United Nations Mission in Sudan (UNMIS). It is my goal to share a comprehensive blog on my time spent there. But before I can do that I feel I must provide some background on the mission. And the best way to do that is to forward those interested to the mission website: http://unmis.unmissions.org/ Meanwhile I suppose I should start packing... ... read more
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