Emile Hirsch: Confronting Cholera: My Zimbabwe Diary
The following events took place in April 2009, when I was privileged enough to be invited by Oxfam America to learn about their programs abroad. Focusing primarily on the rampant Cholera epidemic, but also on the importance of sanitation systems and crumbling economies, the diary feels especially timely now, given the Haiti earthquake disaster. Now more than ever, Oxfam and other humanitarian organizations need regular folks' help to keep the victims of these disasters safe from disease and death. -- Emile Hirsch
Day 1
Still hung over from an endlessly long yet surprisingly fun Coachella experience, I swill down Diet Coke and resist the burning desire to have a cigarette--all the while my foot is pressing harder and harder on the gas pedal. In thirty minutes I will have returned from the massive California rock concert outside of Palm Springs to my loft in Venice Beach. In thirty hours I'll be setting foot in Zimbabwe.
After a restless night of tossing and turning in my sheets I can't believe we are already at the Washington Dulles Airport, waiting in the Admirals Club Lounge. By "we," I mean Nabil Elderkin--a young 27‐year‐old raging bull of a photographer, all testosterone, passion and energy--and Lyndsay Cruz, the cute, sharp as a whip beach blonde hair Oxfam Public Figures Liaison, and myself. We all went into the Congo in June of 2008 together, and had eye-opening and memorable experiences while we learned about the rampant poverty, political instability, and quiet determination in that beleaguered country. I originally got involved with Oxfam after portraying Chris McCandless in the film Into The Wild. Chris had given his life savings of 24,500 dollars and sixty‐eight cents to Oxfam before departing on a cross-country spiritual odyssey. Chris was a remarkable individual, with a hard to understand idealism‐-yet the beauty he saw in the world made me want to live in it to the fullest--so when Oxfam first called me to see if I wanted to be involved, I felt Chris tapping me on the shoulder.
Zimbabwe, formerly Northern and Southern Rhodesia until granted independence from the United Kingdom in 1980, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Now under the leadership of longtime President Robert Mugabe, and, in a new, positive sharing of power with onetime serious political rival and now Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, what was once a bloody, murderous political climate by many accounts has apparently cooled down quite a few degrees. Meaning just really hot, instead of boiling. Controversy over the fairness of the Zimbabwe presidential elections was the talk of much of world in 2008. But now, with these two powerful leaders joined up, one can only hope there will be a renewed vigor of focus for Zimbabwe's biggest ailment--its collapsed infrastructure and economy.
Anybody who wants to really see that being a "billionaire" isn't all it's cracked up to be need only visit Zimbabwe. Because the hyperinflation of their economy has gotten so incredibly out of hand (independent economists say the inflation rate ran into the quadrillions of percent), four trillion dollars won't even buy you a bottle of water. Political turmoil and civil unrest have resulted in the weakening of the farming and export industries, as many white farmers had their lands stripped from them, rendering far fewer crops than anticipated. And as a result of this collapsed infrastructure, basic services and utilities that most humans take for granted, such as running water and proper sanitation systems, coupled with parching droughts throughout the country, have created a deadly nest for a deadly bacteria--cholera.
Cholera is a water-borne disease that is primarily contracted through human ingestion of contaminated feces. Meaning, if there is a lack of food and people are forced to grow their primary crop (corn) in the street, yet also forced to defecate in back streets and alleys because the sewage system is not working, then there is going to be a high risk of a cholera outbreak. 90,000 Zimbabweans have already been infected due to the 2008 cholera outbreak, with over 4,000 deaths. My eyes grow wide as I read how cholera kills you--diarrhea and dehydration. The insane part of all this is that weeks before, on an early online conference call I did with Oxfam doctors in Boston, I learned the cure for cholera is simple: sugar, water, and salt.
On the plane trapped in seat 26A my mind is racing. I'm fidgety. Pressing down on the screen in front of me attached to the seat, I scroll through all the movies South African Airlines provides. One of them grabs my attention--Senator Obama Goes To Africa. The engaging documentary follows the then Senator Obama on a trip back to Kenya, where he is given a superstars' greeting, to Chad, visiting refugee camps and then to Cape Town South Africa. In Cape Town he gets a tour of where Nelson Mandela was held prisoner, always telling the younger prisoners who joined him in captivity at Robben Island to stop concentrating on fighting and killing, and to concentrate on studying instead. Throughout watching the program I just continuously catch myself with a huge smile on my face. President Obama exudes such empathy for the Africans--I'm happy he's our leader right now. For Africa and the issues like HIV and poverty, violence against women--having President Obama leading the way gives me hope that he is going to inspire a massive revolution of peace and prosperity.
After thirty hours of flying and transferring flights, my feet hit the surface of Harare, Zimbabwe's capital. I feel as if I'm in some sort of jet‐lagged dream. At customs, the Zimbabwean man asks how long I will be staying before he stamps my visa. "7 days,'' I reply.
"7 days is more than enough," he says. Hmm, I think to myself. Was it just me, or did that sound slightly ominous?
At baggage claim, we meet a Zimbabwean man who sticks out a big, meaty paw. "Ransam," he says. His full name is Ransam Mariga, and he's worked for Oxfam for the past seven years. His voice is deep, and each word isn't spoken so much as echoed up from his belly, all in a very controlled, matter of fact way. He reminds me of Arnold Schwarzenegger in T2, but looks more like George Foreman with professor spectacles. He leads Lyndsay, Nabil, and I outside to where his car is parked.
"Smell that?" Nabil says. I do. A burning wood, campfire smell. "Smells like Africa" he says.
Unlike the Congo, where we had official trucks with massive radio antennas attached to them, all sporting big Oxfam logos across them, Ransam is driving a SUV Silver BMW X5. "Ransam, I didn't know you rolled like that," Nabil cracks.
Driving on the roads my heart pounds, not just because I'm in a New World now, but also because Ransam hauls serious ass while driving. With two lane long stretches of dark highway lit primarily by the night stars above, the area feels quiet and empty, and the peace is broken with occasional clusters of lights coming from houses or businesses.
"Ransam, you think I can get some of those big bills?" Nabil asks, referring to the standard fifty trillion dollar bill.
"Yes, I have them." Ransam replies.
"Well, we can do a trade off," Nabil says.
"That won't be necessary. You can have them," Ransam says.
"Why?" Nabil asks.
"Because they're useless." Ransam says.
And the Zim dollars are now, in fact, worth less than the paper they're printed on. Ransam explains that three weeks ago, in an effort to resuscitate a dying economy, President Mugabe let the people officially trade in foreign currency, primarily US dollars, rendering Zimbabwe into a totally cash economy, and leaving Zimbabwe dollars obsolete. Ransam begins talking about the now dilapidated state of the country, and reminisces back on the Harare that used to be just little more than a decade ago--once one of the most beautiful cities in the world, Ransam says. Lyndsay asks Ransam if he has a family. Ransam says he has a wife and four children, plus another ten children that live with him that are two of his wife's sibling's children. Her siblings died of of AIDS and Ransam and his wife decided to raise them. Fourteen children, and three of them, he says, have HIV themselves. The antiviral medicine makes it so you practically cannot even tell by looking at them they are sick. The poor, he says, are not so lucky when it comes to affording expensive medicine. The government reports 18% of the population is HIV positive here, Ransam says it's "more like 25%."
Read the rest plus pictures & videos at The Huffington Post.
Day 1
Still hung over from an endlessly long yet surprisingly fun Coachella experience, I swill down Diet Coke and resist the burning desire to have a cigarette--all the while my foot is pressing harder and harder on the gas pedal. In thirty minutes I will have returned from the massive California rock concert outside of Palm Springs to my loft in Venice Beach. In thirty hours I'll be setting foot in Zimbabwe.
After a restless night of tossing and turning in my sheets I can't believe we are already at the Washington Dulles Airport, waiting in the Admirals Club Lounge. By "we," I mean Nabil Elderkin--a young 27‐year‐old raging bull of a photographer, all testosterone, passion and energy--and Lyndsay Cruz, the cute, sharp as a whip beach blonde hair Oxfam Public Figures Liaison, and myself. We all went into the Congo in June of 2008 together, and had eye-opening and memorable experiences while we learned about the rampant poverty, political instability, and quiet determination in that beleaguered country. I originally got involved with Oxfam after portraying Chris McCandless in the film Into The Wild. Chris had given his life savings of 24,500 dollars and sixty‐eight cents to Oxfam before departing on a cross-country spiritual odyssey. Chris was a remarkable individual, with a hard to understand idealism‐-yet the beauty he saw in the world made me want to live in it to the fullest--so when Oxfam first called me to see if I wanted to be involved, I felt Chris tapping me on the shoulder.
Zimbabwe, formerly Northern and Southern Rhodesia until granted independence from the United Kingdom in 1980, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Now under the leadership of longtime President Robert Mugabe, and, in a new, positive sharing of power with onetime serious political rival and now Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, what was once a bloody, murderous political climate by many accounts has apparently cooled down quite a few degrees. Meaning just really hot, instead of boiling. Controversy over the fairness of the Zimbabwe presidential elections was the talk of much of world in 2008. But now, with these two powerful leaders joined up, one can only hope there will be a renewed vigor of focus for Zimbabwe's biggest ailment--its collapsed infrastructure and economy.
Anybody who wants to really see that being a "billionaire" isn't all it's cracked up to be need only visit Zimbabwe. Because the hyperinflation of their economy has gotten so incredibly out of hand (independent economists say the inflation rate ran into the quadrillions of percent), four trillion dollars won't even buy you a bottle of water. Political turmoil and civil unrest have resulted in the weakening of the farming and export industries, as many white farmers had their lands stripped from them, rendering far fewer crops than anticipated. And as a result of this collapsed infrastructure, basic services and utilities that most humans take for granted, such as running water and proper sanitation systems, coupled with parching droughts throughout the country, have created a deadly nest for a deadly bacteria--cholera.
Cholera is a water-borne disease that is primarily contracted through human ingestion of contaminated feces. Meaning, if there is a lack of food and people are forced to grow their primary crop (corn) in the street, yet also forced to defecate in back streets and alleys because the sewage system is not working, then there is going to be a high risk of a cholera outbreak. 90,000 Zimbabweans have already been infected due to the 2008 cholera outbreak, with over 4,000 deaths. My eyes grow wide as I read how cholera kills you--diarrhea and dehydration. The insane part of all this is that weeks before, on an early online conference call I did with Oxfam doctors in Boston, I learned the cure for cholera is simple: sugar, water, and salt.
On the plane trapped in seat 26A my mind is racing. I'm fidgety. Pressing down on the screen in front of me attached to the seat, I scroll through all the movies South African Airlines provides. One of them grabs my attention--Senator Obama Goes To Africa. The engaging documentary follows the then Senator Obama on a trip back to Kenya, where he is given a superstars' greeting, to Chad, visiting refugee camps and then to Cape Town South Africa. In Cape Town he gets a tour of where Nelson Mandela was held prisoner, always telling the younger prisoners who joined him in captivity at Robben Island to stop concentrating on fighting and killing, and to concentrate on studying instead. Throughout watching the program I just continuously catch myself with a huge smile on my face. President Obama exudes such empathy for the Africans--I'm happy he's our leader right now. For Africa and the issues like HIV and poverty, violence against women--having President Obama leading the way gives me hope that he is going to inspire a massive revolution of peace and prosperity.
After thirty hours of flying and transferring flights, my feet hit the surface of Harare, Zimbabwe's capital. I feel as if I'm in some sort of jet‐lagged dream. At customs, the Zimbabwean man asks how long I will be staying before he stamps my visa. "7 days,'' I reply.
"7 days is more than enough," he says. Hmm, I think to myself. Was it just me, or did that sound slightly ominous?
At baggage claim, we meet a Zimbabwean man who sticks out a big, meaty paw. "Ransam," he says. His full name is Ransam Mariga, and he's worked for Oxfam for the past seven years. His voice is deep, and each word isn't spoken so much as echoed up from his belly, all in a very controlled, matter of fact way. He reminds me of Arnold Schwarzenegger in T2, but looks more like George Foreman with professor spectacles. He leads Lyndsay, Nabil, and I outside to where his car is parked.
"Smell that?" Nabil says. I do. A burning wood, campfire smell. "Smells like Africa" he says.
Unlike the Congo, where we had official trucks with massive radio antennas attached to them, all sporting big Oxfam logos across them, Ransam is driving a SUV Silver BMW X5. "Ransam, I didn't know you rolled like that," Nabil cracks.
Driving on the roads my heart pounds, not just because I'm in a New World now, but also because Ransam hauls serious ass while driving. With two lane long stretches of dark highway lit primarily by the night stars above, the area feels quiet and empty, and the peace is broken with occasional clusters of lights coming from houses or businesses.
"Ransam, you think I can get some of those big bills?" Nabil asks, referring to the standard fifty trillion dollar bill.
"Yes, I have them." Ransam replies.
"Well, we can do a trade off," Nabil says.
"That won't be necessary. You can have them," Ransam says.
"Why?" Nabil asks.
"Because they're useless." Ransam says.
And the Zim dollars are now, in fact, worth less than the paper they're printed on. Ransam explains that three weeks ago, in an effort to resuscitate a dying economy, President Mugabe let the people officially trade in foreign currency, primarily US dollars, rendering Zimbabwe into a totally cash economy, and leaving Zimbabwe dollars obsolete. Ransam begins talking about the now dilapidated state of the country, and reminisces back on the Harare that used to be just little more than a decade ago--once one of the most beautiful cities in the world, Ransam says. Lyndsay asks Ransam if he has a family. Ransam says he has a wife and four children, plus another ten children that live with him that are two of his wife's sibling's children. Her siblings died of of AIDS and Ransam and his wife decided to raise them. Fourteen children, and three of them, he says, have HIV themselves. The antiviral medicine makes it so you practically cannot even tell by looking at them they are sick. The poor, he says, are not so lucky when it comes to affording expensive medicine. The government reports 18% of the population is HIV positive here, Ransam says it's "more like 25%."
Read the rest plus pictures & videos at The Huffington Post.