Mark Lee - The Canal House

ON OUR FIFTH DAY in Darwin, the Telegraph called and said it wanted an article and photograph about Hand-to-Hand. Daniel wrote five hundred words and e-mailed them to the paper while I boarded the Seria with my camera. Interfet, the UN military force, was sending the nine navy ships north to Dili. When I entered the cabin, Julia and Richard were trying to decide if they should leave with the convoy. Richard studied a map of East Timor lying on a gray steel table.

Tig Collins stood in the shadows behind Richard and clutched his assault rifle. You couldn’t tell that he was a total idiot and that Darwin was as safe as the pope’s bedroom. Julia stood on the left side of the chart table. She was beautiful and pale and tired from loading all the cargo. Captain Vanderhouten sat on the right side of the table, his face half buried in his hands. You couldn’t tell that he was hung over and annoyed about missing his afternoon nap. Instead he seemed frightened and worried about his ship.

I knelt down on the floor like a true believer and shot upward so that Richard appeared tall and powerful when he made his decision. And it was fake and I knew it was fake, but it was easy and a damn good photograph and I had to take it.

The Seria left Darwin that evening. Twelve hours later, my photograph of Richard appeared on the front page of the Telegraph and in several other newspapers around the world. Editors were drawn to the image and they believed that Richard was a hero. Because the camera doesn’t lie.

Like most of thejournalists in Darwin, we’d been trying without success to get on one of the first planes going to East Timor. But after my dinner at the casino with Billy, Daniel and I were both moved up on the list and the Australian military command offered us body armor, ground pads, and food rations. We turned it all down, of course—too much weight. I was already carrying my cameras and Daniel had his sat phone and computer. We decided to bring along a change of clothes, a packet of Australian and American dollars, a few drugs and bandages, tropical chocolate bars, and four large water bottles.

“And buy a hat, Nicky.”

“I hate hats. I look stupid in hats.”

“The heat’s going to get you,” Daniel said. “Not the militia.”

WE WENT TO WAR in a taxicab. Early Monday morning, the driver picked us up at the hotel and took us out to the Winnellie military air base. It was still dark, but the parking lot near the runway was crowded with armored personnel carriers, military Land Rovers, and Australian soldiers bunched up in platoons. The Australians wore green-and-brown camouflage uniforms and combat helmets instead of their usual bush hats. Everyone was strapping on body armor, backpacks, and web belts heavy with supplies. The extra gear made the soldiers appear large and formidable, until you saw their faces. Most of them were no more than twenty years old and Daniel talked to a soldier from Alice Springs who was only seventeen. They looked pale and tense beneath the security lights. Several platoons didn’t have enough ammunition and their sergeants ran back and forth, borrowing rounds from other units.

A soldier was crying beside an armored personnel carrier, but when I went over with my camera a captain rushed up and said that he was going to send me back to Darwin. We started arguing, but Daniel slipped between us and spoke with a calm, soothing voice. I’m very sorry about this. He won’t take a picture. Daniel took my arm and pulled me away before the captain could change his mind.

“Come on, Nicky. Let’s just get on the plane.”

“It was a good shot.”

“I agree. But I don’t want to lose you before we get to Dili.”

Just before sunrise, the first transport took off, heading to East Timor. Three more flights left the air base before we followed a platoon of soldiers up the ramp of a C-130 Hercules. The inside looked like the long, ribbed belly of a whale. Canvas benches had been attached to both walls and two other benches ran up the middle. The Australian soldiers sat facing us, each man holding his rifle and a bottle of purified water. I checked my cameras one more time while Daniel studied his flash cards with phrases in Portuguese, Indonesian, and an island language called Tetum. “Stay buckled in!” shouted a sergeant. “If you feel sick, just lean over and spew on your boots!”

Our plane had a few small windows and I twisted around to look outside. The ocean was milky green close to the shore, then cobalt blue as we passed over deep water. We approached Timor from the south and began to fly across the island. There was a flat coastal strip, then tall mountains at the center covered with dense tropical vegetation. Dirt roads followed the ridges like the blurry lines from a brown crayon. The cargo plane reached the north side of the island, banked hard to the right, and flew toward Dili. A gray haze covered the harbor area and black plumes of smoke drifted up from oil fires. It looked as if the entire city was burning.

Our plane landed hard and taxied to the end of the runway. The pilot kept the engines going as the ramp went down and we quickly got off onto the tarmac. It was hot and sticky and there was a bitter smell in the air, as if someone had been burning tires and old cans of paint. The soldiers from our plane jogged over to three military Land Rovers, but when Daniel and I tried to follow them a corporal jumped out of the driver’s seat and began shouting at us. “Get off! No room for journos! You’re on your own!”

I hesitated, wanting to remain with the soldiers, but Daniel turned and started across the runway. He showed the same lightness, the sense of detachment, that I had first seen in Africa. “You know what, Nicky?” He glanced back at me and smiled. “I like that new hat of yours. It’s got character.”

“It’s just a tourist hat. I bought it at a souvenir shop where they sold fake didgeridoos.”

“Maybe it’s a tourist hat, but you wear it with a certain flair.”

The airport terminal consisted of three small buildings with steep metal roofs that were supposed to resemble the thatched tops of island huts. The red roofs were the first things you saw crossing the runway. They seemed to float above the banyan trees that surrounded the terminal area. Passing through a broken fence, we entered the airport waiting room. Plastic tables and chairs had been kicked over or smashed through the windows. Feces covered the floor and some of it had been smeared on the walls. We stepped carefully through the trash. Daniel motioned to my camera and I took a few photographs.

The hallway out was littered with paper, torn books, and trash. Bullets had chopped holes in the white plaster; it looked as if a madman had attacked the building with a hatchet. The office phones had been stolen; everything else was torn apart or smashed into pieces. Legs had been ripped away from desks and chairs. File cabinets had been pushed over and set on fire. A framed poster of an Australian flight attendant lay on the floor, defaced with bullet holes.

We left the building through a smashed-out door and stood beneath the shaded entrance to the terminal. Daniel lit a cigarette and I asked for one. The burning tobacco helped to overpower the smell that clung to our skin and clothing.

“Who did this?” I asked.

“The militia or the Indonesian army. Both of them were in charge of the airport.”

“Everybody’s crazy here.”

“They weren’t happy when the Timorese people voted for independence. I guess they decided to destroy everything before they left the country.”

When the UN mission had fled East Timor a few weeks earlier, all the officials had driven to the airport and abandoned their cars in the parking lot. Two weeks later, the vehicles were still there, parked in a haphazard manner. File boxes and half-opened suitcases were dumped on the asphalt as if the drivers had raced to the terminal, then dashed inside to check on a flight.