Boots on the Ground: From Minister to Refugee by Rob Carr

In the mid-1990s, while I was working for EMOPS, the civil wars in Sierra Leone and Liberia were raging. A cholera outbreak had hit a refugee camp in Sierra Leone, and I was dispatched to Freetown to support the office, conduct field missions to "hot spots," and coordinate with government and donors.

After a series of bush flights and helicopter hops, I found myself in Kenema—a diamond-mining town where rebels and government forces fought bitterly for control of the mines. Just outside town was a camp holding thousands of Liberians who had fled their own civil war, only to find themselves trapped in a new one.

I was there with a senior EMOPS colleague and a cholera expert from the CDC. As we met with the camp leaders to discuss the outbreak, the atmosphere was chaotic. Suddenly, one of the elder leaders froze, looked at me, and shouted, "Robert Carr! Robert Carr!"

He made a distinct Liberian gesture—pointing his index finger at his eye and then at me: “I wanna see you.” When I walked over, he grabbed my hand, gave me an enthusiastic "finger-snap" handshake, and pulled me into a bear hug.

I realized then who he was. Just a decade earlier, he had been a powerful Minister in Liberia overseeing the rural water program where I worked—first as a Peace Corps Volunteer and later as a consultant.

“I will see you at the guest house later,” he whispered.

That evening, I heard a familiar sound at my door: “Bock-bock.” In rural Liberia, where huts often have mats instead of wooden doors, you don't knock as there is no wood; you say the word "bock" out loud. I knew instantly it was him.

We embraced again, performing the cool finger-snap handshake.  In the 80s, when he was a Minister, he was anything but humble. He would brazenly ask for "favors":  an extra LancCruiser, a personal borehole, or even a bag of cash. As we sat together, he told me how he had fled for his life and how drastically his world had changed. He reminded me that he was the one who insisted a big engineering firm hire me for my first real job because I was the only person brave enough to tell him why the project was failing.  Of course, I was hired to turn it around.  Everyone else was fired.  (that's enother story)

Then, he got serious. The "ask" was coming.

I braced myself. I assumed he wanted UNICEF to provide a car, or perhaps he wanted me to pull strings with UNHCR to get him asylum in America.

Then he popped the question: “Mr. Robert, I want you to please help me—with a pair of rain boots. I have a cassava patch here in this camp and the mud is too much!”

My heart dropped. One of the most arrogant men I had ever known had become one of the most humble.

We held hands—as men do in West Africa—and walked to the town market to pick out a pair of boots. As we walked back to the camp, he had a new spring in his step. The onlookers cheered in that beautiful Liberian way:

“The rain boots fine!”
“You are bluffing now!”
“The bossman look fine!”

We finished with one last snap handshake. I left Kenema reflecting on how what goes around doesn't always come around the way you expect—and sometimes, it returns with a pair of muddy boots.

Do you recall someone who fell from grace?