CBNNews.com - There are uniformed soldiers everywhere around this dusty border town on the shores of Lake Kivu. But it's not like it once was.
My driver tells me that two years ago, he was stopped by some Congolese soldiers who decided they didn't like him. So they shot him in the head. Really.
Somehow, the bullet only grazed his skull, knocking him unconscious. Some friends found him later and wedged his bloody, almost-dead body between them on a motorcycle as they drove him to the hospital. The ragged scar remains today. Now, he's a pentecostal minister.
Today, however, the soldiers are thankfully in a very good mood, for the most part. They wave tentatively at my salute as we drive past. They all seem to be waiting for something, I'm not sure what.
Rebel leader Lauren Nkunda has been captured in Rwanda - fleeing his own generals with a truckload of gold and diamonds. Now, factions who had been bitter enemies are calling for peace, even joining forces.
But as the truckload of gems demonstrates, the stakes here in eastern Congo are high - and there's more than power to be had. Generals from various factions and the Rwandan Army swoop into the only nice hotel in town - the Ihusi - for meetings over lunch. Most have girlfriends in tow. I ate lunch there two days in a row. I didn't bring a girlfriend.
Give Me a Break!
Yesterday when I stepped into the toilet there to wash my hands, one of the Congolese army generals' security guards was in the latrine as well. When I walked in, he immediately sized me up and said "Give me your money."
I looked at him - his English was passable, but he couldn't have been 19 years old.
"Are you a private?"
He blinked. "Yes. Give me your money." He fingered his assaut rifle.
I made a disgusted sound.
"I'm not giving you anything." If this bozo was going to rob me, he was going to have to go get someone higher ranking than that. I'm not getting rolled by a private in the bathroom, even if he is carrying a Kalashnikov.
"Then give me your sunglasses," he said, trying to sound more forceful.
"No." I turned and walked out the door.
Like the Pounding Rain
Later, I got a tour with the British charity OXFAM of one of several large camps on the edge of town for Internally Displaced Persons - refugees in their own country. They live in tiny tents made of the kind of plastic you'd throw on the floor before you paint.
One corner of the camp was wall-to-wall people - tens of thousands, waiting in unruly lines for their daily allotment of food. While the adults waited, the kids run wild. There are children everywhere.
Stepping out of the purple Oxfam landrover plastered with "please don't shoot me" stickers, I was immediately set upon by several hundred mud-caked urchins, all wanting to simply touch me, as if doing so would let them rub off some of my prosperity. More likely, they're just interested to see what my white skin feels like. And they LOVE my cameras.
I have to enlist help to clear them out of the way whenever I want to film something BESIDES them. It's nearly impossible. Once, I got too far from the vehicle and actually got scared - the kids were swarming around me so thick I thought they might eat me if given half a chance. I brought little flashlights to give away, but I don't dare.
Many of these urchins are covered with skin lesions - scabies, lice, ugly white spots that speak volumes about the living conditions. I poke my head into one tent, just as a hard rain started to fall. There were three pygmy children huddled inside, and the rain on the plastic sheeting was deafening. The floor - mud not much less soupy than that outside the tent.
On the way back to the OXFAM compound, my heart is pounding like the rain. How can I do anything to help these people? There are just too many of them.
The best thing I can do, I decide, is tell the story to you.
Click play above to see my photos of these children.
Chuck Holton