The Bang-Bang Club

by Greg Marinovich

  The next day, after a five-hour flight north, Kevin and Joao arrived in Nairobi and went to the Parkview Hotel, one of the cheaper, rather dingy, hotels that cater to backpackers and other budget travellers. To economize, they shared a room that enjoyed a view of a muddy alley. The telephone only reached as far as the lethargic receptionist and there was no television.

  It was a Sunday in Nairobi and deathly quiet. They went for a walk, Kevin hyper-active, striding and talking fast. They ended up drinking beer on the colonial Oaktree Hotel’s veranda, watching the tropical sun set over the city. Kevin was excited and happy to be in Nairobi, and they were both looking forward to getting to Sudan.

  The next day things started going wrong. Kevin tried to change a 100-dollar bill and the bank rejected it - it was a counterfeit. They contacted Rob at the Operation Lifeline Sudan headquarters at Girgiri on the outskirts of Nairobi, but further disappointment was in store for them. The plan had been that they would fly in on a food drop, and spend about a week on the ground before being picked up on the next food delivery, but an upsurge in fighting meant it was unsafe for the planes to land, and the aid flights had been suspended. Their trip was put on hold - indefinitely.

  Every day they went out to the UN compound to see if the situation had changed, but for five days they got the same negative answer. The disappointment built up in the tiny hotel room. Joao was furious, unhappy. All his careful planning was going down the toilet. Time passed slowly and painfully; they spent sparingly and ate in increasingly cheap restaurants. They did the rounds of the aid agencies, to see if any of the other organizations were flying in, despite the fighting. They abandoned the more expensive personal taxis and began using matatus - the colourful local minibus taxis which pack in up to 20 passengers. The drivers seemed to be in competition as to who could fit the largest disco speakers in their vehicles. When the buses were very full, the speakers would serve as seats, and on one such crammed trip Kevin had to sit on a speaker. The reggae that blared out of the speaker was too loud for anyone to speak and be heard, so Kevin sat back with an amused look of contentment, and took the occasional picture through the window with his cherished old Leica M3.

  In spite of their lack of progress, Kevin was having a good time. All he could talk about was how this trip was going to work out and how everything was going to be great. He made plans to resign from the Weekly Mail, go freelance and pursue a relationship with Kathy - get some stability in his life. Joao, on the other hand, was uptight. The pressure was getting to him, he had sold the trip to The Star and Newsweek on the strength of combat images, and there he was, stuck in Nairobi with little hope of getting near the fighting any time soon.

  Then suddenly there was a UN trip to Juba-a besieged, government-held town in the south of Sudan. A barge carrying food aid had been travelling up the Nile and had finally made it to Juba. It was an ‘in-and-out’, a one-day affair. Since Kevin had the guarantee from the AP, the UN put him on the plane flying in. There was no room for Joao, who had to stay behind. He was livid. Joao had done most of the preparatory work, set up the main part of the trip, and Kevin, who had mostly just followed his lead, was getting into Sudan while he cooled his heels. He assumed the worst: this was it - there would be no other chance to get to Sudan and he would return home without having shot a frame.

  Kevin Carter plays with children as a local villager looks at his camera in the Kenyan border settlement of Lokichokio, March 1993. (Joao Silva)

  A vulture seems to stalk a starving child in the southern Sudanese hamlet of Ayod, March 1993. This picture would win Kevin Carter the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography. (Kevin Carter/Corbis Sygma)

  Left:

  Greg Marinovich covering floods in the Kwa-Zulu Natal town of Ladysmith, 1996, shortly before he left to take up a post in Jerusalem for the Associated Press. (Joao Silva)

  Below:

  Ken Oosterbroek, with a South African Defence Force armoured vehicle behind him, during the fall of the homeland of Ciskei, February 1994. (Joao Silva)

  Right:

  Kevin Carter crouches while covering clashes between the ANC and Inkatha in Alexandra township, Johannesburg. (Guy Adams)

  Below:

  Gary Bernard, left, and Joao Silva on a winter morning in Soweto township, July 1994. (Greg Marinovich)

  Three dead men lie in the street where they were gunned down during a battle between Inkatha and the ANC in Soweto’s Dobsonville suburb. The graffiti reads ‘Remember - Life owes you nothing - you owe everything to life!!!’ (Joao Silva)

  Policemen load corpses into an open trailer after a night’s violence between ANC and IFP supporters in Thokoza, July 1993. Sixty people were killed in the township that weekend. (Joao Silva)

  An Inkatha supporter lies dead amongst his traditional Zulu weapons after several hundred warriors tried to storm the ANC’s headquarters, Shell House, during a march in downtown Johannesburg, 1994. Several Zulus were killed, and it became known as the Shell House Massacre. (Greg Marinovich)

  Another Inkatha supporter lies dead, with his shoes taken off for his journey to the next world, as soldiers look for the sniper who killed him during the Shell House Massacre. (Greg Marinovich)

  Kevin Carter during a late night shift as disk jockey at the Johannesburg station, Radio 702. (Joao Silva)

  The print-ready artwork from the article entitled ‘Bang-Bang Paparazzi’, which featured in the South African magazine, Living, that led to a subsequent article called ‘The Bang-Bang Club’, featuring Kevin Carter, Greg Marinovich, Ken Oosterbroek and Joao Silva. (Joao Silva)

  Bisho, 1993. Ciskeien homeland soldiers opened fire on tens of thousands of ANC supporters who marched across the South African border to demand the Ciskei disband. Some 26 ANC marchers were killed. (Greg Marinovich)

  Then State President of South Africa, PW Botha, and his wife Elize, are greeted by a woman in the black township of Sebokeng, south of Johannesburg, in the late 1980s. (Ken Oosterbroek / The Star)

  ANC fighters carry a wounded comrade during clashes with Inkatha supporters in Alexandra township, Johannesburg. (Kevin Carter/Corbis Sygma)

  Smoke rises from a cap of an ANC self-defence-unit member shot in the head at pointblank range after he mistakenly opened the door to Inkatha gunmen in the dead zone in Thokoza township, 1995. Four other ANC militants were killed. (Greg Marinovich)

  What Joao and Kevin did not know was that the UN was having great difficulties in securing funding for Sudan. An appeal earlier in the year for 190 million dollars had barely raised a quarter of that. The UN hoped to publicize the famine in which hundreds of thousands of southern tribesmen faced starvation. Without publicity to show the need, it was difficult for aid organizations to sustain funding. There is nothing like a disaster to boost an aid agency’s profile, and they needed to have the media cover the existence of the emergency. There are those who insist the war in Sudan would have ended decades ago if food and other aid had not been allowed to sustain the fighters; that the aid agencies and their food were manipulated, used by both government and rebels as a weapon of blackmail against the civilians in their areas of control, but Joao and Kevin knew none of this - they just wanted to get in and shoot pictures.

  Kevin flew off to Juba while Joao sat brooding in the depressing hotel room. It was still daylight when Kevin returned. The trip had been a waste of time, he told Joao. They had landed, been taken to a pier on the While Nile, shown a barge with food being unloaded, suffered through a press briefing - and that was it. Despite the barge having had to travel for two months up the great river, during which it had been raided for over half of its cargo by famine-stricken people on the way, the only half-way interesting pictures Kevin found were of children scrambling for some grain that had spilled on to the dock. Kevin tried to alleviate Joao’s sour mood by showing him the negatives to prove just how useless the trip had been. Though Joao realized he had missed nothing, the knowledge did not make him feel any better. Joao was given to omens and they were look
ing pretty bad at that moment.

  They decided to give it two more days and if nothing changed, they would head home. But then they received the news they had been waiting for: one of the rebel factions had given permission for the UN to fly in. In addition to the cargo plane carrying the food, Rob was going in on a light plane to assess the situation on the ground. Joao and Kevin were welcome to join him, but there was no guarantee as to when they could be picked up again. The following afternoon they were in the air, once again buoyant at the change in their fortunes. Three hours later, they landed just inside Kenya’s northern border, at the settlement of Lokichokio, just a few hundred metres from Sudan. Lokichokio was a tent-city, an UN forward-base for the big Hercules cargo aircraft that flew food and medical supplies into the famine areas.

  Kevin and Joao were allocated a tent, then they had dinner out in the open, under a crystalline African sky. Dinner was good and the beer was cold, and they hoped to have more under the seamless canopy of stars, but the bar closed soon after ten. Back in their tent they could not sleep - too much excitement, too many thoughts of what might happen to them tomorrow.

  ‘What do you think is waiting for us there?’ Kevin asked, his voice loud in the dark silence that had settled on the camp. Joao could see Kevin’s profile, lit by the glowing tip of his cigarette.

  ‘Flies and hungry people, from what I’ve heard,’ Joao replied.

  Their conversation skipped from topic after topic, but unlike all other similar conversations Joao had persevered through with Kevin, this time it was all positive. No self-indulgence, no self-pity. The future looked bright: Kevin was confident that the trip would be successful, that he would be able to cover his costs and make some money. This new girl, Kathy, was going to be just right for him. But mostly they spoke about South Africa, their work, the violence and where the country was heading in the coming years and the upcoming vote. The first elections that all South Africans could finally take part in were just 13 months away.

  The conversation came around to Kevin’s tattoo. He had a misshapen map of Africa drawn on his right shoulder, clearly the work of an amateur. Joao told him he had seen better tattoos on convicts. Joao also had a tattoo on his right upper arm showing a winged angel, with the motto ACCEPT NO LIMITS on unfurled scrolls. It was also less than fantastically well drawn, but it was a work of art compared to Kevin’s.

  After a lengthy discussion of tattoos, they decided Kevin’s should be re-done, reshaped so that the continent would look like the real thing, all in black, but with a single red tear coming out of South Africa and spilling on to his arm. The tear would somehow signify Kevin’s own pain as well as the pain of those whom he had photographed. They laughed that it would at least look better than his current tattoo. The pilot, who was trying to sleep in the adjoining tent, pleaded with them to keep quiet. They lowered their voices, noticing that dawn was not far off - they could hear the sounds of workers preparing breakfast.

  Two hours later, their plane touched down in the tiny southern Sudanese hamlet of Ayod. It taxied to a halt at the end of the dirt airstrip and the pilot turned the plane in to position for a quick take-off, should it prove necessary. Half-way through the turn the front of the little plane lurched to an abrupt halt. They climbed out and saw that the front wheel had sunk into thick sand and the plane was stuck. It was nothing serious, the plane was undamaged, and they had started to push it out of the beach-like sand when they saw the massive cargo plane approaching. The cargo plane was making its approach for descent. Fortunately, dozens of Sudanese had come to greet the plane, the sound of aircraft meant food, and they quickly helped to wheel the little plane off the runway, averting what could have become a complicated situation.

  As the cargo plane landed, its giant propellers raised a storm of sand and pebbles. The Sudanese crouched low alongside the runway, braving the hot, stinging blasts to be nearer the food. There is never enough food in these circumstances to feed everyone and the hungry villagers rushed the plane to try to ensure that they got their share of nutritious biscuits and maize meal. Those too weak to get to the runway had to rely on the aid workers for food. Some 200 metres from the runway, a low brick building from which the food aid was distributed stood out among the surrounding conical huts made of long thatching grass. That was Ayod. The first food consignment after months without aid attracted a pushing crowd of hungry Sudanese. They wore patched rags or walked around naked. Mothers who had joined the throng waiting for food left their children on the sandy ground nearby. The small food aid building also served as a clinic and was full of ill and starving people. There were those who needed special care if they were to survive, and others that could only be comforted before they died. Kevin and Joao separated. There were pictures everywhere. Once in a while, Kevin would seek out Joao to tell him about something shocking he had just photographed. In one of those foul-smelling rooms, Joao saw a skinny child lying spread-eagled on the dirt floor. It was dark and he struggled with the light, trying to get a frame. Kevin joined him and went down on to his knees to shoot the picture; he then looked up at Joao, wide-eyed. Despite all the happy anticipation of the night before, all the excitement had disappeared now that he was witnessing the effects of the war-induced famine.

  Joao left the room. He wanted to find rebel soldiers who could take him to someone in authority. Their plane would take off in an hour and they needed to secure rebel permission to stay on. Joao found a group of fighters. They were dressed in rags, the only indication that they were indeed soldiers were the AK-47 assault rifles hanging limply from their shoulders. Kevin joined Joao and they tried talking to a rebel with deep traditional scars etched vertically on his cheeks, but the fighter spoke no English and communication rapidly broke down. They kept frozen grins on their faces as they tried to mime their way through the conversation. The only thing that was apparent was that the rebel had developed an interest in Kevin’s wristwatch. Somehow, Kevin gave the rebel his watch. Joao was surprised, but understood Kevin to be giving the soldier the cheap watch in an effort to ease his conscience about all those hungry people he could not help - or to secure goodwill to help them get across to the fighting.

  They separated again. Joao photographed a half-naked man walking past him, completely oblivious to the white stranger. He went back inside the clinic complex, where he was told that permission to stay had to be obtained from the rebel commander, Riek Mashar, who could most probably be found at Kongor. This was good news; their little UN plane was heading there next.

  Joao left the cool of the clinic and returned to the harsh sun and headed in the general direction of the runway, to where he had last seen Kevin. He came across a child lying on its face under the hot sun - he took a picture. Joao assumed the child had been left there by its mother while she went for food. He moved on to where he could see a man on all fours, digging at the arid soil with a hand tool of some sort, trying to plant seeds in the desiccated ground, hoping that the rains would ultimately arrive. Kevin had seen Joao and was coming towards him, moving fast, frantic. ‘Man,’ he put one hand on Joao’s shoulder, the other covered his eyes. ‘You won’t believe what I’ve just shot!’ He was wiping his eyes, but there were no tears, it was as if he was trying to obliterate the memory of what he had photographed, of what was burnt on to his retina.

  Joao gave him a look. He didn’t like this ‘I-shot-shit’ at the best of times, much less when he had not seen any outstanding picture opportunities, but Kevin continued, not even noticing his friend’s sceptical look. ‘I was shooting this kid on her knees, and then changed my angle, and suddenly there was this vulture right behind her!’ Kevin was excited now, and talking fast. ‘And I just kept shooting - shots lots of film!’ His arms were all over the place, as they usually were when he was recounting something exciting.

  Joao perked up, ‘Where?’ looking around, hoping to catch up on this amazing-sounding scene. If it were still there, he needed to shoot it. ‘Right here!’ Kevin said, pointing frantically fifty
metres in front of them. Joao could see a child lying face down on the dry, grey-brown soil. The child looked similar to the one Joao had photographed a little earlier, but there had been no vulture near it then, and there was none now. ‘I’ve just finished chasing the vulture away!’ Kevin’s eyes were wild, he was speaking too fast, and losing words. He kept wiping at his eyes with the green bandanna he wore around his neck. ‘I see all this, and all I can think of is Megan.’ He lit a cigarette and dragged hard, getting more emotional by the second, the thin grey smoke disappearing into the air. ‘I can’t wait to hug her when I get home.’

  Joao sensed immediately that he had missed out on a big moment, and, imagining what the picture would look like from Kevin’s description, knew his own take was going to look bad. Joao consoled himself with the thought that Kevin always got overly excited. He, on the other hand, had nothing to get excited about at all. But he was prepared to wait and see the pictures, being used to watching Kevin get electrified about images that sometimes turned out to be very average. Minutes later, they were back in the plane and leaving Ayod behind.

  Kevin was telling Rob and the pilot all about the moment he had just experienced and how it made him feel, and that all he could think of was his own fortunate young daughter back home. He repeated how much he looked forward to seeing her, to hugging and kissing her. ‘Just five minutes in Sudan and he is blabbering about how terrible it is and how he’d never seen anything like it, all because of war,’ Joao thought. Up in the air, away from the realities, Kevin’s mood improved and he seemed a little happier. The realization of what he had shot was seeping in, for both Kevin and Joao. Joao sat quietly in his seat, withdrawn, disappointed and wishing he were elsewhere. The flies that had persistently followed them at the camp took off with them, making themselves at home in the plane. ‘So far my prediction is right,’ muttered Joao miserably to himself; he felt he had nothing but pictures of some hungry kids and half-naked men with guns. ‘Flies and skinny people.’