Land of Promise

by James Wesley, Rawles

  I hold a Thai passport. The other adults here hold an assortment of passports: Six from Pakistan, two from the Philippines, one from the UAE, two from Egypt, two from India, one from Jordan, one from Indonesia, and one from Russia. Our children’s passports are as follows: Three from Pakistan, three from Kazakhstan, one from Egypt, and four with no passports whatsoever, two of whom are infants.

  To make matters worse, eight of our work visas have expired, or will expire in the next few months, and three of our passports (including mine) are beyond their expiry dates. Two more passports will expire soon.

  The only remaining French representative with a diplomatic passport, who in effect “held the keys” to this outpost of France, died of liver failure in the Astana hospital last week. He drank himself to death. The embassy grounds are still presumably on sovereign French soil, but without a French diplomat here, the Kazakhs see us as interlopers or even as squatters.

  The Kazakhs are eyeing us with increasing suspicion, yet they refuse to deport us or provide us with passports or any means to leave the country. They have completely severed the Internet connection to the country, condemning it as “a portal for immorality, infidel corruption, and Alga Party subversion.” They call us “The Christian Devils.” They regularly accuse us of Sharia violations, mostly fictitious, but a serious charge nonetheless. Several of us have been beaten and whipped. Last week, one of our single Pakistani women was out shopping in the market for staple foods and was stopped by a Sharia Courtesy Patrol and accused of wearing a face veil that was too brightly colored. It was, you see, medium brown instead of the prescribed dark brown or black. She was whipped repeatedly with a barbed whip. This left her shoulders bloodied, and the back of her dress was shredded. Then, to add insult to injury, as she began painfully walking back to the former French compound, she was stopped by another Sharia patrol (from a different madras), and again detained, this time for having “exposed skin” — yes, it was her exposed and bloodied back. They handcuffed her, beat her, locked her in the boot of a patrol car, and brought her to a small police station for interrogation. There, the three Sharia policemen beat her and raped her 11 times over the next 48 hours. Then they dumped her on our doorstep and sped away.

  I implore you to help us. I believe that you are our only hope. Please, I beg you, help us find a country willing to issue passports and offer us sanctuary. I cannot over-emphasize the gravity of our situation.

  With Abiding Faith In Christ, Grace Wattanapanit

  When Alan read that letter, he was moved nearly to tears. He said, “That old woman’s situation proves that we, the Ilemis, can make a difference.”

  Mark Mtume simply said, “Then go.”

  Twenty-six hours later, Alan Pilcher was aboard Tulloch Air Transport’s IL-76 “Charles” en route via Tel Aviv. He had with him 75 sets of blank passport forms and one of their newly-acquired compact passport printing and binding sets. Aside from Alan, the only passengers were two Israeli Magen David Adom (MDA) aid workers out of Lake Turkana who needed a free hop back to Israel. MDA was associated with the International Red Cross/Red Crescent parent federation. The plane was carrying less than half its potential cargo capacity. Their paid cargo, which was scarcely enough to pay for their fuel but emitted a strong, pleasant aroma , was 180 large boxes of Kenyan tea and 144 sacks of coffee beans ordered by Cérémonie Tea, a coffee and tea blending and reselling company that was a venture of Kibbutz HaEmek in the western Jezreel Valley in northern Israel. Their flight to Israel would take six hours and was quite familiar to the TAT crew.

  Once on the ground at Ben Gurion, they had a nine-hour stop to unload the tea and coffee, disembark the two Israelis, refuel, and rest. Rest was needed because they did not bring any relief pilots. While the cargo shifting was in progress, Tulloch took a “power nap.” Alan also did his best to sleep but found that he slept better while flying than with the plane on the ground. Their subsequent flight to Astana was 2,227 miles and took nearly seven hours.

  Rather than complicating their layover with a hotel stay, Tulloch and his crew planned to refuel and simply wait onboard the plane. There were many fully reclining passenger seats available for sleeping.

  Tulloch was amazed at the absurdly low state-subsidized price of one Global Caliphate Dinar (GCD) per liter of fuel. Tulloch roared, “I should have brought a tanker!”

  Diplomatic passage through customs is usually cursory, but in this case it was a 40-minute process because none of the customs officials had heard of the new Ilemi Republic. It took several phone calls to straighten things out. Now with a befuddled Kazakh Customs officer as his escort, Alan was taken by cab to the French embassy on Barayeva Street. After unloading his Pelican case, the cab driver consulted briefly with his escort in rapid-fire Kazakh. The two then drove away, without asking Alan for any fare.

  Pilcher felt very much like a stranger in a strange land as he wheeled his Pelican case behind him up to the embassy. A crisp French tri-color flag still few on an angled staff. The guardhouse in front was unoccupied, so he proceeded to the main door. Beneath tarnished brass plaques that read Ambassade de France and L’ancienne Légation de France there was hand-printed sign with an arrow pointing to a doorbell button. The sign was written in three languages: Kazakh, Russian, and French. Pilcher recognized the last line, in French: “Veuillez sonner la cloche pour le service.”

  A wide-eyed 12-year old Kazakh boy answered the bell. He was wearing jeans and a faded Terminator 7 promotional T-shirt.

  Alan asked, “Parle-vous Anglais?”

  The excited boy answered, “Oui.”

  Alan said very slowly and distinctly, “I am looking for Mrs. Grace --”

  The boy interrupted, “Waiting here, please,” and darted away.

  A beautiful young Eurasian woman came to the door a minute later. She was dressed in a hijab and carried a niqab face veil, in case she had to don it in a hurry.

  She smiled and said, “Welcome to the French Legation.”

  Alan said quickly, “My name is Alan Pilcher. I am a Roving Ambassador from the newly formed Christian Ilemi Republic. I’m here to escort your contingent out of the country.”

  The young woman exclaimed, “An answer to prayer! We heard on the shortwave that Reverend Mtume is now President Mtume.” She started to cry.

  Alan asked hesitantly: “Ca… Can you please direct me to Mrs. Grace Wattanapanit?”

  The woman was now sobbing, and her speech became difficult to understand as she answered, “Yes, I can, I mean, that is… me.”

  “I’m sorry, did you say that you are Grace?”

  “Yes, yes, I am Grace.”

  “Oh! From your letter, I’d expected you were elderly.”

  “I am sorry if I’m not who…”

  “No, not at all. In fact I’m delighted!” He gulped, and then added, “I brought everything we need to create new passports for every Christian here at the embassy who is seeking asylum. And I have a large chartered jet airplane waiting to decamp your entire party at Astana International.”

  Grace looked as if she would faint. Rallying, she stammered, “C-come in!”

  Alan was escorted to a conference room. Soon, all of the senior staff was there, and Alan learned some recent details of their predicament. Grace explained that there were now 35 Christians living in the embassy compound. All but one of the seven recent arrivals were native-born Kazakh Christians who had recently come under intense persecution. The seventh new arrival was Dr. Aziz Darzi, an internal medicine specialist with Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), also known as Doctors Without Borders. He was a Kurdish Christian. She also said they had heard rumors that there might be an assault on the French embassy buildings within a few days, once arrangements and payment were made by the looters for the local police to “be elsewhere” at the time of the assault.

  Alan, alarmed at this news, declared, “Well, then everyone should begin packing, and we’ll start making everyone Ilemi passports, straightaway!”

 
Pilcher immediately unlocked the waterproof Pelican case and pulled out the digital camera, tripod, white backdrop cloth, laser printer, and a heat laminator. With a couple of adaptors, all of the passport-making equipment could be operated on either 120 or 220 volt AC power and included a set of adapter power plugs that made it usable in almost any country. The heat laminators were each about the size of a paperback book, and the printer was about twice the size of a laptop computer. The full ensemble of passport-making equipment fit in the Pelican case, which was the size of a large suitcase.

  Dr. Darzi was one of the first to get a passport. He told his story as Alan worked. Darzi said that two weeks earlier, he had transited Astana International airport while en route to Tajikistan after working for 17 months in Turkmenistan, but he made the mistake of spending a week in and around Astana, touring local sites. When he went to check in for his flight to Tajikistan, Kazakh state security police, on suspicion that he was a spy, interrogated him. They seized his passport and ordered him to wait at the Marriott Astana Hotel. Without a passport, he was essentially under house arrest, and he spent a frustrating week at the hotel hampered by the lack of an Internet connection. He occupied most of his time attempting to make international telephone calls, with no success. The cavernous hotel had just a handful of other guests, mostly Russian, and by their behavior and dress, Darzi suspected that they were somehow connected to the Bratva -- the Russian Mafia. Once his cash began to run low, he made inquiries with the state police. Without any explanation they deposited him at the former French embassy.

  One of the cooks who had experience with digital photography took the required photos, while Alan and Grace worked together to transcribe information and assemble the passports. Meanwhile, one of the cooks made arrangements to charter two busses to carry the 35 people, two dogs, and one pet parrot to the airport.

  Even though Alan delegated a lot of the work, it took a marathon session of 15 hours to produce the 35 passports. He also had to print 35 generic visas. He fueled his effort with Irn-Bru32 energy drinks from Scotland and Mango Tango flavor Mule Bars from England -- his favorites. He had plentiful supplies of both.

  As Alan was completing the passport for Dr. Darzi, the young doctor offered, “I don’t want to complicate your plan, but the state security officers wouldn’t give me any straight answers. When I asked them about my status two days ago, they said, ‘You are not being detained, but your passport is still detained.’ These Kazakhs are very hard to figure out.”

  Alan said, “I’ve already prayed about this. I’ll go ahead and issue you a passport and a visa. But I think it would be wise for you to travel separately from the rest of the group who are flying out tomorrow. We’ll leave you at the Marriott hotel overnight. Take another flight, a commercial flight, the following morning to the destination of your choice. I assume that you will want to return to Kurdistan, but remember that the door is always open for you in the Ilemi Republic. I’m giving you 5,000 NEuros in cash. There is no need for you to repay it. Just consider it a gift, in the spirit of Christian brotherhood.”

  Packing up for their upcoming departure was frenzied, requiring the rest of the day and well into the night. Everyone seemed to be sorting their possessions into piles, continually evaluating and deciding what to winnow out as nonessential. After living for so long at the legation building, the residents had more clothes than room available in their suitcases. A concerted search yielded only a few spare suitcases left behind by the French embassy staff. It was Grace who came up with the idea of packing bundles of clothes in French flags. There had been a large stack of brand new nylon flags left behind. These were all two meters long and, when tied at their corners, made fairly practical clothing bundles. Nametags were attached to their corner grommets.

  They were all ready to go at dawn the next morning. While they were boarding the busses, a crowd of locals gathered and began to taunt the refugees; as soon as the busses pulled away from the legation complex, the crowd swarmed in to loot the buildings.

  Passing through Astana International airport proved remarkably easy. The busses disgorged the passengers in front of the terminal, and they quickly gathered up all of their suitcases and clothing bundles. Then, with Alan Pilcher in the lead, they walked single file through the A Terminal building. The two dogs were in kennel crates, wheeled on dollies. The Kazakh Customs official looked at Alan’s diplomatic passport, gave cursory glances at each subsequent Ilemi passport, and waved them through; he did so without even stamping the passports. It was then just a short walk to the waiting IL-76. As the last of their group made their way up the plane’s mobile stairway, someone began to sing Amazing Grace. As they took their seats, they all sang, using the same tune, but only about half of them sang in English. The rest of them sang in their own languages, blending in a strange but beautiful way.

  A faint aroma of tea from the previous cargo could still be detected. Once the plane’s door was closed, Bill Tulloch announced over the plane’s intercom, “Buckle your seatbelts, ladies and gents. In approximately 19 hours, after one stop at Ben Gurion, Lord willing we will land at Tulloch Field in the Ilemi Republic.”

  The flight to Israel went by quickly, with spontaneous joyous celebration and intermittent dancing in the aisle. There were many tears and praises to God for their deliverance. Grace sat next to Alan, weeping tears of joy.

  Their stop in Israel was just 90 minutes to take on fuel and cargo. The refugees’ baggage was shifted forward, and then 70 wooden crates and 200 cardboard boxes were loaded and strapped down. The boxes and crates were unidentifiable; all original markings were obscured with dark brown paint. The flight engineer had become too talkative with one of the passengers, and less than a half hour after the plane had taken off, a whispered rumor was passed up and down the rows of passenger seats: “Those crates and boxes are filled with Galils and magazines and spare gun parts.”

  Twelve-year-old Timur Usenov, still wearing his Terminator 7 t-shirt, asked Alan, “What is a Gah-Leel?”

  Alan smiled and said, “Come on. I’ll show you.”

  He got up from his seat and walked to the rows of boxes. Opening his Chris Reeve tanto pocketknife with a flick of his wrist, he opened the top of the nearest cardboard box. He pulled out a Galil 35-round magazine in a clear plastic wrapper. He handed it to a passenger in the rear-most row of seats and said, “Please pass that up to Timur.”

  Then he walked further back to the wooden crates, and with greater difficulty unstrapped one and opened it, which necessitated removing four thumbscrews. He removed a Galil 5.56mm battle rifle from the top layer in the crate and pulled it out of its brown VCI protective wrapping paper. Out of habit, he checked its chamber to be sure that the rifle was unloaded.

  Back at his seat, he sat on the armrest, and holding the weapon by its handguard, he showed the Israeli rifle to Timur.

  The boy handed the magazine across the aisle and enthused, “That rifle so Arnie! Can you show me how you load it, Mr. Pilcher?”

  Alan removed the empty magazine from its wrapper and inserted it in the rifle’s magazine well with an audible click. He stepped out into the aisle and held the rifle over his head, grinned, and racked its action. Then he recited the motto of the IRDF: “Every Citizen a soldier; every soldier a marksman!”

  He noticed that one of the women in the refugee group gave his words a disapproving scowl, so he quoted, “… ‘But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.’ That is from Luke, Chapter 22, Verse 36.”

  After returning the rifle to its crate, he closed it, clumsily strapped it back down, and again took his seat. Grace leaned over to Alan and asked, “Can we move to the back row of seats so that I can discuss something privately?”

  “Sure.”

  As they took new seats side by side in the more isolated row, Grace said in just over a whisper, “I am not a very forward person, so this is difficult for me…”

&nb
sp; Alan looked down at his hands and self-consciously rubbed at a smudge of grease on the side of his index finger. He interrupted, “Go ahead, say what you need to say. If you think that what I just did was inappropriate or somehow offensive, then I need to hear it.”

  Grace let out a laugh, and said, “No! That isn’t what I wanted to talk with you about at all. I support the right of the people in the Ilemi Republic to defend themselves, and the right of the nation to defend itself, as a whole. We are living in perilous times, and it is very clear that the IS wants to see the Ilemi Republic and in fact all of Christendom wiped off the face of the Earth. You -- I mean we -- need to be armed and vigilant.”

  After a long pause, Grace continued, “Mr. Pilcher, after so many years of praying for rescue from my situation, I feel overwhelmed that rescue finally came. But before I find a place for myself in your new country, I need you to understand my past.”

  “Go ahead. But please, call me Alan. Mr. Pilcher is my father.”

  She continued with a trembling voice, “Alan, I have a shameful past. I am 27 years old and still a single woman. I was born in Chiang Mai, the second largest city in Thailand. My mother worked as a cook at the French consulate -- the old one on Charoen Prathet Road. My father, whose name I never mention, was a French diplomat. He lied to my mother and told her that he was going through a divorce that soon would be decreed final. But in reality his loyal wife was living in Rueil-Malmaison, thinking that their marriage was secure.”

  Alan nodded again, and Grace continued, “My father charmed and seduced her. But after my mother became pregnant, he abandoned her and requested reassignment to another country. He just vanished from her life. Once a year he sent a birthday card to my mother and enclosed 200 NEuros. Those were the only contacts we’ve ever had. I have found it very difficult to forgive him. But I have found it even more difficult to forgive and accept myself. In my heart, I will always be a bastard child.”