Tuareg in prison and broken bones

Sidi was due to arrive in our new car the day after the others came down on the bus. He stayed to do the second distribution of millet for the Niger Food Relief campaign of the Boston University Niger Program Alumni. He was to arrive with our cook, Aboli who would handle feeding the whole crowd (by now 18 students). It is a long 14-16 hour drive so I knew he would not arrive until late, but at least the two students he was going to bring would only miss the first day. I was not sure who was to be coming with him, but when Djibril and Moussa did not arrive with the others I was chagrined. Djibril was envisioned to be the head of our new solar energy enterprise because is has an advanced education in solar energy, but was never able to tolerate living in the city in order to get work in his field…so he went back to life as a nomad, had a family and herds camels. He, like many of the nomads in the region likes to travel around the region and has started doing that on a motorcycle.
Sidi did not show up that second night so I started making calls. No news. The third day still no news. By this time I am not sleeping out of nervousness… and running left and right trying to feed the students. (They eventually started cooking for themselves.) Finally early the third morning I reached someone in Agadez who heard that they left the day before. Not long after, Sidi called. He was in Taouha, about 4 hours south of Agadez and being detained on suspicion of being part of the terrorist group that recently took 7 hostages in Arlit. After all it was a car with four turbaned men driving and the car only had temporary traveling papers signed by the governor of Agadez, very suspicious. He said not to worry it would work out. They arrived about 5 in the evening of the third day and I got all the news. They had been held in prison the night before to give the authorities time to verify the veracity of the papers of the car. Finally in the morning after speaking to the governor, who was furious at the governor of Taouha for not recognizing his papers, they were allowed to proceed.
Then the rest of the news emerged. Djibril had not come with the rest because while driving his motorcycle late at night in the tall grass his headlight suddenly went out and he hit a rock before he could slow down and went flying. When he landed he seriously fractured his left arm just above the wrist. This happened twelve days before and the arms was very swollen and looking a bit crooked. He had treated it traditionally with a wood splint. Sidi had tracked him down at his camp to bring him along for the formation. He was going to go ahead, but it was obvious he was in pain so I told him I would call a new friend at the CURE hospital in Niamey. Dr. Skankey had discovered this new American opereated facility which was set to open in October and developed a dialogue with them to see about collaboration in ordering medicines for our clinic and referring patients in need of surgery to them. I called Gary Roark who told me that their specialist would see him that afternoon and to get an xray first. We did and when the xray was seen the specialist said that he would need an operation or be handicapped for the rest of his life. The hospital was not yet set up to operate so he referred us to another specialist who saw him the next day, agreed with the diagnosis and scheduled the operation for next Thursday. This was a miracle for Djibril. First, he very likely would never have come all the way to Niamey if he had not been coming for our solar program. If he had, without the reference from CURE, he would have waited at least three months to be seen–by then the operation would have been more difficult if not impossible. Dr. Bob Skankey, you have met this man at our Tamesna clinic, and he knows what you have indirectly done for him. I hope this gives you some satisfaction that even though you are unable to do our planned medical mission you have still–from 5,000 miles away–managed to heal.