Motivated by compassion

By ESTELLE SARNEY

Shortly after Feilding man Alan Johnson arrived in northern Iraq, he was taken to investigate one of the minefields he was there to help to clear.

The driver stopped the four-wheel-drive vehicle in the middle of a paddock and he and two other local members of the team got out one side. Johnson climbed out the other.

They stood looking at each other, until Johnson asked them: "So where's the minefield?"

The driver replied: "You're in it."

"We had quite a lengthy chat about that episode," recalls Johnson wryly.

The 38-year-old has spent the past two years as a survey officer with the United Nations Mine Action Programme, based in the city of Arbil, in northern Iraq.

He is in charge of 85 people, and his survey teams visit villages to gather information about minefields in their area before other teams move in to clear them.

Information on the mines' socio-economic impact, such as how many families carry the burden of members injured by mines, and whether minefields block access to grazing land or water supplies, goes towards allocating assistance such as victim support and mine awareness activities.

Johnson was about to seek discharge from the New Zealand Army after 20 years service as a combat engineer, including missions with the UN to Cambodia and Bosnia, when he heard about his current job through friends who had also left the Army to pursue similar work.

He was interested in working in the Middle East, particularly Iraq, because of its history and culture.

His wife, Diane, and their children, Lauren, 12, and Connor, 8, could have been housed in Amman, in Jordan, but the family decided they would remain in New Zealand. Johnson usually works for three months, then travels home for one month.

"I have to take my hat off to Diane," he says. "It's hard being away from loved ones for such protracted periods, and she's done an excellent job of looking after practically everything for the past two years."

Living in a Muslim country where there is a constant threat of terrorist bombings has its limitations when it comes to fun - almost no movement is allowed after dark and there are no cinemas, pubs or clubs to go to anyway.

Westerners must be careful where and how they consume alcohol. They can't drive anywhere without a UN driver, and can't visit most parts of the countryside in case they stray into an unmarked minefield.

Despite the hardships, Johnson is glad he grabbed this job opportunity when it appeared.

"It is a huge experience, both culturally and historically," he says. "Everyone is working toward a common goal."

Eventually, Johnson would like to gain a tertiary qualification in management or human resources to work back in New Zealand.

"Working in a foreign country within a multicultural organisation like the UN, I've developed a high degree of flexibility and good planning and problem-solving skills.

"Leadership and teamwork are important. I've had to integrate with local staff as well as expatriates."

Noisy children are a joy to Heather MacLeod, who will never forget the fearful silence of a transit centre for children separated from their families in Rwanda.

"The children were not talking, playing or laughing," recalls MacLeod, 42, the Washington-based director for child protection with World Vision International.

"Many people in Rwanda saw the only solution for caring for orphans was to put them in an orphanage, but I had just come from working in the worst of orphanages in Romania, and I focused strongly on reuniting children with their extended family.

"I remember one girl who had not seen her family for three years, and when they were reunited they were all so thrilled. These are the times I know my work is worthwhile."

MacLeod trained as a nurse in Christchurch and worked in Auckland hospitals, where she came into contact with children who had been abused.

She felt called to help to protect children from physical and social harm. In 1991 she joined World Vision and travelled to Romania to work as a nurse in an orphanage.

"The children were aged from newborns to 3 years old. Most had been abandoned and 25 per cent were HIV positive.

"Some 1-year-olds had never been out of the building. I started a volunteer programme through the local churches, so the children could be taken for walks to the park.

"At first they were overwhelmed, but gradually came to enjoy having more human and outdoor contact."

In 1994, MacLeod moved on to Rwanda and remained in Africa, while also supporting World Vision work in Albania and Kosovo, until last year when she took up her current position in Washington.

Now she spends half the year in the office advising on how to increase child protection in communities around the world, and training staff in how to take children's needs into account in their projects. The other half is spent travelling to run training courses, meetings and do field visits.

She has no family with her, but enjoys coming back to Auckland to visit her parents, siblings, nieces and nephews.

"I could never have planned this career ahead of time and working overseas has impacted on me immensely," she says.

"Each new job has built on the experiences of previous jobs. Now I'm enjoying the facilitation of training with the focus on children, so I'll probably stay in this sort of work."

For as long as he can remember, David Murphy has loved animals. Even as a child he became aware of the impact of humans on the survival of many species, and grew up wanting to help conserve them.

Today he is in Vietnam, observing the nocturnal activities of Siamese crocodiles one week, tracking the rare Javanese rhino the next.

As a conservation biologist at the Cat Tien National Park, the 27-year-old says he's gaining personal fulfilment and professional development.

"I wanted to do a job that would stretch me, and I wanted to work outside New Zealand, somewhere that was on the edge of conservation work. I was lucky to find this job, through Volunteer Service Abroad," he says.

In 1999, he completed a Master of Science degree with first-class honours in zoology from Canterbury University, then took on short-term contracts with the university, Canterbury Museum and the Christchurch City Council.

He was trawling the internet for jobs when he came across VSA programmes around the world, and registered his interest with the organisation in New Zealand. Within three months he was off to Vietnam on a two-year posting. He has six months left.

As well as monitoring wildlife, Murphy also manages conservation projects, undertakes research, writes reports and articles, develops project proposals, manages data and ensures skills are transferred to his local counterparts by working alongside park staff.

He wants to make sure his Vietnamese colleagues can continue the work he's helped to start once he's gone. He's become used to living in humid jungle, but still misses friends and family back in New Zealand.

He returns every nine months for a couple of weeks. The only expatriates he works with are two people from Holland, one from Portugal and a consultant from Thailand, so has become conversant in Vietnamese.

"The variety of work I've gained experience in here would have taken me years to attain in New Zealand," says Murphy.

* Next week: we profile more flying Kiwis and suggest how you could follow in their footsteps.