My Experience Working For Doctors Without Borders

When I heard that Doctors Without Borders, also called Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), was looking for a physician to work in a refugee camp in Sri Lanka, I offered my services.

One of the MSF staff who was recruiting for Sri Lanka interviewed me in her office in Paris, France:

“We need somebody to replace a physician who is completely burned out in Madhu refugee camp. This is a 27,000 people refugee camp in the North of Sri Lanka. Madhu is a sacred area in Tamil territory controlled by Tamil Tigers. We are on good terms with the army and with the Tigers at this time, but they are fighting each other in a civil war. We are neutral. If you accept this mission, you will have to leave as soon as possible. You will first fly into Colombo which is full of tourists, then, you’ll be transferred to the North of the Island which is in the civil war area and closed to tourists. Would you accept to go there and if so, how soon can you leave?”

In 1991, I had just left my private medical practice in Paris, France. I was ready for a new adventure. I accepted right away.

After the whole evening talking to my parents about my future mission, we determined that it would be a very easy one and probably not a dangerous one. The future proved us all wrong…

The flight to the largest town of Sri Lanka, Colombo, was very pleasurable and it was great to arrive in a tourist area. As I got off the plane, I was shocked to feel how hot it was. I usually love hot weather. The hotter the better; but this was really hot, barely tolerable for me.

After I picked up my luggage, I saw a man holding a large sign above his head. The sign said “Doctors without Borders.” I went straight to him. He said “Are you doctor Chris Gilbert?” I said yes. His face lightened up and with a great big smile showing beautiful white teeth on a very dark face, he said “Welcome to Colombo.” He then grabbed my luggage and took me to his car. One hour later we stopped in front of 24/4 Guildford Crescent. I recognized the MSF logo. I was “home."

The house was big with a lot of rooms. In most of the rooms were two or three beds. I was taken to a room with three beds. Only one of the beds was not occupied. I put my suitcase on it then proceeded to the bathroom to freshen up. It was hot!

I then went downstairs where I met the local chief of the mission, Henry. He said: "We’ll try to get you on your way to Anuradhapura tomorrow and then Madhu the day after tomorrow. In Anuradhapura, Isabelle, one of your nurses from Madhu will meet you and will take you to Madhu. Sylvie, the physician you are replacing, is very tired and she needs some rest. The sooner we get you there, the better. In the meantime, dinner is ready! Let’s go eat!”

I followed Henry to the dining room where a large table was set up with around 10 people sitting there already. He introduced me to everybody. Everybody was very nice, and dinner was simply delicious. This was my first contact with Sri Lankan food, and I loved it immediately.

After a hot night, at 6 a.m. the following day, I was ready to go. The same chauffeur that picked me up at the airport was there. He smiled at me with a great “good morning doctor,” put my luggage in the trunk and opened the door for me. It was the beginning of a great adventure.

A few hours later, we arrived in Anuradhapura. We went to a beautiful colonial style hotel. This is where I met Isabelle for the first time. She was a little younger than me, from Paris too, very nice and cute. She had been working in Madhu for 3 months and had just come to Anuradhapura to pick me up and start telling me about my new work. She said there were a lot of sick people in Madhu refugee camp and Sylvie was the only physician there, on call 24/7. We needed to get there as soon as possible. I couldn’t agree more. It was great to finally meet somebody I would be working with on an everyday basis. I immediately felt comfortable with Isabelle.

Since it was getting late, we spent the night in this hotel and had a great dinner. It was the last tourist town before entering the war zone. The hotel was very big with a great colonial rich architecture. We were the only ones for dinner and probably the only ones in the hotel. Our rooms were big and very comfortable. I slept well that night, happy to be in Sri Lanka.

The following day, at 6:00am, we checked out of the hotel and our chauffeur took us to Vavuniya which was at the border of the war zone. There, men from the Sinhalese army stopped us. They were heavily armed. They told us we couldn’t go any further. Isabelle talked to them trying to convince them to let us go further north. They still refused.

After one hour of pleading, they finally relented. We quickly got back to our car and went on our way thinking they might change their mind if we weren’t fast enough.

We were entering a civil war zone! I was thrilled. My eyes were wide open! After 2 hours of driving, we saw seeing people running. They were local people running away from where we were going. The more we drove, the more people we saw running the opposite direction. This didn’t look good! That’s when I saw the first Tamil Tigers. They were 10 then 20 then at least one hundred. They were not walking the same direction as the other people. They were going the same direction as us. Most of them were very young. I looked closely and was astonished: They were children! Heavily armed! 8 to 17 years old! They looked friendly, looking at our vehicle and smiling at us. They looked so young and innocent! We were overtaking them quickly. That is when I got really worried! Something didn’t look right! I had a bad premonition.

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As we continued advancing, suddenly, there was nobody else on the road. Then one mile further, we were stopped by heavily armed men. I looked more closely. My God, this was the Sinhalese army! But didn’t we just see more than one hundred Tamil Tigers heading our way? I got really scared. The army refused to let us go any further. They looked like very nice people, young also, smiling easily. We tried to plead but it was useless.

During the time Isabelle was pleading with them, I was constantly looking back. The Tamil Tigers were for sure going to arrive soon and we might be caught between the Sinhalese army and the Tamil Tigers. We had to get out of the danger zone! Isabelle turned around to tell me: “We have to go back to Vavuniya! They are refusing to let us go any further.” I told her that it was fine with me but that we had to hurry. The Tamil Tigers would be here soon. We hopped back in our vehicle and turned around.

After five minutes on our way back, our driver stopped and told us to get out of the vehicle. I couldn’t understand why. Suddenly I saw a quarter mile ahead of us about one hundred Tigers. They had their guns and bazookas in their hands and were aiming at us. They had stopped and more and more Tigers were arriving behind them and joining them. Our driver gave us a white flag and an MSF flag and told us to start walking towards them. He was going to follow us driving our vehicle. We did what he said. As I started walking slowly towards the Tamil Tigers who had us at gunpoint, I wasn’t scared any more. I recognized the children who were smiling at us an hour ago. As we came closer, they recognized us too and stopped pointing their guns at us. They smiled at us again. They were so young and beautiful.

After we passed them, we went back in our vehicle and started heading towards Vavuniya again. 15 minutes later, we heard gun shots, many gun shots, too many gun shots… Tears came down my eyes. I couldn’t stop those tears, thinking that the kids I just saw, the ones that were smiling at us were killing and being killed. They were fighting the army which was made of young men equally nice and friendly. I had never been on a war front before. To walk from the army who were smiling at us to the Tigers who were also smiling at us, leave and then hear 15 minutes later that they are shooting at each other was terrible!

We, MSF, were neutral; we had friendly relationships with the army and also with the Tigers. Our goal was to protect the population, women and children who were defenseless. I had to stay calm.

I was young and untouchable. I felt safe. I didn’t even get scared until…

Read Part 2.

This contains excerpts from my memoir “The French Stethoscope”

Copyright Chris Gilbert MD, PhD