Steve's Proudest Moment

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Preface

Alcohol was banned in Libya but that certainly didn’t mean it wasn’t available. As happens in all “dry” countries, there was a lot of illegal distilling. In the case of Libya, the main moonshine was a booze called “flash”. Being almost 100% alcohol, flash was poisonous unless diluted with water, juice or whatever.

Steve Millard and two other teachers were driving around in the desert south of Beni Walid when they accidentally strayed into a restricted area. An army Land Rover forced them to stop and the soldiers checked the teachers’ IDs and then searched the car. Almost immediately, they found a full bottle of flash, and so they hauled Steve and the others off to the nearby military post.

It wasn’t much of a place: a few wooden buildings around the sides of a small parade ground. In the centre of the parade ground was a stone plinth on which stood a flag pole.

The teachers were taken into the main building, where they were interrogated by the commanding officer, who was a captain.

After a while, the captain left the room. He returned thirty minutes later and ordered the teachers to follow him onto the parade ground, where his sergeant had assembled the whole garrison of some 100 soldiers.

The captain proceeded to give his men a long and very spirited address in Arabic. Every so often he would say a word or brief phrase and the troops would shout it back at him several times. As Steve didn’t speak Arabic, he didn’t know what was being said, although he was a little worried that the shouts might be something like “Zionist spies!” or “Kill, kill, kill!”

When the soldiers seemed to be well worked up, the captain paused and sent his sergeant into the office. Everyone waited in hushed silence.

The sergeant returned carrying the bottle of flash. (Steve noticed that this was now only two-thirds full.)

Like a master conductor, the captain waved the bottle around in the air while the assembled troops shouted and shouted. Then, at the perfect psychological moment, he turned around and smashed the bottle against the stone plinth.

Steve couldn’t help exclaiming “Shit” in a fairly loud voice.

All 100 soldiers instantly shouted as one, “Shit! Shit! Shit!” And again, “Shit! Shit! Shit!”

Steve told me later that it was the proudest moment of his teaching life. And he claimed that the soldiers’ pronunciation was absolutely perfect.

Anyway, from that point on, everything went well. The captain, who appeared to be in a much better mood than earlier, gave the teachers tea. Then he shook hands warmly with each of them and sent them on their way.

I really wish I had been there with Steve. It must have been a transformative experience.