China Box

1

1By noon on 9/11, State was no longer in the counterterrorism racket.

We had no handlers in the field, no local Joes passing us secrets, no remote-controlled sabotage devices.

Other intelligence agencies let us come to the table because they hoped we were right when we said we were smarter than the bad guys.

On 9/11, they laughed us out of the room.

Some of my colleagues protested. Their explanations didn’t change their fates.

Like the rest of us, they were quietly posted to diplomatic backwaters far from Foggy Bottom.

Seventh-floor thinking was that if our failure was less visible to Congress, State Department funding would not be drastically slashed.

Human resources suggested strongly that I put my intelligence analysis career on hold and resume the admin duties I’d originally signed up for.

I’d been a first-time budget officer at the Warsaw embassy when I fell in love with a Polish double agent.

It was 1986, three years before the Cold War ended and terrorists targeting Westerners were holed up behind the Iron Curtain where we couldn’t get at them.

Stefan Krajewski could. He was part of the Polish spy apparatus though he secretly worked for the Danes. He’d drawn me into his arms and his fight against terrorism.

After I finished up in Poland, I did my bit mostly from the US.

When Stefan was murdered in 2000, I lost the heart for it. After the twin towers tumbled to the ground, I knew I’d lost my touch, too.

I did what human resources wanted.

I went back to admin.

For more than a decade, I’ve divided my time between Port Moresby and Colombo and other former Brit colonial capitals accustomed to clapped-out civil servants drinking their way to retirement.

Dhaka’s my home at the moment. In a midget embassy, I handle little management problems.

Local staff get their pay hikes, American Foreign Service Officers get their perks, and buildings are up to code. I pride myself that the smoke alarms in all government housing work perfectly.

One helpless bachelor admin assistant in the political section called me at nine o’clock last night because he set off his alarm. I drove over to his place and removed the battery.

Munched on charred popcorn and sipped herbal tea with him and his cats until the smoke cleared. Reinserted and tested the battery before I left.

One thing’s for damn sure. Nobody else will die on my watch.

I’m no wonder woman. Still, I do my best to harden the target.

Luckily, Americans in Dhaka, Bangladesh are not high on the terrorist hit-list.

But none of us who work abroad are safe. This week, our embassy in Malaysia warned folks to stay off one of the main streets in Kuala Lumpur.

Claimed they had credible information regarding a potential terrorist act. Apparently arising from the arrest last month of several militants connected to the Islamic State.

KL is sixteen hundred miles from Dhaka. Four hours by plane. A decent distance.

Nothing to get excited about.

I haven’t been excited for a long time. Could be why, at the close of my dry-as-dust workday, I’m thirsty as hell.

This September evening, I claim my usual small wicker table in the American Club of Dhaka, five minutes late for the start of happy hour.

Above me, the slowly turning overhead fan slaps humid air so gently it doesn’t disturb a strand of my gray-blond hair.

Before 9/11, I hadn’t served in south Asia. Few things I encounter in Bangladesh force me to recall my former life.

The local cuisine smells and tastes new. Some vegetation looks vaguely familiar, but gardening has never been my thing.

It’s the damn overhead fan that ambushes me. The play of air on bare skin takes me back to steamy nights on my first assignment in Central America when I was young, idealistic, and horny.

I am none of those now. When the fan’s slapping blades sing their siren song, I shut down my hearing.

I inhale a deep breath and smell tomatoes and garlic.

Saved by a nose.

Wednesdays, the club hosts its weekly spaghetti feed. The Bangladeshi sauce tastes different every week. I try to guess what they’ve added. Black cumin is my favorite. Cashews were interesting but didn’t go as well with tomatoes.

Wicker squeaks when I settle into the floral-patterned cushions on the chair, my back to the wall.

An old habit I stick with. A good view of the entrance is useful for an admin officer, too. Makes it easier to avoid any disgruntled government employee trying to interrupt happy hour with a complaint.

A gay red cloth tops the table and I trace the gaudy blue and gold design with a fingertip, enjoying the silky feel. The cloth was embroidered by a Bangladeshi woman skilled in needlework.

Legions of the less-skilled churn out cheap ready-to-wear for the Western world. I saw my first garment industry sweatshop in war-torn El Salvador.

Two decades later, conditions in Dhaka have not improved.

Piecing together clothing is as dangerous in the developing world as it was in Manhattan during the early 1900s when one hundred and forty-six women died at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory.

The Dhaka women made the unstructured white cotton blazer I wear over my T-shirt and slacks to signal that I’m an admin officer who has her act together. The yellow curry stain lurking in a crevice on my rolled-up sleeve undercuts the message.

To say I give a s**t would be overstating my enthusiasm for putting up a good front.

Luckily, no droplets of sauce landed on the page I was reading in A Passage to India.

Lunching at my desk, I always have a book in front of me. I try hard to protect it, too.

I glance toward the bar, searching for the pudgy bartender. The man’s Bangla name means “victorious in war.”

Most of my colleagues shorten it to an American-sounding nickname. I think he deserves better.

I trained myself to say all three syllables. At this moment, though, Samarjit is not in sight.

My eyes narrow and I feel my forehead throb. My daily gin dose is overdue.

Movement near the entrance draws my eye.

A stooped senior citizen limps toward me. The oldster wears a blue and white seersucker suit that looks more worn-out than he is.

The face is bonier than I remember and the skin on his cheeks veers from reddish-brown to pearly-white.

The white mane has shrunk and thinned, leaving an equally marbled bald spot atop his head and a wispy fringe on the sides.

The man has not aged well. Still, I recognize him.

Not that recalling his name is much of a feat.

Three times last week, Holger Sorensen tried to get in touch with me. I didn’t respond.

Today, he’s here.

And bored as I am, I won’t be able to stop myself from asking why.