From a statement on racism, the narrative switches to examine how well the two communities - those affected by crises, usually in Asia or Africa and those who responded on behalf of international agencies and NGOs, usually well heeled Europeans and North Americans - understand or even recognise each other.Ĭhasing Chaos is not an account of the crises per se details of the causes and complexities are glossed over. This seemed like an uncannily apt metaphor for the central question raised by Alexander’s intimate and self-aware memoir of her years spent chasing humanitarian crises across the globe. Melanie is the Canadian volunteer who works for another organisation, six inches shorter and with cropped blonde hair as opposed to the author’s long and dark hair. When Jessica Alexander drives into a refugee camp in Rwanda, her humanitarian aid worker colleague, surrounded by newly arrived refugees from Congo, asks her: “I wonder how the mothers keep their kids apart? Don’t they all look the same to you?” Alexander doesn’t respond to the question, coloured as it is by off-hand racism: don’t all black people look the same? Later, during her work with the community, she is often addressed as ‘Mel’.
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