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On a map, central Africa seems the same as anywhere else. Countries, rivers, cities, railway lines and roads. But these countries barely even exist. Governments are powerless. Roads are grown over. The cities are sewers and the railway tracks all got stolen and melted for scrap.

Only two things really matter: guns and food. There are plenty of guns and not much food. If you don’t have both, you won’t live long.

The heat whacks you in the tunnel between the plane and the terminal. Fifty miles off the equator, your lungs need a few breaths to get used to it. My little brother, Adam, had himself in a state thinking he’d left his Gameboy on the plane. Half his stuff fell out of his pack when he unzipped it to check. All the other passengers had to step over him while he scooted around picking everything off the floor. Dad was way ahead. You always got the sense he’d be miles in front before he missed you. ‘It’s in there,’ Adam said, standing back up. He’d checked a thousand times already. He was more worried about losing the Gameboy than about all the injections before we left. Truth told, I was the one scared of injections, even though I was fifteen and Adam was only eight.

The airport was in a right state. It smelled like rotting food and piss. The carpet was all threads and crumbling black rubber. There were a few broken chairs and the TVs that showed flight information were either busted or stolen. All the shops were boarded up, but a woman in a headscarf sold fizzy drinks off a stall built from plastic crates. We caught Dad up. He was smiling, shaking the hand of an airport guide. ‘Mr Leconte, we meet again,’ Dad said. ‘These are my sons: Jake and Adam.’ ‘Ah Haaaa,’ Mr Leconte beamed. ‘Two handsome fellows.’ Mr Leconte shook our hands. His gut hung over his belt and his peach coloured shirt was covered with dark sweat patches. I’d learned the language from my parents, but the city dialect was a bit different. Mr Leconte rattled off words faster than my brain could grab them. ‘You’re almost as big as your Father,’ Mr Leconte said, looking at me. It was only true if almost as tall meant thirty centimetres shorter. My Dad was massive. When I was little Dad told me he could have been a heavyweight boxing champion if he’d wanted to. I believed him until Mum heard about it; she practically fell off her chair laughing at the thought.

‘Boys, luck is on our side today,’ Dad said. ‘Mr Leconte is the man I always hope to meet when I get off the plane.’

Dad had warned us that getting out of the airport with your luggage and dignity intact was tricky. There were soldiers, police, customs and military police, plus the people working for the airline and the baggage handlers. Most of them were trying to steal your stuff or get a bribe. If you got the bribes wrong you ended up paying a fortune, or you didn’t pay enough and got put in a five hour queue waiting to be strip searched. An airport guide knows who to pay and how much to pay them. With a bit of luck, you’re through customs and out the door in a few minutes.

Nobody bothered to hide the fact they were taking bribes. Mr Leconte’s first trick was five dollars in the palm of an airline employee. This got us access to a small staircase, which led onto the tarmac where the bags were being taken off our plane. The jet engines turned gently, wafting the sickly smell of aviation fuel through the boiling air.

Once our bags emerged, Me, Dad and Mr Leconte grabbed two each. Mr Leconte gave a few bank notes to the baggage handlers. We crossed the tarmac, passing under the tails of three more jets, before going onto another staircase. By the time we made it up, my arms felt like they were coming out of their sockets.

Two government soldiers stood at the top of the stairs. Soldiers were everywhere in the city, wearing identical green uniforms, with cheap rubber boots and sunglasses. These two had M16 assault rifles slung across their chests. One soldier put our bags on a trolley. The other one palmed fifty dollars from Mr Leconte.

This part of the airport was deserted. It was built specially for the President and VIPs. There was air conditioning, fancy halogen lamps and TV’s showing a dubbed episode of Friends. Adam jumped on top of the luggage cart. Dad wheeled him towards the customs gate.

Mr Leconte waved money at a man standing in front of an x-ray machine. Judging by the braids and stripes on his uniform, he was someone important. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it started getting heated. ‘What’s the problem?’ Dad asked. ‘I always pay him a hundred dollars,’ Leconte said. ‘Today he wants a hundred, for each of you.’ ‘You can have one twenty-five,’ Dad said angrily. ‘And that’s daylight robbery.’ The customs man looked at Dad as if he was something he’d scraped off his shoe. ‘There’s a four hour queue to get out of the main exit,’ the customs man said, casually. ‘Pay me three

hundred, or go back and stand in line.’ ‘I know the Minister of the Interior,’ Dad said. ‘I could make life very difficult for you.’ The customs man gave Dad a giant smile, ‘I also know the Interior Minister very well. I am even better

acquainted with my Brother in Law, the President of this country.’ Dad couldn’t trump that. He looked furious. ‘What about two hundred gentleman?’ Mr Leconte suggested, trying to smooth things over. The customs man eyeballed Dad: ‘No. This man dared threaten me. Now he must pay four-hundred dollars, or we will begin carefully

inspecting his luggage.’ ‘Two fifty,’ Dad said. The customs man clicked his fingers. A soldier sitting behind the x-ray machine stood up and pointed

his gun at Dad. Adam looked frightened and started sniffling. ‘OK, OK.’ Dad said. Four-hundred dollars,’ Dad reached in his pocket and handed over the cash. I told Adam to stop balling and pushed the trolley through the gate. ‘I think the customs man is drunk,’ Mr Leconte said. ‘Normally he’s very reliable. You’re a good client

Mr Pascal. Forget my fee this time and I’m sorry for the unpleasantness.’ ‘Not your fault,’ Dad grinned. Dad patted Mr Leconte’s shoulder and tucked a roll of banknotes into his shirt pocket. Then he looked

at his Rolex. ‘Twenty-one minutes to get out of the airport,’ Dad smiled. ‘Not a bad way to spend six-hundred

dollars.’ Six-hundred dollars local currency was about forty pounds. We piled our luggage into a battered Toyota taxi for the short drive to the cargo terminal. Dad let me

sit up front next to the driver. He put his arm around Adam in the back. ‘What are you upset for, little soldier?’ Dad asked. ‘I thought that man was gonna shoot you.’ Adam sniffled. ‘Bullets bounce off me,’ Dad said. ‘I’m made of steel.’ Dad thumped his chest. Adam broke out in a little smile. ‘We should have gone to Disneyworld again,’ Adam said. ‘They never try and shoot you there.’ Dad’s huge laugh boomed around the inside of the cab. ‘Bloody Disneyworld. Never again,’ Dad laughed. ‘Forty bloody minutes in a queue for a ride that lasts

thirty seconds. That place made me absolutely
insane
.’ Dad squeezed Adam and kissed his cheek. ‘Don’t you want to see your Grandma? And play with all your cousins?’ Adam smiled for Dad, but neither of us wanted to be here. Mum said she’d never go to Africa again. The last time she came, her wedding ring got stolen from the hotel room and some guy attacked her in the street. I don’t remember the trip, I was only a baby. Adam wasn’t even born.

Dad was in the import-export business. His company bought up empty space on container ships and sent junk to Africa. Poor man’s gold, Dad called it: worn tyres, used shoes, clothes, old fridges and microwaves, date expired tins of food.

You might throw away your hair drier, food mixer or whatever. It’s too much bother to get them repaired. But in Africa, there are men who strip all this stuff down and make it work again. Fill a container up with the right kind of junk, send it to Africa and you can make serious money.

Dad got rich off junk. He got a different Mercedes every year. Mum drove a big Range Rover. Me and Adam went to public school and we were always going abroad on holiday.

The business worked out of a semi-derelict warehouse at the back of Kings Cross station, in London. When I was little, I used to love running around inside. The roof leaked and I had to wear wellies because the floor was all muddy. People turned up all day long; from dustmen with collections of small electricals they’d found on their route, to huge lorries filled with cans of food.

The woman who drove the forklift used to let me sit on her lap as she picked the pallets out of the trucks. At one time my biggest ambition was to be allowed to touch all the levers and drive the forklift myself.

Course, by the time I was old enough to drive it, playing in a cold, muddy warehouse wasn’t my idea of fun anymore. At fifteen I had this big fantasy about how my life would go. I’d pass all my A-levels, study business and economics at university, then get a job at a merchant bank that paid big bucks. I’d wear handmade £1,500 suits, have my own executive box at the Arsenal and be married to a stunning babe who was resident DJ in a nightclub. I’d give Adam my share of the junk business when Dad retired; I wouldn’t need the money.

The tails of the cargo planes poked over the opposite side of the terminal building. The taxi driver piled our luggage on the pavement. It was a single storey building a couple of hundred meters long, but one end had burned out in a fire. A few families lived amongst the wreckage, in homes built from charred scraps. Two raggedy kids sat against the terminal wall, begging. ‘Why can’t they live in houses?’ Adam asked. ‘Probably farmers,’ Dad explained. ‘There’s a war between the government and rebels from the east. Soldiers destroy farms and steal all the food. The farmers that don’t get killed run away to the city, but there’s no work here and nowhere for them to live.’ Dad went in his trousers, peeled a five dollar note off his roll of cash and handed it to Adam. ‘See if that cheers them up.’ The beggars were about Adam’s age, but he probably weighed more than the pair of them. Adam was

scared to go near them for some reason, he tugged my hand. ‘Come with us, Jake.’ The beggars looked worried as we approached. Loads of people must have given them a hard time. Adam reached out with the note and the bony little faces lit up like it was Christmas, Easter and pancake Tuesday rolled into one. One kid swept the note from Adam’s fingers and ran away. The other one scratched around on the concrete, picking up about fifteen cents in coins that people had dropped around him. When the boys were about ten metres away, they stopped running and waved at us. ‘Thank you Sirs.’ Then they disappeared into one of the little shacks. ‘How much is five dollars in English money?’ Adam asked. ‘About forty pence,’ Dad said. ‘It’s enough to buy half a sack of rice. They’ll eat well for the next few

days.’ ‘Then what?’ Adam asked. Dad didn’t answer. People rushed up to Dad as soon as he stepped inside the cargo terminal. A couple of guys grabbed our luggage. Before I knew it, half a dozen sweaty men were shaking my hand and patting my shoulder. Adam got it even worse. One guy picked him up and started carrying him around to some office women who gave him kisses. The look on Adam’s face was priceless. In England, Dad was a wealthy businessman and people respected him, but here it was like he was a pop star.

Once things settled down we got taken through to Dad’s office. Two guys sat at one end with their heavy boots on a glass topped coffee table. They both held glasses of scotch. Dad introduced us.

‘My bodyguards, Tim and Banky,’ Dad explained. ‘They’ll keep us safe while we’re staying at Grandma’s.’

The two guys crushed my hand as they shook it. They looked like absolute nutters. They both wore black fatigues, and had machine guns, hunting knives, pistols, ammo belts and grenades hanging off every place you could think of and probably a few you couldn’t. Adam was in love. He squeezed between Tim and Banky on the sofa and started pointing at all the weapons asking what they were called and what they did.

Dad got a satellite phone out of his desk. It was about 3 times the size of a normal mobile, and would work anywhere on the planet. You could get normal telephones in the city, but they were so unreliable you used a satellite phone if you were rich enough to have one. Dad threw me the handset. ‘Call your Mum. It’s five quid a minute, so cut down on the rabbit.’ The number was in the speed dial. Mum picked up after a couple of rings. ‘Hey Mum, it’s me, we’re here.’

‘AtGrandma’s?’ ‘No, were still in the city. The flight from Paris was delayed five hours.’

‘How’s Adam?’ ‘He slept most of the way. He’s hanging off my waist wanting to talk to you. I’ll put him on.’ ‘OK Jake. See you in three weeks. Keep safe.’ ‘No worries Mum. Love you... Here’s Adam.’