A LONG WAY GONE.
Memoirs of a Boy Soldier.
ISHMALEL BEAH.
MY HIGH SCHOOL FRIENDS have begun to suspect I havenat told them the full story of my life.
aWhy did you leave Sierra Leone?a aBecause there is a war.a aDid you witness some of the fighting?a aEveryone in the country did.a aYou mean you saw people running around with guns and shooting each other?a aYes, all the time.a aCool.a I smile a little.
aYou should tell us about it sometime.a aYes, sometime.a
1.
THERE WERE ALL KINDS of stories told about the war that made it sound as if it was happening in a faraway and different land. It wasnat until refugees started pa.s.sing through our town that we began to see that it was actually taking place in our country. Families who had walked hundreds of miles told how relatives had been killed and their houses burned. Some people felt sorry for them and offered them places to stay, but most of the refugees refused, because they said the war would eventually reach our town. The children of these families wouldnat look at us, and they jumped at the sound of chopping wood or as stones landed on the tin roofs flung by children hunting birds with slingshots. The adults among these children from the war zones would be lost in their thoughts during conversations with the elders of my town. Apart from their fatigue and malnourishment, it was evident they had seen something that plagued their minds, something that we would refuse to accept if they told us all of it. At times I thought that some of the stories the pa.s.sersby told were exaggerated. The only wars I knew of were those that I had read about in books or seen in movies such as Rambo: First Blood, and the one in neighboring Liberia that I had heard about on the BBC news. My imagination at ten years old didnat have the capacity to grasp what had taken away the happiness of the refugees.
The first time that I was touched by war I was twelve. It was in January of 1993. I left home with Junior, my older brother, and our friend Talloi, both a year older than I, to go to the town of Mattru Jong, to partic.i.p.ate in our friendsa talent show. Mohamed, my best friend, couldnat come because he and his father were renovating their thatched-roof kitchen that day. The four of us had started a rap and dance group when I was eight. We were first introduced to rap music during one of our visits to Mobimbi, a quarter where the foreigners who worked for the same American company as my father lived. We often went to Mobimbi to swim in a pool and watch the huge color television and the white people who crowded the visitorsa recreational area. One evening a music video that consisted of a bunch of young black fellows talking really fast came on the television. The four of us sat there mesmerized by the song, trying to understand what the black fellows were saying. At the end of the video, some letters came up at the bottom of the screen. They read aSugarhill Gang, aRapperas Delight.aa Junior quickly wrote it down on a piece of paper. After that, we came to the quarters every other weekend to study that kind of music on television. We didnat know what it was called then, but I was impressed with the fact that the black fellows knew how to speak English really fast, and to the beat.
Later on, when Junior went to secondary school, he befriended some boys who taught him more about foreign music and dance. During holidays, he brought me ca.s.settes and taught my friends and me how to dance to what we came to know as hip-hop. I loved the dance, and particularly enjoyed learning the lyrics, because they were poetic and it improved my vocabulary. One afternoon, Father came home while Junior, Mohamed, Talloi, and I were learning the verse of aI Know You Got Soula by Eric B. & Rakim. He stood by the door of our clay brick and tin roof house laughing and then asked, aCan you even understand what you are saying?a He left before Junior could answer. He sat in a hammock under the shade of the mango, guava, and orange trees and tuned his radio to the BBC news.
aNow, this is good English, the kind that you should be listening to,a he shouted from the yard.
While Father listened to the news, Junior taught us how to move our feet to the beat. We alternately moved our right and then our left feet to the front and back, and simultaneously did the same with our arms, shaking our upper bodies and heads. aThis move is called the running man,a Junior said. Afterward, we would practice miming the rap songs we had memorized. Before we parted to carry out our various evening ch.o.r.es of fetching water and cleaning lamps, we would say aPeace, sona or aIam out,a phrases we had picked up from the rap lyrics. Outside, the evening music of birds and crickets would commence.
On the morning that we left for Mattru Jong, we loaded our backpacks with notebooks of lyrics we were working on and stuffed our pockets with ca.s.settes of rap alb.u.ms. In those days we wore baggy jeans, and underneath them we had soccer shorts and sweatpants for dancing. Under our long-sleeved shirts we had sleeveless undershirts, T-shirts, and soccer jerseys. We wore three pairs of socks that we pulled down and folded to make our c.r.a.pes* look puffy. When it got too hot in the day, we took some of the clothes off and carried them on our shoulders. They were fashionable, and we had no idea that this unusual way of dressing was going to benefit us. Since we intended to return the next day, we didnat say goodbye or tell anyone where we were going. We didnat know that we were leaving home, never to return.
To save money, we decided to walk the sixteen miles to Mattru Jong. It was a beautiful summer day, the sun wasnat too hot, and the walk didnat feel long either, as we chatted about all kinds of things, mocked and chased each other. We carried slingshots that we used to stone birds and chase the monkeys that tried to cross the main dirt road. We stopped at several rivers to swim. At one river that had a bridge across it, we heard a pa.s.senger vehicle in the distance and decided to get out of the water and see if we could catch a free ride. I got out before Junior and Talloi, and ran across the bridge with their clothes. They thought they could catch up with me before the vehicle reached the bridge, but upon realizing that it was impossible, they started running back to the river, and just when they were in the middle of the bridge, the vehicle caught up to them. The girls in the truck laughed and the driver tapped his horn. It was funny, and for the rest of the trip they tried to get me back for what I had done, but they failed.
We arrived at Kabati, my grandmotheras village, around two in the afternoon. Mamie Kpana was the name that my grandmother was known by. She was tall and her perfectly long face complemented her beautiful cheekbones and big brown eyes. She always stood with her hands either on her hips or on her head. By looking at her, I could see where my mother had gotten her beautiful dark skin, extremely white teeth, and the translucent creases on her neck. My grandfather or kamora"teacher, as everyone called hima"was a well-known local Arabic scholar and healer in the village and beyond.
At Kabati, we ate, rested a bit, and started the last six miles. Grandmother wanted us to spend the night, but we told her that we would be back the following day.
aHow is that father of yours treating you these days?a she asked in a sweet voice that was laden with worry.
aWhy are you going to Mattru Jong, if not for school? And why do you look so skinny?a she continued asking, but we evaded her questions. She followed us to the edge of the village and watched as we descended the hill, switching her walking stick to her left hand so that she could wave us off with her right hand, a sign of good luck.
We arrived in Mattru Jong a couple of hours later and met up with old friends, Gibrilla, Kaloko, and Khalilou. That night we went out to Bo Road, where street vendors sold food late into the night. We bought boiled groundnut and ate it as we conversed about what we were going to do the next day, made plans to see the s.p.a.ce for the talent show and practice. We stayed in the verandah room of Khalilouas house. The room was small and had a tiny bed, so the four of us (Gibrilla and Kaloko went back to their houses) slept in the same bed, lying across with our feet hanging. I was able to fold my feet in a little more since I was shorter and smaller than all the other boys.
The next day Junior, Talloi, and I stayed at Khalilouas house and waited for our friends to return from school at around 2:00 p.m. But they came home early. I was cleaning my c.r.a.pes and counting for Junior and Talloi, who were having a push-up compet.i.tion. Gibrilla and Kaloko walked onto the verandah and joined the compet.i.tion. Talloi, breathing hard and speaking slowly, asked why they were back. Gibrilla explained that the teachers had told them that the rebels had attacked Mogbwemo, our home. School had been canceled until further notice. We stopped what we were doing.
According to the teachers, the rebels had attacked the mining areas in the afternoon. The sudden outburst of gunfire had caused people to run for their lives in different directions. Fathers had come running from their workplaces, only to stand in front of their empty houses with no indication of where their families had gone. Mothers wept as they ran toward schools, rivers, and water taps to look for their children. Children ran home to look for parents who were wandering the streets in search of them. And as the gunfire intensified, people gave up looking for their loved ones and ran out of town.
aThis town will be next, according to the teachers.a Gibrilla lifted himself from the cement floor. Junior, Talloi, and I took our backpacks and headed to the wharf with our friends. There, people were arriving from all over the mining area. Some we knew, but they couldnat tell us the whereabouts of our families. They said the attack had been too sudden, too chaotic; that everyone had fled in different directions in total confusion.
For more than three hours, we stayed at the wharf, anxiously waiting and expecting either to see our families or to talk to someone who had seen them. But there was no news of them, and after a while we didnat know any of the people who came across the river. The day seemed oddly normal. The sun peacefully sailed through the white clouds, birds sang from treetops, the trees danced to the quiet wind. I still couldnat believe that the war had actually reached our home. It is impossible, I thought. When we left home the day before, there had been no indication the rebels were anywhere near.
aWhat are you going to do?a Gibrilla asked us. We were all quiet for a while, and then Talloi broke the silence. aWe must go back and see if we can find our families before it is too late.a Junior and I nodded in agreement.
Just three days earlier, I had seen my father walking slowly from work. His hard hat was under his arm and his long face was sweating from the hot afternoon sun. I was sitting on the verandah. I had not seen him for a while, as another stepmother had destroyed our relationship again. But that morning my father smiled at me as he came up the steps. He examined my face, and his lips were about to utter something, when my stepmother came out. He looked away, then at my stepmother, who pretended not to see me. They quietly went into the parlor. I held back my tears and left the verandah to meet with Junior at the junction where we waited for the lorry. We were on our way to see our mother in the next town about three miles away. When our father had paid for our school, we had seen her on weekends over the holidays when we were back home. Now that he refused to pay, we visited her every two or three days. That afternoon we met Mother at the market and walked with her as she purchased ingredients to cook for us. Her face was dull at first, but as soon as she hugged us, she brightened up. She told us that our little brother, Ibrahim, was at school and that we would go get him on our way from the market. She held our hands as we walked, and every so often she would turn around as if to see whether we were still with her.
As we walked to our little brotheras school, Mother turned to us and said, aI am sorry I do not have enough money to put you boys back in school at this point. I am working on it.a She paused and then asked, aHow is your father these days?a aHe seems all right. I saw him this afternoon,a I replied. Junior didnat say anything.
Mother looked him directly in the eyes and said, aYour father is a good man and he loves you very much. He just seems to attract the wrong stepmothers for you boys.a When we got to the school, our little brother was in the yard playing soccer with his friends. He was eight and pretty good for his age. As soon as he saw us, he came running, throwing himself on us. He measured himself against me to see if he had gotten taller than me. Mother laughed. My little brotheras small round face glowed, and sweat formed around the creases he had on his neck, just like my motheras. All four of us walked to Motheras house. I held my little brotheras hand, and he told me about school and challenged me to a soccer game later in the evening. My mother was single and devoted herself to taking care of Ibrahim. She said he sometimes asked about our father. When Junior and I were away in school, she had taken Ibrahim to see him a few times, and each time she had cried when my father hugged Ibrahim, because they were both so happy to see each other. My mother seemed lost in her thoughts, smiling as she relived the moments.
Two days after that visit, we had left home. As we now stood at the wharf in Mattru Jong, I could visualize my father holding his hard hat and running back home from work, and my mother, weeping and running to my little brotheras school. A sinking feeling overtook me.
Junior, Talloi, and I jumped into a canoe and sadly waved to our friends as the canoe pulled away from the sh.o.r.es of Mattru Jong. As we landed on the other side of the river, more and more people were arriving in haste. We started walking, and a woman carrying her flip-flops on her head spoke without looking at us: aToo much blood has been spilled where you are going. Even the good spirits have fled from that place.a She walked past us. In the bushes along the river, the strained voices of women cried out, aNguwor gbor mu ma oo,a G.o.d help us, and screamed the names of their children: aYusufu, Jabu, Fodayaa We saw children walking by themselves, shirtless, in their underwear, following the crowd. aNya nje oo, nya keke oo,a my mother, my father, the children were crying. There were also dogs running, in between the crowds of people, who were still running, even though far away from harm. The dogs sniffed the air, looking for their owners. My veins tightened.
We had walked six miles and were now at Kabati, Grandmotheras village. It was deserted. All that was left were footprints in the sand leading toward the dense forest that spread out beyond the village.
As evening approached, people started arriving from the mining area. Their whispers, the cries of little children seeking lost parents and tired of walking, and the wails of hungry babies replaced the evening songs of crickets and birds. We sat on Grandmotheras verandah, waiting and listening.
aDo you guys think it is a good idea to go back to Mogbwemo?a Junior asked. But before either of us had a chance to answer, a Volkswagen roared in the distance and all the people walking on the road ran into the nearby bushes. We ran, too, but didnat go that far. My heart pounded and my breathing intensified. The vehicle stopped in front of my grandmotheras house, and from where we lay, we could see that whoever was inside the car was not armed. As we, and others, emerged from the bushes, we saw a man run from the driveras seat to the sidewalk, where he vomited blood. His arm was bleeding. When he stopped vomiting, he began to cry. It was the first time I had seen a grown man cry like a child, and I felt a sting in my heart. A woman put her arms around the man and begged him to stand up. He got to his feet and walked toward the van. When he opened the door opposite the driveras, a woman who was leaning against it fell to the ground. Blood was coming out of her ears. People covered the eyes of their children.
In the back of the van were three more dead bodies, two girls and a boy, and their blood was all over the seats and the ceiling of the van. I wanted to move away from what I was seeing, but couldnat. My feet went numb and my entire body froze. Later we learned that the man had tried to escape with his family and the rebels had shot at his vehicle, killing all his family. The only thing that consoled him, for a few seconds at least, was when the woman who had embraced him, and now cried with him, told him that at least he would have the chance to bury them. He would always know where they were laid to rest, she said. She seemed to know a little more about war than the rest of us.
The wind had stopped moving and daylight seemed to be quickly giving in to night. As sunset neared, more people pa.s.sed through the village. One man carried his dead son. He thought the boy was still alive. The father was covered with his sonas blood, and as he ran he kept saying, aI will get you to the hospital, my boy, and everything will be fine.a Perhaps it was necessary that he cling to false hopes, since they kept him running away from harm. A group of men and women who had been pierced by stray bullets came running next. The skin that hung down from their bodies still contained fresh blood. Some of them didnat notice that they were wounded until they stopped and people pointed to their wounds. Some fainted or vomited. I felt nauseated, and my head was spinning. I felt the ground moving, and peopleas voices seemed to be far removed from where I stood trembling.
The last casualty that we saw that evening was a woman who carried her baby on her back. Blood was running down her dress and dripping behind her, making a trail. Her child had been shot dead as she ran for her life. Luckily for her, the bullet didnat go through the babyas body. When she stopped at where we stood, she sat on the ground and removed her child. It was a girl, and her eyes were still open, with an interrupted innocent smile on her face. The bullets could be seen sticking out just a little bit in the babyas body and she was swelling. The mother clung to her child and rocked her. She was in too much pain and shock to shed tears.
Junior, Talloi, and I looked at each other and knew that we must return to Mattru Jong, because we had seen that Mogbwemo was no longer a place to call home and that our parents couldnat possibly be there anymore. Some of the wounded people kept saying that Kabati was next on the rebelsa list. We didnat want to be there when the rebels arrived. Even those who couldnat walk very well did their best to keep moving away from Kabati. The image of that woman and her baby plagued my mind as we walked back to Mattru Jong. I barely noticed the journey, and when I drank water I didnat feel any relief even though I knew I was thirsty. I didnat want to go back to where that woman was from; it was clear in the eyes of the baby that all had been lost.
aYou were negative nineteen years old.a Thatas what my father used to say when I would ask about what life was like in Sierra Leone following independence in 1961. It had been a British colony since 1808. Sir Milton Margai became the first prime minister and ruled the country under the Sierra Leone Peoples Party (SLPP) political banner until his death in 1964. His half brother Sir Albert Margai succeeded him until 1967, when Siaka Stevens, the All Peopleas Congress (APC) Party leader, won the election, which was followed by a military coup. Siaka Stevens returned to power in 1968, and several years later declared the country a one-party state, the APC being the sole legal party. It was the beginning of arotten politics,a as my father would put it. I wondered what he would say about the war that I was now running from. I had heard from adults that this was a revolutionary war, a liberation of the people from corrupt government. But what kind of liberation movement shoots innocent civilians, children, that little girl? There wasnat anyone to answer these questions, and my head felt heavy with the images that it contained. As we walked, I became afraid of the road, the mountains in the distance, and the bushes on either side.
We arrived in Mattru Jong late that night. Junior and Talloi explained to our friends what we had seen, while I stayed quiet, still trying to decide whether what I had seen was real. That night, when I finally managed to drift off, I dreamt that I was shot in my side and people ran past me without helping, as they were all running for their lives. I tried to crawl to safety in the bushes, but from out of nowhere there was someone standing on top of me with a gun. I couldnat make out his face as the sun was against it. That person pointed the gun at the place where I had been shot and pulled the trigger. I woke up and hesitantly touched my side. I became afraid, since I could no longer tell the difference between dream and reality.
Every morning in Mattru Jong we would go down to the wharf for news from home. But after a week the stream of refugees from that direction ceased and news dried up. Government troops were deployed in Mattru Jong, and they erected checkpoints at the wharf and other strategic locations all over town. The soldiers were convinced that if the rebels attacked, they would come from across the river, so they mounted heavy artillery there and announced a 7:00 p.m. curfew, which made the nights tense, as we couldnat sleep and had to be inside too early. During the day, Gibrilla and Kaloko came over. The six of us sat on the verandah and discussed what was going on.
aI do not think that this madness will last,a Junior said quietly. He looked at me as if to a.s.sure me that we would soon go home.
aIt will probably last for only a month or two.a Talloi stared at the floor.
aI heard that the soldiers are already on their way to get the rebels out of the mining areas,a Gibrilla stammered. We agreed that the war was just a pa.s.sing phase that wouldnat last over three months.
Junior, Talloi, and I listened to rap music, trying to memorize the lyrics so that we could avoid thinking about the situation at hand. Naughty by Nature, LL Cool J, Run-D.M.C., and Heavy D & The Boyz; we had left home with only these ca.s.settes and the clothes that we wore. I remember sitting on the verandah listening to aNow That We Found Lovea by Heavy D & The Boyz and watching the trees at the edge of town that reluctantly moved to the slow wind. The palms beyond them were still, as if awaiting something. I closed my eyes, and the images from Kabati flashed in my mind. I tried to drive them out by evoking older memories of Kabati before the war.
There was a thick forest on one side of the village where my grandmother lived and coffee farms on the other. A river flowed from the forest to the edge of the village, pa.s.sing through palm kernels into a swamp. Above the swamp banana farms stretched into the horizon. The main dirt road that pa.s.sed through Kabati was rutted with holes and puddles where ducks liked to bathe during the day, and in the backyards of the houses birds nested in mango trees.
In the morning, the sun would rise from behind the forest. First, its rays penetrated through the leaves, and gradually, with c.o.c.kcrows and sparrows that vigorously proclaimed daylight, the golden sun sat at the top of the forest. In the evening, monkeys could be seen in the forest jumping from tree to tree, returning to their sleeping places. On the coffee farms, chickens were always busy hiding their young from hawks. Beyond the farms, palm trees waved their fronds with the moving wind. Sometimes a palm wine tapper could be seen climbing in the early evening.
The evening ended with the cracking of branches in the forest and the pounding of rice in mortars. The echoes resonated in the village, causing birds to fly off and return curiously chattering. Crickets, frogs, toads, and owls followed them, all calling for night while leaving their hiding places. Smoke rose from thatched-roof kitchens, and people would start arriving from farms carrying lamps and sometimes lit firewood.
aWe must strive to be like the moon.a An old man in Kabati repeated this sentence often to people who walked past his house on their way to the river to fetch water, to hunt, to tap palm wine; and to their farms. I remember asking my grandmother what the old man meant. She explained that the adage served to remind people to always be on their best behavior and to be good to others. She said that people complain when there is too much sun and it gets unbearably hot, and also when it rains too much or when it is cold. But, she said, no one grumbles when the moon shines. Everyone becomes happy and appreciates the moon in their own special way. Children watch their shadows and play in its light, people gather at the square to tell stories and dance through the night. A lot of happy things happen when the moon shines. These are some of the reasons why we should want to be like the moon.
aYou look hungry. I will fix you some ca.s.sava.a She ended the discussion.
After my grandmother told me why we should strive to be like the moon, I took it upon myself to closely observe it. Each night when the moon appeared in the sky, I would lie on the ground outside and quietly watch it. I wanted to find out why it was so appealing and likable. I became fascinated with the different shapes that I saw inside the moon. Some nights I saw the head of a man. He had a medium beard and wore a sailoras hat. Other times I saw a man with an ax chopping wood, and sometimes a woman cradling a baby at her breast. Whenever I get a chance to observe the moon now, I still see those same images I saw when I was six, and it pleases me to know that that part of my childhood is still embedded in me.
2.
I AM PUSHING a rusty wheelbarrow in a town where the air smells of blood and burnt flesh. The breeze brings the faint cries of those whose last breaths are leaving their mangled bodies. I walk past them. Their arms and legs are missing; their intestines spill out through the bullet holes in their stomachs; brain matter comes out of their noses and ears. The flies are so excited and intoxicated that they fall on the pools of blood and die. The eyes of the nearly dead are redder than the blood that comes out of them, and it seems that their bones will tear through the skin of their taut faces at any minute. I turn my face to the ground to look at my feet. My tattered c.r.a.pes are soaked with blood, which seems to be running down my army shorts. I feel no physical pain, so I am not sure whether Iave been wounded. I can feel the warmth of my AK-47as barrel on my back; I donat remember when I last fired it. It feels as if needles have been hammered into my brain, and it is hard to be sure whether it is day or night. The wheelbarrow in front of me contains a dead body wrapped in white bedsheets. I do not know why I am taking this particular body to the cemetery.
When I arrive at the cemetery, I struggle to lift it from the wheelbarrow; it feels as if the body is resisting. I carry it in my arms, looking for a suitable place to lay it to rest. My body begins to ache and I canat lift a foot without feeling a rush of pain from my toes to my spine. I collapse on the ground and hold the body in my arms. Blood spots begin to emerge on the white bedsheets covering it. Setting the body on the ground, I start to unwrap it, beginning at the feet. All the way up to the neck, there are bullet holes. One bullet has crushed the Adamas apple and sent the remains of it to the back of the throat. I lift the cloth from the bodyas face. I am looking at my own.
I lay sweating for a few minutes on the cool wooden floor where I had fallen, before turning on the light so that I could completely free myself from the dreamworld. A piercing pain ran through my spine. I studied the red exposed brick wall of the room and tried to identify the rap music coming from a car pa.s.sing by. A shudder racked my body, and I tried to think about my new life in New York City, where I had been for over a month. But my mind wandered across the Atlantic Ocean back to Sierra Leone. I saw myself holding an AK-47 and walking through a coffee farm with a squad that consisted of many boys and a few adults. We were on our way to attack a small town that had ammunition and food. As soon as we left the coffee farm, we unexpectedly ran into another armed group at a soccer field adjoining the ruins of what had once been a village. We opened fire until the last living being in the other group fell to the ground. We walked toward the dead bodies, giving each other high fives. The group had also consisted of young boys like us, but we didnat care about them. We took their ammunition, sat on their bodies, and started eating the cooked food they had been carrying. All around us, fresh blood leaked from the bullet holes in their bodies.
I got up from the floor, soaked a white towel with a gla.s.s of water, and tied it around my head. I was afraid to fall asleep, but staying awake also brought back painful memories. Memories I sometimes wish I could wash away, even though I am aware that they are an important part of what my life is; who I am now. I stayed awake all night, anxiously waiting for daylight, so that I could fully return to my new life, to rediscover the happiness I had known as a child, the joy that had stayed alive inside me even through times when being alive itself became a burden. These days I live in three worlds: my dreams, and the experiences of my new life, which trigger memories from the past.
3.
WE WERE IN Mattru Jong longer than we had antic.i.p.ated. We hadnat heard any news about our families and didnat know what else to do except wait and hope that they were well.
We heard that the rebels were stationed in Sumbuya, a town twenty or so miles to the northeast of Mattru Jong. This rumor was soon replaced by letters brought by people whose lives the rebels had spared during their ma.s.sacre in Sumbuya. The letters simply informed the people of Mattru Jong that the rebels were coming and wanted to be welcomed, since they were fighting for us. One of the messengers was a young man. They had carved their initials, RUF (Revolutionary United Front), on his body with a hot bayonet and chopped off all his fingers with the exception of his thumbs. The rebels called this mutilation aone love.a Before the war, people raised a thumb to say aOne lovea to each other, an expression popularized by the love and influence of reggae music.
When people received the message from the miserable messenger, they went into hiding in the forest that very night. But Khalilouas family had asked us to stay behind and follow them with the rest of their property if things didnat improve in the subsequent days, so we stayed put.
That night for the first time in my life I realized that it is the physical presence of people and their spirits that gives a town life. With the absence of so many people, the town became scary, the night darker, and the silence unbearably agitating. Normally, the crickets and birds sang in the evening before the sun went down. But this time they didnat, and darkness set in very fast. The moon wasnat in the sky; the air was stiff, as if nature itself was afraid of what was happening.
The majority of the townas population was in hiding for a week, and more people went into hiding after the arrival of more messengers. But the rebels didnat come on the day they said they would, and as a result, people started moving back into the town. As soon as everyone was settled again, another message was sent. This time the messenger was a well-known Catholic bishop who had been doing missionary work when he ran into the rebels. They didnat do anything to the bishop except threaten that if he failed to deliver their message they would come for him. Upon receiving the word, people again left town and headed for their various hiding places in the forests. And we were again left behind, this time not to carry Khalilouas familyas belongings, as we had already taken them into hiding, but to look after the house and to buy certain food products like salt, pepper, rice, and fish that we took to Khalilouas family in the bush.
Another ten days of hiding, and still the rebels hadnat arrived. There was nothing to do but conclude that they werenat coming. The town came alive again. Schools reopened; people returned to their normal routines. Five days went by peacefully, and even the soldiers in town relaxed.
I would sometimes go for walks by myself in the late evening. The sight of women preparing dinner always reminded me of the times I used to watch my mother cook. Boys werenat allowed in the kitchen, but she made an exception for me, saying, aYou need to know how to cook something for your palampo* life.a She would pause, give me a piece of dry fish, and then continue: aI want a grandchild. So donat be a palampo forever.a Tears would form in my eyes as I continued my stroll on the tiny gravel roads in Mattru Jong.
When the rebels finally came, I was cooking. The rice was done and the okra soup was almost ready when I heard a single gunshot that echoed through the town. Junior, Talloi, Kaloko, Gibrilla, and Khalilou, who were in the room, ran outside. aDid you hear that?a they asked. We stood still, trying to determine whether the soldiers had fired the shot. A minute later, three different guns rapidly went off. This time we started to get worried. aIt is just the soldiers testing their weapons,a one of our friends a.s.sured us. The town became very quiet, and no gunshots were heard for more than fifteen minutes. I went back to the kitchen and started to dish out the rice. At that instant several gunshots, which sounded like thunder striking the tin-roofed houses, took over town. The sound of the guns was so terrifying it confused everyone. No one was able to think clearly. In a matter of seconds, people started screaming and running in different directions, pushing and trampling on whoever had fallen on the ground. No one had the time to take anything with them. Everyone just ran to save his or her life. Mothers lost their children, whose confused, sad cries coincided with the gunshots. Families were separated and left behind everything they had worked for their whole lives. My heart was beating faster than it ever had. Each gunshot seemed to cling to the beat of my heart.
The rebels fired their guns toward the sky, as they shouted and merrily danced their way into town in a semicircle formation. There are two ways to enter Mattru Jong. One is by road and the other by crossing the river Jong. The rebels attacked and advanced into the town from inland, forcing the civilians to run toward the river. A lot of people were so terrified that they just ran to the river, jumped in, and lost the strength to swim. The soldiers, who somehow antic.i.p.ated the attack and knew they were outnumbered, left town before the rebels actually came. This was a surprise to Junior, Talloi, Khalilou, Gibrilla, Kaloko, and me, whose initial instinct was to run to where the soldiers were stationed. We stood there, in front of mounted sandbags, unable to decide which way to go next. We started running again toward where there were fewer gunshots.
There was only one escape route out of town. Everyone headed for it. Mothers were screaming the names of their lost children, and the lost children cried in vain. We ran together, trying to keep up with each other. In order to get to the escape route, we had to cross a wet and muddy swamp that was adjacent to a tiny hill. In the swamp we ran past people who were stuck in the mud, past handicapped people who couldnat be helped, for anyone who stopped to do so was risking his own life.
After we crossed the swamp, the real trouble started, because the rebels began shooting their guns at people instead of shooting into the sky. They didnat want people to abandon the town, because they needed to use civilians as a shield against the military. One of the main aims of the rebels when they took over a town was to force the civilians to stay with them, especially women and children. This way they could stay longer, as military intervention would be delayed.
We were now at the top of a bushy hill immediately behind the swamp, in a clearing just before the escape route. Seeing the civilians all about to make it out, the rebels fired rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), machine guns, AK-47s, G3s, all the weapons they had, directly into the clearing. But we knew we had no choice, we had to make it across the clearing because, as young boys, the risk of staying in town was greater for us than trying to escape. Young boys were immediately recruited, and the initials RUF were carved wherever it pleased the rebels, with a hot bayonet. This not only meant that you were scarred for life but that you could never escape from them, because escaping with the carving of the rebelsa initials was asking for death, as soldiers would kill you without any questions and militant civilians would do the same.
We dodged from bush to bush and made it to the other side. But this was just the beginning of many risky situations that were to come. Immediately after one explosion, we got up and ran together, with our heads down, jumping over fresh dead bodies and flames of burnt dried trees. We were almost at the end of the clearing when we heard the whizzing of another rocket grenade approaching. We sped up our steps and took dives into the bush before the grenade landed, followed by several rounds of machine gun fire. The people who were right behind us were not as lucky as we were. The RPG caught up with them. One of them caught the fragments of the RPG. He cried out loudly and screamed that he was blind. No one dared to go out and help him. He was halted by another grenade that exploded, causing his remains and blood to sprinkle like rain on the nearby leaves and bushes. All of it happened too fast.
As soon as we had crossed the clearing, the rebels sent some of their men to catch those who had made it into the bush. They started chasing and shooting after us. We ran for more than an hour without stopping. It was unbelievable how fast and long we ran. I didnat sweat or get tired at all. Junior was in front of me and behind Talloi. Every few seconds, my brother would call my name, to make sure I wasnat left behind. I could hear the sadness in his voice, and each time I answered him, my voice trembled. Gibrilla, Kaloko, and Khalilou were behind me. Their breathing was heavy and I could hear one of them hissing, trying not to cry. Talloi was a very fast runner, even when we were younger. But on that evening we were able to keep up with him. After an hour or maybe even more of running, the rebels gave up the chase and returned to Mattru Jong while we continued on.
4.
FOR SEVERAL DAYS the six of us walked on a tiny path that was about a foot wide, walled by thick bushes on either side. Junior was in front of me and his hands didnat swing as they used to when he strolled across the yard on his way back from school. I wanted to know what he was thinking, but everyone was too quiet and I didnat know how to break the silence. I thought about where my family was, whether I would be able to see them again, and wished that they were safe and not too heartbroken about Junior and me. Tears formed in my eyes, but I was too hungry to cry.
We slept in abandoned villages, where we lay on the bare ground and hoped that the following day we would be able to find something other than raw ca.s.sava to eat. We had pa.s.sed through a village that had banana, orange, and coconut trees. Khalilou, who knew how to climb better than all of us, mounted each of those trees and plucked as much from them as he could. The bananas were raw, so we boiled them by adding wood to a fire that was in one of the outdoor kitchens. Someone must have left that village when he or she saw us coming, because the fire was new. The bananas didnat taste good at all, because there was no salt or any other ingredients, but we ate every single bit, just to have something in our stomachs. Afterward, we ate some oranges and some coconuts. We could not find something substantial to eat. We got hungrier day after day, to the point that our stomachs were hurting and our visions blurred at times. We had no choice but to sneak back into Mattru Jong, along with some people we encountered on the path, to get some money we had left behind, so that we could buy food.
On our way through the quiet and almost barren town, which now seemed unfamiliar, we saw rotten pots of food that had been left behind. Bodies, furniture, clothes, and all kinds of property were scattered all over. On one verandah we saw an old man sitting in a chair as if asleep. There was a bullet hole in his forehead, and underneath the stoop lay the bodies of two men whose genitals, limbs, and hands had been chopped off by a machete that was on the ground next to their piled body parts. I vomited and immediately felt feverish, but we had to continue on. We ran on tiptoe as fast and as cautiously as we could, avoiding the main streets. We stood against walls of houses and inspected the tiny gravel roads between houses before crossing to another house. At one point, as soon as we had crossed the road, we heard footsteps. There was no immediate cover, so we had to swiftly run onto a verandah and hide behind stacks of cement bricks. We peeped from behind the bricks and saw two rebels who wore baggy jeans, sleepers,* and white T-shirts. Their heads were tied with red handkerchiefs and they carried their guns behind their backs. They were escorting a group of young women who carried cooking pots, bags of rice, mortars and pestles. We watched them until they were out of sight before we began moving again. We finally got to Khalilouas house. All the doors were broken and the house was torn apart. The house, like every other in the town, had been looted. There was a bullet hole in the doorframe and broken gla.s.ses of Star beer, a popular brand in the country, and empty cigarette packets on the verandah floor. There was nothing of use to be found in the house. The only food that was available was raw rice in bags that were too heavy to carry and would slow us down. But the money was, luckily, still where I had kept it, which was in a tiny plastic bag under the foot of the bed. I put it inside my c.r.a.pe, and we headed back toward the swamp.
The six of us, including the people we had entered the town together with, gathered at the edge of the swamp as planned and started crossing the clearing three at a time. I was in the second batch, with Talloi and another person. We started to crawl across the clearing at the signal of the first group that had made it across. While we were in the middle of the clearing, they signaled for us to lie flat, and as soon as we hit the ground, they motioned for us to continue crawling. There were dead bodies everywhere and flies were feasting on the congealed blood on them. After we made it to the other side, we saw that there were rebels on guard in a little tower at the wharf that overlooked the clearing. The next batch was Junior and two others. As they were crossing, something fell out of someoneas pocket onto an aluminum pan in the clearing. The sound was loud enough to get the attention of the rebels on guard, and they pointed their guns toward where the sound had come from. My heart throbbed with pain as I watched my brother lying on the ground, pretending to be one of the dead bodies. Several shots were heard in town, and that distracted the rebels and made them turn the other way. Junior and the two others made it. His face was dusty and there were residues of mud in between his teeth. He breathed heavily, clenching his fists. One boy among the last batch to cross the clearing was too slow, because he carried a big bag of things he had gathered from his house. As a result, the rebels who were on guard in the little tower saw him and opened fire. Some of the rebels underneath the tower started running and shooting toward us. We whispered to the boy, aDrop the bag and hurry. The rebels are coming. Come on.a But the boy didnat listen. It fell from his shoulder after he had crossed the clearing, and as we ran away, I saw him pulling on the bag, which was stuck between tree stumps. We ran as fast as we could until we lost the rebels. It was sunset and we walked quietly toward the big red sun and the still sky that awaited darkness. The boy who caused the rebels to spot us didnat make it to the first crowded village we reached.
That night we were temporarily happy that we had some money, and were hoping to buy some cooked rice with ca.s.sava or potato leaves for dinner. We high-fived each other as we approached the village market, and our stomachs growled as the smell of palm oil wafted from cooking huts. But when we got back to the cooked-food stalls, we were disappointed to find that those who had been selling ca.s.sava leaves, okra soup, and potato leaves, all cooked with dried fish and rich palm oil served with rice, had ceased to do so. Some of them were saving their food in case things got worse, and others simply didnat want to sell any more for unexplained reasons.
After all the trouble and risk we undertook to get the money, it became useless. We would have been less hungry if we had stayed at the village instead of walking the miles to Mattru Jong and back. I wanted to blame someone for this particular predicament, but there was no one to be blamed. We had made a logical decision and it had come to this. It was a typical aspect of being in the war. Things changed rapidly in a matter of seconds and no one had any control over anything. We had yet to learn these things and implement survival tactics, which was what it came down to. That night we were so hungry that we stole peopleas food while they slept. It was the only way to get through the night.
5.
WE WERE SO HUNGRY that it hurt to drink water and we felt cramps in our guts. It was as though something were eating the insides of our stomachs. Our lips became parched and our joints weakened and ached. I began to feel my ribs when I touched my sides. We didnat know where else to get food. The one ca.s.sava farm that we ravaged didnat last long. Birds and animals such as rabbits were nowhere to be seen. We became irritable and sat apart from each other, as if sitting together made us hungrier.
One evening we actually chased a little boy who was eating two boiled ears of corn by himself. He was about five years old and was enjoying the corn that he held in both hands, taking turns biting each ear. We didnat say a word or even look at each other. Rather, we rushed on the boy at the same time, and before he knew what was happening, we had taken the corn from him. We shared it among the six of us and ate our little portion while the boy cried and ran to his parents. The boyas parents didnat confront us about the incident. I guess they knew that six boys would jump on their son for two ears of corn only if they were desperately hungry. Later in the evening, the boyas mother gave each of us an ear of corn. I felt guilty about it for a few minutes, but in our position, there wasnat much time for remorse.
I do not know the name of the village that we were in and didnat bother to ask, since I was busy trying to survive the everyday obstacles. We didnat know the names of other towns and villages and how to get there. So hunger drove us back to Mattru Jong again. It was dangerous, but hunger made us not care that much. It was summertime, the dry season, and the gra.s.sland had grown yellowish. A fresh green forest engulfed it.
We were in the middle of the gra.s.sland walking in single file, our shirts on our shoulders or heads, when suddenly three rebels rose from behind the dried gra.s.ses and pointed their guns at Gibrilla, who was in the front. They c.o.c.ked their guns, and one of them placed the muzzle of his gun under Gibrillaas chin. aHe is scared like a soaked monkey,a the rebel laughingly told his companions. As the other two walked past me, I avoided eye contact by putting my head down. The younger rebel raised my head with his bayonet, still in its scabbard. While he was looking at me sternly, he took the bayonet from its scabbard and attached it at the muzzle of his gun. I trembled so hard that my lips shook. He smiled without emotion. The rebels, none of whom were older than twenty-one, started walking us back to a village we had pa.s.sed. One was dressed in a sleeveless army shirt and jeans, his head tied with a red cloth. The other two were dressed in jeans jackets and pants, wearing baseball hats backward and new Adidas sneakers. All three wore a lot of fancy watches on both wrists. All these things had been taken from people by force or looted from houses and shops.
The rebels said a lot of things as we walked. Whatever they said didnat sound friendly. I couldnat hear their words, because all I could think about was death. I struggled to avoid fainting.
As we approached the village, two of the rebels ran ahead. Six of us and one rebel, I thought to myself. But he had a semiautomatic machine gun and a long belt of bullets wrapped around him. He made us walk in two lines of three, with our hands on our heads. He was behind us, aiming his gun at our heads, and at some point he said, aIf any of you makes a move, I will kill everyone. So donat even breathe too hard or it might be your last.a He laughed and his voice echoed in the distant forest. I prayed that my friends and brother wouldnat make any sudden moves or even try to scratch an itch. The back of my head was getting warm, as if expecting a bullet anytime.