Sometimes in April

I once wrote a now lost essay in which I tried my best to lay out certain aspects of the Rwandan Genocide and the Sierra Leonean Rebel War side by side in the compare and contrast style enjoyed by academia. A ridiculous challenge of an assignment for sure but my reward would be an incredibly moving research experience. Maybe, given where I have started to spend so much of my time, the impact of that lingers still. And amongst the horror that seemed to intensify with the turn of each page, I learned the names of people who I would now list amongst my “heroes”.

Have you ever heard of Philippe Gaillard? Born in Switzerland in the 50s this literature graduate was head of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) delegation in Rwanda during the genocide. He wouldn’t expect you to recognise his name. Not exactly a huge fan of the spotlight which would inevitably shine his way for a time in 1994, he once commented, “I wish I were never visible again.” His time in Rwanda however would be the first time the ICRC would be active in the midst of a genocide and an estimated 65,000 lives were saved.

How was such a thing done? The ICRC stayed when so many others left and ran a makeshift hospital for the wounded or the "not finished off" as Gaillaird prefers to call them. Only a few of their expatriate staff remained but that was enough to protect the 120 national staff members who were then able to help so many of their fellow Rwandans. As Gaillaird says, “We went, entered and stood our ground, instead of clearing out. We spread out, instead of locking ourselves in. We conversed and, in the hell that was Rwanda, we spoke to all the devils.” The power of dialogue is something Gaillard believes in implicitly, explaining matter-of-factly that, “the best way to save people is to talk with the people who want to kill them.” I cannot imagine the intensity of these conversations, so often at road blocks manned by Interahamwe militiamen like those who had at one point emptied a Red Cross Ambulance and “finished off” all those inside. Gaillard describes a heated exchange he had with one of the genocide’s architects, Colonel Bagosora like this:

I told him, "Colonel, do something to stop the killing. This is absurd. This is suicide." And his answer was -- there are words you never forget -- his answer was, "Listen, sir, if I want tomorrow I can recruit 50,000 more Interahamwe." I took him by the shirt-- I'm 58 kilograms and he must be 115-- I took him by the throat, looked in his eyes and told him, "You will lose the war.”

What Gaillaird shares when he considers the nature of the ICRC’s impact is powerful. Pondering the numbers, he once commented, “Ten thousand people is nothing in a conflict that saw almost a million die in under three months, it is just a millimetre of humanity in kilometres of horror.” But what precious space. Somewhere else he said that, “There is not one millimetre of humanity in a genocide.” And so it was the job of the ICRC to create a millimetre of beauty. As Gaillard himself puts it, “Yes, this is our job, to find beauty, create beauty in the very core of horror”. He invokes Keats, “A thing of beauty is a joy forever." He is quick to re-emphasize the vastness of the horror, the utter barbarism that surrounded everything but there was something crucial about being able to find that tiny space of the still human.

Gaillard tried to create a human space for his staff during the days of killing by reading them poetry – Rimbaud’s “A Season in Hell” - at dinner every evening. He said, “You have to find a way to pray.” Talking about the negation of humanity by genocidal horror he comments that, “Whenever you can reduce this negation it is a miracle. And the memory never forgets miracles.” It is these memories now that Gaillard struggles to cope with. The millimetre of beauty which the ICRC and others were able to create. He says now that he will never return to Rwanda. “Not at all because this would remind me of awful things”, he explains. “I don't want to meet again with people we have saved, because it's too strong. It's unbearable. It's too beautiful.”

Guided Tour of Banta

When I first went to Sierra Leone all I had were some pretty dodgy maps to try to piece together an idea of where I was going. While there it was hard to build up a picture of the geography of the place from my 5-foot-something-small vantage point. Since that time I have been able to look at better maps and now, with the help of google, we can see what it all looks like from space. What is really interesting about what is currently available on google is that it is all about 6 years old so we can see what Banta looked like before there was Children of the Nations.

So let's take the tour...

I am going to assume you know where Sierra Leone is in the world and so let's start with a shot of the whole country. As we go through these pictures you can have a look at any one of them in more detail simply by clicking on it.


So if you were flying to Sierra Leone you would land just north of Freetown, across the bay, in a place called Lungi. That's where every journey begins. If we look further south we will find Moyamba District.


You will see Bo city over in the east there and if you look right in the middle you will see a little area of blue, what look like lakes. Now we're getting very close to Banta because these lakes are what has been left by the mining of rutile. People in other parts of Sierra Leone don't generally know where Banta is but if you tell them you are from "the rutile area" they know where you mean. It is suggested that one third of the world's rutile, a mineral used in paint and welding rods amongst other things, is under the soil of this part of Sierra Leone.


Anyone who has been to Banta will be familiar with the river in the eastern side of this picture as it is the river that runs past Mokpangumba, Wubangie, Mokele and others. And you will see that google and I differ on the spelling of Mokpangumba. Look out to the east and you will find Serabu, our nearest hospital.

Now, find Mokpangumba on the river and look over to the east a little and you will see the bauxite mining plant owned by Vemetco. Which means our next picture is going to be of Banta itself and is going to feature a little village called Ngolala. If you have been to Banta look at the below picture, follow the road up from the mining plant and see if you can find Ngolala for yourself before moving on down...


If you aren't sure where to find it, look at the middle of the above picture near the top and just east of the road you have the village we know and love. The below picture gives you a better look.

Let's take a closer look at that...


Finding this was all pretty exciting for me. Ngolala has grown a lot since this picture was taken with many more houses built, especially up at the top of the village. You can see the cleared area at the top which is now "Ngolala Field" football pitch. And, beginning back down in the heart of the village, you can follow the path out to the east through Chief Kobba's palm tree plantation and take a right off the path, heading south across a swampy area to the beautiful village of Senehun, one of my favourite journeys. You can find Senehun at the bottom right corner of that picture.

Let's look more closely then at Ngolala, which from above looks like it has taken the shape of a tear drop.

And here is Senehun.


And if we passed Senehun and went round the corner of the mining road we would find ourselves at Jiminga. All of these villages have grown since these pictures were taken, it looks like there were no houses between the central part of Jiminga and the road at this time.


None of these villages can match the growth of Wondie however. At the time of this picture below, what is now referred to as "the old village" seems to have actually been "the whole village".


Then we have little Mogborie, surrounded by bush.

And Monicawe, by the road.

Let's go back across the river to get a closer look at Mokpangumba...


And then this picture of Mokelle. The little village to the north, at the top of this picture is where you get the boat to cross. If you are taking a dugout canoe you will probably cross more or less straight over and walk down to the village. If you are lucky enough to enjoy the bigger boat with the outboard engine you will travel south, up-stream to the village proper.


Let's go back to this wider shot once more so you can get your bearings again.


Find Ngolala at the top and in the middle of the above picture. Look left to the road from Ngolala and then about the same distance to the left again and you will see the little brown circle of Mogborie. Nowadays there is something pretty big that should show up in the space between these two villages. Nowadays the picture below would be a great shot of Children of the Nations...


Mogborie is there in the top left corner and you can see our swamp to the south of that. Notice that there is just one hut where the village of Ngolala Junction has now grown up. This is an incredible image when you think about what this patch of green jungle has become. I look forward to google updating their images so we can put the before and after side by side.

If you want to search google's representation of this part of our world for yourself then here is a link to start you off: Banta on Google

MTV Wrecking Belfast

As preparations were being made for Snow Patrol's open air gig at Belfast's City Hall...disaster strikes...

The Gospel in Chairs

Get your theological gears working while considering a different perspective on the old, old story...

A & J

I sat and watched Akay as she cradled Jack. They are a gorgeous pair. Akay, with her perfect ebony skin and high cheek bones is a stunningly beautiful young woman. Jack's big dark eyes and his round face are handsome but its when he lights it all up with a smile that you realise just how handsome. Akay holds her young son close, leaning forward and rubbing the front of her chin on his forehead making him giggle.

Akay's brother is sitting next to her mother on the bench beside me. I don't say much on visits to their home like this one. Theirs is a family of storytellers and so I just enjoy the free flowing entertainment. A lady from the village comes to sell some really nice traditional clothing and before his mother knows what is happening, Akay's brother is trying on his favourite. He sends a joke in Jack's direction about how much more handsome he is than his little nephew. Akay sucks her teeth in disagreement and points out Jack's smile and his red lips to back up her argument. Her brother looks at his mother and says, “Aren't you going to speak up for your son, Ma?” She looks at her teenage boy and sighs. He laughs good naturedly and, referring to how much he looks like a young version of his father, says, “Mama says that Papa has gotten old and ugly and that I have stolen his body.” Akay joins the joke now, flashing her own broad smile and laughing, “Oh, Mama looks at you and she remembers those days!” They both clap their hands, hum a beat and pretend to dance, laughing hard at the idea of their parents doing the same in their younger years.

Akay lives in a mud hut with no electricity and no toilet. She gets her water from a stream behind her home which is where people from her village also bathe. I didn't tell you that at first because I was afraid you would make her an “African” in your head, a cardboard cut-out that was decorated for you by oversimplified news stories, one dimensional charity advertisements and half remembered school projects. I believe that one of the biggest barriers to people's compassion towards the absolute poor is their inability to understand them as real, living, breathing, teasing their sisters and laughing at their ageing fathers people. People just like you. Akay and her brother are two particularly powerful examples of the world's inequality of opportunity. If they had been in your class at school they would have not only been the coolest kids in the place but quite possibly amongst the most successful afterwards. They just brim over with talent and potential. With the help of COTN, their parents and others who care for them, the prayer is that they will defy the odds and live the kind of lives they might dream of. Remember the kinds of dreams you had as you entered your last year of school? Yeah...lives like that...

With the sun beating a hasty evening retreat, and no torch in my bag, I got up to say my goodbyes and go home. Akay got up to “leave” me, which means walk with me a little of the way back, but as she moved she tripped and fell forward. After regaining her balance, she turned to me, stood up perfectly straight and smiled one of those embarrassed little smiles which say, “Ahem...let's pretend that didn't happen...”

Which I thought was cool because that's exactly what you probably would have done...

Fatherhood and friendship bracelets...

Sitting on the end of the hospital “bed” (little more than a mattress sitting on the grubby, tiled floor), the pink bracelet on my daughter's wrist taunted me.

I looked around the ward – some mattresses with women lying prostrate, mosquito nets tied above them and ceiling fans and lights which would never come on. The only thing which could have been labelled as “equipment” was the drip stand which was now feeding drugs in to my girl's bloodstream after a number of painful, abortive attempts by unskilled fingers to find a vein. In this we were lucky, another patient's IV was tied to one of the bars on the window beside their mattress. Our daughter was crying out to me and to the others around me in pain, panic and fear. The doctors reckoned they knew what was wrong but qualified their confidence by explaining that the tests they had the ability of running were severely restricted.

My eyes fell on that pink bracelet. A gift from a friend who works as a doctor in some excellent hospitals. The unfairness of our world screamed in our faces. I could feel anger swell up within me but it was accompanied by something I hadn't felt before in moments like this – it was a sense of guilt or maybe shame. I was being confronted with the question, “Is this the best you can do for your daughter?” I felt a pathetic sense of powerlessness intensified by what that bracelet represented – everything that was needed existed and was available to me. It was just somewhere else.

As I travelled home that evening I wondered if this was what my life was going to be like. Trying to care for people I love in a place that does all it can to prevent you from doing just that. Obviously I was feeling a little sorry for myself. But I don't really feel like I chose this. We are born in to our families. We don't choose them. That's how I feel about our ministry here. Like I didn't choose it any more than I chose my surname. There are times when I panic about money or get frustrated and get to feeling sorry for myself and I wonder about whether this is the place for me or not. And in those moments I could almost get annoyed about that familial connection. Because it refuses any attempts at shaking it off. This doesn't mean that my place in the family will never change but it probably means that I'm going to care about it for ever. Whether I like it or not.

Irritating really.

(And yes, she did get better, praise the Lord and the doctors doing lifesaving work in the bush.)

Shorts: The Seaside

Two Chinese men went to the beach. They paid a man so they could park their car. Then they paid a man so that they could sit on the sand at a nice table with a nice beach umbrella. They paid another man so that they could enjoy a drink and watch the waves. Then one of the Chinese men paid yet another man and he brought over two young women in swimming costumes. One of the Chinese men disappeared with his girl while the other sat at the table he had paid for with the drink he had paid for and the woman he had paid for. And so they had a nice day at the beach.

(Though the men in this story were Chinese they could as easily have been from anywhere else in the world. The girls are always African though.)

–

“Dooong!” The bell sounded and I closed my eyes and tried to imagine what it must have sounded like to the slaves it was originally used to call to attention. I was in the village of Dublin (!) on Banana Island, once used as a kind of holding site for slaves before they made their long journey to the Americas or Britain. I looked at the canons that were used to “protect” the slaves from pirates in the way a supermarket security guard protects the potatoes and tried to imagine how the slaves would have felt about them. I walked the trails of the small island, trails that probably haven't changed since slaves were marched up and down them before they were shipped across the Atlantic and tried to imagine how they must have seen this place – to you and me a tropical paradise, to them perhaps the very gateway to hell.

I tried to imagine. But I couldn't.

–

Far out enough that they would be difficult to see from the shore, the local fishermen paddle their small, one-man dug-out canoes despite the swell of the ocean waves. They have a line in the water and hopes of a decent catch, repeating a scene that hasn't changed for hundreds of years. You just have to watch and wonder.

–

We had fought the usual Freetown traffic down one of the busiest streets in the city, Kissy, a hive of people, market stalls, all kinds of vehicles and some more people, but had to walk the last part because a container truck had blocked the road. It was an unremarkable Freetown day as the city sweated, shouted, honked its horns and tried to sell things to itself. Then the next thing we knew we were in what looked like an airport lounge in an American city with people offering to buy us Starbucks coffee.

We were visiting the Mercy Ships floating hospital, Africa Mercy, where one of our kids had surgery earlier this year and where we had a few contacts and wanted to make a few more. I spent a lot of the time just gazing around. Everywhere you looked Americans and Europeans were tapping on Macs or draining coffee cups. These people all contribute to some really amazing work but spend the bulk of their time in this weird western microcosm. I wondered if any of them ever really get to begin to understand where they are. Then our visiting hours were over and we headed back to Sierra Leone and walked up the bustling Kissy Road trying to work out what had just happened.