The other trainees nod. The scenario is only too familiar.
‘The boys are from different clans and the two clans started insulting and threatening one another. “Step aside,” the parents were told, “this is now a clan matter.” Olum’s clan demanded blood money for the slap Olum had suffered, but Kidega’s clan refused. They reminded Olum’s clan of the many attacks they had carried out on them; girls raped, kinsmen killed.’
‘And the outcome?’ the trainer asks.
‘I think there will be widespread fighting, and very soon,’ Mrs Gisemba says sadly.
The trainer turns to the rest of the group. ‘What if you were the teacher in this situation?’ she asks them. ‘If Olum and Kidega were your pupils, what would you do to help solve this dispute? Where would you begin? Let’s brainstorm some ideas.’
People call out suggestions and the trainer quickly compiles a list on the blackboard. Their next task is to discuss each suggestion and decide which ones might actually work.
‘The idea is to draw on the life skills of the people involved,’ the trainer reminds them.
But the calm exchange of ideas is derailed almost immediately when somebody mutters, ‘Since the skills in this case are thieving and bullying, there is no peaceful solution possible. Can a leopard change its spots?’
An Acholi man responds angrily. ‘Are you saying Acholi are liars and thieves?’
‘No,’ the other man replies, ‘but the victim’s father deserves an apology and the thief should be beaten for his sins. If this cannot happen, then Olum’s family must fight Kidega’s.’
Others join in the debate. Conflicting views are thrown back and forth.
‘If we continue this way the violence will only get worse.’
‘We will all be lost.’
‘Pah, the child who stole should be punished.’
‘The family must be avenged.’
‘But isn’t that what starts all wars?’
‘It is up to the teachers to punish the child.’
‘The parents are not the ones to blame!’
‘What can parents do to protect their children?’
‘We will all be victims if we don’t protect our own.’
‘It’s this rotten war. Blame the government!’
People begin to shout. Obulejo feels like shouting, too, he’s so angry. That stupid man who made those remarks about the Acholi, and those older men and women who said the boys should be beaten and the parents thrashed, they ought to have their heads banged together! What are they thinking? How can the children learn peaceful ways when adults are so intolerant?
And the trainer – why doesn’t she do something? Is that all this peace education amounts to – playing games and charades, but when it comes to an actual conflict, let the same old violence prevail? Doesn’t anyone but Obulejo understand what’s at stake?
The long, long, hot session drags on. The group reaches no agreement. But what really sets Obulejo’s blood boiling is the comment of a Dinka man: ‘We must all share the responsibility for creating peace because we all created the war.’
Typical Dinka, Obulejo thinks. They start a war and then expect everyone else to share the blame.
‘Speak for yourself,’ Obulejo blurts out. ‘It is you Dinkas who dragged us into this war. The Ma’di are a peaceful people. We don’t wage war.’
‘Oh no?’ an Acholi man retorts.
Others grin. The never-ending skirmishes between the Ma’di and Acholi in times past are common knowledge.
‘No, they leave it to the Dinka,’ another chips in, ‘then run away and hide behind the skirts of Mother Church.’
Eventually, the trainer winds up the discussion. She asks Mrs Gisemba to let the group know the outcome of the problem between the two students, and then dismisses everyone.
Obulejo leaves that session fuming, and deep into the night goes over and over the discussion, the things he said and what everybody else said. It’s almost dawn before the penny drops. He’s no different from anyone else, he realises; he’s just as caught up in old hatreds and prejudices. Isn’t he angry at Malia’s uncle for keeping him from Malia, and wouldn’t he like to force Uncle’s hand? And when he tries to imagine a way the conflict between Mrs Gisemba’s two Acholi families might be solved without blood being shed, he can’t. The old conflicts are too deeply ingrained, the mistrust too long-standing.
As if in response to that thought, Obulejo catches the sound of running feet, and shouts begin to ring out. As the footsteps and shouting get closer Obulejo hunches low on his mat and edges away from the entrance. Maku is on watch outside, he knows, but one person alone is nothing against a gang intent on looting and killing. The footsteps pick up pace and the yelling and screaming intensifies until Obulejo expects the door to burst open and a rifle-wielding marauder to rush in. But no, the footsteps pass by and then retreat into the distance and the yells become fainter: some other unfortunate inmate is the target tonight.
The next day brings sobering but all too familiar news – a dozen men and boys kidnapped by the Rebels during the night, and three shelters in Obulejo’s sector robbed and their occupants brutally beaten. One of the victims is not expected to survive. Obulejo doesn’t catch his name. Rumours fly about. Women raped, a child slaughtered, someone chopped with a panga.
In the schoolyard and in the staffroom there is much talk of revenge. And is it just his imagination, Obulejo wonders, or are his pupils more unruly and troublesome than usual today? The boys pushing and scuffling and the girls pinching each other, fidgeting and fussing and name-calling. Everyone is unsettled. The daydreamers gaze about even more vacantly than usual, pupils Obulejo has taken great pains to help and encourage stumble more when reading aloud and even the most capable don’t seem able to do the simplest sums.
As the day drags on, his patience starts to fray. And though he hates to admit it, he is unnerved by this latest outbreak of lawlessness. Are the attacks becoming more frequent? A dismal prospect. He reminds himself that at least there is choir practice to look forward to today, and relishes the prospect of joyful adungu music, dancing, singing and the chance to be near Malia.
But when he arrives in the square, neither Malia nor her sister Mondua is there.
‘Have they been delayed?’ Obulejo asks one of Malia’s friends.
She does not answer.
‘Are they ill?’ he asks another.
The girls put their heads down and turn away, which makes Obulejo uneasy. Where are Malia and Mondua? They’ve never missed choir before. Something must have happened. Could they have been taken in last night’s raid? Surely not; it’s boys the Rebels want, not girls.
His mind races. Why won’t the girls tell him where Malia is?
Suddenly it comes to him. Robbers. That must be it. Malia was attacked by those thieves he heard racing past in the night – Mondua too. Those jackals, how dare they! But they won’t get away with it; he’ll find them and punish them. He’ll kill them! He’ll go and find the girls’ uncle straightaway, and tell him that he, Obulejo, will join the avengers.
Before he can act on his plan he is intercepted by Maku, who strides towards him.
‘I must go,’ Obulejo says, after briefly shaking Maku’s proffered hand. ‘I have urgent business to attend to.’
‘More urgent than leading the singing?’ Maku says. ‘You and Malia are the only ones who can teach this song and she is not here today —’
‘Yes yes,’ Obulejo says bitterly, ‘I know about her being attacked by robbers. Now please, I must go.’
‘Not so fast,’ Maku says. ‘My friend, you are mistaken. Malia has not been attacked by anything, as far as I have been informed, except illness.’
Obulejo’s heart skips a beat. ‘She is ill?’
‘Cholera, I’m afraid.’
The blood drains out of Obulejo’s face. Cholera is far worse than being bashed by robbers. Everyone fears it. It spreads like wildfire, and there are few doctors in Kakuma and not enough an
tibiotics. Sick people die every day.
‘Mondua too?’ Obulejo says.
Maku nods his head. ‘They are both very ill. We can only pray that they recover.’
Obulejo has seen how quickly cholera can turn a healthy person into a ravaged skeleton. But not Malia, surely – it cannot be possible. But he knows only too well that it can. The worst thing is that there is nothing he can do to help Malia. The hospital will not let him see the sisters, and even if they did he might carry the disease back and spread it to others.
His heart is not really in the singing that afternoon. He misses Malia’s soprano accompanying his tenor. He misses her shy presence, and he is racked with worry for her. Getting sick is one of the most dangerous things that can happen to a person in a refugee camp.
Have Malia and Mondua been using the filthy water the Turkana trade with the inmates? he wonders. Their uncle should have seen to it that they had clean water. Everybody knows about the animal and human faeces in the water the Turkana peddle. Only the most desperate resort to using it.
Hah! There is something he can do to help, he realises: he can fetch clean water for the sisters, and use some of his precious shillings to buy them some soap. Clean water and soap are the two best defences against cholera – that is, if Malia and her sister are not already too ill.
When Obulejo finally arrives home close on dark that evening, he is completely exhausted. What a day! No sooner had his fears about the sisters being hurt by robbers proved false than the news of their illness crashed in on him, and instead of searching for wrongdoers and punishing them brutally he has walked miles and waited hours in line to fetch clean water and carry it to the hospital for them, then risked going to the market late in the day to purchase bars of soap as well.
And he will keep doing it, he vows, as long as they are ill.
25
WHEN HE JOINS the other trainees for the next peace education session, it takes Obulejo a few minutes to properly focus, so preoccupied is he with worry about Malia and her sister. The girls are no better, he has learned, but neither are they any worse – that is at least some cause for hope.
Finally he directs his attention to the front of the class. On the blackboard, chalked in wobbly capitals, are two lines of writing. Firstly a question:
IF I WISH TO CHANGE THE WORLD WHERE MUST I START?
And on the next line, the answer:
I MUST START WITH MYSELF.
Obulejo reads the sentences through, impatiently. The ‘if’ in the first line is unnecessary, he thinks. Of course the trainees want to change the world, that’s why they’re here. That’s why he’s prepared to work with both friends and enemies. And if he were in charge he would put an end to war, demand that everybody live in peace, and that people treat each other with kindness and respect.
He reads the two sentences again. The second one stops him in his tracks. I MUST START WITH MYSELF. The words feel as if they are burning themselves into his brain. Accusing him. He looks around. Are the words having the same effect on other trainees? It seems not. People are chatting and laughing. A few are flipping through notebooks, or copying the sentences down.
He’d like to rub the words off the board and pretend he hasn’t seen them. Surely he’s doing his part by training children to co-operate with each other and find peaceful solutions, and by being tolerant of those in the training group? What more do they expect?
But then he thinks about the times he’s used violence against others. He’s always excused himself by saying that he has no choice. But is it really true, and is that how a peacemaker should act? The other day he was blaming colleagues for their ignorance and laying the responsibility for any conflict on the elders and leaders. Does he have any peaceful alternatives to offer? No.
The shadows lengthen and the heat of the day begins to fade. The sun is a red fireball behind the endless rows of camp barracks. At this time of day, back home, the family would be gathering wood, uncles carrying home logs and children dragging bundles of sticks for the evening fire. The mamas and sisters would be stirring the pots from which enticing aromas would float. Home. Comfort. Certainty. Family, one door, enclosing him protectively.
Obulejo’s mind races back to a day in the gardens when he was a small child and the big rains came suddenly and flooded the creek. The children could not cross to get back to the village. The little ones were frightened. ‘How will we get home?’ they whimpered. And even while the bigger children were trying to reassure them, shouts reached them from the further bank, and there came the mothers and fathers, wading into the floodwaters to fetch their children and bear them safely home through the floods.
All that has been lost. No one will come for me in Kakuma, Obulejo thinks. There is no one to take me safely back home.
His musing is interrupted when the trainer enters and the classroom shuffles to order. It is an older man today. He picks up the pointer and raps it against the words on the board. The class reads the words aloud several times in unison. They are asked to consider the statement over the course of today’s session and in the ensuing days.
Then the trainer tells them a story.
‘There was an old man,’ he begins, ‘who had spent his life trying to change the world for the better. Long and hard he laboured until, in old age, he at last admitted defeat.
‘“I have not changed the world,” the old man told his family. “I have failed. It has been too big a task and I am just one man.”
‘So he decided he must be less ambitious. He would change his country. There was much that was unjust in the land of his birth and many who suffered. So he struggled and struggled to persuade the leaders to change their ways, but they refused to heed his calls.
‘Defeated, the man turned to his local community. “All right,” he said, “if I cannot change the world and I cannot change my country, then I will change my local community. I will persuade people who live in my district to care for one another and to stop quarrelling and fighting.”
‘A few people were persuaded, but largely the man’s efforts came to nothing. Exasperated, the man turned his attention to his family. “As the head of my family,” he declared, “if I cannot change things here, if I cannot bring peace, then I have achieved nothing. My life has been lived to no purpose.”
‘His wives smiled and the uncles scowled, and the aunts and sisters and brothers waited to see. The old man did his best, but you know families. When he met resistance even there the old man threw up his hands in despair. All his life he had striven to change things, to persuade people to act more kindly, and to create peace, and it had been for nothing. He might as well die. His life had been wasted.
‘As he sat pondering these dismal thoughts, a tiny grandchild came toddling through the compound. Then she stumbled and fell. She held up her tiny grazed hands and began to wail. Irritated by the wailing, the old man looked around for the child’s mother, or an elder grandson or daughter to tend to her. It was not his job to look after children.
‘But as the child continued to weep, the old man began to look at things in a new way. The little girl was hurt. He had witnessed her tumble. She needed comforting. He was close by. It was that simple.
‘He gathered her in his arms and patted away her tears, soothed her sore palms and carried her to a shady spot by the brush fence. And he was surprised to discover that although the burden on his arms had increased, the burden in his heart had lightened.’
There is a long silence at the end of the story.
When the trainer asks for feedback, the discussion is heated. Some argue that the old man employed the wrong methods. He should have gathered a group to make new laws and to enforce the peace. People should have listened to him. What sort of community disregards the advice of an elder? And the mother of the baby, or her older brothers and sisters, should have looked after the tot more conscientiously. Why had a tiny child been left to roam alone and allowed to come to harm?
A few remain silent. For Obulejo there is
no need for discussion. The message in the story drops into his heart as clearly as any of the teaching stories Moini told his children by the fire at night.
‘And what is the biggest change we all need to make, each and every one of us, in order to have peace?’ the trainer asks.
A few suggestions are offered. The trainer writes them all on the board. Shifting opinions, overcoming prejudices, getting children to understand that co-operating, helping each other and finding solutions together are better than fighting.
‘Yes, all good points,’ the trainer says. ‘And what is the concept that underlies these?’
Obulejo raises his hand.
The trainer nods.
‘Changing our own attitudes.’
The trainer nods again. ‘Good answer. In what way?’
‘One door,’ Obulejo replies.
Then, realising he has lapsed into Ma’di, he translates quickly. ‘Family. Not clans and tribes and nations, but family. One family.’
He sits back down. A clamorous discussion breaks out around him, but he sees and hears none of it. He is busy pondering this revelation – this pathway to peace. Accepting everybody as part of his family.
Is it possible? Everybody one big family? Even the Dinka? Or is that a jump too high? In Dadaab it was the Somalis he had to watch out for, who visited harm on the Christian Sudanese, and they were frightening enough, but it is the Dinka who are really to blame for Obulejo’s plight. He cannot forgive them, not while he’s still in danger of their tribesmen kidnapping him and carting him off to fight.
He can co-operate with the Dinka trainees during games and exercises, but at what price can he truly think of them as brothers and sisters? By giving up his Ma’di ways? It’s who he is, he can’t change that. His thoughts and feelings and hopes and aspirations are those of a Ma’di. And the prejudices, a small inner voice whispers, but he discounts it. He is not to blame for how things are; the troubles started long before he was born!
But the story of the old man will not let him be. It is the Ma’di way to teach and learn through stories – and the meaning of this story is very clear. To help his granddaughter the old man had to step out of his traditional role and be willing to take on the work of younger people, of girls and women. It made no sense to leave the child weeping while he shouted for someone else to come and help her. He was the one on the spot. He had seen her fall and he was the best person to help her – because he was there.
Trouble Tomorrow Page 15
