by Ishmael Beah
* * *
“I need my pen back, sir.” The waitress took the pen out of Bockarie’s grip and placed it in her pocket, returning to stand by the counter and chat with her coworkers. They whispered to one another and laughed at the fact that Bockarie had bought only mango juice since he sat there. He ignored them, folded the napkin, put it inside his front pocket, and turned his attention to the young men outside. Just then a group of foreigners arrived in the area, headed to the mobile phone store down the street. One of the young men went in their direction and greeted them.
“Hello! You do not need to buy a new phone. I can help unlock the ones you have and you only need to buy a SIM card then. You’ll be saving lots of money. So what do you say, my good people?” He spoke quickly, as the distance to the mobile phone store was quite short. The foreigners seemed hesitant, looking at one another.
“Please, give me yours and I will open it for free.” He put out his hand to a young woman the same age as him, nineteen years old. She apprehensively gave him her phone. He first took out the battery and restarted the thing, then quickly typed in a few numbers and letters, pressed Enter and then another set of numbers and letters. The young woman, a bit intrigued, tried to see what he was doing. She moved closer and he turned toward her so that she could see his hands more clearly.
“I will do a test with my SIM card,” he said, turning the phone off again and placing the card in it before turning it back on.
“Awolowo, call me phone, ya,” he called out, setting his voice above traffic, to one of his friends who sat on the pavement of the street while handing the phone back to the young woman. Awolowo pulled out his mobile phone and dialed. The phone rang and the young woman answered. Awolowo said something that made her laugh.
“Man, nor mess wit me business oh,” he warned Awolowo, who hung up and waved to the woman. Bockarie watched in amazement as the young man now unlocked the phones of all the foreigners, sent his friend Awolowo to buy SIM cards for all of them, and made sure everything worked. He charged them, and the foreigners were so impressed that they paid more than he had asked. One of them decided to give him an extra hundred-dollar bill. After the foreigners left, the young man showed the money to his friend Awolowo.
“I hate 1996, man,” he said, handing the bill to Awolowo who looked at the 1996 series of the hundred-dollar bill.
“You won’t get much for this.” Awolowo gave it back to him. Hundred-dollar bills as old as 1996 were rarely accepted here, and when they were, the exchange rate was very low. You needed bills that were more recent than 2000. “You know, I have always wondered who came up with this rule that the 1996 series isn’t good. We do choose some interesting standards, man, for people who have no money.” He laughed. “Isn’t it a law that money is legal tender?”
“Awolowo, you have too much time on your hands today, man. The law is different here on the street. You know that. And for the 1996 bills, the idea came about because people found out they were easiest to fake.”
“Doesn’t it mean, though, that those making fake 1996s would have moved on to making other notes?” Awolowo looked at the bill.
“Man, keep quiet and go find business there!” His friend pointed to another group of foreigners.
“Amazing, isn’t it?” The voice of someone reached the ears of Bockarie. He looked up at the man who sat across from him. He hadn’t noticed when he entered the restaurant.
“Amazing,” he repeated and continued. “That young man has technology and business skills. But he only uses them to survive. Imagine if someone gave him an opportunity to use his talents to live well, not just to make small change on the street. He will be successful.” The man looked at Bockarie’s face, his strong and intimidating stare piercing into Bockarie.
“I am here on behalf of Mr. Kaifala. He cannot meet you today, so he asked me to tell you to come to this address tomorrow for the meeting.” He handed a piece of carefully wrapped paper to Bockarie. Opening it, Bockarie saw that the location of the next meeting was in Aberdeen, another part of the city, farther. He surely would have to take one of those transportation vehicles. The man did not tell Bockarie his name.
“Mr. Kaifala also instructed me to buy you a meal and give you some money to pay your way back home.”
Bockarie wanted to ask the man to give him the money instead of buying the meal, but he was ashamed. So he ordered and ate food that his wife cooked better. After the quiet meal, during which the nameless fellow just observed Bockarie, he gave him the money for transportation. As he took the money, they both saw a boy no more than eight years old writing the alphabet in crayon on the body of a brand-new car. He used every inch of the vehicle’s body. When the owner returned, he asked the boy in anger and amazement why he would do such a thing.
“My father has no money to buy me a notebook,” the boy replied. The owner just shook his head, not knowing what to do.
The man and Bockarie, too, shook their heads. Bockarie left him at the table in the restaurant and pretended to catch a taxi while he was looking. As soon as he was out of sight of the man, he started walking home, keeping the transportation money in his pocket. En route he witnessed some bizarre things that, he mused, possibly only occur here.
He was at a very busy intersection where a traffic policeman was exasperatedly waving his hands to regulate cars whose drivers ignored his authority. The traffic was coming from four directions, all of them two-way streets. Suddenly, the policeman took off running as fast as he could. The drivers and pedestrians were at first confused, frowning as they searched for what had caused the sudden departure. And there it was: coming down the hill of one of the streets, behind the policeman, was a taxi, its driver not only out of his seat but also in front of the car, trying to use his body weight to slow it down. Inside the taxi were people seated comfortably, as though nothing was going on. Knowing that he couldn’t stop the car, the driver shouted to the passengers to jump out. Then he stepped away, and the vehicle sped even faster down the hill, hitting a BMW that was coming from the other direction. The passengers, though screaming, weren’t hurt, nor were those in the BMW. But the driver couldn’t afford to pay for the damage so he took to his heels and disappeared among the houses, leaving his taxi behind. This provided laughter for everyone and eased their frustration with the traffic for a few minutes before they started blowing their horns and shouting at the policeman, who had returned to his unenviable post.
Shaking his head and wishing he had a pen and paper to write what just happened, Bockarie continued on. As he climbed a small hill toward the main college in Freetown, he saw the most wretched vehicle, a taxi, he had ever seen. The car had been welded together, but not properly. The areas that couldn’t be welded because the metal was too rusty had been tied with wires. It was a car with a nervous condition because everything shook as its tires rolled under its dilapidated body. The taxi made a sharp turn around the corner—and the driver fell out, with the door! He wore no seat belt and the car kept on going, with its passengers, until luckily it slowed itself down without crashing into streetlamps, walls, or another vehicle. It was a blessing after all that the engine had no strength.
The driver staggered up, carrying the door with him, and ran after his vehicle. When he caught up with the car, panting with relief, he demanded that the frightened passengers pay him the fare. They cursed him and yelled for him to let them out; they couldn’t open the doors on their own.
Bockarie left them arguing and increased his pace home to see his family.
* * *
Kula and the children waited for Bockarie on Mr. Saquee’s veranda. As soon as he appeared in the short distance, Thomas and Oumu ran to greet him.
“Welcome back, Father!” they said together and pulled the plastic bag from his hands thinking it might have sweets or something of that sort. Learning that it was just his shirt, they quickly and excitedly explained to him all that they had seen during their wanderings to discover their new neighborhood—the buildings,
the cars, so many people, and they also got sweets and ice cream!
“Please wait until I sit down so that the whole family can hear your stories,” Bockarie pleaded with the twins, but they were too impatient.
“Father, have you ever seen a Chinese person like in the karate films?” Thomas asked. He went on before his father had a chance to respond. “We saw so many of them walking around and some even selling medicines in the market. Hawa and Maada will never believe me.” He finished with brushstrokes of wonder on his face.
“We also saw people without arms like Sila, and they had children, too, like Hawa and Maada. Why were they begging, Mother? Sila didn’t beg with his children,” Oumu asked.
“This is a different place, my daughter. I am sure if they didn’t have to they wouldn’t.” Kula pulled Oumu closer.
Thomas broke in eagerly. “We walked all the way to PZ, you know that is the main center of the city. Then we watched a Barcelona–versus–Real Madrid match, the last twenty minutes, from a big, big television in one of the Lebanese stores,” Abu looked to his older brother for a continuation of the story.
“The Lebanese didn’t let us inside so we watched from the street, and when the game ended we sat on the pavement and watched people. There was a group of four boys who just went up and down the road trying to steal things from people. One or two of them would walk in front of someone they had spotted and the others behind. One would distract their victim while the others pickpocketed or snatched his or her bag and ran away. Sometimes they would show people a fake bottle of perfume or a gold necklace as part of their distraction. They just went up and down the street the whole time.”
Manawah still didn’t understand why the boys spent so much time just to snatch something from passersby. Why couldn’t they use that time for something more constructive? Perhaps they had tried their best and this was what they had been left with?
“What was your experience, Miss Quiet?” Bockarie asked Miata. She smiled a bit and started by saying that she made a new friend who was a student at Fourah Bay College, where she had gone on the instruction of her mother to find out about preparatory college classes during the holidays. Kula and Bockarie wanted Manawah and Miata to be prepared for school when it reopened and not feel intimidated by their classmates in the city.
“The campus is on top of the hill, way up there, and the view is so beautiful but it is difficult to get up there by transportation. On the way down my new friend and I decided to walk since we couldn’t get a vehicle quicker. All these cars with tinted glass kept slowing down and asking if we wanted a lift. My friend told me we must not get in them. Her name is Isatu, and she kept telling all of them off including the boys who whistled at us.” She ended.
“I would like to meet Isatu. She sounds like a good friend to have and a strong young woman.” Kula looked at her husband, indicating that it was his turn. Bockarie told them all about his walk and the amazing, bizarre, and funny things he had witnessed and that he would have to go to town again the next day.
“I should come with you next time. Your day was more enjoyable than mine,” Kula laughingly told her husband. She was about to recount the stories of her search for work when Mr. Saquee arrived and joined the family on the veranda. He told Bockarie that a friend of his, a pharmacist, had agreed to treat Manawah’s forehead for free. It was then that even Manawah remembered that his forehead was still swollen. The excitement of the city had completely occupied him.
“Have the boys sleep in my parlor so you don’t have to wound one of them every night, man!”
Kula then told her story about the rude secretaries she had dealt with all day on the phone. “It seemed to me that they didn’t want anyone to get employed where they worked,” she concluded with frustration.
“You are doing it the wrong way, my dear. You have to go to these places in person or try to know someone there, otherwise you are wasting your money making all these calls.” Mr. Saquee cracked his knuckles thoughtfully. “Would you like to look at the possibility of working at a hotel? I think they have some openings for receptionist positions. I can call the manager who used to sleep here—on the ground, in that parlor. Don’t bring that up when you see him!” His jovial face once again lit up with a smile. He pulled out his mobile phone and made a call, walking away from them to have his conversation. He returned shortly.
“You will go to Aberdeen tomorrow to the Inamutnib Hotel and ask for Pascal. He said no promises, but what have you got to lose? I will write his number for you and give you directions. It is something to occupy you and of course provide money while you search for what you’d really like to do.”
“Thank you, Mr. Saquee! I will make you cassavas tomorrow!” Kula said.
“You know I will do anything for the way you cook cassavas. I feel as though you are giving me my childhood back when I eat it.” Mr. Saquee laughed, and the silence that ensued invited the beginning of night.
* * *
There was a commotion growing, and the young men causing it soon came into view with a thief they had captured. The fellow, the same age (twenty-two) as his capturers, begged them to take him to the police station, but they refused and started beating him mercilessly. He cried out, “Please take me to be locked up in jail instead. That is the law isn’t it? Why don’t you want to abide by it?”
The young men didn’t listen. The thief made a break. Limping but running as fast as he could, he escaped with a bloodied body and possibly broken ribs. Mr. Saquee called over one of the young men who had captured the thief.
“Come here, Almamy, and tell us what just happened.”
Almamy explained to Mr. Saquee and Bockarie and his family that they had captured that same fellow the other day and taken him to the police station, but he had been released because he was in cahoots with the police. Whenever they took thieves to the station, he said, the police would ask them for a detailed list of items or the amount of money that had been stolen. All this, so that they made sure to get their fair share from the thieves they had sent out. In addition, they demanded money from whoever brought a thief to the station for feeding, lodging, and to buy pen and paper to write down the statement.
“So now when we catch a thief we just beat him up badly, as taking him to the police station will cost money,” Almamy finished.
“There was a discussion on the radio about this the other day,” Mr. Saquee said. “Should people take justice in their own hands when their system of law does not function?” He pondered but gave no response, just instructing Almamy to help start the generator so that they could watch the national television station for the news before the Manchester United–Arsenal match. Almamy happily went to the back of the house and soon the evening was greeted everywhere with the sounds of generators that covered the night noises of crickets. However, that night, when it fully came in, was darker as the lights from the generators were too dim to push back the darkness a bit toward the sky. The stars and moon came out later and won over the darkness. They shone brighter than the lightbulbs, and this was an assurance that God and gods still paid some attention to things here, this and the sun, its heat that remained as hot as it had always been.
“Light don cam” (Light has come), a boy called out from the other house and there was a small clamor as people who had electricity ran home to charge their mobile phones and turn on their fridges and anything else that needed electricity, as quickly as possible before the power went away again. The generators were switched off and the proper silence of night arrived. The power was, however, weaker and the lights were like the eyes of a sleep-possessed person who tried to stay awake. The bulbs dulled and then brightened repeatedly, but even when they were at their brightest, a flashlight had better vigor. Before the excitement of the arrival of electricity was finished, the power was gone.
“Almamy, please start the generator again,” Mr. Saquee called out. “We are not lucky enough in this part of town. You see up the hill where the lights are now? There is always el
ectricity there because one of the ministers has a mistress in that neighborhood. So whenever we have a new government, we pray that someone in it has a home in our neighborhood or will find a girlfriend in our part of town!” Mr. Saquee said. Bockarie thought about Principal Fofanah in Imperi and his conversations with Benjamin when they were teachers.
The quietness of night was driven away again when all the area generators came on. Bockarie sat with his family and Mr. Saquee’s in the parlor and watched the local news, which was mostly about praising the work that the current government was doing. They claimed the government had brought electricity to the country and boasted of its natural beauty, as though the government were responsible for that, too. The president came on to brag about what his administration was doing.
“We have brought electricity to this country…” he began, and the lights went off at the television station. Bockarie and Mr. Saquee laughed. Their television was still on because it was powered by a generator. After several minutes, the television station regained power and the president picked up right where he had left off, speaking about the wonderful electricity they had brought to the country and other development projects in the pipeline.
“Now, that is pure comedy,” Bockarie said.
“I had a feeling you would like it, man. That is why I watch this so-called news show. You really see what is going on in this country in the background of the news itself.”
Bockarie wanted to mention that that was just half of what was going on, there were worse things that most people in the city would probably never know about—they had their own worries and desperation. But the match between Manchester United and Arsenal came on after the president’s speech, and gradually the house was filled with men and boys who had come to watch.
