Dying to Live

by Pierre-Claver Ndacyayisenga

  If you could avoid getting sick, which was not easy in this environment infested with malaria-carrying mosquitoes, production could reach between fifty and eighty sacks of charcoal per month, worth about 50,000 to 80,000 CFA francs or $100-150. At the beginning, the demand for charcoal was high and it was easy to sell. But by the end of 1998, many people, Rwandans and Congolese alike, had entered the industry, resulting in overproduction and falling prices. As a result, I abandoned charcoal production to sell cassava flour and cigarettes on a table I set up in front of my dwelling. The new business didn’t require much initial investment and wasn’t very profitable, but I could at least feed my family and the work wasn’t so hard. As I spent the entire day sitting in front of my stand waiting for a handful of customers, I decided to use this time to make baskets that women could use to carry groceries. I had mastered basketry as an art as a young man, picking the appropriate vines in the forest and weaving baskets that I then sold to pick up extra cash.

  By the end of 1998, the situation of the Rwandan refugees of Pokola had greatly improved due to their efforts. We had reverted to people who were clean and who wore clothes and shoes, whereas when we had arrived, we had been half naked and barefoot. Our young men began to be accepted by young Congolese women and our daughters and wives, who had regained their femininity, were once again naturally coveted by the Congolese men who initially could not stand to even touch them. The fidelity of the Rwandan women was to be commended; despite poverty, for the most part they declined the advances and marriage proposals they received from the Congolese men. The Congolese generally considered women as a commodity and did not understand how a beautiful woman could remain attached to a poor man. They didn’t realize that in the Rwandan culture, marriage is a lifelong commitment and separation and divorce are virtually unheard of.

  In 1998, our children were aged fifteen, eleven and seven years old. Ange-Claude had been in the fourth grade when we left Rwanda, but the two girls had not had the chance to attend school. As a former teacher, I was particularly concerned about having children of this age who were not in school. Thus, whenever the opportunity presented itself, whether in the camps in Zaire or in the villages of Congo-Brazzaville, I managed to find the time to teach them the basics: reading, writing and mathematics. They wrote their answers in the dust on the floor with their fingers, banana leaves or with small pieces of wood. Aware of what was required at each level of study, I made sure that each child received the basic education appropriate to their age, and I was glad that my children were enthusiastic and interested in learning.

  In Pokola, it took a special effort to teach our youngest the vocabulary of the home. Having lived more than half her life in a tent in the various refugee camps that we had inhabited or in the bush and forest, she had to acquire the habit of living between solid walls and familiarize herself with the words for the various parts of a house such as “door” and “window,” or furniture such as “table,” “chair,” etc., things she had never known after becoming old enough to express herself in words.

  However, these elementary courses were not enough to provide them with a proper education. We knew that there was no future in Pokola for them, nor for us. Now that we had regained our strength, we had to think of leaving this forest, and among the possible destinations, Cameroon was the most prominent.

  CHAPTER 9

  From Cameroon to Canada:

  The Slow and Difficult

  Return to Normal Life

  Despite the closure of Cameroon’s land borders to Rwandan refugees, some were able to enter, mostly settling in Yaoundé, the capital, about eight hundred miles from Pokola. They passed back word to us of better living conditions and aid provided by Father Carlos of the NGO Caritas Spain, a priest who had already helped the refugees in the camps around Bukavu and who had also been to Tingi-Tingi. We also learned that there were telephones, faxes and mail service, which did not exist in the Pokola forest.

  In early 1999, I began to prepare to travel once again, this time to Yaoundé. It wasn’t an easy trip to organize. In fact, I needed money to pay for the trip, because this time I’d be travelling in logging trucks that carried wood produced by the CIB to the port of Douala. It would also be necessary to have all my documents in order before crossing the border.

  Despite our efforts to live on as little as possible, I had only managed to make enough money through the sale of charcoal, cassava flour and cigarettes to cover the cost of keeping two people alive, whereas we were actually five. After several days of discussion with my wife, who rightly feared that we would be separated, we reached the conclusion that if we wanted to leave this isolated place, we would have to travel in two groups. Our son Ange-Claude and I would be the first to leave, having as our mission, once arrived in Yaoundé, to raise the funds necessary to finance the rest of the family’s fares as quickly as possible.

  To make sure I had the necessary papers, I went to see the Pokola police commissioner I had met when I was the representative of the refugees. He gave me a document stating that I was a Togolese citizen who had fled the civil war (which had flared up), lost his identity papers and was trying to return to Togo via Cameroon. Now we had everything we needed.

  We spent three days and two nights riding in a truck on a particularly deteriorated road due to the rainy season, finally reaching Yaoundé after having crossed all of eastern Cameroon, as well as the central part of the country and its cities, Bertoua and Batouri. Once there, we were accommodated by a friend who had arrived shortly before us. I was soon able to obtain the email addresses and phone numbers of our old acquaintances who had already established themselves in Europe or America. Some promptly reacted to hearing that my whole family and I were still alive, sending me some money via Western Union. This enabled me to finance my wife’s and two daughters’ transportation one month after arriving in Yaoundé. Our new life began. After five years in the jungle, we had to relearn how to live in a city, especially our youngest child, who only remembered what it was like to live in the forest.

  With the help of Caritas Spain and the contributions of our friends, we were able to get our two daughters into the last semester of primary school, Emmérence in the first grade and Claudine in the third. With one hundred and twenty students per class, the public schools in Cameroon were pretty chaotic; but at least the girls were getting an education.

  In July 1999, I started looking for work, hoping to find a job in private secondary education. In September, I was hired to teach geography and history at a private school called La Rosière that was located in my neighbourhood. As the director also ran a primary school, we had an arrangement: instead of receiving a salary, I would teach in exchange for our two daughters’ schooling. But this exchange would only last one semester because at the end of December 1999, I had to leave my job and resume travelling.

  Sixteen-year-old Ange-Claude’s situation was complicated by the fact that we couldn’t afford to send him to private school. In search of a solution, I went to speak to Father Jean-Hervé, a Frenchman who was the Father Superior of the Brothers of Saint-Jean and the principal of a private secondary school. After I had explained my concerns about my son, who had not been able to graduate from primary school, he agreed to let him take the first year entrance exam, while explaining to me that his school didn’t accept students older than twelve at this level. The test was limited to French and mathematics so I asked him to give me copies of previous exams so I could help Ange-Claude study. For two weeks, we put in a regular school day, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. with an hour break for lunch, cramming him full of mathematical formulas, rules of grammar and conjugation. In the end, the young man barely passed the French, but had a good score in mathematics. Father Jean-Hervé, who was satisfied with the results, suggested I meet with the Sister Superior at Saint-Jean, who ran a secondary school in Batouri, about five hundred kilometers east of Yaoundé. She was passing through the capital on her way to the order’s mother house in Paris. Her name was Sister Marie
-Marthe, and she was very moved by our situation and promised to try to obtain a scholarship for Ange-Claude while she was in France. Upon her return two weeks later, she informed me that the scholarship had been granted and that the child would go with her to continue his secondary education in Batouri. He would study there for the next five years before joining us in Canada.

  The problem of the children’s education was basically solved, but our adventure continued. Around the month of November, one of my friends who had settled in the West told me he wanted to help me get to Europe or America. As he had some money and I had nothing to lose, I began preparing myself, most importantly, by trying to acquire travel documents. By total chance I came across a smuggler who could provide false papers for Canada, but it was risky since they would be examined a number of times in transit, there being no direct flight between Cameroon and Canada.

  At the end of two weeks of mental preparation, aided by the smuggler, the big day finally arrived. I had prepared my departure under the utmost secrecy, with only my wife aware of what I was planning. I had to leave my family again, this time without saying good-bye to the girls or to Ange-Claude, who had returned to Yaoundé for the Christmas break on the eve of my departure. It was, in fact, prudent to remain silent, since nothing was certain. After all, operations of this type were often aborted and, in many cases, could easily become a nightmare where you found yourself in jail after spending a fortune, which in my case would have been five thousand dollars, including airfare.

  On December 25, 1999, early in the morning, we took the road to Douala, about two hundred kilometers west of Yaoundé, from where the plane was scheduled to take off. Once there, the smuggler, aided by his accomplices, prepared the final details of my departure. At this point, I was being led around like a lamb, having no first-hand knowledge about the travel documents that I needed or the airline I would be flying on. All I knew was that the plane would land in Paris, where I would then have to board another flight to Canada. Stress and panic, combined with the forty degrees Celsius heat of the day, had me pouring sweat—even in the shower.

  Shortly before 11 p.m., we went to the airport where everything had been arranged so that I could get on the plane without passing through any security, except at the door of the plane where I had to show my papers to an airline official. Everything went smoothly and I was seated. It was my first time in an airplane. I had to pretend I was an experienced traveller in order to avoid drawing attention to myself. Even though I really didn’t know how to do the simplest things, I had to refrain from asking how to attach my seatbelt, how to recline my seat, etc. I had to rely on my wits, carefully observing what other passengers were doing and imitating them. During the flight I definitely made a few mistakes. When I was slow to respond to the stewardesses because I did not know what to say, they thought I did not understand French and spoke to me in English instead. I answered “yes” to almost everything they asked me.

  Arriving in Paris on the morning of December 26, I had to scramble to get oriented, always careful not to draw attention to myself. The first challenge that almost gave me away was the moving sidewalk; I had never seen such a thing before. Pretending to tie my shoes, I watched how others proceeded before I got on the machine. Having passed the first test, I had to then find the boarding area for the flight to Canada. But I wasn’t too worried since I had nine hours in which to do it, the same amount of time I would be in the air.

  An event I will never forget just about ruined the whole plan. Cyclone Lothar slammed into Western Europe on December 26, 1999, causing enormous damage and significant upheaval in the airline industry. Numerous flights were either cancelled or delayed, including the one to Canada that I was supposed to be on. Throughout the day, my flight to Montreal, originally scheduled for 3:30 p.m., was listed as “cancelled.” Airport personnel were visibly stressed trying to deal with the large number of stranded passengers. Apologetic announcements asking for passengers to remain patient were repeatedly broadcast over the sound system. There was nothing to do but wait. My only concern was that if the storm were to continue for very long, airline officials might decide to put us up at a hotel. I might then be subject to an identity check and be discovered. Were this to happen, I’d be forced to implement plan B and declare myself a refugee in France.

  Planes began flying again by around 3 p.m., especially towards central Europe. Transatlantic flights were restored during the course of the evening. Miraculously, the flight to Montreal took off the same day, at 10 p.m. When I presented myself for boarding, the overwhelmed airline personnel had no time to thoroughly check all my documents. They just apologized for the inconvenience and wished me bon voyage!

  We landed at Montreal-Mirabel around 11 p.m. I hadn’t been able to sleep a wink since we had taken off in Cameroon. As soon as I stepped off the plane, I informed immigration officials that I was seeking asylum. After submitting to a lengthy interrogation and the usual formalities, I was given documents allowing me freedom of movement in Canada and directed to a Montreal hotel where I was to stay until my situation was regularized. Room and board were paid for by the Canadian government. As I had declared possession of the equivalent of about seventy Canadian dollars divided between French francs and U.S. dollars, the agents asked me to fend for myself and take a bus or a taxi into the city.

  I exited the terminal to wait for the bus. As I passed through the doors, I was struck by a blast of cold air, but I thought I could probably handle it. Three minutes later, I felt my body start to freeze solid. The newcomer that I was simply could not cope with such frigid temperatures. Not only had I never experienced anything like it in my life, but I also was not dressed for the occasion, with my thin jacket, dust coat, shirt, light-weight pants and summer footwear. After five minutes, unable to endure another minute outside, I re-entered the terminal. While I was wondering how I would ever get to my hotel, a taxi driver looking for business approached me. After a few misdirected back-and-forths caused by our difficulty in understanding one another, him speaking to me in the most rudimentary French, me with only my poor English, he drove me to the Stanley Street YMCA, after separating me from the rest of my savings.

  It’s not easy to find the words to describe how nice my first few days in Canada were! A new immigrant, fresh out of the jungle, I found myself in a hotel, eating well and three times a day! It was as if I had won the lottery. After a month at the YMCA, time enough to receive some documents and fill out the forms for those I still needed, I was authorized to move into my own apartment. This is where my problems truly began, because I was starting from scratch. With no orientation process, I had to go it alone in this new life with precious little support. It was like being in a new school, only without a teacher, where you had to learn to cook and eat new foods, to manipulate all kinds of new devices, to get around town and even how to behave properly in society. With the five hundred dollars I received monthly in social assistance, I had to pay for rent, food, a telephone, a Metro-bus pass and still manage to send something home to my family back in Cameroon, especially considering that Françoise was unemployed. When my work permit came through, I immediately started looking for a job. I was desperate for an income that would enable me both to meet all these needs and to save to be able to bring my family to Canada. After working in various factories in jobs I got through employment agencies, I began working for myself as an office cleaner. This activity was done exclusively at night, but the advantage was that I could put in a lot of hours. My financial needs were such that as soon as spring arrived, I had to take on day work as a landscape contractor in addition to the cleaning I did at night.

  The precarious economic situation in which I had left my family was troubling. But fortunately, my efforts over the previous months finally bore fruit. By October 2000, a little less than a year after coming to Quebec, I had saved enough money to have my wife and two daughters enter Canada the same way as I had. Ange-Claude was in good hands in Batouri and waited until 2004 to join us, by whi
ch time Françoise and I had acquired our permanent residence status and could sponsor him. In 2010, Thérèse and Joseph, whom we had left in Pokola and whose family had meanwhile grown by two, were also able to benefit from the sponsorship system to come to Canada.

  When my wife and daughters arrived in Montreal, our greatest priority was our children’s education. Emmérence, then aged nine, was enrolled in second grade, in a special class usually reserved for immigrant children who do not speak French. We did not understand why the school board made this decision, since she came from Cameroon, where she had studied French. But we had not reached the last of our surprises, since at the end of the school year the school principal told us that our child wasn’t understanding what was being taught and that, therefore, she would have to be placed in an institution for special needs children. My wife and I protested against this decision, and even threatened to complain to the Minister of Education. We couldn’t imagine that a girl who had placed first in her second grade class in Cameroon had experienced difficulties repeating the same year in Canada, and what is more, in the same language. Confronted with our determination, the prin-cipal had a change of heart and allowed Emmérence to attend regular school. Her experience there was so successful that at the end of her fifth grade year, she was allowed to take the secondary school entrance exam and skip sixth grade.

  Claudine was thirteen years old when she arrived in Canada. When we went to register her for school, the school board decided that, given her age, she would have to enter into secondary school. However, the poor girl had only attended one full year of elementary school. I insisted that she at least be allowed to start at the sixth grade level, but in vain. In order to catch up, she and I had to work hard every night for two years, after which she was able to sprout her own wings and fly! She can now claim to be one of the few people who has been to university without completing primary education.