#mapaki

January is in its final days. Harmattan winds have been blowing through the mornings for the past six weeks. As the mid-morning light brings with it dust-laden breezes, I pour in a second liter of petrol to the cobalt blue tank of Kwame’s knock-off, 70’s era Honda CB. The tank holds at least 2.4 gallons, or nine liters. Osman sells me four liters at 5,000Le each from the chicken wire wrapped cage. His storage space looks more like an oversized stool than a petrol stand.  Each pink-tinted liter, all a vaguely different shade than the previous one, gurgles out from the 1.5liter water bottle it was stored in. 

Village boys gather around Mille and I as we prepare to leave. She stands off the back left of the bike, facing the delta that makes up the entrance of Mapaki. Her H&M denim shorts carry dust from the dry season roads. She wears a heather-grey tank top. Her soft, peach-tanned skin holds a mist in the sun. The air is cooler than normal for this time of morning.  I hand off the last liter of petrol to Osman and pay him. The cap for the tank is placed on; it’s keyhole no longer functioning.  On the stubby, chrome rack above the taillight I double-check my black Manhattan Portage courier bag. Inside we’ve packed wedges of Laughing Cow cheese, crackers, and bread and cheese sandwiches; bananas are there for our potassium.  My Nikon N80 bounces next to a transparent grey Nalgene water bottle covered in stickers.

I pull the FDMCO around in a U-turn, clicking down one gear, and entering first. Unlike traditional motorcycles, its gear system is all down or all up. The top is neutral. In first gear, I keep the rpms steady as Mille mounts the back. We haven’t a plan, and no functioning odometer. I calculate we can get at least 100 kilometers on the poor quality petrol. Colleagues from the school and children gather around as I roll us out of the village. We head northeast towards Limba country. From the veranda of his timeworn, chipped, yellow and green concrete veranda, Paramount-Chief Kebombo meets with his headmen and village elders. They wave while we pass in slow retreat. I yell, “Se ne kane so,” over the low-whine of first gear. See you back.

Mille laughs as we turn left at the dog-legged curve closing out the village. “You’re like a little boy now.” I smile back over my left shoulder. In brown flip-flops, Stussy shorts, a Pushead Metallica shirt, and backwards black and white mesh hat, I switch the FDMCO back to neutral for the hill. Out and through the country we catch open spaces revealing the long, rolling, grass and planting-heap dotted hills that only Africa can create. At the lower depths of road we slow for narrow sections, still washed out and unrepaired from the last of the rainy season storms in October. Deep, rutted channels are cut into the steeper sections of road where the rain found its natural path of least resistance. We talk over the FDMCO’s steady, puttering whine. The rice swamps are dry now. Dry, and cracked like the skin of an elephant. Once rich humus soil looks like flakes of cow dung.

Women and children balance tools, baskets, and cooking items on their heads. Before we approach they fade into the tall, ocher powder covered grass. “Walle-Walle,” we shout to one another. Hello, hello! From a hill, smoke is seen rising above the mango trees, still waiting to bloom. The road flattens out. Less than a dozen mudbrick and thatch homes line either side of the road. At the water pump students brook their clothes for tomorrow’s classes. Excited cries of “Eh!” and “EhBo!” hang-high above the motorcycles noise. I slow down for the dirt speed bumps ahead, only after I hit it at 45kmph.  They are shocked to see two whites this far out, on a motorcycle, one a teacher; the other his “wife” they’ve heard of, and may only have imagined seeing before. “Walle-ne!” I reply.

We move out of the village at a steady 30kph. Down a slight incline and flat through more swamps. Traction is difficult to gain as we ascend; Mille asks that I go slower. I listen. I acknowledge that I’m not worried what happens to me, but should she get hurt, well. Villages appear, their notorious speed bumps now a keen sight in my vision. Children run after us. Walle, Walle trails the FDMCO, until I can shift into 3rd and pull deeper into the tight, rutted road. There is one village, with a clear fork. Veer right? I know that goes to Makeni. Or, left? We head towards Makeni. Maybe 30 minutes have passed. We talk about looking for a place to stop.

I can sense Mille wants to push further, but fears a flat-tire or an accident. We are out here. In awe and truth I think of where we are. That no one, except for she and I, knows where we are. The villages we’ve passed know only our skin color. Few may recognize me as the teacher from the Chiefdom Headquarters. It’s here, for the first time, do I feel the purest sense of freedom. Of escape. Of extreme bliss. A man and his woman, on the road, under the sweltering African sun. Alone. Together. Blades of grass seem to pass slower, the clouds lack movement. I am at once content and amazed.

            Rain hovers over the village. It is a light mist, pausing at times, and continuing again. This pattern weaves itself over the next three hours. I walk in the drainage path, which leads up Mapaki’s only hill. Cresting the top, I turn right to the last house on this side of the village. My landlord, Abdul, is seated on a worn out iron chair. His white embroidered disha dasha is a stark contrast to the dust laden walls of his family’s veranda. He is eating out of a small enamel dish. Three of his grandchildren walk towards me.

           “Well, afternoon.”

“Afternoon, Alusine. Let’s chop,” he responds.

“Ah! No tenki, I de cam go cook jus now.”

           In unison, the children call my name, come close and run away as I try to lift them up to my hip. His wife, Mbalu, is tending to the smallest of the children, an infant, really. I shake hands with the Abdul.

           “I de come for tell una tenki for host me na dis village whey I de ya for these two grain years dem. I de cam lef una finally next tamarra.”

           “Eh, Alusine. We de feel am bo. So you de cam lef we finally.”

           “Yes, sah, But I wan cam tell una tenki for protect me and keep me safe whey I de ya. Una don turn me na brudda, uncle, and una na mi fambul dem. Tenki for gi me da ouse. Una don turn me fambul whey I de ya an fo dat I go gi you de plenty tenki,” I address the landlord and his wife. His home will be the seventeenth home I have visited. I will visit another twenty before the afternoon has run out.

 “Eeeh Bo! Na you get da tenki. You don lef you fambul dem for come elp we na ya. Le God bless you, Alusine. Le God go gree for gi you long life. Le God go gree for le you meet you fambul sofely. Ah! Alusine. We de feel am.”

Uncle Harry whipped up a piece for the in-coming/now here Salone-3 PCVs.

Harry always knows just when to cut me off.

If one plus one equals two and Birkenstocks plus socks equals hippie, then sports plus Dry  Season equals chaos. Pure chaos. Occurring across Sierra Leone anytime between January and March is “sports,” a two-day production of sporting events that can disrupt academics for upwards of four weeks. Each year a school decides to “yes” or “no” sports. Due to budget issues Sports 2011 was given a nay. Sports 2012? Ten votes for. One vote against - one adamant vote against. The decision was made in early February for sports to take place the third week of March. Preparations would begin the final week of February with the events being held on March 16th and 17th. Arguments were made for preparations to begin the first week of March. Ten votes against. 

As decided, the final week of February saw to it that sports madness would start. Like a parasite with a minor symbiotic relationship to its host, sports slowly sucked the life out of academia. It is a quiet killer. The last period of the school day was the first sacrifice. Students - the entire student body - are commissioned to begin clearing the field. Stumps, tall grass, roots, stones, et cetera are to be cleared. Week one managed to stay on course. Each day the students and faculty became distracted from academics just an ounce more than the day prior. Several days passed. Second and last period were swallowed whole. Students began to disappear from the campus. Teachers dragged their feet to school. The morning assembly - scheduled for 8:00a.m. - began at 8:30a.m. 

Working its way through towns and villages throughout the country, sports single handedly upset academics as the events drew near. Mothers have been seen purchasing fabrics of blue, yellow, green, and purple for the various colored houses - teams are named after colors, each school has four divisions or houses with a corresponding color - which students represent. “What house are you supporting?” is asked by many and any passersby. “Did you build your booth?” “Our booth will win your booth!” With academics fully consumed by the end of week two preparations, students (the few that feel obliged to come) and faculty now arrive at 8:45a.m., take attendance and proceed to the field. A fence must be constructed around the field - sports is a “pay to see” event. Booths, aboveground dugout looking structures, are built for each of the houses to cheer their mates and seek refuge from the sun. The building of booths may be the most important event as there are awards for cleanliness, construction, and control of students. 

Seated at the Paramount Chiefs table is a well dressed man of medium height. His deep-cranberry button up and black tie pair well with the gold tie-tack that rests at a slight angle on his tie. I take a seat. We introduce ourselves. The Paramount Chief is occupied with another man, and mumbles a greeting and explanation. The gentleman asks is we could sit somewhere more convenient. It’s not problem, I assure him. What is to be discussed is rather vague. I stand up, confounded.

                “Can you give a statement?” he asks.

                “Sure? About that incident behind here?”

                “Yeeahs. I’m from C.I.D. Makeni. I understand you responded to the incident.”

                “Yes. What, what is C.I.D. Makeni?”

                “Criminal Investigation Department”

                “Oh. Sure.”

                “Please, offer me your statement.”

                A breeze came in quiet breaths. It was four o’clock, maybe a little later. Must have been later-yes - closer to 4:30p.m. I was taking a nap after school. Lying on the bed, the cool air flowing through a single open window and massaging the orange poplin curtains, there was a bang. A Bmmph! noise. My eyelids split open. The noise was like that of, I don’t know, a smack, like a door falling down flat off its hinges. I stepped out of bed. Outside, I could hear people shouting. A few women were hollering in pain. I thought maybe the house they were breaking down came down on someone.

                Walking around the corner of the house, I saw a wave a people coming from there, yes; they came from that direction and were headed to the hospital. Yes. The hospital. No, I didn’t know what had happened. I came because of the noise. When I reached the road there was a crowd of women, men, and children. Several women and girls were crying. I began asking, “Wettin appen? Wettin appen?” One man, that Joseph Sankoh. Yes. Joseph Sankoh explained to me. I came behind the house and saw blood on the ground and a hole where it landed.

                Yes. No. He explained that last, last Wednesday they were breaking the roof of the house when they found it. Yes. It was a local one. A grenade. It looked like the leg of a chair. He said on Thursday, yes, Thursday the 9th, that a boy, or well, a young man was playing with it. How? He had the pin in his hand and swung it. Right. Like this. So, I think wettin happen was that the pin came out and the grenade landed on the ground and exploded. Um. I think, like, six, yeah six women were hit with fragments; and that boy. Osman. Bangura? No. Osman Conteh. Yeah, he ran into the bush, or so they can say.

                After Joseph explained I went to the hospital to see the women, but they were already gone. The Paramount Chief’s vehicle came and took them out. They went, straight? I don’t know, there is only one way in and one way out. Makeni or Mabraka. I don’t know. I went to the house because I forgot to lock it then I returned to the scene. A group of people were gathered in a circle, so I went there. Yes. This time that boy Osman was in the center, sitting down. He had plenty of blood on him. I went back to the house and took gloves, bacitracin, gauze, plaster, and peroxide. No. Simple first-aid. No. I did not remove any fragments. Just to clean the wounds and dress them for transport. I asked one boy for a rubber of water and told Osman to strip to his drawers. I think people were afraid to touch him. Maybe. I don’t know. Maybe they thought there was another grenade. He was in his drawers. I washed all the wounds on his legs and arms. He had a bad wound on his left hand. I had him keep his hand above his head. When I finished they put him on transport with one Pa. I don’t know who. No. Maybe Mabraka. I collected all the things and burned them. I stopped at Joseph Sankoh’s and we ate beans. They were sweet. That is how I saw it.

                “Alright. Thank you,” he said.

                “No problem. I’m going to the house now. If you have more questions you can call anytime. Thank you, too.”

Two men in white poplin turbans sit cross-legged on worn plastic mats. A third man rests on his right side, turban veiled over dark eyes. They wear long, dust laden robes. Seated here, they form the last stall on the edge of the Friday market. The sharp cheek bones and pointed noses are a stark contrast to the deep complexion and broad faces of the Themnes. Passersby take in their small inventory laid out before them, concealed in plastic bags and recycled instant-coffee tins; powders and leather amulets. 

The man in the middle reveals a long piece of leather with an oval shape at its center. I approach the man, who is speaking with a woman. We greet with a slight movement of the hands and a nod. I look to the man at the left. He is quiet while unfolding the edges of a package.  A peculiar feeling airs over these men. A feeling of true calm and knowing. From where have they traveled? What have the six eyes behind the three cloths witnessed?

The woman finishes her business and continues. The man in the middle draws me near. In a hushed voice he tells me he is from Niger. We discuss that I came on the long road behind me to a village at its end. Another woman approaches. On the right the other man pulls me into conversation. His turban sits tight upon his head exposing his soft face. The man's light skin is accentuated by a rough mustache and goatee. The hair stretches no further than the corners of his mouth or the turn of his jowls. Something is said between the men. 

"En jaran ma," I say.

"You speak Pulaar?" 

I shake my head. These men are Fulani a (traditionally nomadic) tribe of cattle herders and traders who live predominately throughout West Africa; and are known for being wise business men. He places his hands together at the thumbs and motions for me to sit. His voice is audible only by straining forward. One tin is opened then sealed and replaced by another. The powder, he tells me, will provide man strength. Using his index finger on his left hand he then points at his wrists and grips his forearm as a gauge.  Forty years. Add the burnt orange powder to rice and man power will last forty years. I assure him that I don't have a women but will return. 

Still close I move. All is spoken at a level that has my eyes trained on his lips. He reveals a leather charm. Wrapped in rough cut leather rests an amoeba shaped stone. He indicates his stomach, then side. 

"For child. No stomach problem"

I nod.

"Give them. No sick," he motions to his mouth, stomach, side. 

I shake my head, again. He places the leather down. From inside a dry, crackling plastic bag he withdraws another leather product. 

"This. Witch. No come," he wraps the banned around his left bicep.

"This. Witch. No come."

I crouch lower to examine the talisman. The leather is wrapped in a dried strip of animal tendon. One side ends with a brown piece of leather spiraled into a loop to better secure it. 

"Witch. No come. House. Sleep. No come."

"Aw mos?"

He confers with his brother in the center. 

"30,000 Le"

"No"

"Aw mos yu pay?"