Behind the Eclipse

by Pramudith D. Rupasinghe

  It was almost a few hours after we crossed the border and the truck stopped near a white colour building that I quickly identified as a church. The Reverend Maurice got down the truck first and started to walk towards the huge arch like the door of the church. Before he reached the door, a lantern light came out with a creaky sound. Then a man in a white robe came out followed by two young men in country clothes. The man in white robes looked like a priest. The Reverend Maurice kept on talking with him as if his fury had already been left abundant at the border of Liberia.

  The young men came and helped us take the things inside the church.

  ‘Viens par ici!’ One old man who looked like a servant told me. I did not understand a single word in French. I looked around seeking for help.

  ‘He asked you to go that way,’ one of the young men who was helping us to carry the bags told me.

  I was given a small room that was relatively bigger than the truckle bed which was in it. But it was not to be shared with anyone. There was a Bible on a small high table standing at the right side of the bed and a wall-mounted cloth hanger on which two old shirts were hanging. The old lantern that was carefully placed near the window was a God-given chance for me to read. I opened the small drawers under the table to see what else was there in the room as I was already impressed with the sudden shift of life after a journey through desperateness and hopelessness. There were some more books, and one was not English. There were different marks on English letters which I could not read. I felt that my life was all set again. I came to believe what the Reverend Maurice said just after my baptism.

  ‘Your life is in the hands of God.’

  I could not forget what Oldman said as well. ‘Life never remains constant.’

  Next day morning, we all met again in a small hall behind the church, the Reverend Maurice, the Reverend James and three other priests were there.

  ‘I Pastor Laurent,’ the oldest looking priest among them told us in broken English. He kept on introducing his colleagues and gave us a briefing about the church and their mission.

  ‘It is our pleasure to accommodate you here in my mission. Whatever denomination we belong to, we serve the same God,’ he said with a smile.

  ‘Till everything is settled in Liberia,’ he was very clear about what he was telling.

  ‘The young man can continue his education, but we have French teachers.’ He looked into my eyes as though he wanted me to learn French.

  ‘He is good at studies,’ the Reverend Maurice added with delight, and I nodded in pride which I was not in a position to show to others.

  In a couple of weeks, I got some new clothes, and I was able to join the missionary school next to the church. Until three months, I learnt only French. The Pastor Jean-Paul, my French teacher, was a very friendly person. He spent most of the time with me as I was the only student who needed special attention in the language class. I enjoyed French and the company of the Pastor Jean-Paul. Over time, he became my mentor. I completed three months with him and commenced full-time education in the missionary school, but I did not forget to meet him after school to discuss difficult points to which I needed clarification. His amazing teaching skills and unbelievably constant and high level of patience impressed me.

  ‘Un Jour, Je veux être comme toi,’ I told him that I wanted to be like him one day. He laughed; laughter that was not sarcastic but genuine that one would react to a surprise.

  He told me to learn more and join the church in case he wanted and the rest would be in the hands of ‘Dieu!’

  ‘Oui,’ I nodded in agreement.

  I dedicated my days and nights again for studies.

  ‘Life never remains constant.’ Words of Oldman echoed inside my mind. Just like hibernated plants came back to life when the rainy season started, my hopes began to breathe, and ambitions to grow.

  16

  My life in Guinean town of Macenta became more routine and focused on religious education. The Reverend Maurice left for America two weeks after arriving in Guinea leaving me with the Pastor Jean-Paul, and the Reverend James too left after a few months as the situation in Liberia escalated drastically, but they promised their return before the end of the year. Nonetheless, I had developed a very close relationship with the new church which belonged to French Protestant denomination and their work at the community. Love had been increasing significantly owing to large numbers of refugees crossing the border of Liberia.

  One day, the Pastor Laurent called a meeting and said that we had to start a community outreach soon because there were refugees moving into the region in large numbers.

  ‘We need to extend our services to the places where the refugees are staying,’ the Pastor Laurent insisted. Whenever he emphasised something, he raised his index finger and looked into the eyes. His pale grey eyes reminded me of a cat that was aiming at its prey focused, confident and firm.

  ‘George,’ he looked at me.

  ‘You have to help Pastor Simon for the morning and evening services for the Liberians who live in the camps,’ he added.

  The Pastor Simon was a Haitian who was quite conversant in English and had arrived for helping the church for the extended services to the refugee community of Liberia which was fast growing with drastically deteriorating security situation in Liberia.

  Even though Guinea was a majority Islamic country, Liberians were mostly Christians by that time as missionaries had successfully penetrated the country and converted a significant majority of Liberians into different denominations of Christianity, but they had not completely given up their animistic beliefs such as ancestor worship and witchcraft, therefore, it was vital for us to keep continuing the religious activities in refugee camps.

  It was the very height of age crisis. On a rainy morning in August 1990, many people from Monrovia had escaped to Guinea, and I conducted my first service with the Pastor Simon. In Macenta we had our church. There were a hundred-thousands people who had escaped inhuman atrocities that had already claimed a few hundred thousands of lives in my country. After a few weeks, the Pastor Simon said. ‘We need to cover Yomou as well,’ which was another small township where the refugees had gathered for weeks without any proper shelter or food. The small town that had less than five small brick buildings had turned into complete chaos.

  At the very early stage, there were no non-governmental humanitarian actors or government interventions, but the villagers tried their best to help the affected using the limited resources at their disposition. Also, there were many situations where there were unrest and conflicts between the refugees and the native villagers which the clergy had to intervene to resolve. But Yomou and Macenta being Islamic towns, sometimes, the religion itself was the source of the problems. Therefore, the Pastor Simon had the opinion that we had to be present in the refugee communities often and continually. Based on the belief that the constant presence of the church in refugee communities would accelerate the spread of gospels and prevent the dissemination of any other faiths, I was asked to go to Yamou and continue delivering religious services at least two times a day. The Pastor Jean-Paul decided to accompany me to Yomou and stay a couple of weeks to guide me.

  ‘God willing, this time we will complete this,’ the Paster Jean-Paul stopped at a half-built brick building that looked abundant for a long time.

  ‘What is this?’ I asked since what he said was not clear for me.

  ‘This is our church building in Yomou, but we did not have enough funds to complete it. On the one hand, the Christian devotees in this area are not many. Therefore, we did not have strong support from the community. On the contrary, the majority Islamic groups did not want a church to be in their village.’

  In the building, there were several families even though there was no proper shelter in the big hall that was partially built.

  ‘Let’s go in!’ Having noticed the Pastor Jean-Paul coming in, many peo
ple reached him pleading for help. Before reaching the two locked rooms that were at the end of the short passage along the half-built church hall, the Pastor Jean-Paul stopped a few times and talked to the people and blessed them. It looked like the presence of the Pastor or simply a messenger of God or someone who recited at least a part of Gospels made them relieved for a moment. I realised that it was a wise decision the Pastor Simon had taken.

  At times of haplessness, there should be a belief to hold on to which I realised when I left the Kpelle village for the first time in my life. And then we had to escape the war. Again, I saw the same thing among thousands of people who had been displaced in Yomou. Probably, it could be their first displacement in their entire lives whereas I had been experiencing multiple displacements since the day I left my native village to find medicinal herbs to cure my father who was already dying with the Bush-curse.

  Whenever I saw the signs of woe and misery on those faces, I felt as if it was me who was leaving Monrovia on the trunk of the old Ford truck of Congo-man. The fears that were dominant in every single second of my life since the day I witnessed death and suffering of people from the Bush-curse traversed my mind whenever I saw men fighting and women quarrelling. People fight out of fear. The fear of loss and death defines how healthy human interactions are. Even though I did not accept their behaviours, I could feel exactly how they felt after losing almost everything they had accumulated.

  The day I was escaping Loma village, I did not want to leave the old piece of country cloth which was with me until the day I reached Monrovia. The rugged piece of fabric that had caught all dirt throughout the years of displacements was a piece of garbage which was a subject of disgust to the outsiders from the city or outside the country, but for me, it was my sole property that supported my survival. My Pillow, the old used shoe, and clothes I brought to Guinea from Liberia were vivid inside my eyes.

  ‘I understand these people Pastor,’ I told the Pastor Jean-Paul who was checking whether the rooms were safe and suitable for staying.

  ‘I know George. Simon was right, he wanted someone who feels their heartbeat and somewhat speaks their languages,’ the Pastor Jean-Paul looked at me over his round eyeglass frames lifting his eyebrows.

  ‘You are the most suitable person we have for this mission,’ he touched my shoulders and shook me in joy.

  ‘You will serve the God and help your people in Yomou. The bricks of this building will rise as you lift their lives up.’

  ‘I do not have a doubt about that,’ he added.

  The very first day, the men among the refugees helped us to clean the rooms, and finally, we managed to make the rooms barely liveable. From that moment on, we kept on talking to people, listening to their grievances and started reassuring them.

  The moment they heard the words from the Holy Bible in Liberian English, the refugees started gathering around me just like red ants surrounding a piece of sugar. The Pastor Jean-Paul sat beside me enjoying the attention that had been drawn to the young kissi man`s divine words and their immediate impact on the people who had escaped leaving behind everything they had possessed.

  I witnessed the way sorrow and grievance vented in the air with the receiving of prayers and how hope was gradually placed in the hands of God which not only motivated me to keep delivering services but also gave me a purpose for my life.

  I read the Bible every evening and noted the areas relevant for timely psychological and social needs of the refugees who were my people. The following morning, I delivered the service as if their own thoughts were voicing aloud. Almost all my day was dedicated to the church and people from Liberia that became simply a routine which kept me going and growing.

  After a few months, a French delegation came to Yomou.

  ‘Pastor Patric and Pastor Jean-Claude, They are from Paris,’ the Pastor Jean-Paul said.

  ‘Good day,’ the Pastor Jean-Claude said which looked like he directly translated from French into English.

  ‘He speaks fluent French,’ the Pastor Jean-Paul added before I told him ‘Bonjour.’

  ‘We have heard about your service. Jean-Paul and Simon wrote to us to visit Yomou to see the impact on our mission on Liberian population.’ The Pastor Patrick pulled an old piece of paper from one of the pockets on his robe.

  ‘George, qui est aussi un Libérien livre une service incroyable chez les réfugiés et il est bien reconnus parmis la population déplacée. Il est homme sympathique et courageux qui possède tous les competence pour être un représentant de notre église.’

  I read it aloud while the Pastor Patrick and the Pastor Jean-Claude were looking at me in amazement as to how well I read. The Pastor Jean-Paul, my French teacher, was smiling with a humble pride looking at the skies as if he was thanking God.

  ‘George who is also a Liberian delivers an unbelievable service for the refugees. He is recognised by the refugee population. He is a courageous gentleman who has all competencies to become a representative of our church.’ I translated it into English and told them.

  ‘Merci Beaucoup!,’ said the Pastor Jean-Claude.

  The Pastor Patrick also thanked me.

  I treated them with an honest smile when a feeling of self-worth conquered me that raised me up to the endless skies, and the first drop of tears oozed out in happiness was silently going on its journey to fall on the earth without being noticed by anyone around me.

  ‘Pastor Patrice will deliver a speech at tomorrow morning service,’ The Jean-Paul said.

  ‘You will conduct the service as usual,’ he added.

  I was in a surreal situation I felt. I looked around. The old brick walls of the room were the same; nothing had changed despite the three white men in robes.

  ‘Angles do exist,’ I said without my knowledge. But it was not loud enough to be heard.

  Immediately after the discussion, we headed to visit the people who had already noticed the presence of two new white men in robe in the town. The first message that they might have heard as rumours could be ‘White men in the town with food’ which is a usual thing that happened whenever a white man came to communities.

  When we reached the areas where most of the refugees were staying, we noticed them already waiting for us. The Pastor Jean-Claude wanted me to be his interpreter when he started to talk to the people. We moved to meet almost everyone who was in the site and disseminated the news about the special morning service on the following day. An untold happiness was rapidly growing within me whenever people confirmed their participation for the service. All uncertainties regarding my decision to leave the Kpelle village had already disappeared in the positivity and hopefulness boosted by the opportunity of growth that was given. I moved with the pastors among the people who had come to talk and get blessings, and I felt that I was also in a robe.

  ‘I will soon be in a robe.’ I heard an echo in my own ears, and I said ‘Thanks God!’

  17

  It was a Sunday morning at the peak of a dry season; fresh and lively with the maturing sun that kissed the high treetops adding warmth to a new beginning. I felt anxious and excited about what was about to happen which might unfold a better future. The refugees, my own people, beaten left and right by the bloody, ruthless and inhuman armed conflict had already gathered under the tamarind tree in front of the partially built church building with the last bit of remaining faith, seeking a divine word of hope.

  ‘You have red-eyes,’ said the Pastor Patrick while sipping his morning coffee. I did not tell him that I was unable to fall asleep the whole night and that I was restless and anxious every single second that passed behind me.

  ‘Yes, sometimes it happens,’ I added.

  Old bell that was hanging on a mango branch rang aloud. I heard my heart beat louder than the metal bell that was indented to call the whole village. Under the shade of the huge tamarind tree where everyone had gathered, I stood between
Pastor Jean-Claude and the Pastor Patrick. The Pastor Jean-Paul decided to stand among the crowd facing us.

  It was not the first time I conducted the morning service in Yomou, but it was the first time I stood before such a large crowd, and it was the first time I was with a delegation at a service.

  ‘May God bless you all!’ I started the service in front of the large gathering before my very eyes and I dared not look at them because the number of heads extended beyond the very end that my eyes could capture, provoked agoraphobic feelings. And the presence of the delegation of high dignitaries in the church also added more weight to my psychological response. Tremors in my fingers shook the Holy Bible that I was trying hard to hold firm. When my voice started wobbling, sweat glands had opened unto their very maximum nearly dehydrating me to faint. Louder than my own words to which the crowd had gathered and was attracted like bees to flowers, I heard ‘lob-dub’ sound of my palpitating heart. When the last few minutes of the service fell by, I started feeling recharged and confident. On top of all that, I felt happy that I was about to finish it. With a sigh that relieved all my anxieties and fears, I looked at the crowd at the end of the service. It was a look seeking for recognition. It was a look through a pair of eyes that were shining with happiness and sense of accomplishment, and it was a look that was loaded with hopefulness. Without my knowledge, a bubble of tears had formed a lens upon my eyes through which I saw the very end of the crowd.

  Through hot tears at the peak of my happiness, I saw a woman who was breastfeeding her infant. The blurred vision was not hazy enough to leave her unrecognised.