Stepping Into Tomorrow

PART ONE   

   STEPPING INTO TOMORROW  

              By  

      Tommy de Laurence  

           ...............  

        In Search Of Visa  

 I left behind sounds of sirens and terrifying presence of military convoys menacingly displaying might and brutal intolerance amidst looting, disorder and general feeling of uncertainty in the streets of Accra. It was the second day of a coup d’etat to topple Kwame Nkrumah's regime from power.  

I had just completed a year's teaching assignment at St Peters College, Nkwatia and had been offered admission to University of Wisconsin in the United States. However, the Scholarship Secretariat and Ministry of Education which were administering my student exchange status had been thrown into confusion and lacked orderliness to rely upon. Uncertainties and fear of the unknown overcame many minds into making on the spur of the moment decisions. I had purchased a ticket and was waiting for Visa confirmation from the US embassy.   Meanwhile the booming sounds of gunfire in and around the Presidential palace did not offer encouraging urge to linger under patience. I was determined to continue my hunt for Visa from the nearest US embassy in order to meet the University's deadline for admission.  

  Many flights to and from Accra International Airport were put on hold with the exception of PANAM Flight 390 which was allowed to lift foreign and American nationals to Robertsfield Monrovia.  

The plane was loaded with children and foreign nationals, terrified and eager to leave the looting turmoil and sporadic sounds of gunfire.  

 The flight was quiet and somber.

Upon arrival we descended slowly and filed down the tarmac like sheep being led to a slaughter house. Every step towards the Immigration check-point echoed a feeling of uncertainty. Free buses were waiting to convey passengers aboard the plane to their respective embassies or hotels of choice.  

  My first choice for a place to sit and introspect was The Green Tavern on Center Street in Monrovia. It was conspicuously lit with blinking bulbs and conveniently positioned in the center of business activities - strategically poised to attract patronage of wayfarers, merchants and prostitutes. It was an ideal place to share a few glasses of draft beer over loud conversations in spite of the foul stench of tropical sweat in this over-crowded setting of wild revelers.  

  At a table of five I was the only male with an obvious demeanor of a stranger. I had just arrived by a Pan Am flight from Accra, dressed in a three piece suit with convincing semblance of a bank official - very unfitting for this raucous unsophisticated gathering. A cursory glance around revealed a mixture of multi nationals - Lebanese, Chinese, Nigerians and Ghanaians, all sharing a common purpose - trading in currency exchange for US dollars.  

  A well groomed female sitting next to me introduced herself as Fatu, a Sierra Leonean national of mende tribe. She steadily gazed at me with intermittent flashes of smile as I sipped down cold beer from a chilled frosted glass.  

"Do you care for a draft?" I politely asked.  

"Sure".  

She answered and drew closer with a much wider smile which revealed her beauty and sumptuous femininity.  

  She consumed three tots of brandy and a mini glass of Bloody Mary, all at a gobbling speed usually reserved for experienced alcoholics. She quickened the tempo of our conversation with a flurry of questions then interjected with burbles and slurry blabs.  

 "You na Ghanaman?  

Her smooth creole assent registered a gesture of romantic interest. I drew closer and whispered "Yes” into her left ear.

She admired the thrilling effects and my gentleness as I drew closer to her in a spurious attempt to protect her see-through blouse against stains from splash as she tried to shy away from the mess she created by knocking down her glass of wine. With subdued embarrassment she looked up into my eyes and I felt the accompanied sensation.  

  Fatu possessed a sculptured body of incredible beauty, well suited for serious romance and prolonged admiration. She shared a single room apartment with a girlfriend on the Sinko water front - an area reserved for political elites and upper social echelons.  

 My first night in Monrovia was replete with strange but pleasant experiences of indelible memory.  

I woke up lying in the middle, sharing bed with both ladies and missing my empty wallet. Whoever took it did not know I had removed my money and tied it to my underwear which never departed from my thighs throughout our night's escapade.  

  My second day in this strange city was observed with nostalgic introspection. I leaned against a rail of the balcony facing the Atlantic Ocean, pondering and reminiscing about my most immediate past. With the absence of gunfire or anything familiar other than soothening chirps of sea galls and sounds of tumbling waves, my mind veered towards the family I had left behind: my mum, a six year old boy, two lovely sisters and a sick father. I conspicuously succumbed to a creeping feeling of loneliness.  

  For the first time in life I felt very detached and craved for divine companionship. With devotional courage I stood firm to challenge the future by submitting pending uncertainties to the unseen pity - a guiding faith I embraced from the biblical passage: "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want". In my solitary moments I murmured repeatedly as it became a fountain from which I drew courage and inspiration thereafter.  

  I felt some warmth - a soft feminine arm snaking around my neck. Its unexpected presence was joyably comforting. It was Fatu's. She pierced one of her radiant glares straight into my eyes.  

“Why are you so quite baby, do you miss your people back home?"  

 She demurely asked. I turned and bumped my lips horizontally into hers, invitingly across mine. The meeting of minds suggested a kiss - a plausible antidote for my loneliness. I thanked the unseen Pity for a gift of companionship. We prolonged our romantic overtures into noon.

Ducor Inter-Continental Hotel perched aloft a hilly end of Monrovia's Broad Street. On a clear sunny day it commanded a distinctive spectacle of architectural elegance, majestically protruding from a surrounding neighborhood of slum and shanties. It enjoyed a history of being the first of its kind along the coastal stretches of West Africa - a disputable view held by admirers of Ambassador Hotel in Accra, Ghana.  

From the parking lot a meandering walkway guided by trimmed hedges led the visitor into a cavernous hall which also served as lobby for this splendid edifice. 

  A smoke free warning sign dangled over a curved mahogany desk whose polished surface displayed a welcoming arrow pointed at a receptionist positioned away from conspicuousness. Further down the hall another glowing arrow pointed at a neon sign with multicolored inscription for Bar and Cuisine. Near the entrance floodlights displayed a sculpture of the famous Marlboro Cowboy whirling lasso at imaginary cattle. 

  "You must be looking for Edna" the receptionist intercepted our enquiry. "Yes we are meeting for lunch here" Quipped Fatu. 

"Follow this man please”. 

She stretched her hand pointedly towards a security guard who led us past the cowboy into a spacious but well occupied dining area. We looked around for our host. As we walked towards the western end of the hall Fatu spotted her friend Edna and a gentleman sitting by a table.  

  A tall beautiful lady hurriedly threw her pocketbook on the table, charged it to the custody of the gentleman, turned to embrace Fatu in a fit of friendliness and exhilaration as her companion followed with a show of surprise at recognizing who I was. It was a scene marked with indelible memory. 

  "Tommy! My God, is that you?" He asked. For a minute I thought I had either been set up for the unrealistic or was hallucinating. To my recollection I had talked and dined with this friend of mine barely eight months ago at a social gathering in Accra during which most of our playful discussions cored around recollection of silly events of our school days at Presec. He lunged his body forward and hugged me. 

 "Gladstone, gad be damned, this is a small world." I retorted with disbelief. After brief introductions we settled at a table much closer to the window. 

  Gladstone was held to high professional standard among his soccer fans and the general public of this tiny West African country. Within a short period since he arrived from Ghana, he had worked to cultivate stardom and admiration for his dribbling skills and unique style of play. His role as leading scorer for his team named IE is peanuts in comparative consideration of his other abilities. 

At any play session he could singlehandedly dribble a ball, cut it through any opposing formation, flip it over and above heads of stultified opponents, stop midway down his assailing direction to sit on the ball and issue instructions to his team mates in a comical fashion usually reserved for traffic directors and captains of Harlem Globetrotters. He hardly faulted in his bid to register a goal - even as he performed such antics to summon roaring cheers of admiration and bewilderment from the stands. He was a wiz at his game - an incredible artist who never ended a match without receiving a standing ovation.    What drew him closer to people was his envious composite of personality characterized by humility, neatness in appearance and looks of boyish naivety. He was the people's choice for admiration. 

 Featuring prominent among his staunch admirers were politicians, Center Street socialites and pretty ladies of high social standing mostly from the aristocratic quarters of Sinko's high echelons.  

  Edna was introduced as his girlfriend. She bore semblance of a model straight out of the runway. While I gazed at her unending smile Fatu drew closer to me, shifting her attention away from the stunning view of West Point - a plateau of slum and filth as depicted through a window juxtaposed to our table.                

Fatu and I ran our fingers along a list of Mediterranean food on a brochure presented to us by a waitress wearing red apron with two white pockets patched to its frontage. In futility to find anything familiar to order, we shared unified looks of surprise across the table. 

  "She's probably mistaking us for her regular Lebanese clients" 

 Murmured Edna from the other end of the table.  

"My friend, wake up and look at us. Do you serve local food in addition to this?"   

Edna asked while she jokingly stretched her arms to indicate a 'for us' inquiry.  

 The waitress thrusted her hand into the left pocket and dished out a different brochure of menu itemizing what we were looking for: assorted items of local dish.  

  As my companion tried to point an item from this new menu her attention was diverted by a motioning figure gravitating towards our side of occupancy. 

 "Have you ever tried broiled tilapia and potato leaves gravy topped on fried rice? It’s very delicious" Gladstone whispered from a diametrically opposite direction in a leaning posture halfway across the table. I had tasted so many kinds of vegetables before this day but certainly not potato leaves. But what a heck, there would be no harm in trying. I succumbed to his recommendation

while Fatu stuck to her choice of cassava leaves and grilled meat. 

  Halfway through the meal I observed that Fatu was struggling with her meat which appeared tough to chew. When I eventually learned it was monkey meat my jaws dropped. I looked straight into the eyes and thanked Gladstone for his recommendation. 

     Meeting a friend in Monrovia 

  I moved to share a two bedroom apartment with Gladstone in a house situated at a far elevated end of Center Street.  

  From a far the house looked like a sparkling shrine - a Taj Mahal of Monrovia. However a closer look revealed a unique construction of Victorian architecture which, at a more closer examination, projected recommendable evidences of contemporary masonry with many praiseworthy architectural add-ons. A huge aperture, meticulously chipped and penciled along its original bricks, housed four sliding tinted glass doors which also served as entrances to the rotund shaped living room. It’s remarkable design was aimed to offer viewers a broad display of downtown Monrovia from the comforts of their seats in the living room. 

At the eastern end of the compound was a bamboo roofed structure designed and shaped like a hut. It was positioned in the center of a well manicured lawn. The structure commanded attraction and curiosity but lacked inviting signage. A curator who doubled as watchman led visitors to this enclave of stored secrets : archives and historical instruments of American slaves released to this tiny coastal section of West African tropics. To many ancestral remnants it is a museum of historical reminder and identity drawer – a memorandum to draw emotions to provoke spurn and scorn against compatriots bereft of descendancy of the freed slaves. 

  The house was donated to the IE soccer team by a Lebanese business mogul with strong ties to diamond trading enterprises and supply of ammunition along the West African coast.  

While some politicians and high priced businessmen used its spacious hall for brain storming and as vertex of convergence to discuss matters of confidentiality, others took advantage of the serenity to share romantic moments with extra marital partners in the neatly decorated twelve rooms reserved for club usage. The convenience of having a bar, massage room, coffee shop and

catering for after hour activities at a basement encouraged high level personalities to over-extend their stays far beyond limits of tolerance. 

  I enjoyed my two-week stay in this interesting abode. 

After one of such encounters I was introduced to Calton Karpeh as a brother of Gladstone. He explained his intent to make physical health care among his workers a priority. His view that a sound worker must possess a healthy body led him to form a team of physical experts to manage a sporting complex at his Mano Mines. He had noted with interest my background as a sportsman and instantly earned his admiration and acquaintance. Carlton Kapeh invited me to team up with Gladstone at Mano River as a physical education specialist and soccer coach respectively. It was a challenge I nervously accepted. 

A bus for our one hundred-and fifty mile journey to Mano River Mines had been dispatched to pick us from the house. Except with the driver and his two assistants aboard it was empty, dusty and playfully graffitied with a "Please Wash Me" indentation. 

  Curiosity stepped in to question the sanity behind spending so much money to buy petrol on five passengers destined for a long journey aboard a thirty seater bus.  

 The driver took solace to wrap tobacco for a puff behind the steer whose circumference appeared larger than his skinny arms could handle. A closer look revealed his brown dusty eyebrows and lashes - an appearance which portended a pending rough adventure. 

The two assistants were totally enclothed with dust and appeared ruggedly rustic and agitated. At the back of the vehicle was an inscription : "One day the child of this charcoal mum will wear white shirt". 

  Fatu stood in complete silence. She looked straight in my eyes and for a minute I heard the numbing silence fill the air with inaudible sobs. Soon a stream of tears ran down her soft cheeks as she could no longer contain the impact of my departure on her mind.      I drew closer to her and wiped off her tears with a handkerchief which trespassed into her upper torso barely clad in thin silk. I paused for a moment and traded sympathy for admiration.    I promised her I would be back and sealed our separation with a kiss. But as

I was about to climb into the bus she held my hand and said "I have a gift for you" . She handed me a parcel wrapped and addressed at the back thus : 'Tommy Keep This Till We Meet Again'. I accepted it and finally climbed on board. Out of curiosity I unwrapped the gift. It was a neat ladies underwear and a brazier with a large F written across the right part and T on the left. I smiled very privately.                              

        The Mano Mining Village 

 Mano is a rural iron ore mining community of low income workers drawn from neighboring villages and from a pool of rustics belted along the navigable effluents of mining dredges of Mano River, locally called Gbeyar.  

  The village adopts its name after the river which snakes its path from the Guinea Highlands through the forests into the Atlantic Ocean.  

  From its tributary of Morro near Noway Camp, it forms more than ninety miles of the Liberia-Sierra Leone border. 

  The community enjoys a diversity of colorful culture, language, and human attributes drawn from its geographic proximity to Guinea and Sierra Leone. 

  Our arrival coincided with a festival of celibacy. In an open field was a throng of young men and adults beating drums made out of goat skin, dancing and reveling behind a display of many young virgin females, all completely naked except partially clad in thin white stripes of calico tied to beads around their exposed waists from front to back - an attempt which barely shielded their lower organs from visibility. 

  These damsels were unashamedly paraded and led to climb a ladder positioned directly against a raised platform where young men with whetted appetite for sexual involvement were waiting with eagerness to snatch and claim them as practicing partners. The damsels, some underage, underwent abuse of instant and forceful violation of their virginity as onlookers and parents stood and watched with passive disgust. 

  Growing out of puberty in this part of the country the ritual marked a significant involvement or turning point in the life of a female. It was a customary ladder each female had to climb to merit womanhood. 

  The intensity of the crowd which congregated around our bus ebbed away and dissipated as the sunset slowly dimmed the atmosphere with its receding rays.