Sahr from Sierra Leone

Sahr Yambasu is a Methodist minister from Sierra Leone. He met his Irish wife at Queen’s University, and in 1995, when the family had to flee the civil war in his home country, they returned to settle in Galway. When I met him at his home, I expected to greet a formally dressed minister in clerical garb. Instead, I met a chunky man wearing boxer shorts and T shirt, with a beaming smile and contagious, rich laugh. As I arrived, his blonde, slim wife was racing out the door. Sahr had just come back from jogging, and invited me to join him in having a cold drink. We sat down in the conservatively furnished front room, complete with family photos on top of the piano. Three teenagers, two boys and a beautiful girl, smiled from one family portrait.

I come from the east border of Sierra Leone, from a village called Lalehun. The population was maybe 500 people.

My father was a court messenger. That was a very important position. He had four wives. He was a very lucky man! My mum was the youngest, and the last one he married before he died. In our system, we don’t have a social welfare system, but we do have the extended family system. My father’s nephews, quite a few of them, came to live with him, in the same home. They also did most of the farm work. He was the overseer really.

In Sierra Leone, everybody has a piece of land to grow their food. The main activity of the village was farming. With farming in Africa, a lot of the work would be done by hand. Each area would be about one acre. Each one of the wives would have a little plot to grow their own food.

My father lived in one house, and the wives all lived in another house. They were altogether with their children. The house was a round house, big, and my mother’s bed was here, and her cooking place was here, and the other wives’ beds were there, and so on. They all cooked separately. My mother had seven children; the others had one or two children each. I am the first son, and the second child.

My father would go with a few of his nephews to bring the produce to sell in the nearest place, about 24 miles north of our village. So, for 24 miles, they had to walk, carrying everything on their heads. It could take 3, 4, 5 days before they would return to the village. It was on one of those trips that my father came in contact with a Methodist missionary from England. He attended one of the services, which was open to the community. Maybe the service would be held in somebody’s sitting room. In the kind of culture in which we were growing up, nobody was afraid of anybody, so all the doors were always open. People never worried that somebody was going to come in and steal something. So that’s how he came to know something about Christianity. Every time he was away, he made sure he went to one of the services.

When he came back to our village after one of these visits, he told our elders about this newfound faith and asked permission to start it in the village. They interviewed him, and said, ‘well, if it’s not about doing any harm to anybody, you can start.’ So, he started in his own house. His wives and nephews and nieces and children were the first members of his congregation. He would have had about 12 children of his own. I was very young at that time. So we all gathered every time he wanted us to gather. He would say a few prayers, and repeat the sermon that he had heard from the missionary. Because he was illiterate, he couldn’t read or write, which meant he couldn’t read the bible for himself. So he would listen to the missionary, and when he came back, he would relate that message to us.

As time went on, other people in the village became curious and they wanted to know what this was all about. They would come and stand by the window and listen. They would do that a couple of times, then they would come and sit down with us. So it started to grow.

My father was quite charismatic. So his church grew and grew and grew, and there was soon no room in the house. Finally they all decided they should build a communal house. So that was the first church. When the church was built, he went back to the missionary and told him that he’d started a church in our village, and invited him to come and see it. The missionary came and saw it, and was very happy.

To make things easier for him to be visiting the area, maybe once every three months or so, he suggested that they construct a road. So the chiefs organised it. By that time, a road between a closer village and the mission had already been constructed. So all our village had to do was construct a seven-mile road.

Eventually the missionaries started requesting a primary school. Of course the missionaries had a real problem with my father. They were in a fix. I mean, how could this man with four wives become a Christian?! In a way, they made do with him because he’d invited them to the community. But at the same time he was living this life that they did not accept. He could not become, strictly speaking, the leader in the church either. But they put up with him anyway. As they found they had to put up with so many others in Africa! They had no choice. Otherwise they would have had everybody leaving. There would be nobody in the church!

So your father brought the church to your village on his own initiative! No formal training? He wasn’t ordained?

No formal training.

What was the general belief system before that?

Traditional religion, with rituals and ceremonies to honour the ancestral spirits. Every year, for example in the village, even after Christianity, there would be a ceremony of veneration of all the people in the village who had died. No one would go to the farm that day. Everybody would stay in the village. Goats, chickens are killed, they cook the food, offer it up to the spirits, and then the rest of the food we would eat. Sometimes they would go to the riverside and they would offer the same kind of ceremony to appease the spirits so that if people were bathing in the river, if they were trying to cross to the other side, if they were fishing, that there would be no accidents. And apart from the general public rituals, there were also the private household rituals. Every household had their own spirits, their own ancestry, and they have to appease them all, to venerate them all every year. That was something the missionaries never knew about.

But when they came to take a service, almost the whole village went to the church, and the missionaries thought this was wonderful! So everybody was becoming a Christian. What they didn’t know, of course, was that back at their homes, and during certain times of the year, they still had their rituals, which were not acceptable to Christianity. And they would go back to their headquarters in England and tell them that the kingdom of Christ was being extended in Africa!

So then the Methodist school started in my village. I went to that school. And three years later, my father died. I was in grade three. About eight years old.

Teachers came from outside to teach there. Then later, people from the village would go for training, and then come back to teach. But initially they had to bring teachers in. In Africa, loads of people offer their services for free, and that’s how it started.

What about social or other cultural rituals?

Boys and girls would have circumcision. At that time, they would join a society, usually called secret societies by missionaries. But they were only secret to missionaries, not to anyone else in the village! Everyone eventually becomes a member of that society. Because if you come to my village and you are not a member of that society, either the women’s or the men’s, it doesn’t matter how old you are, you are still considered a child.

There were many things that you were taught in that society, about expectations and responsibilities etc. You are taught the history of how we came to be there, about the taboos, all that. How to cultivate land, how to climb the palm tree and get palm leaves which are normally used for covering the house, or to get palm oil, the main oil used in cooking; how to set different kinds of traps, to hunt animals. These are skills you need to have in order to live in that society. You go into the bush, into the forest. And you stay there until you are taught all those skills. Then you come back into the community. For girls too.

So girls are circumcised too?

Yes.

What about the trauma of this experience, not to mention the unnecessary loss of pleasure in sex?

I think they do still have pleasure, definitely, yes. Otherwise they wouldn’t have affairs, which many of them do! But with circumcision, yes, there are a lot of risks, and trauma as well, having the fear of sex because of what happens. But the reason I say they do enjoy sex, I mean, why would they not? I am seeing they do enjoy sex. They get married. OK, you might argue from the point of view that in our society they are expected to get married, so they have to. But they would still have extra-marital relationships. So there must be a sense of enjoyment there, in order for you to do that. If it was forced upon you, it goes without saying you’d stay where you are, without looking for more. So there must be some pleasure. I’m not saying it’s good. I’m just saying there must be some pleasure.

Why do they circumcise women? What’s the point?

I think the point is that men think if women are not circumcised that they are never satisfied sexually.

Why do they think that?

I don’t know. I think men say that out of ignorance.

Are girls prepared for it? Or do they resist it?

In the cities, because of all the human rights things and people being exposed to these ideas, they might be opposed to it. But if you go to my village, I would actually say that 80 to 85% of women are circumcised. They would be taught all the things that women in society are expected to do.

And what are they expected to do?

(Whispers) To keep their husbands satisfied!

(Laughs)

Are they allowed boyfriends?

Oh yes. It would happen that way, or marriages might be arranged. But parents would consult their sons or daughters first. Because they found that if they put pressure on their sons or daughters, the marriage never lasts for long because there will always be problems.

When do people get married?

Well, people can actually get married when they are still in the womb. They are engaged.

Before they know if the baby to be born is a boy or a girl!

What happens is that, say there’s a family next door and you are very close to them. And you have a son, when the lady next door is pregnant, you and your husband go next door and offer a gift and say if your child is a girl, we are engaging that girl for our son. If the child is a son, then the next time there is a daughter, it is understood that she will be engaged to your son.

That could be called an arranged marriage. Then other times they might approach another girl in another family later, not long before the marriage ceremony. And they approach the family and say we want your daughter to be married to our son. And if the family if OK with that idea, they will expect you to pay all the expenses.

So the groom’s family pays the bride’s family?

Yes. What you are able to give. Sometimes it is prescribed. A lot of the time it depends on how much they like the family.

What about love matches?

Very unlikely.

What about you and your wife? Did you love her?

My wife and I? Well that’s different because I…well, I don’t consider myself as being from my village. They only time I spent there continuously was in primary school. After that, I went on to secondary school far away from my village, in a place called Segbwema also in the eastern part of my country. But when I went to school then, I never went home until the end of term. I had to take care of my own feeding, make sure that I studied myself. My parents weren’t there. My parents had never been in that town at all.

My uncle thought it was a good school, a Methodist secondary school, and he knew someone in the town I could stay with. And staying there literally meant I had a bed. They weren’t responsible for anything else. So from eleven, I had to do all that. After my ‘O’ Levels, I went to another town and looked for a job as a pupil teacher (a pupil teacher is a teacher who has no training) so I went and did that, and during that time, I decided to become a Methodist minister. I told you earlier that when my father died, I was in grade three. Then Mum got married to one of my father’s nephews. They were a similar age, because my father would have been a lot older than my mum. So when he died, and my mum got married to my step dad, I realised because of the financial situation they were not going to be able to pay for my secondary school at all. Primary school was OK, not very expensive, but secondary was very expensive. So, when I passed my 11+ examinations my parents were overjoyed for about an hour or so. Then it dawned on them that they were not going to be able to pay for my secondary education. So from laughing, they started crying. That was at the beginning of the summer holidays. I remember walking behind my mum, going to the farm. My mum was crying. I never liked to see her crying. So I started praying quietly to myself, that if God helped me to get a secondary education, that I would give my life to serving him. And the only way I knew to do that was through the church, because that was what my dad had brought to the village.

So, one month of the vacation went by, two months went by. And we were still nowhere near finding a solution. Then in the third month, as we were heading for the farm one morning a messenger came from where the missionary was staying, seven miles from my village. A letter saying he wanted to see me, to go back with the messenger. So we went together, and when I got there, he took out another letter, gave it to me. The letter was from his brother in Darlington in England. He had known I was to go to secondary school, but that I wouldn’t be able to pay. So he had actually written to his brother, and told them about us. We didn’t know anything about it. He asked him if he’d be willing to pay for my education. And his brother and his brother’s wife said yes.

So I could go to school. So now it was all smiles instead of crying.

When I finished my secondary education, there were all sorts of expectations for me to go and do something else. But then I was reminded of that time when I was walking behind my mum. So I went back to that missionary and said, ‘well, this is the time for me to make a decision. I could go to university, but if I do that, there will be quite a lot of temptation to go and do something else. So I want to begin now, to start training to become a minister in the church.’ He couldn’t believe it. He said, ‘you’re joking.’ He sat me down and said, ‘you know you’ve gone to school with so many of your friends. In 20 years’ time, they will be high up there on the social ladder, and you’ll be right down there.’ So he said, ‘go and think about it. After three months come back to me again’. So I went away for three months, came back and said, ‘I still want to do what I promised to do.’

So he said ‘OK. You’re going to have to leave the pupil teaching you are doing. I’m going to make you a catechist in the church. And the first thing you’re going to see is that your salary will drop. I said, ‘that’s OK.’ So I left my teaching, started the catechist for several years, then eventually I went to theological college in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, and studied there for three and a half years. I graduated from there as a Methodist minister. During my first couple of years there, I was offered a scholarship by the Methodist Church in Ireland, to come and do post ordination studies there. So I accepted the scholarship, and came to Queen’s University. I stayed three years there, doing a BD (Bachelor of Divinity) degree. Then I got a scholarship from the University of Cambridge to do a post graduate degree. Then when I finished, I went back to Sierra Leone.

So, to get back to your question about love! I met Clodagh at Queen’s. She was a teacher in Bandon. Her primary degree was in Irish and French. She taught in primary school there for four years. Then she decided it was not what she wanted to do. She got a call to the ministry, went to Belfast, and it was while she was there that we met, in ’86.

I was afraid, and did everything that you would think an African man would never do to win her over! (Peals with laughter.) In Africa, all you have to do is say, ‘I’ll have you’ and she’s yours! (More laughter.)

Oh, I fasted, and everything. Took her to cinemas, and everything, and all the time I wanted to tell her that I’m really in love with her, but I was afraid. What would she say? What would the parents say? Because African men are still very traditional in that way, and the permission of the parents is very important. So these were huge questions for me. So I decided to pray and fast, for the courage to say that to her.

Was this your first relationship?

I was supposed to marry someone in Sierra Leone, but it didn’t work out. She was just finishing her primary school. And my parents had to pay for her secondary education to prepare her. But it never worked out.

Why not?

Oh my goodness me. We were not compatible. Her view of things was completely different. She also didn’t understand and accept the nature of the work I had to do. She was going to be an obstruction in my way. I talked to my parents and they soon realised that I had no choice really. There was also the advantage of my parents not being educated. Because that meant I have a lot of freedom to do what I want to do. So that was that, and then I left.

So, back to Belfast. I got the courage and then I told Clodagh. I don’t think she believed me. She actually wanted someone else. But they were having problems. So I came in at the right time! She said she would think about it. And when she said yes, I was on top of the world. I can still remember the way I couldn’t stop smiling, the way I was walking, whistling on my way to lectures. Then I started thinking of all the implications. At this point we’d had no physical contact. We actually only consummated our relationship after marriage.

So then I said to her, you have said yes, but what about your parents?

She said she would discuss it with her Mum first. Then her mother could win her father over.

I had actually met them once before. Her sister was preparing to go to the Gambia as a missionary, so they came to ask my advice. And I used to write in the Methodist magazine so they would have read things I had written. So anyway, Clodagh went and discussed it with them, to prepare the way! We had already bought rings in Darlington when I took her to meet my second family, the ones who had paid for my education.

I arrived at her home on St Stephen’s Day to ask for her hand. I was going into her home for the first time. She showed me into my bedroom. She had spoken to her Mum but not her Dad. And I thought, ‘there is no way I can meet them, and wait till after dinner to ask, I’ll have to do it straight away!’ So then I spoke to the parents, said I was in love with her, and wanted her hand in marriage. You can imagine – in Ireland – it was awful!! The father was absolutely gobsmacked. He didn’t know how to handle me, etc. So then I asked Clodagh to give me the ring, and I handed it to her father, and asked him to bless it for her. He was a Methodist minister too. So he had to do that! He did it, and then I put it on Clodagh’s finger. That took about 10 minutes, then everything was over. I left, went into the bedroom, and breathed out, a huge sigh of relief. There was frantic running up and down and around the house. But by the time I came out, they had already started looking up the directory for hotels! When I came back, then he said, ‘OK. We are very happy for the two of you’.

We got married in July ‘88. I was 31. Then I went on to Cambridge in September, while she had to stay on in Belfast. So we were separated! That was the year BT announced their greatest profits. We were on the phone the whole time! I came over every holiday. Then after three years I had finished my course, and we went to Sierra Leone. While we were there, my older sister died in the process of giving birth. She had a womb rupture. She was young. We were there when that happened, so we adopted the baby. We called him Fayia.

We told him from the very beginning, what had happened.

His father is in Sierra Leone. We are all hoping to go back there. We lived and worked there until 1995.

Were the children born there?

Abbie (who is named after my mother) was born in England. Fayia (which means ‘gift from God’) was born in Sierra Leone. Sahr (named after me, and whose name means ‘first son’) was born in Scotland!

So they have lived here for ten years, the longest period of their lives in one place. Do you think they feel Irish now?

I would think so, definitely. We came back in ‘95 because of the civil war in Sierra Leone. It started in March ‘91. I was in Sierra Leone at that time, doing my research. The country was controlled by rebels at that time. The first year I was working in the church in Freetown. Clodagh was at home. The second year I was moved from the church and made principal of the college. And Clodagh started teaching Hebrew at the college. But the war got so close to us in Freetown, I could hear gunshots. Our office in London phoned and said we should pack and leave, get out of the country. So I went back home that afternoon, we packed up, and Clodagh and the children left two days later on one of the last flights. But I stayed, with a suitcase and essential documents packed beside my bed. Because there was no way I could just leave the college like that. The family had left that way before, and then things had calmed down, and they’d come back. So we thought the same thing would happen this time. But things got worse and worse and worse. So in August ‘95 I came back and joined them in Ireland.

How have the children adjusted?

Abbie and Fayia were at school in Sierra Leone, so it was not easy for them. But the worst thing was the nightmares they used to have. They would dream that there was a soldier in their room with a gun. They were seeing soldiers in the streets in Freetown all the time. They might have experienced a little racism too, but we went and spoke to the person responsible at the school, and that was the end of that. I think they would be very comfortable in the community here now.

Do they learn Irish?

Yes they do.

What other languages do you speak?

I speak Kissie and Krio and Mende. They started Krio too. I’m hoping when we go back in January that they’ll pick some more Krio up.

How do you see the Irish?

I think they’re very culture conscious. That’s one of the reasons I decided to change my name. I was called John before. My name is John Sahr. Because in Africa we always want to be western. So we would give our children African names but always call them a second name like Prince or something! So here I decided to change my name back to Sahr. That kind of thing is appreciated here, a sense of cultural identity.

When I came here first I found a lot of people didn’t know about my part of the world. When I was going home once, a woman told me she wanted to give me a letter to take to a friend there. The letter was addressed to South Africa! So I said to her, I don’t mind sending the letter from there, as long as you don’t expect me to deliver it!!

People know very little about Africa, but they don’t want to know either. And they don’t appreciate that people from other parts of the world have really struggled to learn a lot about Ireland and the Irish. There is always a hint that you have something lacking if you are not making the effort to learn. It’s very challenging.

When people in the college knew we were engaged, that’s when we learned the true colour of people. At that time there were few individual friends, Irish people who were lecturers, who were totally with us. There were people really highly placed in the Methodist Church who were not a bit happy at all. I was even accused by one of them that I was stealing Clodagh, to bring her back to Sierra Leone. The reason was because the church felt she had great potential for languages, and they wanted to get her to continue, keep that up, and maybe become a lecturer in languages in the college. But because I was going to marry her, that was not going to be possible, so they were not happy at all.

I was always going to go back home, no doubt in my mind.

When you were living in Sierra Leone as a couple, did you have to adapt to the customs there?

A few adjustments here and there, but it was basically the same really. Clodagh dressed like an African there. She used to wear skirts and the African dress. Even when we got married, she used that instead of the traditional wedding dress.

Where do you feel you belong now?

Sometimes I don’t know where I belong. I am comfortable wherever I am. When I am in Sierra Leone, I get annoyed with everyone, and the system. That’s what I miss about here when I am in Sierra Leone. Here I know if I want to get things done, they will be done. In Sierra Leone, if I want to get anything done, there are so many obstacles in the way that you could spend the whole day trying to get round people to get things done. That really bugs me a lot in Sierra Leone.

As for other aspects of the culture, we do eat a lot of African food here. So food isn’t a problem. Culture is something we are not really aware of. It’s in us, and around us. It’s that kind of thing I miss. Everything just clicks together. Whereas here, when somebody does or says something, I have to spend a lot of time trying to put an interpretation on to it, what’s the meaning etc. I don’t have to do that in Sierra Leone. So in that sense, the thing clicks, so easily. And also in Sierra Leone, I don’t have to make any effort to be accepted.

What about Clodagh? Is she accepted there?

Well, you might know, in Africa, white people would be put on a pedestal. And because of that, you can’t come close to them. Also there’s a language problem as well. If people come to visit our house, most people don’t speak English, so we have to speak our language. So that’s quite uncomfortable for everybody.

Do you feel that you’re better off here, as a family? Or would you rather go between the two countries?

I think I’d rather do the two. That would be the ideal situation. Weather is very important to me. In Sierra Leone, I don’t have to jog to lose weight! Here I have to do all this jogging! It’s a big effort for me to do that. There I have loads of friends all over the place in Sierra Leone. Almost everywhere I go, I meet past students. You know everybody. It’s not the same here.

How big is your church here?

We have about 150 people, from 18 nationalities. In many ways, it’s not as exciting as church in Sierra Leone at all. There, it’s very open, informal, and people are into it. They enjoy themselves when they worship. It’s gospel. I enjoy the vibrancy of it all there. It’s not the same here. I don’t really know where I belong now. Sometimes I don’t really know what I want. When I go back, the services take hours. And after two hours, it’s really pushing me to the edge! After that, I’m off, it doesn’t matter what’s happening, I’m going.

Being married to someone from a different culture, have you experienced personal conflict with your differences?

There are always problems. And they get worse as you get older, oh definitely. Because we all become ourselves more and more, the older we grow.

And your children? From a cultural point of view, where do you think they’ll settle?

I think they’ll settle here. They were very young when they left Sierra Leone. But I’ve already told Abbie whoever she is going to marry will have to come and stay with me for at least two months! (Laughs.)

Are you strict with them? Re alcohol, drugs, boyfriends?

Oh yes. We would actually stop our children from going to stay with people unless we knew something about the family, and they were acceptable to us. If we knew anything negative about them, they would be forbidden to go. It’s probably also the Methodist influence.

If you were Bertie for a day, what would you do to improve this country?

I would move this country to Sierra Leone, and move Sierra Leone here! (Peals with laughter).

***


Sierra Leone in West Africa is bordered by Guinea in the north and Liberia in the south, with the Atlantic Ocean to the west. During the 18th century, Sierra Leone was an important centre of the transatlantic slave trade. The capital, Freetown, was founded in 1787 by the Sierra Leone Company as a home for formerly enslaved African Americans who had fought for the British in the American Revolution. These returned Africans were from all areas of Africa. The joined the previous settlers and together became known as Creole or Krio people. Cut off from their homes and traditions by the experience of slavery, they assimilated some aspects of British styles of life and built a flourishing trade on the West African coast. Sierra Leone gained independence in 1961.
Corruption within the government and mismanagement of diamond resources led to the outbreak of civil war. With the breakdown of state structures and the effective suppression of civilian opposition, wide corridors were opened for trafficking of arms, ammunition and drugs, all of which eroded national and regional security and increased crime.

From 1991 to 2002, Sierra Leone suffered greatly under the devastating effects of rebel activities, which were stopped by UN and British forces, who disarmed 17 000 militia and rebels. The brutal war in neighbouring Liberia played an undeniable role, with Liberia’s Charles Taylor reportedly giving military aid in return for diamonds. Forced child recruitment of child soldiers was also a feature of rebel strategy. The government of Sierra Leone, overwhelmed by a crumbling economy and widespread corruption, was unable to put up significant resistance. Several coups and coup attempts took place over the next few years, resulting in massive loss of life and destruction of property. In 1999, the UN agreed to send peacekeepers to help restore order. Some 500 peacekeepers were taken hostage, and the peace accord collapsed.

By the time the civil war was declared officially over, an estimated 50 000 people had been killed, while hundreds of people had had their arms or legs hacked off by rebels. A war crimes court was set up in Freetown.

Elections were finally held in May 2002. President Kabbah was re-elected, gaining 70% of the vote. Sierra Leone has been at peace since then.

Source: Wikipedia enclypedia