About Loneliness

Talk about loneliness
I had never socialized much with the larger community of American residents of Liberia. For the most part they were either with the embassy or employed by an embassy satellite like USAID or a multinational corporation like J.P. Morgan Chase or the accounting firm Price Waterhouse (before Cooper) and they were paid in American dollars, which meant their incomes more than quadrupled mine. Most of my social life was with low to middle income Liberian Nationals. Occasionally one of my well-connected American friends toted me with them to a party in the home of someone that had friends in the Liberian Community and in the foreign community. There was Virg a former Peace Corps Nurse and Kava a friend of mine who taught at the American School and I don’t remember how, but somehow I managed to have a friendship with Gloria the US Ambassador’s secretary. We would sit in her gorgeous high rise apartment across the street from the embassy and chit-chat over snacks and wine. I was her insight on what Liberia was really like since 95% of her time was spent on the embassy hill.


One of my more memorable experiences in Liberia was actually shaking hands with Maya Angelou. Ms Angelou was at the cocktail party of a Liberian doctor and his American wife and I was crashing the cocktail party with Kokava a friend that taught at the American School and her husband Massiehoo. When I saw her that night so tall and statuesque she absolutely sucked all the air of the room and took my breath away. We stood at the back of the room during the reading but then Ms Angelou rose and began shaking hands with other guests I was drawn towards her and then somehow my hand wound up and her hand and I was muddling something inane like I read “Why the Caged Bird Sings,” and loved it, as if everyone in the known world hadn’t. She graciously smiled on my and it felt like warm sunshine, truly.

I also met Nina Simone in Liberia. Betty [ last name] threw a party for her at her home. Nina was exiled from America at the time for income tax evasion and was going to Amsterdam to sing. At the time she sang and played the piano a little and sang one song but she seemed as though she was recovering from an illness. Her friend Betty that had once been a jazz singer, and had married into the Tolbert Family and bought a fleet of garbage trucks that had contracts with the American and other foreign embassies. She had a compound that was quite lovely and I saw her socially several times a year at her home or parties thrown by someone close to the embassy. I was on the periphery of the “in crowd” because all I really wanted in life was to make a difference in Liberia and educate my children. I really didn’t place much importance on friends, at least not then.

The Kind of Hearts You Have

At 3:00am recently I awakened with this memory and I wanted to share it with my children so I hoped online and created this email for them. I had repatriated my elder children back to the United States with the final batch of American evacuees during the later stages of the coup in 1989. I had high hopes for Liberia's recovery and the possibility that our family had a future in Liberia and so I stubbornly remained with my three youngest children who were Zevah (10 years), Zefron (8 years) and Elitikvah (6 years). My plan was to wait out the coup and later send for the elder children. As it turned out we would also be forced to flee Liberia.

Dear Children,

If you recall Binah and her daughter Yohanna and Penemiel had been sent back to America and we stayed. Binah was young and beautiful and it would have been hard for me to defend her against a soldier deciding to rape her during the war and I was terrified that Penemiel, who was a wild, free spirit, always curious, always exploring other areas would be kidnapped and forced to become a child soldier. They were evacuated by the American Embassy about for or five long months before we decided to flee. I kept you three with me and home schooled you. My hope was that America would intervene in Liberia's affairs and that the coup would not turn into a bloody Civil War. My thinking was that, since I co-owned First Steps Child Development Center, and had been guaranteed a part time job at the Embassy, on the horizon, I would be able to afford plane fare back to Liberia for Binah, Yohanna and Penemiel and all would be well... at least that's what I thought at the time.

At any rate, the three of us, were living in our house on Chubor Road. Food was very, very scarce. People who had food hid it and cooked at night or indoors instead of outside on the coal pot as we typically did in Liberia. Liberians are such generous people and it was painful to keep having food a secret. We had a bag of rice which we had hidden in the ceiling to protect it from being stolen soldiers. For the 4 of us I was cooking only 2 scoops of rice for the entire day! Every morning I got up very early and walked to the market to fight for whatever vegetables I could get in the market to make the soup for our little rice.

This particular day, the little girl that Zevah and Zefron played with across the road was very sick with malaria and her father came to tell us. She had been sick for awhile with malaria and her family was treating her with roots and herbs. They had no chloroquine and they had no food. I remember listening to her father saying that if she didn't eat he thought she would die. He sat with a heavy heart and I promised that we would pray for her and then he left. When he left I called you together and explained how serious her situation was and that I wanted us to pray for her as a family.

And then the most wonderful thing happened. Zefron said, "She can have my rice!" and Zevah agreed as did Elitikvah. We talked about the fact that giving away our food would mean that we wouldn't have food to eat that evening and you all were fine with it. So we put all of the soup that we had for dinner, keeping just a bit of the rice and oil to cut your hunger, into a bowl.
I really wanted you children to feel the effects of your sacrifice and so I covered the bowl and handed it to Zefron and you guys humbly carried the soup across the road and spent some time sitting with your little friend.

As a mother, that was one of the proudest moments of my life! Here were my children, in the midst of a war with hunger all around them, giving up their food for a sick friend. It is easy to be generous in the midst of plenty but when you are personally facing hunger and are willing to give your food to someone who needs it more, this is real generosity and real love. When I reflect on our time during the War in Liberia, the series of miracles that kept us safe during that time and the miracle of our eventual escape from Liberia I'm sure that the Universe was just giving back some of the good that we projected in Liberia.

I have no idea why after all these years my spirit gave me back this memory but I wanted to write this memory down and share it so that you always remember that you all have the capacity for loving and giving in the midst of serious adversity. Have a wonderful and productive day!

Reflections of the Past

I lived as an American expatriate in Liberia for 11 years and I've written a memoir of experiences that I had in Liberia. I'm wondering if there are any other expatriates that lived in Liberia out there that want to talk about our experiences.