Host: Jay Allison
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Jay: [00:00:12] From PRX, this is The Moth Radio Hour. I'm your host, Jay Allison, producer of this Radio Show. In this hour, stories of identity fabricated, forged and forgotten.
[00:00:26] First up is Judith Samper Albero from our 2014 Moth Community Showcase. The showcase features some of our favorite stories told through our community workshop. Those favorites include this story, which revolves around a forged bus pass in London. Here's Judith, live from the Housing Works bookstore in New York City.
[cheers and applause]
Judith: [00:01:43] [Spanish language] Hola. Me llamo, Judith. Soy espanola ya mucha wondra. But well, maybe you want me to talk in English, right? I don't know. Maybe you can understand me better.
All right, so, before telling you my story, I need to tell you a little bit about my culture. I'm from Spain, so I'm going to let how the Spaniards are. The Spaniards, we love to get things for free. [audience laughter] The more we can get, the better. Just imagine you have a bowl of candies, and the Spaniard will get one for themselves and one for the cousin, one for the mother, one for the father, the sister, the daughter, for all the whole family. If there is nobody in the room, they will take all the candy and the bowl because it will look amazing in the living room. [audience laughter]
Well, when I was 25, I was an art student in London. I was broke. As you can imagine, paying rent or paying for food, it was a struggle. [unintelligible [00:01:59] was paying for transport. One day, I was waiting for my bus at the stop. I was looking at my bus pass and thinking. this would be so easy to falsify. [audience laughter] Like, I'm an artist, I can't do things. So, I was thinking, oh, my God, I can't do this with my eyes closed. ,So I decided to give a try. [audience laughter] And the first time I tried, I was a bit scared. But it worked. It worked.
So, after a couple of weeks, it just became a routine to start my week, clicking around the computer, hitting print. [unintelligible 00:02:37]. I was ready to go. So, I don't know, after a couple of months doing that, I was so easy that I didn't feel that I had any more fake bus pass. It was totally real for me. So, another day, I was just going to downtown London for a party. I was going in the bus, listening my music, looking through the window.
I felt like somebody stabbing my shoulder. I turn around and I see an inspector asking for my bus pass. So, I just handed it to him. And as soon as I gave it to him, I remembered that I'm giving him a bus pass that is fake. I looked at his face and I can notice that he knows it too. So, the next thing he does is taking his notebook, “Name, please.” And without even thinking, I say Antonia Gonzalez, which obviously is not my real name. And Antonia Gonzalez is the most Spaniard name, most common name that you can find. It would be like here, St. John Smith, something like that. [audience laughter]
But I thought, okay, he's going to put me a fine, this fine that they give to everybody when they don't pay their tickets, like it's £20. That's a shame, because that would be a few less beers tonight. But what can I do? Just [unintelligible [00:03:58] pay. That's it. So, the next stop, he made me go down the bus and there is a line of 10 policemen waiting. Two of them, they grab me by my arms so high that my feet can barely touch the floor. And like in a movie, they bring me to the police station reading my rights.
When I arrived there, I managed to sneak my ID into my panties, because I realized the thing I'm Antonia Gonzalez there and I don't want them think I lie about my name. [audience laughter] So, after that they frisked me and they take everything I have in my pockets, they take my piercing, everything and they couldn't find it. They asked me as well where I bought the bus pass. And I say, I bought it on the street. I didn't know even it was fake. So, I don't know, they didn't believe me too much, but [audience laughter] they have to ask if I wanted a court appointed lawyer. And I say, “Of course, I needed to defend my innocence.” [audience laughter]
So, I had to wait for a couple of hours until he came, and they brought me into a cell. They took off my shoes, they opened the door and I see like a cement bed with a blue mat like this one that you can find at the gyms. A metal toilet and in front of it a camera. So, they cannot lose any detail. They can know even if you are constipated there. In those two hours, I was thinking about my story, what I was going to say. Like, thinking about where I bought it exactly, from who I bought it. But without trying to give too many details, I didn't want it to point to anybody in concrete, because I'm a good person, you know? [audience laughter]
So, my lawyer came. I tell him all my story. They bring us to an interrogatory room with another police officer, with a police officer. She starts recording and make me all kind of questions. I start answering, but none of my answers seems to please her. She starts playing with the fact that English is not my mother tongue, so everything I was saying, she was changing the meaning of everything. After 45 minutes, like going back and forth, back and forth, she just asked me if I want to translate her. And then, my lawyer, again like in the movies, looked at her and said, “Can I talk to my client, please?
So, she stopped the recording, leaves the room. My lawyer turned to me and said, “Listen, this is how the things work in England. The police here has a 90% of solved cases. And that's because you need to say what they want to hear. So, when she come back, just say to her that you are a student, you don't have much money, you knew it was fake, it's wrong what you did, you regret and you're never going to do it again.” At that point, I was so convinced of my story and my innocence that I wasn't [audience laughter] like I didn't want him to do that. I was like, “Why I have to say that?” [audience laughter] But the whole night there, I was like five, six hours with them. And I was thinking, okay, maybe he's the lawyer. Maybe I should follow his advice.
And the police officer came back and I say my speech. And after that, she doesn't make me any more questions or say anything else. She stopped the recording, leave the room. When she come back, she said that they are going to release me. So, I said, “Great. I'm just feeling great. Everything is finished.” They are going to release me as soon as they certify my identity. Yeah, Antonia Gonzalez. So, at that point, my whole world crumbled.
I was like, I just start crying and crying. And the lawyer and the police officer, they were handing me Kleenex. They didn't know what was going on. I couldn't even talk, keep crying until I managed to say to them that I lied about my name. And then, the lawyer was looking at me and he was smiling, thinking. I think he knew I was a young person. I didn't know what I was doing. But the police officer, the police officer thought that I was a terrorist. So, after that, it took me hours to make them believe which one was my real identity and demonstrate that I wasn't a criminal, because they thought that too.
During all that time, I never once pulled out my ID, [audience laughter] because I thought it was going to be an insult to the police officer who frisked me before. [audience laughter] So, I think at the end, they just felt sorry for me and they thought it was having me the whole night like that. I think they thought it was enough punishment. So, they let me go without any fine. At the end, no fine, nothing. So, when I get up at 06:00 in the morning from the police station, the only thing I could thought about it was, how I'm going to get home now without my bus pass? [audience laughter]
Obviously, I learned my lesson. After this. I never in my life even there about falsifying another bus pass. But lately, I've been observing at the MoMA membership card, [audience laughter] because $25 to get in, come on, I should be free. Thank you.
[cheers and applause]
That was Judith Samper Albero. Judith is from Vienna, a Mediterranean city in Spain. She moved to the US nine years ago and currently teaches at California State University and works as a virtual reality specialist and illustrator. While continuing to develop her passion for art, she loves camping with her dog too.
Judith told us that luckily her bus pass forgery has only come back to haunt her one time. Last year during her green card interview, this issue came out and she had to request her criminal records from England. They let her go home without a warning, and it didn't affect the process of her permanent residency beyond an extra three months of paperwork and some anxiety. She told us, “Thankfully, youthful stupidity gets cured with time.”
Next up is Shaun Gohel, who told this story at our open mic StorySLAM series in New York, where WNYC is a media partner of the Moth. Here's Shaun.
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Shaun: [00:11:03] So, it's the first night of summer camp and I'm trying really hard to bond with the other guys in the dorm when one of them goes, “Hey, Shaun, tell us about your first kiss.” And I'm like, “Hmm.” This is my nightmare question for two reasons. One, I am a huge dork. At this point in my life at 16, I've only kissed like my PSAT book for good luck. [audience laughter] And two, I am in the closet. So, anything about intimacy in general makes me retreat into my body like a shy turtle. But luckily, I have prepared answer for this very specific question, a fake answer.
So, I turn to him and I go, “My first kiss was Sarah Brown. We met at Disneyworld. [audience laughter] Sparks flew. We had our first kiss outside the France Pavilion at Epcot. But unfortunately, we lost touch.” And the guys are like, “Ah, very good,” “Yes.” [audience laughter] So, we're leaving the room and one of them goes, “Hey, did you really kiss Sarah Brown?” And I'm like, “Ah, as a matter of fact, yes, I did.” And he goes, “Huh, that's so crazy, because she's here.” And I was like, [audience laughter] “Who's here?”
So, it turns out that there may or may not be a Sarah Brown in Florida, but there definitely was a Sarah Brown at this camp in the girls dorm. That in itself is not a problem, because then I was going to go to plan B. “Oh, wrong Sarah Brown, common name, common mistake.” But what I didn't anticipate was that this news would pinball across camp and get to Sarah and made her nervous, because Sarah, like me, had never kissed anyone, and she didn't want people investigating her kissing history and then making fun of her for never having done so. So, instead of saying, “No, I don't know who this guy is,” she said, “Yes, like we did. It's not a big deal.” [audience laughter]
So, the next day, I'm eating a turkey sandwich and this throng of guys comes up to me and they're like, “Yo, dude, we talked to Sarah. She remembers her kiss.” And I'm like, “What? [audience laughter] But I didn't think she'd remember. That's so crazy.” They're like, “Yo, this is great. Like, you're going to have a reunion and this summer, you're going to hook up.” And I'm like, “Oh, crap.” [audience laughter] So, I kid you not the next six days, I basically hid in the bathroom for 45-minute intervals, trying to avoid this hormonal, twilight obsessed, roving mob of teenagers hungry for a romance to make happen in real life.
But all good things must come to an end. I emerge from the bathroom one day, and lo and behold, there is Sarah Brown. She comes up to me and she goes, “Hey, Shaun, I'm Sarah. [audience laughter] I think it's really funny that you told everyone we kissed.” And I was like, “Oh. Hey, Sarah. I think it's really funny that you exist. [audience laughter] It's like The Legend of Bloody Mary. [audience laughter] Like, I've said your name enough times that you've manifested yourself and you’re going to ruin my life.” [audience laughter]
We make a little bit more small talk, and then she goes, “You know, we don't have to keep lying. We can just quickly make this true.” She gives me the look. And then, I'm like, “Oh, my gourd.” I'm just processing the fact that my fake gay beard has manifested herself [audience laughter] and is now proposing the summer fling that everyone thinks we already had at Epcot. [audience laughter]
The second thing growing through my mind is, I don't want to make this real. But also, I don't want to keep lying. And it's like, I am in this weird in between where I don't want the social capital. I'm lying solely as a defense mechanism. But my lies have backfired, and instead of making me disappear, they've been pushing me further and further into the spotlight. So, I realized, in order to stop this rollercoaster, I just have to be honest with this girl. And I'm like, “Sarah, I can't.” She looks at me, and she squints her eyes, and I could see the wheels turning and she goes, “You can't.” And I say, “Yes.” And she goes, “Because of your religion.” [audience laughter] I go- [audience applause] -[feeling uncomfortable] “Kind of. Yes. Yes.” [audience laughter] So, actually, that pretty much settled the matter. When you bring up Hinduism in rural Pennsylvania, people are just like, “Okay, cool.” [audience laughter] But not only was I thankful that this story died, I was really thankful that at this time in my life, this secret was such a burden and I was really thankful for that moment. So, I could see that in an environment as difficult as high school, there were other people putting on a performance, and it made me feel a little bit less alone. So, thank you.
[cheers and applause]
Jay: [00:16:57] That was Shaun Gohel. Shaun won the StorySLAM that night with this story and went on to tell another story at our New York City GrandSLAM, which brings winners from 10 StorySLAMs across the city to compete.
In a moment, stories of personas and costumes, one donned by an actor at a children's party, one worn by a lawyer arguing in front of the Supreme Court, when The Moth Radio Hour continues.
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The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. and presented by PRX.
This is the Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Jay Allison. In this episode, our stories are about crafting your image, playing a part, faking it until you make it and dressing for the job you want. That's what our next storyteller, Dave Moran, has to do. When called upon to argue in front of the Supreme Court, Dave told the story to GrandSLAM in Ann Arbor, where we partner with Michigan Radio. Here's Dave Moran.
[applause]
Dave: [00:18:39] “Mr. Moran,” the deep baritone voice rang out. I stood up with my hands shaking violently and walked to the lectern of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Four months earlier, the Court had granted review in a case that I was representing an indigent defendant who had been convicted of a crime greater than he should have been convicted of. I had never been to the US Supreme Court before, so I didn't know what I was in for. And the first thing you do when you're a lawyer and you're going to a new court is you read the court rules. I read the court rules. And one of the first things I noticed, is that a council shall appear, and I quote, “In dark conservative business attire.”
Well, I'm a law professor, and I dress badly. [audience laughter] So, I went to the department store at Briarwood Mall [audience laughter] and I went to the men's department. And after teaching a class at the end of the day and I was wearing pretty much what I'm wearing today, khaki pants, polo shirt, five o'clock shadow, and I said, “I need a dark, conservative business suit.” [audience laughter] And the man looked me over and he said, “Job interview, sir?” [audience laughter] And I said, “No, US Supreme Court argument.” [audience laughter] I'm certain he didn't believe me, [audience laughter] but I got to suit.
Of course, the other part, things you do when you're preparing for US Supreme Court is you do a lot of preparation. So, the case was about the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment for those lawyers present. I read every case I could to get as ready as I could possible. But the problem is, I had never even seen a US Supreme Court argument. So, in March 2003, a month before my scheduled argument, I flew to Washington and went to watch an argument of another criminal case. And the argument started.
First thing that I noticed was that this is a really small room. Those of you who've been there know this, this is a really small courtroom. And the lawyer is just a few feet under the nose of Chief Justice William Rehnquist. And the argument started, and it was a death penalty case. The lawyer arguing for the inmate was getting into it with Justice Scalia about what the record really showed. It turns out Justice Scalia had this weird habit of he would ask a question, and you would think he was done, and it would be a deep breath and a long pause, and then there'd be more question coming.
The lawyer was very eager, and he kept starting to answer the questions and then Justice Scalia would ask some more. This happened two or three times, and suddenly Chief Justice Rehnquist leaned forward and said, “You will let Justice Scalia finish asking his questions. There will not be two people talking at the same time.” Now, the lawyer at the podium didn't seem fazed at all. He just went on with his argument after a quick apology. But if cameras were allowed in the courtroom, you would have a video of all of the blood draining out of me. [audience laughter]
So, I came back home and I told people in Michigan about this terrifying experience. Everybody had a Chief Justice Rehnquist story, that how he loved to chew out attorneys, if an attorney sometimes got the name wrong. The Justices don't have nameplates on the bench. And some attorneys mistake the name and he would say, “That was Justice Souter, not Justice Kennedy.” Or, the worst thing you could do would be to answer a question and start the answer with, “Well, Judge O'Connor,” “It's Justice O'Connor.”
So, I was terrified that I was going to go there and be humiliated in front of my friends and family, all of whom had been invited to go to Washington for me. But I prepared as best I could. I wore my suit, made sure it fit and we flew to Washington in April 2004. Now, the night before the argument, we all agreed to meet the friends and family and other lawyers on the team. We met at a Mexican restaurant just a few blocks from the Supreme Court. I ordered Enchiladas Suizas. They were delicious. I thought, margaritas might help me sleep. So, I had one margarita and then I had another margarita and I thought, three margaritas, not a good idea, so I had two margaritas and I got a good night's sleep.
I got up the next morning, and we walked to the court and waited and waited until the case was called, “Mr. Moran.” I walked up there, terrified that I was going to be humiliated, handshaking. And I said, “Mr. Chief justice,” and it may had pleased the Court, and started the argument. And quickly the questions started coming and the tension melted away, because as a lawyer, I'm very happy to answer questions. It's easier than just making a speech like this.
Justice Scalia asked a lot of questions, and I counted to myself, thousand one, thousand two, [audience laughter] thousand three. I waited until I was sure he was done, and I began to answer. And the questions came, and I thought it went pretty well. It’s 30 minutes of argument in front of that Court, and the case was over and I walked out the doors, down the magnificent marble steps and thought that was pretty fun. [audience laughter] I've been back five times since then, and I've won some and I've lost some, but every single argument has been fun. I haven't been chewed out by any of the Justices. [audience laughter] I must say that Chief Justice Roberts runs a much nicer, more friendly court [audience laughter] than Chief Justice Rehnquist. But every time I walk out of there, walk out those great doors and down those magnificent marble steps, I think to myself, damn, that was fun.
[cheers and applause]
Jay: [00:24:18] That was Dave Moran. Dave is a professor at the University of Michigan Law School, where he co-directs the Michigan Innocence Clinic. He always eats at the same Mexican restaurant the night before a Supreme Court argument, and he always orders the Enchilada Suizas and two margaritas, and he buys a new suit.
This is the second story of Dave's that's aired on the Moth Radio Hour. While this story features him dressing up, his first story was about him dressing down, way down and posing nude for a drawing class. To hear that story, as well as see a photo of Dave, fully clothed, on the steps of the Supreme Court, visit themoth.org.
Next up, Camille Qurban. Camille told this story at a StorySLAM in Sydney, Australia, where we partner with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation ABCRN. Here's Camille, live from Sydney.
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Camille: [00:25:35] Hello, I'm Fairy Twinkletoes. At least, I was. I worked at the Fairies Wishing Wand on Unley Road for four years. So, I've been to about 400 children's birthday parties. [audience laughter] The Fairies Wishing Wand was the name of the shop, and it was run by a woman called Pauline. She used to smoke like a train during the parties, but then burn marshmallow incense to cover up all the tobacco stench. [audience laughter] I did all the parties either at the shop or went out to their kid's house. And if you did it at the shop, then you had to do it in the enchanted forest. It wasn't that impressive really.
There was like a big bunch of fallen gum tree leaves in the corner that Pauline had spray painted gold. [audience laughter] That was the enchanted tree. It had some fairy lights in it, but most of them were blown out. [audience laughter] I met Fairy Lavender. She trained me up. Fairy Lavender wore like a skin tight purple leotard, a big purple frou skirt, like this purple head garland thing and big wings and size nine silver jiffies. [audience laughter] I was horrified when I saw it was tizzied and bowed and belled, and I got given the exact same uniform but in pink.
I was on my way to the first party and I was in Fairy Lavender's car. She was fanging a Holden Barina up the freeway, giving me tips. She was chugging down the last of her up and go, telling me what to do and what not to do and everything. “Whatever you do, just don't give them your wand,” she said, “because they'll hit you with it.” [audience laughter] I looked down at the wand and it was just this spray-painted, jewel-encrusted hunk of MDMF. I was really scared. But she said, “Chill, just follow my lead.” So, I did. Before too long, Twinkletoes was in demand.
I was really good with kids. I'd babysat for years. I babysat Chelsea Lambert that lived down the road from mum and dad's house. She used to run down the street without telling her dad she was coming, always under the guise of wanting her hair done. She'd have a brush and a handful of bubbles and whatever, and she'd push through the door and say, “I need plaits. Dad can't do them.” [audience laughter] I always obliged, because Chelsea was gorgeous. She was boisterous and bubbly.
She came bounding in one day when I was running off to work, “Mum said, ‘No, Chelsea, I'll do your hair today, because Camille's got to go to work at Subway.’” When I rocked up to the fairy party that morning, I heard the normal cheer and chatter in the lawn. I walked in to the lounge room and the mum called out that the fairy was here, and I saw them all come running in off the lawn. And coming up the rear was Chelsea with eight plaits flapping. [audience laughter] She stopped dead in the doorway. Her lips were pursed and her forehead was just wrinkled with confusion as she stared at me. I was horrified. I didn't know what to do.
I couldn't break the fourth wall man, but [audience laughter] I didn't know how I could get through it. I just decided I was going to have to give the most convincing fairy performance of my life. I don't know, like Academy Award fairing. She sat down with the little girls in the circle-- When I sang the songs at party, I sang like an angel [audience laughter] and I'm tone deaf. [audience laughter] When I told her the stories, I put on all the voices. When I painted their faces, I put in extra detail, I covered them in glitter, I gave out all the marshmallows. I wanted to convince her. And by the end of the party, she was smiling and laughing and lapping it all up. And I was like, “I've got these kids eating fairy bread out the palm of my hand.” [audience laughter]
I hugged them all and gave them little hugs at the end and said goodbye and everything. She muscled in and she gave me a hug. She put her arms around my neck, and then when they were little sticky marshmallow mouth, she whispered in my ear, “Bye, Camille.” When she pulled back from the hug, she eyeballed me. She had a bit of a crooked smile and a twinkle in one eye. I just blushed. And then, she turned her little plaited head and headed outside and straight to the swing set.
She came round a couple of days later and she said to me, “That was you at that party, Camille, wasn't it?” Sometimes believing in something for the sake of other people can be really magical. So, I looked at Chelsea and I said, “No, that was Fairy Twinkletoes.” Chelsea is now 22, and I still can't admit that I'm Fairy Twinkletoes. [audience laughter] you.
[cheers and applause]
Jay: [00:31:01] Camille Qurban is a production manager for a broadcast news and current affairs network. She says, she's also a sometimes actress, terrible coffee snob, a neat freak and a mother.
Do you have a story you'd like to tell at The Moth? You can pitch it to us right on our website by leaving about a two-minute message summarizing your story. Or, you can call us at 877-799-MOTH. That's 877-799-6684. We listen to all the pitches and we develop many of them from all shows all around the world.
Remember, you can share these stories or others from The Moth Archive and buy tickets to Moth storytelling events in your area, all through themoth.org. We have Moth events year-round, you can find a show near you and come out and tell a story. You can find us on social media too. We're on Facebook and Twitter, @themoth.
When we return, writer Ishmael Beah chronicles his transformation and that of his village, when war comes to Sierra Leone. That's when The Moth Radio Hour continue.
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The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. And presented by PRX.
You're listening to The Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Jay Allison. Our final story in this hour comes from the writer, Ishmael Beah. Ishmael recognizes the identity of his village by its soundscape and recognizes himself by the narratives he stores in his mind. Both of these are soon changed by war in his country. A caution. There are some vivid descriptions. He told this story at a Moth event celebrating the 100th birthday of the New York Public Library. Here's Ishmael Beah.
[applause]
Ishmael: [00:33:49] The evening always began with several commotions. One of them was the arrival of people from their various places of work, from their farms, from whatever form of employment they had. They all came, greeted each other and went into their houses. The second commotion was by children. Boys and girls being sent to knock on the doors of these very people who had just arrived to invite them to dinner, to have this grand meal of the day. During this meal, all the young boys and men ate from the same plate and all the girls and the women ate from the same plate as well.
When the eating started, which I was part of, the eldest or the oldest person at that gathering of the male, particularly the one that I ate with, would stop eating first. And then, the second oldest would stop. As it went down the line, then the boy and the youngest person would be left at the plate with enough food for them to eat. This was how the evening began in my small village in the south of Sierra Leone, West Africa, where I'm from.
After we finished eating, the fire had already been set with firewood, and the darkness had come in very quickly, that the only source of light were the flames of the fire that leapt into the air. We sat around and waited for stories to be told to us. This was how we learned how to understand our history, the history of our families, of ourselves, our roles in the community, how we would function as children, but also as adults. These stories, also this oral tradition, started many, many years ago, before I was born and this was a way that brought to us a way of listening actively, so that we can hear not only with our ears, but also with our heart, with our eyes, and we can hear beyond the words that were being told to us.
At one of these gatherings, I must have been about nine years old, my grandmother sat next to me and she whispered into my ears. She said, “I want to let you know that each person's mind is their own personal library. And as life breathes its moment through you, those moments become memories, and those memories become narratives, and those narratives become chapters and books that you put on that shelf of your personal library. And this is the only library that you have access to whenever you like. You can open and close it whenever you like. You can decide to nourish it. You can decide to use the information properly or improperly as it suits you.”
After my grandmother told me this, I began on a quest to decide, well, if I'm in charge of this personal library of mine, I want to make sure that I stack on those shelves in my mind the best possible images, sounds of my background, of my upbringing, of this place that I grew up. Where I grew up was so remote that most of the things that reminded me of what time of the day it was with the sounds of nature. I could tell what time of the day it was by the position of my shadow. I didn't have a watch or any of these kinds of things.
So, the next morning, after my grandmother told me this on my way to school-- My school was about 30 minutes’ walk, but I would get up very early to go to school because going to school was very unpredictable. You left about an hour and a half to two hours, because you didn't know what you encountered on the way. As a young boy in the place where I grew up and every adult was responsible for you, every adult was your aunt, uncle, or could even be your mother and father.
And so, on the way to school, you greeted people elaborately. Not the New York greeting, hello, goodbye. [audience laughter] It was more of you ask, “How are you? How is your family? How is school?” and you went on and on. And it was rude to just say, “I have to be in school, I'm going to be late,” and I'll be flogged because of that you had to participate in the greeting fully. In addition to this greeting, an older person would randomly ask you to perform a task which could be, “Could you fetch firewood for me? Could you go to the river and bring water for me?”
So young people had to get up very, very early [audience laughter] to make sure that they can actually-- for this 30 minutes’ ride, they could think about two hours. And sometimes it took that much. On my way to school, I had a plastic bag that had the [unintelligible 00:38:38] notebook that I had in it. And also, my shoes were wrapped in this bag, so that it wouldn't be coated by the dust. It was very dusty, so I walked barefoot. I allowed my mind to partake in the beautiful sounds that welcomed the morning.
First, there was a call for prayer that was very loud, azan that went deep into your heart. And then in addition to that, there were various birds singing. The vigorous ones were the sparrows and the doves. My grandmother also told me that they sang vigorously, because they wanted to wave goodbye to the night and welcome the day. They did that every morning very vigorously.
As I walked on, there were also sounds of brooms as people swept their yards. So, the sound of the brooms meeting the dried leaves filled the air as well. There are also the sounds of buckets that clattered in the arms of children as they went to the river to fetch water. There are older people sitting outside clearing their throat to remind young people who were still sleeping that it was time to wake up. There were people who were sharpening their cutlasses and stones, and that sound actually made your teeth sour as you walked by. There was the sound of bells being rung. These were iron bells hung in the arms of mango trees. They were being rung as a call for school.
When I got closer to my school, which was near a stream, I would wash my feet and then I would put on my shoes, so that I would arrive looking very clean. We stood in line. There was cleanliness checkup. Check your hair if it was combed. I wouldn't survive at this point. [audience laughter] And then, we went into the classroom, which was the very one building that we had. It was a mud brick house with no roof. We would take out a few benches, and some of us would sit outside under the mango tree and there was a blackboard and the teacher would start teaching.
Now, we didn't have very many books. So, if we had one book, it was only the teachers. So, for example, when we read Shakespeare, many occasions, the teacher would come, and he or she would recite to us, “We are reading today so and so play,” Julius Caesar, for example. And the teacher would read, “Friends, Roman countrymen.” We would repeat, all the children, “Friends, Roman countrymen,” “Lend me your ears, have come to bury Caesar.” “Lend me your ears, have come to bury Caesar.” This is how we learned. You made notes.
In order to gain access to these books, you became friends with the teacher. So, after school, you could go to the teacher's house, so that you'll be able to read the book. Now, based on how you behaved in the community, how you took care of the book, the teacher will slowly trust you to allow you more time to read, but also lend you the book to take away and bring back. Now, if the book was dirty, then you lost that privilege. So, we became very close to our teachers. The teachers also were part of the community where they would actually come to your house in the evening to make sure that everyone was doing their homework. I didn't like this very much when I was a kid [audience laughter] But in retrospect it helped me.
So, in order to gain access to this book, you had to become part of the life of this teacher. I remember when we read Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, the teacher made a good deal of making us react the story in the classroom. And every young boy wanted to be Jim Hawkins. So, we walked around our community pretending that we’re Jim Hawkins of our very small village.
Now, all of this sound and all of this nurture and this knowledge began to change few years later, when I was 11 years old. When people began to come through my town, these are people who had been affected by the war that had started in my country and they spoke about what had happened to them, how their houses have been burnt, their families have been killed, how they've been walking for days, weeks, months. There was a gloomy feeling that came about.
And later on, when I was 12 years old, the war reached my part of the country. The sounds that I heard in the morning that woke me changed and they were replaced by gunshots. I was separated from my family during the first attack. I started running from this war and I didn't know where they were. The belief that they could be alive was what kept me moving. I was with a group of boys, seven of us. We constantly started walking in the countryside, trying to look for our family. The sounds were no longer the same. The very sounds that woke me up as a boy, the birds singing, the call for prayer, people going to the river to fetch water were no longer there. Nature itself was afraid of what had come about. The only sounds that greeted night or day or the wind that sailed was the sounds of guns or grenades exploding in the distance. This was what filled my life completely, and I began to slowly forget and distance myself from the very sounds that I'd heard as a kid.
Now, I began running from this world for about close to a year, I was constantly running. Everything had changed tremendously. I came across somebody who told me that my family was in a small village that I would be able to find them. So, we started running to this place and we began to hear the sounds of the village. These were sounds that were familiar from when things were peaceful. There were women singing as they pounded rice in mortar, we could hear that. We began to rush. We could hear sounds that promised that life was possible somewhere.
When we got closer to the village, under the bushes in a banana farm, we heard somebody chopping up the bananas. It was a man that I knew as a boy named Gasimov. He came from under the bushes and he said to us, “Oh, can you boys help me carry the trunks of banana into the village?” [audience laughter] And of course, even though we’re in a rush then, we could not refuse to do this, so we helped Gasimov to take the bananas to the village. As we were going with the banana, he told me, “Oh, your parents are going to be very happy to see you. Your brother is there. Everyone is there and everyone's been waiting to see you. They've been worried that you may not be alive.” So, I was very excited.
As we started hurriedly going down into the village, we began to hear gunshots. We began to see smoke and fire coming from the village. We began to hear men screaming at the top of their lungs, their screeches covering the sounds of women and babies that were crying. And there would be gunshots and bullets flying in the air. So, we ran from the hillside and try to lay in the bushes so that we wouldn't be struck by stray bullets. After everything died down, we arrived into this village and we realized that everybody who had been in this village had been killed. People had been put down, face down and shot in the back of their heads. And their blood was the only thing coming out of their bodies, was the only thing connecting them.
As we walked around the village, trying to hope that somebody would have been alive in this village, we heard in one of the buildings that were consumed with fire. Nails popping, tin roofs flying into thatch roofs and creating more fire, we heard this noise coming from this building. People were banging on the doors and the fire was consuming the house. And when the door broke open, the two people that came running was a woman and a little boy. Everything happened so fast that we became rooted where we were standing. We couldn't move at all. They ran back and forth. They would hit a tree and they would run the other way again and they would hit another building or another tree and they would run the other way. Finally, the woman stopped moving, and the boy sat on the mango tree and put his head down and stopped moving.
As we walked around, we began to see other bodies as well. People in different postures of pain, some holding their head as life departed them in that particular position. We saw different kinds of things. Ashes of people, burnt remains. As we were seeing these kinds of things, I became quite angry because I blamed Gasimov for making it possible for me not to see my family again. I attacked him. I wanted to hurt him tremendously. Because at this point, the pain of knowing what had happened was so great that I wished I had seen my family one last time before this happened. I didn't understand that he had actually saved my life, so I actually wanted to kill him.
My friends removed me from him. And between ourselves, we started fighting because we blamed each other for maybe somebody was walking slow, so and so forth. As we were fighting amongst ourselves, we heard a noise of people coming to the village. So, we ran and hid into the nearby bushes. We saw young people coming to the village. Two of them particularly were about my age. At this point, I was 12 years old. And they wore military outfits and guns. One had a gallon of petrol or kerosene with matches. The other had weapons. They were laughing about how they got this village really good, how they were able to get everyone and kill them and nobody escaped.
As we lay in this bush under the shrubs without being seen looking at these young people, I did not realize that a year later, I would be one of these same people, one of the same young men that I was seeing that I'll be one of those people going around and stacking a different kind of narrative in the library of my own mind. But not only that, I grew up in a place where I also believed that when an older person dies, a library is destroyed or burns. And now, we were going around destroying the very same knowledge, the source of knowledge, that could add to our own narratives. We didn't know what kind of library were creating. And worst of all, we’re destroying the source of knowledge that perhaps could help us understand how our narratives would actually pan out. Thank you.
[audience applause]
Jay: [00:48:55] That was Ishmael Beah. Believing his family was dead, Ishmael was pulled into the violence and recruited as a boy soldier in Sierra Leone. His memoir about his experience, A Long Way Gone, has sold more than a million copies. And it's been translated into 40 languages.
That's it for this episode of The Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time. And that's the story from The Moth.
[overture music]
This episode of The Moth Radio Hour was produced by me, Jay Allison, Catherine Burns and Meg Bowles. Coproducer, Vicki Merrick. Associate producer, Emily Couch. The stories were directed by Jenifer Hixson and Larry Rosen, with additional GrandSLAM coaching by Jodi Powell.
The rest of the Moth leadership team includes Sarah Haberman, Sarah Austin Jenness, Kate Tellers, Jennifer Birmingham, Marina Klutse, Suzanne Rust, Brandon Grant, Inga Glodowski, Sarah Jane Johnson and Aldi Kaza. Moth stories are true, as remembered and affirmed by our storytellers.
Our theme music is by The Drift. Other music in this hour from Blue Dot Sessions, Nicola [unintelligible 00:50:26], The Westerlies, Max Roach and Blue Cranes. We receive funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. And presented by PRX. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching us your own story and everything else, go to our website, themoth.org.