monrovia, white plains, and memories

it’s funny to be on a ship again. it’s been four years since i laid foot on a mercy ship, but here i am again, and it feels...good. not the kind of good that makes your stomach bubbly and your heart flutter with excitement, but the kind of good of waking up late on a weekend morning to streaming sunshine and birds singing. it’s a kind of lazy good that says this feels right, but also knows that this moment doesn’t last forever yet can still appreciate the moment for what it is.

the africa mercy is a beautiful ship, but it’s very different from the little ship i called home for so many years. the caribbean mercy was older, much shorter, and thinner with tiered decks that allowed for a lot of outdoor space. the africa mercy is like a floating building, square and full to the edges. there’s very little wood to be found anywhere, but it really is lovely. yesterday my dad told me that we sailed the anastasis for the first time when the ana was twenty-eight years old, and we sailed the afm for the first time when she was twenty-seven. it’s funny then to think of the years ahead of this ship and all of the families that will call it home and the loyalties that it will engender. because that’s really what one feels now, as the anastasis is prepared for her final voyage, the sadness of many goodbyes to many years of memories. what makes us humans so fond of the past, i wonder?

this has been, so far, a nostalgic trip, as i remember life on board the cbm and childhood memories evoked by familiar smells and sounds and other ship-esque things. box milk, fresh bread, food lines, public spaces, the generator’s hum, the gentle listing in port – so many things i didn’t even know i remembered.

then there was our trip yesterday to see the sites of my dad’s childhood, in and around monrovia. we left the ship around midmorning, and drove along a road-turned-river, compliments of the rainy season, to white plains, a retreat center run by the united methodist church, where my dad had spent some holidays and where my grandmother’s heart is buried. after a lot of asking and some backtracking, we met up with the groundskeeper, mr. mo, and he drove with us the rest of the way. we emerged from a small track densely crowded by a hundred shades of green to find a large clearing with several buildings of cinderblock and brick. Walking up the main clearing, flanked by the men’s and women’s dormitories, we came upon a large rectangle of unmarked stone shaded by some young trees. this is karis, mr. mo pointed out, and it was a really special moment. what really struck us the most, throughout our journeying around, was how everyone remembered the name. my dad would only say, i’m jon fadely, the son of tony and karis fadely, and everyone’s eyes would get very big and they would say, ohhhh, and that would be that. everyone remembered or remembered hearing about the young white family from the united states that had lived there thirty years ago, who had pastored the church, and who had taught the choir. in talking with mr. mo, he found out that i was working in sierra leone. “you are in missions like your grandmother,” he said. “thank you for caring about africa.” i nearly cried. it was a beautiful moment.

we also visited the methodist church and the compound in sinkor where my father lived and my grandfather worked. more memories, more friendly and warm greetings from the methodist workers. even though it was raining buckets nearly the whole time, i remember it even now as a beautiful, sunny time.

liberia is, after all, different from sierra leone although they share a border and their west african culture. the first thing i noticed after coming off of the plane was how flat the land here is. freetown, nestled in among the hilly mountains of sierra leone, has a different feel from monrovia which sprawls across a plain. the war here is fresher, and the people are more subdued. the wounds of the war are only just beginning to heal here, it seems. after only a short time in the car with our driver immanuel, who returned to monrovia two years ago after living as a refugee in ghana for six years, the stories began to spill out about the atrocities which he had witnessed and the monumental task of forgiveness and reconciliation which he and others had begun to undertake.

two of his sisters had been raped a killed by a man who Immanuel knew to live in a certain neighborhood. he met the man and became friends with him while the man was unaware of their connection. then, after several months, immanuel took the man aside and told him, “you know the two women you raped and killed in such-and-such place? they were my sisters. i forgive you.” and the man broke down in tears. “it is the only way,” immanuel said. “the way of forgiveness is the only way.”
after we had seen everything that my dad wanted to show us, we were well past lunch time. immanuel offered to drop us off at a nearby hotel restaurant while he ran and grabbed some food from a local vendor. but it seemed to silly, so condescending to have our “driver” drop us off at this swanky restaurant while he ran off to huddle beside some food stand in the rain. but when we offered to have him join us, he grinned sheepishly and said that he doesn’t like western food. so after a brief discussion it was decided that we would go with him, to eat african food.
a few minutes’ drive brought us to the door of daba’s african food restaurant, and we ran inside. once we stopped dripping, we sat down at the table and looked at the day’s menu. everyday had some standards: fufu with soup, douboy and soup, GB, and then there was a daily special available. monday was potato leaves, tuesday cassava, wednesday palava sauce, thursday jolof rice, friday collard greens, etc. so palava sauce and rice it was, and it was good. much better than royal hotel, i think, and much more human. later, my dad and i had a really wonderful and stimulating conversation on the benevolent prejudices which often plague missionary or charity works, whether overseas or in your own neighborhood. it poses an interesting challenge.

so it is another rainy day in monrovia. i don’t think that i will get to know and love monrovia nearly as well as i have already with freetown, but i am very happy to be here, to see the extended family of mercy shippers that i have missed so much, and to reconnect a bit with the past. my prayer today is with everyone involved with the anastasis’ final voyage. it’s not an easy task to be the bearers of so much scrutiny as everyone is really deeply invested in that beautiful ship. it’s never easy saying goodbye...