Tuesday's Lesson

As I have mentioned before I work in the Writing Center on campus. I tutor students and help them with their papers.

Today I was at work, sitting on the couch reading a book when a man came in. He introduced himself as James. He looked like he was in his 20's, maybe even 30. He had bright eyes, beautiful dark skin and a thick accent. We went outside to sit and work on his paper. In his careful English he explained to me that he was working on a narrative assignment. They were told to describe in vivid detail the most important day of their life, or the most significant thing that had ever happened to them.

I begin reading my new friend's paper. He opens the paper by describing an African scene: he is 6 years old and is in the fields working alongside his brothers. His mother and sisters go by on their way to the well, balancing large pots on their heads.

I stop reading and ask him where he is from.

Sudan.

I continue reading. So far I'm thinking it sounds like a neat life. In the next paragraph James says their field work is interrupted by screaming. All of a sudden the village erupts into chaos. A man passing by tells them that the "northern rebels" have come. He explains the terror that fills him--he's heard stories of what these men, and these child soldiers do. He described it as "your heart jams, forgets to beat and time freezes. All you know is fear." His mother screams for the children to run, so they do. He runs as fast as he can, describing the adrenaline and fear he feels. He runs outside the village and climbs a tree with his brother. They spend the day in the tree watching as their village is burned to the ground. He describes how these men let cattle lose, running the streets trampling people, how people are slaughtered, raped, captured. He describes the bloodshed before him, and the only sound heard was that of terror filled, dying voices. He watches all of this from a tree. While he is in the tree a snake comes and bites his brother, who falls. He doesn't know how long he is in the tree, but a man comes and gathers all the stray children and tells them they must escape, they must go to Ethiopia where it is safe. With nothing but the clothes on their backs they start walking--one man and a group of children.

May I remind you that James is six years old?

The children have no shoes. James describes the pain in their feet, the blood, the bruises, the sores, the thorns, the scars. He says they cannot stop and tend to their feet for fear they will be left behind and taken by wild animals--they must keep walking. As they walk he can think of nothing but the bloodshed of the scenes he has seen replaying in his head. He wonders where his family is and if they are alive.

On they walk.

At night they stop and build a fire for the night and one child goes off to go to the bathroom. They hear lions, and he never comes back.

All they knew was terror.

The last leg of their journey was to cross a river. They all enter the water and the James watches as three of his friends are eaten by crocodiles. He explicitly explains the fear he felt as one by one his friends went under the water. He watched as they would submerge thrashing and screaming, be dragged back under then just an arm or a leg would surface, go back under, and nothing would be left but a pool of blood. He explains what he felt as he reached down to be sure he himself was still alive as he continued on to the other side. He was terrified.

When they finally made it to Ethiopia he lived on the streets, had nothing, and no one. He lived this way for six years, until it was safe to return to Sudan.

At this time James was twelve years old.

He returned in hopes of finding his family.
He was able to find his mother, and one sister.
The rest of his family had been killed that day the village was raided.


I'm supposed to help this guy polish his grammar and write a good paper, and there I sat in wonder of him fighting back tears. My head was full of questions, my heart hurt for him, and I longed to simply talk to him.

He wasn't much older than me, yet he seemed so old, so knowing for all he'd been through.

As if that wasn't enough to make you think, here is the part that was like a kick in the stomach...

Shortly after James left a cute, nicely dressed blonde girl came into the Writing Center. She had the exact same teacher and the exact same assignment. We sat down and I read her paper.

The most significant thing that ever happened to her, and the most important day of her life was the day she was crowned homecoming queen. She describes the excitement of going and shopping for the perfect dress, having her nails done, buying shoes, walking the field with her Dad, and going to the dance in a limo. That was the most significant day of her life.

After she left I wanted to cry. Not because she was so wrong, so materialistic, but because I so related to her. No, I wasn't homecoming queen, but I more understood where she was coming from than and I did James. I was more apt to think as she did than to consider life as someone like James would.

I was floored. Sure, you read stories about people like James, you hear of genocide in Sudan, you know about child soldiers and Invisible Children, but never before in my life had a heard a first hand account of such horrors told to me face-to-face. A real live living and breathing person before me...and in the MC Writing Center of all places.

It happens, yet I think we chose care more about "homecoming". It's easier to think about homecoming than it is to think about mass killing in Africa.

It was a serious reality check. I did not like how it made me feel, yet I so needed to hear it. James walks around with vivid memories of the things he has been through, and we do not take the time to stop, hear his story, reach out, and care because we're busy worrying about our happy little lives and the things we must have--our nice cars, clothes, what we eat, where we go to school.

It made me feel selfish and materialistic, and I'm glad it did. I needed to be reminded of the bigger picture, and I needed to experience first hand what suffering is really like. In this country the American Dream is just handed to us in the form of life on the fast track. We know the right things to do to ensure our success. Because of this our priorities are easily skewed, our perspective shrinks to what makes us most happy, and the things in life that are truly significant are so diluted that we brush them off and forget to notice.

I'm excited to see my friend James again, and I hope and pray I'll remember to have this perspective and remember James' story.