The torch Fatmata holds now has been a source of pride since it had been passed on to her at year fourteen when her mother went to be with the ancestors. She might not be the sole user of the torch; it might not be used for any extraordinary purpose, but Fatmata holds it dear to her heart because in all of her village, she is the sole trustee of the guiding torch; having inherited it directly from a long line of female heads of the Chernor family.
The holder of the guiding torch has a very simple task; stand at a specific spot when you see the light of the incoming canoe and hold it aloft, swinging a few times in an East to West direction and back to guide the canoe to shore. The makeup of the torch has changed considerably since her great grandmother, Ma Mariatu, last held it. Today, unlike in the time of her great grandmother, the bamboo-based stem now holds kerosene in a receptacle that used to hold canned food. In the days of her great grandmother, before the pale-skinned people had come to visit with the gun in one hand and the Bible in the other, the bamboo stem supported a different kind of receptacle in which was a different kind of fuel.
As Fatmata guides in the incoming vehicle, she has already started mentally planning how to guide out the dawn canoes. Hers would be the last which means she would have to hand over the torch to another to guide her and her team out; another whom she has trained extremely well. Though it might seem a simple task, the job of the guide is very technical and requires at least eight months of technical and on-the-job training. The fisher folk in her community like to tell others that they do not know how to use a modern compass. That's a lie. They do not use it because they believe much more in the effectiveness of the guiding torch.
The ocean chose Fatmata. Not only was she born into a family with a long-standing tradition of fishing, she has been drawn to the ocean since childhood. Fishing feeds her and her family; has been their passport and visa to several neighbouring countries they would never had had the opportunity of visiting and has surprisingly been their best form of entertainment.
Just about 30 metres either side of Fatmata, the next set of canoes are being readied by their occupants to set off. They both have names boldly painted on with other words of encouragement and all sorts of art painted by their sides. "FISH NOR GET NATIN FO DU WIT RENKOT" (a fish has nothing to do with a raincoat) is the name emblazoned on the canoe to her right. The team that is using that canoe is slightly ahead of the other in preparation to set off. They already have their wooden glider pegs set up to roll out the canoe unto the ocean. Having the glider pegs makes it much easier to transport the canoe into the sea. Before they learnt the technology from the Tsevie community in Togo, they always had to work about ten times harder pushing the canoe through the stubbornly wet beach sands into the sea.
Team Fish Nor Get Natin also has most of its supplies ready. Bits of yesterday's fish to be used as bait for today's catch. In this community, they don't only cast nets to cash fish, they also use the rod method in certain parts of the ocean to catch specific types of sea food. They also have a cutlass and hoe ready. A lot of people not familiar with fishing usually wonder what they need cutlasses and hoes for. Well, those people wonder because they do not know that fisher folk can 'farm' for staples for their food on the sea. They are currently packing a sack load of salted beef. The salted beef would not be used for their own food. It serves as special bait for squid. The other types of little fish used as bait do not attract the squid. It took a long time and a chance event for the community to come to the realization that squid were best baited with salted beef. They will soon pack their sugarcane and lemon which are eaten together to fight seasickness and ice for temporary preservation of the fish while they are out at sea.
The official flag of the canoe is currently being hoisted. The flags do not only serve to help identify the canoes when there is a search party out in times of distress, they are also a strong source of pride and motivation to the team members who look upon them and remember that they are continuing a long held tradition of their community. The flags serve an even more special purpose. They are hoisted at the front end of the canoe where a special platform has been built. Around the flag, two posts have been built around which a temporary curtain can be erected at short notice. The curtain is mounted when Mother Nature calls out a member of team and privacy is needed. Very soon they would be filling the tank of the outboard motor with fuel and packing the extra gallons into the corner of the canoe.
Fatmata stirs, drags her eyes off the happenings around her and refocuses her attention on the task at hand. The flame of her torch burns brightly. She lifts her head to assess the position of the incoming canoe. The canoe is close enough not to miss the village shore. Her task, however, is not just to guide them to the shore but to ensure they dock at the right spot to prevent any obstruction and inconvenience to the outgoing canoes. She has an extra motivation to guide this particular canoe to that exact spot. If they miss the spot, they would have to spend another forty minutes or thereabouts to navigate to the right spot. That also means everyone on the canoe would be required to help. Everyone would include Abdul. Her canoe leaves in thirty minutes. She guides right or she misses the chance to talk briefly with Abdul before her canoe sets off. She hasn't seen Abdul in a week. If she leaves without talking to him, that would mean another week of not talking to him. Two weeks? That's too much. Abdul lights up her life.
The canoe is following her guidance almost perfectly. On days like this, her guidance is so near perfect that she begins to feel that her hands are not holding the torch; that the hands of all the trustees before her are rather guiding the canoe; the hands of Ma Mariatu, Ma Binta, Ma Sinnah and even those before them.
Fatmata starts softly humming a folk song that her mother taught her. It's a sad song. She misses her mother. Her thoughts wander to the moments she spent with her mother at this very spot at dawn just like now. Those were moments she would cherish forever. Those moments when her mother taught her how to use the guiding torch and fuse as one with the ocean.
She is suddenly brought back from her thoughts. She realizes there is something wrong but cannot put a finger to it. When she turns around, all the people around her have stopped their preparations and are staring at her with very worried faces. She still cannot see what's wrong. Then she looks up, following their eyes. The light of the torch has gone off!
When Ma Hassanatu, her mother, started teaching her how to guide the canoe, she was only eight years old. When her mother died, she was fourteen. She has already been the trustee for ten years since Ma passed on. That means she has spent sixteen years actively involved in using the torch to guide canoes in and out. Not once in all those years, not even during the strongest breeze, has the flame died. But what scares Fatmata the most is that Ma Hassanatu had specifically told her that the flame would not go out even under the worst of weather conditions. She remembers very well because on a rather very windy day, she had tried sheltering the flame under her cupped hands and Ma Hassanatu had laughed out loud. "Fatmata, the ancestors protect the torch and keep it aflame. If they have not allowed it to go off, no breeze can let it. If they decide to allow it to go off, nothing can protect it", Ma Hassanatu had said.
Ma Hassanatu had however continued that if there was impending disaster of a great magnitude, the ancestors might let the flame die as a warning to the living. That was Fatmata's biggest fear now. What could be so terrible that the great flame of old could go off as a warning of?
Fatmata suddenly hears an unfamiliar sound. She lifts her head to see the canoe coming to the shore at a much faster speed than normal. She has never before now seen any canoe move at that level of speed. What's even more shocking is that the canoe is following the perfect path without the guidance of the torch. She keeps her eyes on the canoe and its unusual speed. Soon, she can see the shape of Pa Orman. Pa Orman is the leader of that canoe. He is also one of the most respected elders of their village and Abdul's father. When the canoe gets closer, she can see a very worried look on Pa Orman's face even from a distance.
The canoe docks. Pa Orman jumps into the water and runs toward Fatmata. "Come with me, my daughter. Come quickly!" he says. As he leads her toward the village, Fatmata begins to apologize for the flame going off. Pa Orman suddenly stops, holds Fatmata's face in his palms and says, "My daughter, you think that was your fault? Didn't your mother tell you what would make the flame die? Didn't you notice the speed with which we came in? Did you think that was because of our paddling skills or the strength of the outboard motor? No, we had nothing to do with it. The ancestors, seeing that they had killed the flame, decided to take over the canoe and guide us home"
Pa Orman then turns to the shore and shouts out to the two parties preparing to set off to sea, "Take all your supplies out of your vessels, park the canoes and go home. No one goes out to sea today." Then he turns his attention back to Fatmata. "Let's go my daughter! Hurry! We need to know what's going to come"
"Why?" the young man asks the ice cream hawker in a jokingly taunting manner, knowing fully well the little girl would not grasp the import of his question. The little girl balances the chest with the ice cream delicately on her head while she holds a megaphone in one hand and a stool in the other. The recorded message on the megaphone is playing on set repeat, "Ice Cream! Bay you sweet ice cream! Ice Cream! Buy you sweet Ice Cream!" (Ice Cream! Buy your sweet ice cream)
"Why wetin?" the little girl asks innocently.
"Why you scream?" responds the taunting young man with a mischievous smile.
The now very confused little girl dismisses him with a coy "lef mi" (leave me alone) and saunters away, peddling her wares.
Fatmata watches the brief exchange between the two young people with amusement and then turns to focus on her task. The torch is very bright this early evening as she guides the two canoes back to shore. It's been two years since the ominous warning had come as has been the disaster they were warned about. Ebola!
Ebola. Never again, the ancestors be our helper; the ancestors who had protected their own. Not one member of their community had been affected by the epidemic as it scourged across the land and neighbouring Liberia and Guinea; but they had seen the devastating effect on other people. While they thanked the ancestors for their own safety, they prayed for others.
Fatmata remembers how accurately the community conduit of the ancestors had predicted the epidemic that cold evening two years ago when Pa Orman had gone with her along with other elders of the community to the conduit for an interpretation of why the flame had gone out. "Wan bad bad tin go apin. Pipul den go vomit blod. Den go wik en den go los boku boku wet. Boku pipul den go day. No fred bikos i no go toch ivin wan pan wi " (There will be a disaster. People will vomit blood. They will be weak and lose a lot of weight. A lot of people will die. Do not fear because it will not touch even one of us). Although it was impressive enough that it had happened exactly as had been interpreted by the conduit, it was even more impressive how far the ancestors' protection had gone.
After the conduit had given the interpretation that cold night, the elders had held a meeting to decide whether it was safe to go about their lives as usual or find an alternative means of livelihood. It was Pa Orman who had proposed that life continues as usual. "What is the alternative for us? How are we going to feed our families unless we go out to sea? You all heard the conduit. The ancestors have promised to protect us", he had said.
When a village durbar was organized to communicate the impending trouble to the rest of the community, Pa Orman had once again reiterated the need to continue as usual with the normal lives. Many of the community folk had interpreted that to mean they could leave the village and go to town to purchase needed supplies as usual. When word got back to the elders that some members of the community had been leaving the village to town and putting them all at risk, an entire week had already transpired. The elders had contemplated fishing out the culprits and keeping them all by themselves for a while. The big government people called it quarantine. It was once again Pa Orman who had asked the elders to leave the culprits alone. "The ancestors do not promise and fulfill partially. If they have promised to protect us, it will be full and complete protection". Based on Pa Orman's message, even the elders of the community started going out to town. And yet, over the entire course of the scourge, even though they had personally seen the town folk keel over and die; even though they knew the disease was very contagious, not one member of the community was affected. Not one of them even had a high temperature over the entire period. As if the ancestors had decided to make a strong statement, the members of the community did not even have the normal malaria and typhoid that was hitherto so prevalent. Indeed, they had been completely protected.
Fatmata recalls the day Pa Orman had sat her and Abdul down under the huge tree at dawn to have a conversation. "My children", he said, "Going about our normal lives as usual also means we can go ahead and plan your union as if nothing has happened. Therefore as is customary, you would have to sail together to neighbouring communities to learn how others live together in union and how they bring up their children. Although we believe our way is the best, it helps to learn about other people's ways because they might come in handy in complex times. Most importantly, the period away together would help you to build a stronger bond."
It had been a rollercoaster ride for six full months as Fatmata and Abdul together with the assistants they had been assigned sailed across West Africa learning about the ways of other fishing communities. From Pujehun in their own sweet Salone to Marchall in Liberia; from Bereby in La Cote d'Ivoire to Axim in Ghana, from Tsevie in Togo through Grand Popo in Benin to Ifolu in Nigeria, they sailed and docked continually, engaging the people, eating their food, learning their culture; and yet in all of this period, they never contracted the dreaded Ebola. After the six month period, they had arrived back at the community to a grand welcome and a courtly ceremony to officially seal their union.
As Fatmata holds the guiding torch to guide the canoe in this evening, she knows this is not duty as usual. The canoe coming in does not only carry members of a community she has a duty to, it also carries the man who planted the seed she now carries in her womb. She is eager to meet him and take him home.
"You are Amina! We do not remember you by face because we did not meet you in person; but we have heard by oral tradition all that you represented and how you behaved. Even as a baby, we can see that you exhibit all of those traits. We are therefore convinced that you have returned from the land of the ancestors to live among us once again. Welcome back, Amina. Our traditions have not changed. We still clearly distinguish the truth from deceit and we still choose truth. What I am dropping on your tongue this moment is water. Never call it gin. Water is water and gin is gin; this is how we remind you to always tell the truth. When you see??."
Fatmata holds her newborn daughter in her lap as Pa Orman performs the customary naming ceremony. Her daughter has just been named Amina after one of their most illustrious forebears. Fatmata says a silent prayer for Amina as the ceremony goes on. She prays that she would be protected by the ancestors all her life. Although she has tried very hard to suppress it, one other memory of that night when the conduit of the ancestors had delivered the ominous news keeps coming up. "Several years after this scourge has passed, another will come upon the whole world. It would not have the same behavior as the impending one but it will have a much more devastating effect on the world. Not only will many people die, it would also lock almost the entire world indoors and affect people's livelihood. Once again, our people will be protected" the conduit had said.
As Fatmata looks upon Amina her daughter, she raises her head and says a silent prayer of thanks to the unseen ancestors. She is grateful that Amina will grow up and pick up the mantle of bearer of the guiding torch. She prays that she would find good friends and have a good life. In all of these, there is one thing she is certain of. Through the grace of the ancestors, her daughter shall be protected!
