WE THE NEWS — JULY 16, 2017
CIVIL WAR AND CONFLICT:
We the News is a newsstand that distributes and sells black immigrant-focused publications and products. It features zines that archive stories and conversations shared by immigrants and first-generation Americans during a series of story circles lead by artist Lizania Cruz in partnership with the Black Alliance for Just Immigration. We the News first iteration is possible thanks to the support of the Laundromat Project. wethenews.net
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Discussing the Past and Political Conditions in Relation to Immigration
This is an excerpt from a We the News story circle at Hancock Community Backyard Garden Park in Bedstuy, Brooklyn on July 16, 2017. The story circle explored questions around identity, displacement and the power of storytelling. Samah was born in Liberia. She is a law student and currently works for African Services Committee. Below is a conversation between Samah and Lizania Cruz and Albert St. Jean (Interviewers).
I was born in Liberia, [d]uring the Civil War, [a]nd we lived there until I was about six or seven years old. My dad was from Sierra Leone, so we tried to go [there], but the war reached Sierra Leone at that time. So I think a lot of my life has been influenced by the Civil War and how it impacted my family. And I think that because of [the war] they felt forced to leave, [c]ause I don’t think my parents wanted to leave. They thought they could wait it out but the war kept getting worse and worse. They owned a business there, [t]hey were doing very well, [a]nd then we came here. I think when we first came we were in New York and then we ended up in Virginia. A huge part is that I’m half Liberian and half Sierra Leonean and part of our society has focused on this idea of accountability. And trying to build community and not allowing any of us to use each other. [S]o I’m in Law school and I’ve been doing a lot of work around community building and trying to help people not look outside [of] their communities for help, [b]ut to look within—to realize that we can hold each other accountable and we can reimagine what justice is to us. So I think for a lot of people after the war, trying to imagine what justice was—was far beyond incarceration right? Like you couldn’t incarcerate everyone that participated in a war because they went far beyond that. I think justice, especially in Liberia, center[ed] 1
around community building; it centered around a woman’s movement. I mean the head, the president, at the time wasn’t incarcerated but people rejoiced about it. I think it’s [more so] about people returning to the land, being able to rebuild their community, and being able to be home and have that. Women really love that, and so I try to focus a lot of the work that I do around organizing woman within the diaspora here about ways to better what I’m doing right now. [S]pecifically, [I’m doing] innovation work, but beyond immigration it’s just the idea of what is justice to you; [a]nd like how do we move beyond trying to rely on an external system [and instead] build a stronger community so that we don’t result to harming each other. If that makes sense. So yeah, it’s complex and I don’t know where I’m going to adapt. [At the moment] I’m at African Services in Harlem and we’re a multi-service organization. I’m in the Legal Department but we do housing benefits, [w]e have a nutrition program so we provide food, [w]e give back to people. It’s like a center that’s specifically for the community, you can get everything that you’re looking for. [T]hen that’s the focus, that it would be run by the community as well. Which is difficult because a lot of attorneys are white. But I feel like [in] most of the other departments we have people who speak every [local] African language, [f]rom West
Africa to East Africa. So I don’t know if that’s really my story in a way but I think like[...]
That’s like your story now.
Yeah. It is what it is now.
Yeah. So I’m curious to know now, like even with this project, I’ve been thinking about xenophobia among us, immigrants. I think that’s really interesting when you’re talking about how we hold ourselves accountable.
And how do you incorporate people within your community to do that? And what are the resources that your organizations have in place to do that?
Yeah. I think it’s like — I mean this isn’t specifically within the African community. I think it’s within every community, or country.
Yeah.
I think a lot of the issues that we face [to an extent, doom us] and [restrict us] from somethings. So like when people talk about the world, like they talk about all of the topics that have been happening beforehand and how people couldn’t really find any form of employment and that’s how a lot of the rebels were gathered and things like that. I think a huge part of this is recognizing the issues that exist within your community and then trying to bring people together to imagine... and like not imagine in the sense of like whose [but] let’s imagine like truly being—brainstorm [w]hat they think will resolve the issue. For example, within the African community, I notice it’s everywhere, especially in Harlem. [T]here are a lot of—it’s all immigrant actually not all African—there are a lot of people within the community who prey on newcomers. And they pretend to be attorneys or pretend to be this and that and get them to pay the money to help them with things. [I]t’s just natural for you to trust your own people and so, people trust them. So [if] they are Liberian, they are still going to
believe them of course, [or me], they’re not going to harm me. [T]hey are my people and so we have a huge conversation around that because there were specific names that keep coming up. People are preying on certain people and we are like what can we do? Are we filing disciplinary—if we’re filing disciplinary things against them, what exactly is the solution to this? You know. I think a lot of people really wanted to confront them and be like we do realize what you’re doing and how you could be doing this to us, to your own people. [There is] a collection of people who’ve got like narratives [about] how this is affecting people—really trying to bring [things] to light. I think you’re shaming them in a sense. Some people are in deportation proceedings because of things that have been submitted. Like this is what you’re doing. [F]or some people, it did reach the points that we (people who are actually Attorney’s) had to file disciplinary things against them. So like different things like that. I don’t know if it kind of makes sense. So yeah.
So how does this happen? Like do you reach out to the person physically, do you create a database?
Yeah. So I mean it depends. [T]here’s something called ineffective system counsel and you have to inform the person that you’re filing this against them. Basically getting an actual attorney is the way for them to go. Disciplinary actions taken against them [are likely] to be discarded. It’s like sort of the same thing as reaching out to them and being like, here [are] all of the complaints people in your own communities [are making] about things that you are doing to them. What is your response? And some people correspond or they just ignore it. But some people will try to make up excuses and things like that. They think the most powerful [or] best thing that would happen will be for us to have a safe space. The people who were telling us their stories, if they felt comfortable to show up and for that person to show up and to have a discussion[...] about what happened and like why [are] we have this going on. It’s hard cause I think, I’m slightly 2
cynical. [W]hat I would really want is for people to be like, of course this is wrong. But at the end, it’s not that they knew; they didn’t know. Yeah. But I think it does have an impact when you have to actually look at the people you harm. That make sense? Or rather than just choose like someone from your bar calling, they [are] telling you “Here is a [complaint that] we received against you.”
Yeah. Yeah.
[Laughing].
You have to confront them.
Yeah.
Going back to your past story, one interesting thing that you mention[ed] was that your parents didn’t necessarily wanted to leave...
Hmm-hmm.
I think that a lot of people, especially in the US, ignore how much of a problem displacement is...
didn’t have the capital to start a business here. So they were working minimum wage jobs. I think my mom eventually found community here, but I don’t think my dad ever did. Like, even to this day, I don’t think he’s very comfortable here. And you know, I see him in a lot of my clients—like he’s just sort of doing it because he has children here. He’s like, “You know, I don’t feel like I really did what I wanted to do because the war happened and I ended up here. You know, I would have gone back to school, but I have five kids. I want to start a business. I didn’t have the capital. I was just working on numerous jobs.” So I think that it’s very difficult for him, [and] in a lot of ways his idea of success in America is through his children, not through himself. Even though we were always like, “You raised five kids with a minimum wage job in the United States [...] [y]ou did a lot.” I mean, [we’ve said to him] “[You’re not too old] you can go back to school. You can do things like that…,” but I think, I don’t know, I don’t think he ever saw himself here, or found a community, and felt like he belonged here.
Do you think that’s because he always had the idea of going back?
Yeah. I think if it was up to him, he would be back right now.
Exactly.
Can you talk about, maybe, a story from your organization, or something similar, or even the stories from your past?
I think we might hear [that] they are planning [to go to] bordering countries— they try to. [L]ike I said we tr[ied] to go to Sierra Leone, but the war had already reached there. Then they blocked Liberia, and [they blocked us], and [then we tried] to get to Guinea. But they think something happened with the boat, and stuff like that. So I think, even when they came here, growing up, all I ever remember my parents saying is “Oh we’re going back home.” That was always like a thing. Like they worked hard when they got here, so my mom didn’t have a college education. My dad had a little bit of quality education, but they had a business. They owned their own businesses [back home], but they 3
I think my mom is a little different. [E]veryone has their own ways of coping, and my parents saw a lot of things through the war. So I think when she came here, she sort of tried to push all of that away. It’s very interesting because I feel like I grew up in a competing household, [w]here my dad would try to speak to us in different languages or try to tell us stories, and my mom, she’s like “No.” [Laughing] She’s just like,“My kids are American. Speak English [...] We’re going to do this like that [...]” And so it was very interesting because I think they both find different ways to cope with it. Like, she wanted to distance herself, in a way, from everything that had happened and he just wanted to go back home. And it’s interesting.
As a kid, or now, how do you feel
about having those confronting views at home or like is there [a side]? Do you choose sides, not choose side? [D]id you feel that you wanted to adapt something more than the other?
I think that growing up, I really thought that my dad was annoying. [Laughing]. Yeah. Like in a lot of ways, cause he was the storyteller. If something happened, somehow [he] would turn [it] into this long story about how when he was here, this happened, and then this happened, and this is like Sierra Leone in culture, and this is this. I was just over it. But I think as I got older I got to appreciate my dad and realized how much I miss the culture because I was in Sierra Leone recently and my creole was terrible—like I can’t speak it, like really. I mean if I had put in some effort and actually[...] spent time with him and actually spoke with him, it would have been better. It’s just a lot of things I don’t know, like his specific tribe. Things of his past that he has always talked about, I just didn’t pay attention to a lot of it. So, I’ll just say that I thought with my mom’s perspective. [It] was terrible either way cause, like I said, I think she experienced a lot of not so good things during the war, and it really traumatized her in a lot of ways, so that was her way of coping with it. I appreciate my mom. Actually, as a kid, you just sort of want to blend in. [You don’t want to] be the kid taking the African dish to school; like sometimes my dad would be like, “Oh you don’t need lunch money, there’s leftovers,” and then when they escort me to school, my mom would hand me like two or three dollars. You know, things like that. So I don’t know, I think it’s hard and they did the best that they could. And I turned out fine. So…
the stories that [are] memorable to you?
There’s this one he always told. It’s not necessarily about any culture in Sierra Leone, but he grew up very poor. So my dad is Sierra Leonean but he [sort of] grew up in Liberia cause his father passed when he was really young. Then that’s how he started doing business because he would spend a lot of time in, the how do they call that? Market, the market, yeah. Basically doing trades and stuff for other people, and stuff like that, until he could raise enough money to go to school and things like that. Anyways, anytime we [would] complain about anything or [were] having a bad day he would tell us a story about how he really wanted a pair of jeans. [W]hen he was in Liberia, in this market, there was [a] person who’s selling the jeans and how, for him, getting a pair of jeans was super important; and [that] he was twenty something years old [when] he had done enough favors in the market for that person to give him a pair of jeans. [Laughing] And we’d just be like, “Okay,”and he’s like “You’re not understanding.” He was like, “You can’t just get everything you want. You have to work for it.” And stuff like that. I’m trying to think what else he used to tell us, cause I know a lot of stuff about like food. Like when we [would] complain about eating the same thing over and over again. It was always rice and some dish, like stew and we were always like “Can we have something else?” And he’d be like “Let me tell you about this food.” So like a huge meal in Sierra Leone is cassava leaf. You know the cassava [leaf]?
No. I know like Cassava.
It’s like Yams. The leaves. So it grows under the leaves. Yeah. So they cook the leaves.
[Laughing]
Yeah. It seems like you turned out fine. Well, what were the stories that your dad shared? What is some of
You cook this [?]
Hmm-hmm. 4
We have like Cassava bread.
Yeah.
But I didn’t know you could eat the leaves.
Yeah.
So how do you [cook it]?
It’s[...] huge, like if you go anywhere in Sierra Leone that’s what they will serve you.
are slowly getting there. It will take more time or stories like, I know my dad faced a lot of issues [with wages] when he first started working here and things like that. And so it’s sort of the same idea, I mean not necessarily solely accountability, but sharing narratives within the community so then you can help other people. I think that’s a big thing and I’ve also [been] trying to think of how to get [help]—cause people face like wage abuse, people face [that] all the time.There’s of course other trauma people face when they’re home, but then when they come here there’s a whole other level of trauma[...]
facing, especially for the Dominicans, so much internal racism, it’s like, oh we’re not treated the same or like we have to face this identity barrier that we have in the past.
Exactly.
We don’t talk about that stuff. We [are] usually just like, oh yeah we’re like rolling in dough, and that is natural.
[...] People go through. And so just trying [to] get people to talk about it.
That’s right. Exactly. Exactly. And I also think it creates this misconception for a lot of people who are in home countries and the way they imagine the US. I think there is just a lot of romanticizing and I think it’s because of that, That facade that people put up and [...]
Yeah.
Yeah. [...] just sort of pretending that everything is okay, when it’s not.
Yeah. It’s basically cooked like that.
It’s been a projects of mine. And trying to think of way to do that. I mean, I would love it if people would go to therapy but I don’t think that we’re at that level yet.
Uh.
[Laughing]
It’s a different texture. And [there is a] taste to it. Then, yeah, you eat it with rice, or sometimes people eat it with FuFu. So that was like a huge thing we used to get sick of it all the time. That’s all we would eat and he’d just be like, “Let me tell you, in Sierra Leone to get a bowl of cassava leaf…” It kept going on, and on, and on it didn’t stop, so yeah.
So it’s [more so] gathering narratives of struggles that people previously or [are] currently going through to share within the community and try[ing] to find ways to resolve them.
Oh. And I think it came out of people being poor and they didn’t know what to do with the food. But yeah, it’s basically [that] they take the leaves and grind it. [Then] they cook it with different meats, or like fish, [and] season it. It’s like[...] I’m trying to think[...] I don’t know, have you ever had potato leaves?
That’s awesome. Anything else that you want to share?
Yeah. I think a lot of people— and I have been actually trying to do this with my parents as well—a lot of immigrants, especially immigrant parents, I feel like they have to hide a lot of the struggles they go through, for the benefit of their kids or just because they are like “Oh why do I have to complain. I just work hard and do this.” [So] trying to make them sort of understand that there is value in verbalizing the pain and struggle that you go through and not putting up this facade all the time. I’ve been trying to have them tell me some stories, but they 5
Yeah.
Yeah. It’s funny because I was just home in the Dominican Republic and I was chatting with someone and he was like “ Yeah you know when you’re Dominican you have to go to the DR and show that there’s no struggle in New York.”
Yeah. Trying to understand there is no such thing. It’s [not] a perfect country and that people are truly struggling everywhere. Yeah. So yeah.
Thank you for sharing.
Hmm-hmm.
And I’m like, BS that.
Yeah.
Like we have to tell each other the truth because there’s really a struggle here, even if you are legally here.
Exactly. And then coming to the US and 6