The Childhood River

By Quipu Mai Yuan

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• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jul 22, 2010
• ISBN: 9781453540473

Quipu Mai Yuan

Quipu Mai Yuan Since 2002, has served as an unpaid volunteer of the African Farmers Cooperative, a program of the Universal Human Rights International (UHRI). Quipu’s leadership has helped UHRI to establish one of the most successful refugee-led agriculture projects in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. She served as the National President of the United Nimba Citizens Council in the Americas (UNICCO) for two years and continues to serve as a member of its board. Her efforts have gained national and international media attention, including a September 15, 2000 interview by The New York Times focusing on the plight of her family and Liberians in the United States. Quipu and her children presently live in the United States, while her husband, Harry T. Yuan lives in the Republic of Liberia, in West Africa. Her book, The Childhood River, although not based on reality, is greatly infl uenced by her experiences and childhood memories. It refl ects on the lives of the people in her native country, Liberia and the war and sufferings they have gone through. The book also focuses on the traditions- marriages, child raring- special emphases on educating the boys and keeping the girls back for early marriages.

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Copyright © 2010 by Quipu Mai Yuan.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This book was printed in the United States of America.

To order additional copies of this book, contact:

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CONTENTS

PREFACE

Chapter One

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

PART TWO

THE INEVITABLE

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

CHAPTER THiRTY

CHAPTER THRITY-ONE

CHAPTER THRITY-TWO

Acknowledgements

Editorial

Lexicon

Once the war actually started, nothing was ever the same and ever will be.

Monleh

Also coming soon by Quipu Mai Yuan

A Book

Dead on Arrival

PREFACE

UPON MY GRADUATION from the elementary and junior high school, The Ganta United Methodist Mission, in Nimba County, Liberia, West Africa, my mother, Madam Esther Leiwei Kotee would not have a party for me. She said it was an accomplishment, but not enough to warrant a party, so she instead purchased for me a beautiful sewing machine, as I had a passion for sewing. After high school, (Ricks Institute in Virginia, Liberia) she said, What is high school, finish college and I will have the biggest party you’ve ever seen. As a kid my mother did not have the privilege to attend school, but in her adult years she attended some night classes in LAMCO, Yekepa where she worked. She made me to believe early on that anything I wanted to become, I could, and that all I needed was to put Myself out there and reach for it. Unfortunately, she passed on too soon.

The acquisition of western education was a special privilege bestowed upon boys; especially boys of the rural areas of the country while girls received special trainings to prepare them for housewife responsibilities; when discipline and tough love were the tools to preserve traditional values; when cultivating the love of a girl required genuine love; determination to get the best with blessings and unflinching support of caring parents, and of course self-motivation, I rose among thousands to be the first woman to obtain a college education in the Beo Clan, in the early eighties from the University of Liberia in the studies of Agriculture and Home Economics. Worked for a period as the Assistant Technical and Training Director for the Liberian Coffee and Cocoa Corporation, ran an import and export business just before the war came and I had to get out of Liberia. I traveled to Bari, Italy where I studied Irrigation for a year before heading to the United States from the parts of West Africa where I had been in exile with my family for many years.

Well, here I am doing the same thing. I thought of writing this book a long time ago, but I’ll then put it away after writing a paragraph here or a few pages there. At times, I’ll call some of my friends and tell them what I was doing and I’ll ask them to listen to few lines and they would be so impressed that, well, it froze my thoughts I guess, and I’ll drop the writing for few months or a year or sometimes, two. But then, I’ll pickup after remembering my mother’s encouragement . . . Don’t give up, and then you can have your party when you are done. Yes, mama, the first of many books to come is done. Thanks for being my mentor all these years even when you were not with us anymore.

My thanks and appreciation goes to my friends who have stood by me through the years encouraging me to finish this book. I want to confess to you all that I heard your voices, but I was blocked by uncertainty and fear of not completing the work.

I have incorporated into this book ideas from people of different nationality, family members, friends and events in my life which have all come together to honor the knowledge of all that are known to me.

I also want to acknowledge that in the course of my writing I built my ideas upon the approach and inspiration of other writers before me and I am grateful to them known and unknown. In my endeavor as a human, I could never have completed this book without the encouragement, insights, and perspectives of others.

With their encouragement, I had the wind beneath my wing to fly with this work.

Lastly, to you the readers: I pass unto you the support, the push and the faith that has been given to me by my loving husband, my adorable children and grandchildren, and my supporting friends and relatives.

CHAPTER ONE

BOSS MAN, I bought some food and I am going to cook it quickly. I know by now you must be very hungry from that frown I see on your face. Larmie said with a smile, looking side ways at the man he was addressing.

"Well, if you have become a sand-cutter, then tell me what took you so long ehn, my son? I started thinking maybe the market women got you; you know, took you from me, my only son. I remembered you leaving very early this morning, even before that noisy woman next door came out. Did the road to the market change or the distance got longer? Eh Larmie?"

Sergeant Lehbon, or Boss man, was very fond of this boy Larmie, and would not chastise him. He had asked all these questions just to make Larmie talk about his time at the market. Larmie always had such crazy stories that made him laugh and cheer him up in light of their present condition.

To Sergeant Lehbon, Larmie was the son he never had. He was very happy that Larmie had survived the ordeals of the past few months that brought the three of them to this boarder town. He was also very grateful to his fellow officer that had the hindsight to treat the boy and patiently wait for his recovery to take him to safety.

Please forgive me for staying too long at the market today ho, Boss man. Larmie said smiling at Sergeant Lehbon as he began to walk away towards the open space structure covered with some rusty zinc used for food preparation. Larmie could tell that Sergeant Lehbon was not really angry with him. He knew how much this man cared about him. If it had not been for this man he would not be alive today. Larmie wished he could call him papa instead of Boss man, but he would have it no other way. It was either Boss man or Sergeant Lehbon. So he chose instead to call him Boss man, to him, a father or the man in charge.

There had been shooting everywhere, and he remembered being hit by a bullet right in his knee, paralyzing him momentarily. He thought he would die from the excruciating pain, but a uniformed