“It is finished in my heart,” or, how to forgive the man who cut off your arm
I don’t have any idea. But here’s what Temba Kekura told me (this is the last part of my Sierra Leone series; if you…
Read MoreSierra Leone
A Former Rebel Faces the Farmer He Mained
GPAINGBANKORDU, SIERRA LEONE — Before the war, when his village and his family and his body were whole, Temba Kekura was a farmer. He…
Read MoreReally, I went to Sierra Leone; or, A look at reconciliation, village by village
Way back in March, the Christian Science Monitor sent me to Sierra Leone to report a series on ‘grassroots reconciliation,’ for lack of a…
Read MoreApologies–mine, and otherwise
Oh, so many apologies. * First, to my few but devoted commenters–commentors? how is it spelled? this new internet age!–whose wonderful thoughts I’ve let…
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Sierra Leonans Look to Truth-Telling for Post-War Peace
BOMARU, SIERRA LEONE — Little but its history distinguishes Bomaru from other villages scattered across Sierra Leone’s countryside. A quiet place with mud houses…
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Sierra Leone’s “Family Talk” Heals Scars of war
KAILAHUN DISTRICT, SIERRA LEONE — John Caulker might know the rough, red-rock roads of rural Sierra Leone better than he knows the hallways of…
Read MoreA step, or a leap, or maybe nothing at all, for African women
About a week ago, the Christian Science Monitor ran an article I wrote from Sierra Leone on a new law protecting women in war…
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In Africa, Justice for Bush Wives
FREETOWN, SIERRA LEONE — Fatmata Jalloh was just a kid selling pancakes on a rural road in Sierra Leone when a rebel soldier snatched…
Read MoreThere are only so many ways to say something
Earlier this week, I went through recording after recording from Sierra Leone–interviews with forced wives, and with women who suffered every denigrating crime even…
Read MoreGetting right speech right
I’m pretty sure I waxed rhapsodic in my graduate school essay about the importance of telling people’s stories. Stories were the one thing in…
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