A Man from Another Land: How Finding My Roots Changed My Life (28 page)

I had been back at work for over six weeks. I didn’t understand what it was about me that the world felt it needed to hate
no matter what I did. I started to understand that this was deeper than the color of my skin or even my behavior. I knew now
that DNA had memory. Could it be that it also had “enemy memory”? I thought back to the Canada Lee Award I had won in 2005,
and his meteoric rise to fame and subsequent fall from grace. I started to wonder if the award that I thought was the key
to discovering who I was instead was in fact some kind of horrific omen.

I continued to focus on my work with TGMF. It was the one place I felt that I could accomplish something, where I still had
some measure of control. My work in Sierra Leone and the Foday Golia Memorial School were like heavenly blinders for my psychic
peace. Not only did the people of Sierra Leone need me, I needed them.

T
here was an announcement over the PA system that we would land in Liberia. “Why are we flying over Freetown into Monrovia,
Liberia?” I asked.

The Astraeus Airlines flight attendant explained, “President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf’s son Dr. David Sirleaf and other family
members have had a death in the family and need to arrive in Liberia as soon as possible.”

I walked over and introduced myself. Dr. David Sirleaf was very nice and offered me some champagne. After we had a few glasses
together, he tried to convince me to get off the plane with him in Monrovia. He had heard about the work I was doing in Sierra
Leone and wanted me to meet his mother. I was extremely honored, but I told him that I was on a tight schedule and had to
get to Sierra Leone and return to the United States within a certain time frame.

“Maybe you can visit Liberia when you complete your stay in Sierra Leone,” he said. I told him that would not be possible.
I
was scheduled to shoot my new film,
The Least of These,
in June. But I was excited. The good word about what I was doing was getting around!

May 24, 2007, marked my second trip to Sierra Leone. I was very happy to see Dr. Sheku T. Kamara and the staff at Hotel Barmoi
again. I was given the same VIP room as before. Dr. Kamara arranged to have a live band playing music that night on the patio
just for me. He even had some Bundu dancers.

Since my last trip, I had made some new additions to my team. Antonio K. Hubbard could not make this trip to run security,
so he recommended another former marine, Malcolm “Mike” Bradford. Malcolm was a top criminal investigator in the United States
Marine Corps. He held the rank of Master Sergeant while stationed at Camp Pendleton in California. He was amazing to travel
with because he was very quiet and watchful. He could be in a room and yet have an amazing ability to be so unassuming he
was virtually invisible at times. I also had a great new cameraman, Martin Proctor, and a soundman, Mark T. Laurent. Martin
was an all-around great guy and proved to be a very good photographer in spite of being tormented by the Sierra Leonean children
who constantly called him, “
white man.
” In reality, Martin was a “light-skinned” brother. In spirit and rage, Martin was “blacker” than me! The renowned Academy
Award–winning documentarian Chuck Workman, who reminded me so much of Harry Poe, was also on board as my filming director.

The legendary blogger/activist for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) rights Jasmyne Cannick was also traveling
with us. Jasmyne started a petition to keep me on my TV show. She was the only voice from the LGBT community who came to my
defense and publically charged GLAAD and the media with racism. This would be Jasmyne’s first time in Africa. Dr. Andre Panossian
could not make the journey either, so I had Dr.
Zoanne Clack, also a writer/producer on my TV show, travel as my team physician.

Our first day of filming took place in downtown Freetown with Joe Opala. I was very anxious to get to BO and see the progress
of the school in Njala Kendema. When we arrived at the school, Sonya and I waited for my tribal brother Raymond Scott-Manga.
Raymond was running unusually late, even for “Africa time.” Sonya was going over the ledger for the school with Raymond’s
younger brother, Josie Manga, and detected a discrepancy in the budget. There was $1,500 unaccounted for.

I sensed this was going to be a problem that could become a bigger issue if I didn’t address it head-on. Sparks began to fly
when Sonya confronted Raymond. As an American, you are often expected to accept “things as they are in Africa.” I knew there
were going to be some severe decisions to make that day. As if I didn’t have enough to deal with already, going through hell
back in America. The “media liability” speech Eric Nonacs had given to me before my first trip to Sierra Leone now applied
to me, and I wasn’t in the mood to give it to myself.

I was thinking, “If my money can ‘disappear’ then my potential investors’ money could disappear too.” I wasn’t interested
in hearing anyone tell me “I told you so” about trying to do business in Africa with Africans. So I decided to get creative
while on the school site.

I was directing now; Chuck had had to get back to the States after we finished filming in Freetown. I knew empirically that
I had to confront Raymond, his brothers Alieu and Josie, and Chief Lamin publically. They were very powerful in this village,
but I needed to make a stand. I did.

There were protests in English and in Mende against my “implication” that one of them, if not all, had taken the $1,500. At
one point I thought, “Isaiah, it’s only $1,500, give them a break.” I shot that thought down. That kind of rationale had
stifled this country for centuries. The tension grew with every passing second.

The interpreter I had hired in Freetown was not a part of the Njala Kendema village. This fact proved to work to my advantage.
I had quietly asked my interpreter to secretly ask the villagers working on the school if they had been paid and given their
agreed upon stipends and food items. The answer came back a resounding no.

Someone was lying. I pressed them hard to find answers. I must admit that I truly appreciated how the brothers stuck together,
but they knew I too bore the proud name of Manga.

Alieu eventually spoke up. “There were extenuating circumstances,” he said. There was that phrase again. It was the same reason
he had given when I had asked how they could have sold their brothers and sisters into slavery. I forgave then but never accepted
it as right. And I didn’t accept it now. Alieu put his head down and walked away from the conference circle. Aware that my
cameras were capturing every moment, I decided to push Raymond harder for more drama. I had to sacrifice him. Yes, he was
the man responsible for bringing me to Sierra Leone, but I could not allow this transgression to go unaddressed.

I watched Raymond step away from the conference circle in an attempt to escape my cameraman. On pure instinct, Martin pointed
the camera in his direction without me saying a word. It hurt me, but I had to make my point. I said, “You see? This is what
I was saying before my induction. This is why I forgave you for selling my ancestors.”

Their muted grumbling shot around the village like a rabid bat and made my body twitch slightly. I could feel my adrenaline
and heart rate begin to spike a bit. I eventually found my bearings and pushed on. I said, “Alieu, you see? DNA does have
memory. You said the exact same thing to me the night before my induction and now you take money from me?”

There were extenuating circumstances….

That did it for me. After that, the moments passed at lightning speed as Chief Lamin, the site manager, stepped in, stoically
outraged. He was looking at me with hurt or concern in his eyes, holding both arms up waving them in a “now hold on” or “that
is enough” fashion. At this point, I didn’t care which.

I knew I had just broken a major rule in Africa. I just embarrassed my family in front of Sonya, my “white woman.” Those words
“white woman” are an important element of this story. Later in my dealings with the Manga brothers, they would become quite
ironic. I would also discover that exposing them in front of Sonya was more of an insult than my accusing them of any fiscal
impropriety.

I thought that because they had made me a chief that I was one of them. I thought that I could live and die by their rules.
I didn’t think that anyone would cut my throat on the spot, but they might possibly attack me when I left the country. And
of course, history showed my people clearly knew how to hold a grudge. They had fought each other for eleven years.

I ascertained by their body language that if I were somebody other than Chief Gondobay Manga, I would have been instantly
run out of this village, escorted by men wielding machetes and rocks. I knew without a shadow of a doubt that they understood
that I was here out of love; I was here because I cared and desired to change this country one village at a time.

Armed with this new information about financial impropriety, I stood on the red dirt addressing the brothers. Slowly, the
villagers were gathering around. The workers and my chief builder, Pa Musa, slowly assembled under a shade tree a few feet
away. I knew that they had no idea what I was saying, but they could certainly feel that it wasn’t good. The chief wasn’t
happy and I had a good damned reason not to be.

I pushed on, “How dare you. How dare you. I’ve come all the way across the ocean for this?”

Once, when charging through a particularly dense thicket, I stalled and lurched off my bike, landing hard on the dirt.

“My name, my reputation, my career is being destroyed in America as I speak.”

My body itched and ached from the angry burrs that held fast to my clothes, skin, and hair. It was as if they were chastising
me for disrupting their order. But, I remained undaunted, ignoring the pain of the razor-sharp weeds tearing at my hands….

This cannot happen, you understand?”

… I yanked my bike’s chain, pedals, and wheel spokes away from their snaking grasp and ripped them away from my legs.

“Raymond? Didn’t I promise you that I would build a school? Isn’t that what you wanted?”

Raymond mumbled, “No, I never told you to build a school.”

I was unwilling to give up and lose face—I learned that from my grandmother Muh’ Dear.

“What? Didn’t you tell me that the only way I could show the people that I wanted to help them was to build something that
they needed?”

Raymond said, “Isaiah, I don’t remember telling you that.”

“You don’t remember? You don’t remember, because it was bullshit! Once you saw that I was putting all my money into this school
and not your agricultural center, you got mad. You mad at me? Then be mad, because I’m keeping
my word
.

I remembered:

“Hmmm. You are a man of your word I see,” he said.

“Yes, I am,” I said.

“Be careful,” he warned. “Men have died here trying to keep their word.”

“If I die here keeping my word, that can only mean I will be in better company than I am now.”

I turned and looked right at Raymond. “This school will be built with or without you.”

I reached down and grabbed a piece of glass from a broken bottle I found lying on the ground near my leg and used it to chop
away the weeds that still entangled my bicycle and me. Once free, I began to run using the bicycle as a makeshift plow, pushing
and ripping my way forward as if my life depended on it. I had no idea where the hell I was or the path I took to get there.

If I knew anything about African men and their pride, and I did, I knew that this wasn’t going to be the end of this. Either
way, they now knew what kind of African American man I was.

Dr. Clack and I began to set up shop in one of the mud huts that currently served as the children’s school. I always tried
to offer some medical attention and examinations when I came to Sierra Leone. It might have been on a small scale, but something
was better than nothing at all. Dr. Clack and I noticed that many of the children were suffering from some sort of skin disorder,
lesions. It looked frightening and very painful.

Dr. Clack could not identify the virus. Still, word of our work had spread to the neighboring villages, and people started
bringing their children for help. We were completely overwhelmed and unprepared. When I saw that we were about to run out
of Tylenol and antibiotics I tried to slow down the process. There was a line of about a hundred women and children waiting
outside for medical assistance, but I needed to save some of the supplies for my village, Ngalu.

The heat was unrelenting. I needed a distraction. I asked my driver, Mohamed, to start slipping some of our goods out of the
examining area. The villagers were playing music. I walked out into the middle of the village and began to dance to the beat.
The locals began to form a close circle around me. We all fell in line, circling and singing, circling and singing.

Meanwhile, Mohamed was slipping the goods into his Land Rover. I was still singing and dancing, the heat no longer affecting
me as much as the rising dust, stirred up from our movement, making it harder for me to breathe. But I kept on dancing anyway.
I began slashing at the air with my
Tikpoi
(staff) as if it were a spear. The villagers went crazy, singing louder and playing harder.

I could feel my lungs tightening, but I kept going. I could feel the people around me filling me up with all that they could
afford to give me… their love, their respect, their gratitude. I could feel the spirit of each and every one of them latching
on to mine, strengthening me. I looked over at Jasmyne, who was also dancing; she had a beautiful blissful look on her face,
like she was in heaven. A
Ngoboi
dancer showed up covered in raffia and replete with the ancient spirit to “clear my path.” I danced along with the
Ngoboi,
and the villagers went even crazier, dancing and singing and cheering at a frenzied pace. My interpreter pulled me aside
later and told me that the villagers wanted me to know that the dance moves I was using, unbeknownst to me, were ancient
Ngoboi
moves.