Monday, December 19, 2011

Amara, thy name is trouble

So I have a son. Not the kind of son that storks deliver after a man and a woman love each other very very much, get married, then paint a nursery, but the kind that happened when I found a kid who is awesome, struggling, is 14, has one parent that lives 100 miles away, and is covered in a huge glop of potential. I don’t remember the first time I met Amara, but I remember thinking when I’d see him around that he was as awake as a can of Redbull, dumb as a can of lead paint, and likeable as a steak and potato dinner with a gorgeous girl….right now that just seems like the most likeable thing that comes to mind.
Anyway, I’d love to say I’m taking to my paternal role well, but but given the amount of fussing I aim at him, I think ‘maternal’ is the role I auditioned for- we discussed this, and he does in fact now refer to me as ‘mom.’
It amazed me how much goes in to putting a student together. And not just money- but yeah, a lot of that- but time spent even making trips to get everything. From his white socks to his blue uniform tie. We did a great job though, after assembling him, he’s equipped with state-of-the-art ball point Bic pens, 80 page notebooks, some goofy backpack, and a smile that you’d have to put in a steel box to hid. 
He comes over in the evenings after school to eat gads of rice and sauce with me- the kid adamantly hates on the home-made pizza I try to entice him with- then he’ll go over his notes while I make lesson plans for the next school day. I must be an awesome mom, because after he eats ever last bit of his dinner, he takes all the dishes out back to wash before he studies.
So after I got him into school, though, he hasn’t been able to do all the odd jobs he used to for food money, etc., so I told him I’d hire him as a full-time student. Bad grades equals him getting fired. We’ll see at the end of the term…
But this hasn’t exclusively been a unidirectional parenting situation. Given my, albeit diminishing, cultural ineptitude, in a few situations I’ve had to defer to his bitter judgment. We’ve kind of got a Yin/Yang authority relationship in the marke3t, for example- him taking the wheel during haggling, and myself holding the reigns when  it comes time to pay. And not that my Temne is excellent, but he’s also been helping me along quite a bit with language, and, when necessary, laughing at me quite a bit when I ask a cop to beat me (Sapto) instead of asking him for the key to the water well (Ansapo).
 But hey, before you start whistling the Andy Griffith Show theme song and picture Amara and I skipping off to the fishing hole, there have been some tense moments.
Like- the first nature club meeting my school had.
As one of the four directing teachers, I was shepherding students around the wharf area. Being a club concerned with the environment, it was a good area to look around- the latrine built over the river bank with a smiling pile of excrement under it…..Yeah, it disappears when the tide comes up, but it floats down 30 feet to where women are washing pans in the water and children are bathing.
Anyway, as I played prison warden and simultaneous teacher, I looked over and casually freaked out as I saw Amara getting a five-star whoopin from this very very loud, very very angry dude. “Oh goodness… what has this boy done now…”
Amara’s version of events- He was standing by the vendors (probably trying to get his swerve on with this bread girl I think he likes) when some random guy walks up and starts smackin him around. No greeting. No, “Hey, just a heads up, I’m gonna try to kill you now!” Just WWF smackin.
The fact that Amara isn’t really a big guy worked in his favor, because by the time I got over to him, about 20 people were wedging them apart, trying to save the little guy from brain damage. The Frothing Lunatic was being drug away and Amara had a look of hurt puzzlement duct taped across his face.
“Amara… what in Pete’s name did you do?!”
“No… I didn’t do anything…”
I don’t know if it’s the innate ability of a parent to divine if their ward is speaking truth, or if it’s the stunned, lamb-like manner with which he claimed innocence, but I could really tell he didn’t know what he’d done to cook that guy’s chili.
Turns out some lass (Amara didn’t even know her name…I think it was something like Lying Dingbat?) had tried to get Frothing Lunatic more interested in her by saying Amara was spreading rumors that she and Frothing Lunatic were going to get married. Like I said, Amara didn’t know Lying Dingbat from the man on the moon- he was just the unfortunate recipient of some weird girl’s finger point. But what guy would be weird enough to open fire with his fists on a boy without any confirmation? Only some Frothing Lunatic. Don’t touch my son again. Mamma Bear will anger.
The other situation that had me thinking Amara had really spilled all the skittles, was when I was riding my bike past the Police Station……..and he was inside yelling at the cops. I’d have given a Benjamin to see how shocked I looked- if it had any likeness to how I felt inside, it would have been worth every cent.
There’s usually a mob gathered in front of the police station, but I’ve never known its nucleus member before. Like a mood ring, the mob always had different shades- the shade of this one was triumphant.
I approached the throng with the hurried but apprehensive gait of someone unsure if they left the gas on in the house, and Amara was vomited out of the mass right on to me. I checked his wrists for shiny metal cuffs- nothing.
“Well?”
“I caught the thief!”
Of  course this entered my worried, pessimistic ears as “I was caught thiefing!” and my eyebrows shot off the top of my head as fast as “WHAT?!” shot out of my mouth.
He started blurting out the story- Some money I’d given him for school fees had been stolen almost two months ago. I relentlessly gave him a hard time about it for a while, joking, but he was sincerely upset about the whole thing and I let it rest and forgot about it. Amara didn’t.
When he found the notebook he’d tucked the money inside sitting in someone’s house and a snitch told him he’d seen this guy steal it, Amara went straight to the police and had the dude THROWN IN JAIL. This is about the time I entered the story, Amara and everyone else present were insanely excited about the dump truck of justice that got parked on this guy’s face.
As I write this, I kid you not, this guy is still in jail, literally held for ransom at Amara’s will until a family member pays back the money he stole. If Amara wanted, he could walk over to the jail, tell the cops to let him go, and the guy would go free. But my little surrogate son is vindictive. I don’t know what a proper parent’s response would be here:
“Uh… BAD Amara! How many times do I have to tell you to not hold community members for ransom?!”
He told me last night that he took his prisoner a bowl of food and lectured him on how it’s wrong to steal, even in desperate situations… So I guess I’m actually not sure if he needs any explicit parenting here.
Quotes from the boy:
“I don’t like women… Only education!”
“I’m not a monkey… you are a monkey!” (wow, good one, Amara)
“I don’t need to get a woman… I need to get a book then the women will try to get me.”
“Pizza?” I can not eat American chop and African chop. I will constipate…you must constipate boku.”
Anyway, he’s a good kid and I pray that I’m doing right by him. Two years seems like a substantial amount of time to integrate and effect change, but I was thinking today it’s also a long enough time to tie a few heartstrings to a community and the people it holds.