And because of their selfish desires and stuff, they totally forget about their mission, because they were placed there too, to protect their motherland. And so they were like, ‘oh yeah this will be so cool, we can buy all this and bring it home to Freetown’ and their families will be like “Oh, they’ve been living high and mighty.” So they went into this deal, so they started buying goods, started buying goods, started buying goods but there came a point where they didn’t have money to pay the rebels so what happened was-- Actually, there was a delay in the payment because they [the government] didn’t send their money in time from Freetown to pay them. Because they were stationed there to protect them so they got their money from Freetown but there was a delay, so they didn’t have the money to pay the rebels on time. The rebels were trading with the soldiers who were stationed at the borders and the government paid for protecting the country. They were getting goods, like expensive cars. Because the rebels got all these expensive cars from the stores and mansions in Liberia, but they didn’t have anything to do with them, because that was not their plan. They wanted to just kill people and get the president and stuff and they wanted money, because they needed money to buy ammunition. They started trading so they can get the money and do whatever they want, get ammunition or drugs or whatever.

There came a time when the rebels that were there didn’t have the money on time so the rebels came for the money, they already got the goods and so they told them to come for their money, but when they came, they were like, ‘oh guys we haven’t received a salary so you have to wait.’ They came a second time, the same thing, they came a third time, the same thing, but they told the soldiers that ‘hey guys we’ve come here three times and you keep telling us the same story so when we come back, it’s business. We want it whether you guys have received your salary or not we want it and they were like okay.’ And when they came the fourth time, it was the same thing, so what they did was they deployed most of the rebels around and just a couple of them came for the money and when they started the same thing, ‘oh we haven’t received the money,’ then they opened fire and they killed even the boss who was there, he was a friend of my family, a good friend. He was the first officer that was killed. And that was when the war was started.

Okay, so that day, we heard that they killed this official and so when everything first started, the government, they had to report to the headquarters in Freetown. The military was like, ‘oh, this is a war, they attack our guys and so we have to return fire’ and stuff like that. And so the war started, but they didn’t have all the information, that it wasn’t like that, that there was something going on that just went the wrong way so they started sending troops and stuff that like. Okay, so that was the first part. But at that time, the war was just around the border, not actually intense.

Actually, I didn’t even know at that time that the war was going on. Because it wasn’t like that big, it wasn’t that serious. So we were in Freetown, we were going on with our lives; nobody really cares about what’s going on there. And then from nowhere they came up with this idea, they were like ‘oh, this is the opportunity for us to invade’ because they’ve also been planning. They had problems with the then government of Sierra Leone, and now that the war started, they were like ‘oh why can’t we go in and start out our rebel war.’ So that’s what they did.
He—[Foday Sankoh (RUF-Revolutionary United Front, leader of the rebels) and a couple of boys went to the Liberian soldiers and they made a deal say, ‘okay you guys are gonna help us, we want to overthrow the government and once we do that, it’s over, you go back to your country, we’ll stay in our country.’ And so the war started, more and more, they start recruiting more boys, more boys, more boys, but at that time when the things started, they told the people of Sierra Leone that they were fighting against corruption, nepotism, you know, all those big words. They told people that we are not here to kill you guys, but we wanna fight for you. Because they were like, ‘oh the government is so corrupt, we need to kick these guys off’ and stuff like that. And so the people of Sierra Leone were like, ‘okay, you just do your thing, we are behind you.’

And so the war started, they started fighting, fighting. Okay 1992, they succeeded, but it wasn’t them who kicked the government out, it was like a coup, some of the soldiers, they just had this understanding with the government, so the then government got kicked out and the soldiers were ruling. And when the soldiers overthrew the government the rebels called them and said, ‘you know what, now that we’ve changed the government, let’s come to something;’ then the rebel leaders said ‘what you guys have to do now is go to the backs. You are small guys, you don’t know anything, just go to the back. Then let me be the president.’
Before the coup, they agreed, that okay, once we are there, we’ll just call you and then you’ll be president. But then once they succeeded, they said ‘Oh, come on, you are a rebel, who will want you to rule the country?’ So they started dissing him and stuff like that. And so the war started and people said ‘Hey, hold on, I thought you told us that once this government was kicked out, everything would be okay?’ But nothing like that happened. In fact, the war intensified and they [the rebels] started killing. And the worst thing is that, they turned their guns on innocent people, and that was when all this killing of innocent people and maiming and stuff; everything came.

And as the years went by, everything just exploded and turned into something else and then more factions started coming up and investing their money saying that ‘oh I also want to be a leader so let me just get a couple boys and then train them and then I’ll start my own group’ and so basically that’s what been going on all these days and that’s where Sierra Leone stands today. That was actually how the war started then tribal stuff came in. You know just all this small stuff exploded and that was how the war started. And it came to a point that the people who actually started it, weren’t able to control the thing again, because everything just kept going the wrong way and so they were not able to control the situation again, they ended up losing, because their plans were, their investment just went down the drain. So they couldn’t handle it, the ones they hired, they couldn’t handle it. And so they started fighting between themselves so it was like a big disaster.

Raeshma: So what about you, Loulou, how you experienced this?

Loulou: At that time, I was in Freetown, everything was fine when the war was going on, we’d turn on the radio and hear that a lot of people, the rebels attacked some place in the south or the north or the east and they killed some amount of people and a lot have been displaced and stuff like that. And we were like, okay, we’ve heard it, and maybe you’d be waiting for somebody to pick you up to go to the movies. Actually, at that time, I was younger, but sometimes when I sit down and think about those moments, I was like, we were not actually taking the whole situation seriously. Like I just told you, when we just heard it, we’d be discussing, and we’d say ‘oh, did you hear what they just said, they killed 75 people over there.’ ‘oh, that’s sad, but anyway, let’s forget about it.’ That was our way. And it came to the point where God, the Heavenly Father was like oh, now you guys are not serious about it, you will be tested also, because we were like, ‘oh, they are far away from us, they are in the south’. There was a time where I heard they were in Bo on the south and I didn’t know when they would come down, so I said ‘oh, I am far away from this problem so let me just forget.’
And that was what we kept on saying and saying and saying until boom, they attacked the capital. Actually the one that I actually witnessed was in 1997, in May 25th, it was a coup and then the coup parties, they called the rebels so it was serious. They all entered the same time. That day, the coup was four o’clock in the morning on a Sunday, when they attacked on May 25th. It was actually a coup but they invited the rebels. Because they said ‘okay, if we want the people’s support, we need the rebels. The rebels are in town, everything is fine.’ They thought that everyone would be happy about that.

But when we heard the rebels were in Freetown, oh my god, everybody was sad. We were like, ‘hold on, we’ve heard so much about these people, we’ve seen them on the TV, the news, we’ve heard what they’ve been saying and stuff. And now they’re also gonna live with us.’ People were like ‘hell no, that ain’t gonna happen.’ And so the coup plotters, they were like ‘come on, this is serious, what you guys have to do is listen to us, accept it, we need to forgive each other.’ People were like ‘forgive each other? look what they did to my mother, Look forgive? What are you talking about forgiveness? Look at what they’ve done. They’ve destroyed my house in the village.’

That was her first house in the village. It was a new house, she [my mother] just actually finished everything. It was well furnished. And then the rebels just entered and they destroyed the house. She didn’t even enter into the house, so when she heard about the rebels, she was like ‘Oh, I ain’t gonna forgive these people, what they’ve already done to me, it’s just enough, I don’t even wanna sit with them or see them while walking in the street.’ So there were like similar complaints. Like, ‘they killed my uncle,’ stuff like that.

And so the mass population was like totally against this, so at that time we were still in Freetown, but also while the rebels and the coup plotters were one, but the government that was ousted, the SLPP government, the president was already in Guinea, he was in exile. So the Nigerians, I don’t know if you guys have heard about Sani Abacha?, so he contacted Alhaji Ahmed Tejan Kabba, and said, ‘my brother, I’m gonna help you out, we need to fight these khaki boys who staged this coup. They’re not supposed to be there. We’re fighting for democracy and stuff like that.’ And so, he said Okay. They came up with this military intervention.

And so then they started, sending jets, bombing, killing. I mean, it was like the jet was like in the morning because they send the jet in the morning like 8-10 and then in the afternoon and then the evening. And we were close to the military headquarters. So whenever, the jets fly over the house and then drop the bombs somewhere around. Once I even saw the jet drop a bomb on a house. And this house was packed full of these Muslim women who were just about to pray and so they killed a lot of people. And I mean, it was just about killing. People will be just in their houses and in the morning, we’d hear that they’d kill that person. And you’d be like, ‘who did it?’ but nobody knows.

Guns were everywhere. The rebels were in town. Guns were everywhere. And then you’d be walking down the street and then they’ll be cop cars and they’d be like ‘hey girl what you want, don’t you want time with me?’ And you can’t say like come on leave me alone because you’ll be fired right there. They have the guns and they’re like small boys. And then so when you’re called, you’ll be all confused and afraid and stuff. But you don’t have anything to say…

This is like a personal story. My mother sent me to the store and I was going there. I knew they [the rebel boys] were up there, but we had to go out, we had like no option and I was like come on, they’re like my brothers. They’ve done all this stuff, but they’re Sierra Leoneans, so why do I need to be afraid of them? I was bored enough to go out, so I was going out and one of them called me. And so I heard him call me, I was like uh oh, but I couldn’t just like turn my face, because who knows, he could just take out his gun and shoot me. Nobody will care, nobody will say anything. So when he called me, I didn’t want to turn, but I was like, okay, just let me face this. And then he was like ‘Hey, can’t you, I was trying to call you, what are you doing?’ I said ‘Oh, I didn’t hear you,’ I had to lie. He was like oh, he started talking all stupid and stuff. And all I had to say was ‘You know something’ --I lied --‘I’ll be here in the evening. You here, right?’ He was like ‘Yeah, I’m here.’ So I said ‘Okay, just wait. My mom sent me and I have to get this and once I’m back home, I’ll just come in the evening.’ And why I did that was if you said no, like I said, oh my god!, you’d be killed. Cause it’d be like, oh I’m a rebel right, okay, then let’s see who’s bad. And you’ll be killed. Well, you’re dead, I’m alive now.

Such incidents, they happened a lot. That was why we couldn’t refuse when you’re being called. I was in fact lucky because he didn’t do anything to me. He came out politely and then spoke with me. And once I say that, and luckily for me, that evening, he was transferred to somewhere else, so I didn’t have to see him. So we were like prisoners because we couldn’t go out because you didn’t want to be faced with such bad stuff.

It was risky for you to be a girl. When people are like, ‘oh, I want to be pretty, I want plastic surgery, I want to change my nose, change this different parts’… Back home, people were praying to be ugly. Because why? There came a point where the boys, they were like, ‘all the beautiful women should come out.’ I mean, the rebels, they were like, ‘all beautiful women should come out.’ And if they entered your house, if you were beautiful and in your house, you’d be in trouble. And so people would be praying to be ugly just for that moment. People were doing all sorts of stupid things. Young girls, they wouldn’t even go to the salon to get their hair braided. Everybody wants to be careless. Because you don’t want a rebel to call you up and say stupid stuff to you. That was how it was, basically all my life.

So with all those different situations going on, my parents were like, my mom was like I have two girls and two boys. Talking about boys, there came a time also where they were moving around, trying to get all the young boys because they were like, have to fight for your country, so they’d send the boys and they’d get killed for nothing. And so with all those things, my mom says it’s not safe for us, so we had to leave and once the house got burned down also, so with all those stuff and many more. There was so much going on, so we had to leave, and luckily for me, we left with my mom and my step-dad and my brothers and sister and we went to Guinea.

And once we were in Guinea also we were faced with more problems. One, was language barrier and then secondly, the people there were like, we were stained with the rebel mark. Maybe you’d be walking down the street and people would say, ‘Oh, she’s a rebel. They’ve been killing themselves so let’s don’t talk to them.’ So, you have to be careful and even if you try and explain things like, ‘come on, I’ve never participated in any of their activities, I’m clean and stuff.’ But they’d say, ‘Hell no. You guys all rebels.’ So you’d be faced with stupid stuff like that.

There was no freedom because there were also times when you’d go to collect money and luckily for us, our dad was here [in the U.S.] so he’d send us money, also relatives from all over so actually we had no problem because we were not in a refugee camp, we were in a house in Conakry, the capital. We were like independent, we were like living our lives. It came to a point where even the Guineans, the African brothers and sisters started saying like, ‘Oh, you guys are from like war, but it seems like you have money, all we see you guys with is dollars.’ Because when you go to collect your money you have like gangs all around and once you get out of the building, they’d just attack you and take your money from you. So Sierra Leoneans were faced with such problems also.

More, more problems. Sometimes you’d be staying in a house and then the landlord would just go crazy, like once you’d repaired the house and done all these great things in the house, the landlord will be like, oh this person has done such a great job in my house, let me just kick the person out. He doesn’t have anything to say because it’s Guinea. And Guinea is for Guineans, If he’s against it, ‘why don’t you just go back to Sierra Leone and get killed?’ They’d joke around like that. And the price of goods were very expensive because they were like ‘Oh, these guys are rich, so why not raise all the prices, and live happily?’ So they benefited from the situation instead of helping us, instead of being ‘Oh, these guys are from war, we need to help them,’ they said ‘Oh, lets raise the prices.’ They were like killing us. We were already being killed by our own people, and when we were there, they tortured us again. So everything was just against us.

There were times when you’d just sit and say, No, I can’t go on with this. I mean, I’m tired. Sometimes you’d just be sitting down and you’d cry and just say God, what did I do to deserve all this? But basically, my family, we thank God, because when we went to the apartment was like a residential area so we had enough security, so we were not faced with thieves coming over . I’m telling you, there’s some Sierra Leoneans who would testify to their death that they would never go to Guinea or if even they see a Guinean, they will kill that person. They are like totally against Guineans. They say, ‘these people are not good. They don’t deserve to be our brothers because they did so much to us.’ No one can imagine for someone to forgive them. They did a lot. Not to talk about the rebels.

My family, as I said, did not encounter much, seeing dead people in the streets and stuff like that, yeah, but not much. Because that was what my mother was scared of, she doesn’t want us to see such stuff, and that was why she tried hard for us to leave. Because after we left, we were saying we saw a lot of stuff going on, but when we left there, a lot went on, you can’t even explain it, because we have tapes about what happened and once you see those tapes. You don’t know, you’ll just be thanking God. Because it was worse, there were dead people all over the streets, right in front of the hospital. Because the hospitals were so overcrowded that even the mortuary, there were dead people outside, you’d see the dogs eating, then the vultures and stuff like that. The place, they told me that Freetown was smelly, that’s all you’d smell, that Freetown was stinky. But when you see all those dead bodies around, you just imagine what it looked like at those times. It was horrible after we left.

The coup was in May and we left [in Sierra Leone] in August. We got a car and then left. It was difficult at that time because you had securities all over and they were searching luggages. And so we had to leave early in the morning just to escape some of the checkpoints, so we had to leave early in the morning, and even that, maybe you walk five blocks and you see a checkpoint and you have to get everything down. Then another five blocks, it was like that, all the way. And talking about planes, oh my goodness, it was mad expensive. For a person, just to get to Guinea, 25 minutes flight, it was expensive, it was like double.

Also, I’ll give an example how dangerous Freetown was. Right after I told you guys about the intervention, the rebels, it was terrible, it was really terrible and the fighting was going on. But we were in the house for like nine days without food. I mean, we had food. But it was just tiny food like bread and peanut butter. But you can’t eat peanut butter for the rest of your life and we were like sick and fed up. You should have heard us, we were like, look, whatever happens, we are going out. I mean, I just couldn’t take it any longer. I was tired of peanut butter, jelly, I mean, come on. It wasn’t even tasty anymore. You eat it breakfast, lunch and dinner. So we told my mom and also my dad, you know what, let’s go. My mom was like what?
So Saturday we had done all the shopping and stuff, and guess what, that Saturday we went to the party. It was like a family gathering so we took most of the stuff that was left, we had to take it home because no one could eat anymore so the freezer was packed full and crazy me, when this stuff happened, I was like, Thank God we have enough food.. I didn’t know it was gonna take long and like that food was gonna finish up. And so those few days, oh, we’re having problems so we stayed in and ate all the food.

I don’t know if you guys have noticed that, well, I have, but when you’re in one place, man, you eat a lot. Because you could not go to school, you couldn’t go anywhere. You were just all over the house. So maybe you will have eaten breakfast and then after an hour you’d be like, Man, I’m hungry. I want to eat something. Because you’d see the bullets flying over the house and you’d think, you know what, I’d rather be killed full than be killed hungry. That was what my baby brother would say. He used to say that. So he kept eating. And we’d be like, What are you doing? And he’d say I’d rather die full than die empty. So he was like just eating. And then we almost ran out of food. All that was left was just a little bit of bread, some peanut butter, jelly, mayonnaise, just some tiny stuff. And we just couldn’t stand it anymore.

So that day we told my mom that-- Actually, my mom came up with the idea, but she was scared to go alone, so we were like, Okay, we’ll go. So mommy and I and my brother and my little cousin, because she was over with us for the weekend, she ended up staying with us. So we went out. We knew it was gonna be scared, I mean, you hear the bombs, you see the bullets. We thought that we were gonna be the only person outside, but we got calls from neighbors who were like we better go out and get something because we don’t know how long this situation is gonna continue. So it was like, Okay, let’s go. So we went.

And we were almost to the center to Freetown, but like I said, the checkpoints, every five blocks, you’ve got to get down, they search the cars. Then you get in, then once you’re in, you have to get out. It was like that the whole way. Once we were almost in the center of Freetown, then they had to stop us because they were like if you trespass that zone, maybe you’ll not return, because the fighting was going on there. It was so scary, you can hear the sound, the bombs, so clearly, you know something’s going on there. In fact, you’ll see death there. So when they told us, we said, ‘Okay, we can’t go any further.’ But we also couldn’t get anything because the stores were all closed. The business people, they were all tired, they were like ‘Yes, we need money, but we can’t go and get killed.’ So it was like we wasted our time. There was no food. All the stores were closed.

So sadly, we were returning home, because they also stopped us that you guys better go home, because it’s unsafe to stay out here. And we saw some people from the east. They were like walking all the way with bundles and they were crying because they killed their mother or their brother and you’d see the faces. Faces full of faces, some with anger, some with pain. And we heard some people explaining, because there was traffic, so you’d be stuck there for like 15 minutes so you’d call some of them over and some of them were crying and ask them what happened and they’d say, They just killed my dad, or they just killed my sister or my brother. And so I was like, I don’t know, I was so scared, my mom was just telling my dad, we better go home, we better go home, we better go home, so we were like, okay.

So while we were going home, we were stopped by a couple of NPFL guys who were Liberians and also Sierra Leonean rebels. And they held the gun to my mom’s face because she was driving and they said, ‘Get out of the car.’ They were pretending like they wanted to search the car. So we were like, okay. And once we were out, they held the gun to my mom’s face and were like, ‘You better give us the key.’ And my mom started crying. And then he took the gun close to mom and said ‘What you crying for?’ So my dad had to say ‘Don’t cry, just give the key.’ My mother was like, ‘but if we give you the car key, what do you expect us to do ? It’s so unsafe out here.’ ‘You better give us the key.’ He should have done anything. Because you’ll see he doesn’t even know what he’s doing. So after, my mom says something just came into her and said Just give the key. And so she handed the key. So they took the car and almost had an accident. And so we were left alone and my mom was crying ‘Oh my god oh my god.’ And one man said ‘you are not alone, they’ve done the same to all of us.’ And so we stood there, we didn’t know what to do, there were bullets flying over our heads, it was so unsafe.

I mean, sometimes when I think about it, I don’t know how we were able to get out of that place. So we were there, no taxis or anything. But there were a couple of military cars back and forth. And so luckily for us, one of the guys in the car saw my dad because he used to be in the army. And he was like, so he stopped and said ‘What are you doing here?’ And they said ‘Who?’ And my dad said ‘The Rebels.’ And they said ‘Let’s chase them.’ My dad said, ‘Come on now, leave them, what you can do for me now is just get my family and myself out of this place.’ You know those huge military trucks? I don’t know how I climbed into that truck. I mean, all I wanted to do was get the hell out of that place. I just got into that truck.

Then the next second, we were home and we stayed there until everything died down. That was like… we saw death, that was so terrible, and my brother, Ali, he was the only person home with my grandma. He got scared because we stayed so long. And my grandmother started crying and like Oh my god, I don’t know what happened. And people were like call me back, people have come with stories, like people have died and she started crying and she was like Ever since they left and I haven’t seen them. So when we got home she saw us in this big military van and she was like oh my god what happened? And so we explained. They should have killed us. Because people were like oh, you guys are so lucky, they should have killed you. And Ali and my grandmother, they should have been the only ones alive.

We said we wanted something to eat. I don’t know, but ever since that day, peanut butter and jelly has been my favorite and every time I eat it, I think of those days.

It was terrible, actually. I have tapes, but I don’t think you guys would be able. I think if you saw the tapes, you’d get a good sense of what actually happened. I can’t explain much, I don’t know, so if you guys see the tapes, maybe, not maybe, you’d know exactly what happened. But I’m telling you guys, it’s awful. You see what everyone did, what the rebels did, what the military did, what the Nigerians did. It was awful. The whole war. I don’t know, maybe they’ll come a time, when the Sierra Leone war will go in the Guinness Book of World Records, because our war was not a Rebel war, that’s what people say, but it was more than a rebel war. I don’t know, a lot happened in Angola, I know, a lot happened in Rwanda.

I’m so happy, now you guys will know a lot more now once the war is over, because they’ve disarmed all the soldiers. I mean, when I heard that news, I didn’t know what to do with myself, I was so happy, I was dancing all the way and there was a moment my dad said ‘Wait a minute, what would have done if you were in Freetown? You’re so happy now and you’re so far away, what would you have done if you were there?’ I don’t know, I was so happy because I knew what was happening there. So when I heard that they disarmed them, that the elections are coming up, I ‘m happy and I just thank god that at last, everything is okay.

Everything is okay because there are no guns, but there are more problems coming up. About forgiveness, reconciliation. Because so much has gone wrong. It’s so easy for people to say, oh, forgive this person. But people don’t really know what it was like. You see people now in Freetown, it’s like, people see other people walking in the street and You know what, you cut off your arms and the person will be like ‘Yeah, I did it ‘and the person will be like, ‘Look at what you’ve done to me, I’m begging in the street and you’re walking free. Why did you do that to me?’ No answer. And there are similar things going on.