In this extract Jodie, a wheelchair user, meets Sirra, the ex-Alkalo (Head) of Malinding village while they are both visiting Gladstone's Library in North Wales.
'Sorry if I was staring. I'm Sirra Ceesay, from Malinding
village, in the Gambia' and held out her hand.
'And I'm Jodie Sonko, from darkest Cheshire. My mum and dad
are over there, talking to people. How do you do?' Get me again, all this white
tribe ritual.
'Hello, Jodie. Is it OK to sit and talk for a while?'
'Yeah, so long as you don't try to …' I was going to say
'try to molest me' but I managed to switch out of potty-mouth mode. I could
sense Rachel beaming at me. Where had she been for the past couple of weeks?
Sirra smiled.
'No, nothing like that, whatever you thought'.
I tried again.
'Do you live in a mud hut with a thatched roof? Are there
lots of wild tribes fighting each other? Do you … ' I know when I'm being
laughed at. As soon as we got home I was going to ask dad to sponsor me for a
brain transplant.
'Sorry, Jodie, I wasn't laughing at you. Of course we don't
do any of those things, anymore than you do. We do have several tribes, I'm
Mandinka. There are also Wolof, Jola, Serehula and Aku. Some people do live in mud brick houses but
they may well have piped water and electricity. And to be honest, it's far too
hot to fight. And to explain why I wanted to talk to you, well, you look like a
Mandinka girl.' Was that an insult? Was it better or worse than looking like a
girl from Widnes? I could hear Rachel telling me to shut up and listen. Fat
chance.
'I'm here because my mum and dad wanted me to be here. I'm
adopted. My real mum's dead. My legs are like this because I was in a car
crash. I'm rubbish with books and I'm so stupid I'm a plank. I'm a half caste
and a half wit.'
'Jodie, that's not you. I suppose you could call my children
half caste. My first husband was a white man. He died a while ago and I came
back here to help remember him. I've two children. My son is the Alkalo, the
chief, of our village. He's also a university lecturer. My daughter is a lawyer
and she's also a member of parliament. And you don't seem to be at all
half-witted. You can listen, you can express yourself fluently and you're not
afraid to ask questions. I'm a teacher. Don't look so scared, I won't bite. We
have crocodiles to do that for us.' It took me a moment to see that she was
joking. I hoped she was, about the crocodiles, anyway. I was having a
conversation with a stranger. What was happening to me? I was having meals with
the wrong names. I was being fairly polite. I was staying in the sort of place
that normally wouldn't let me in. I was in the sort of place I didn't know
existed.
'Sirra?'
'Yes, Jodie?'
'Tell me about Africa?'
'Don't look for the differences. Look for the similarities.
Start small. Let's start with Malinding. A couple of hundred compounds - places
where people live. Men, women and children. There are three schools, a clinic,
half a dozen mosques.'
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