St. Charles Episcopal Church - St. Charles, IL
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Guest speaker: Finda Fallah Green, West African Youth Association

To listen to the sermon, click here.

I want to thank you for your continuous support in aiding humanitarian organizations and individuals around the world. I feel honored and blessed to have the opportunity to share my reflection of the 1989 Liberian Civil war, the result of this bloody civil war, and messages from its victims, my fellow refugees. I will also explain the mission of WAYA, the organization I founded to aid my peers in the West Africa region.

My Reflection

I woke up one morning to the sound of shooting, and my mother telling me, "… wake up everyone, pack all your things, we have been attacked, we have to go." As a child then, it was amusing, it seem like a game to me and I was excited to play this game with adults, and all my family because we used to play a war game.

But it wasn't a war game this time. I started to realize that when we fled our house leaving all our belongings. When we got on the street, there were thousands of other Liberians fleeing. Before I knew it we were ducking, crawling on the ground to avoid stray bullets. As we continued walking the number of dead bodies increased and the blood flowed like it been raining blood all day. We had no time to think. It felt like a horrible war game dream; everything was happening so fast but it felt like a slow motion dream. By the time we reached the safety of the St. Paul Bridge, there was no room for hunger, tiredness, showers, or complaining to Mom. Even a 1 year old baby then knew his or her life was in danger. All I wanted to do then was to run as fast as I could without losing any of my family. I remember my mother got tired; she moved slower, and I held her hand, "Mom let's get going, you are slowing us down, we are going to die, I would run ahead and she would call me to slow down, and checking to make sure we are all together among the crowds of people and dead bodies.

Within 5 years, we walked from one village to another, one town to another facing one or to two attacks per village or town. Facing and experiencing one trauma after another, we were able to migrate to Cote D'Ivoire also known as the Ivory Coast. We were then transported by the UNHCR and placed in refugee camps; first, Camp Kola then Camp Lola.

In Camp Lola, my mother left me and my elder sister with her friend, going back to Liberia for some reason which wasn't discussed with me. I remember the day she was leaving felt like hell. I did everything I could to stop her, including crying my lunch out, kicking, rolling in the dirt, hitting my head on trees. My poor sister had to hold me down. When my mother left me, at age 9, my thinking changed. I became raged.

The anger I carried in me protected me for 14 years in those refugee camps. The anger I carried in me made me to stop seeking love, which protected me then from the epidemic of early teen pregnancy in both Camp Lola and Kola, from dangerous abortions that were taking place, and from exposure to STI/HIV.

I may not be accurate but then I felt that people's coping style was similar to those placed in the middle of a forest, isolated from the world. With too much time on their hands, many engaged in unhealthy sexual behavior, rape between refugees or from Guinean natives, physical and verbal violence, teens marrying older man, babies having babies.

Apart from being one of the victims of the rape, and physical abuse, I must say I was blessed and thank God for my anger then. Sometimes in life anger can be viewed as a good thing.

In the camp, we received monthly supplies of bulgur wheat (a brown grain, hard and bouncy like rubber with no taste and was very hard to slower) with split peas and vegetable oil. Fourteen years we ate the same thing three times a day.

You can see that being dependent and not having the opportunity to fend for yourself or change your situation for the better can lead to other emotional frustration or even mental illness. The Mission of WAYA

After almost 15 years of bloodshed, the war ended in the fall of 2003, with the signing of a peace agreement in Accra, Ghana. That Accord paved the way for general and presidential elections in late 2005. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was elected President and she is doing a wonderful job in rebuilding Liberia but not Liberians. There are many organizations with great missions and visions currently working with refugees, and helping Liberians, however the situation has not yet improved. It is understood that it takes a few seconds to hurt someone but a year to heal them. However before that year, there is a 95 % chance that you will see some positive change. Yes there are positive changes but that means taking victims from their home land to a European country. Nothing is wrong with that except the fact that there will be no Liberia before we know it.

The dependency, corruption, rate of violence in West Africa is at all time high due to the civil war in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and the Ivory Cost.

It doesn't matter how much bulgur wheat is sent, how many used clothes, all that is just creating greed. Seven years ago when I learned that I was coming to America, peers, friends, people who I didn't even know - they all were giving me messages and pleading with me not to forget about them. They told me, tell them that we are here; tell them that my son is a smart boy, tell them all the clothes they sent last month didn't arrive. Tell them…Tell who is the question I have been asking myself in the past years of my residency in America.

When I came to America, I had only a year of education, barely could speak the English language properly. I was then placed in the 11th grade because of my age. I graduated with a B average, went to Waubonsee then transferred to Spelman College. I was determined to educate myself while working part-time on building WAYA. By my third year in College, my GPA was still then 4.0. Then one day I was going through my old pictures, and I found this! A picture of Abraham. I told him that I was not going to forget him. I know he has gotten older. I wonder what he is doing now. He was such a smart boy. He said he wanted to become a doctor to help his mother.

Within the last months before graduation, I successfully founded WAYA. It became fully credentialed as a not-for-profit corporation with a Board of Directors, and 501c3 status by April 7 of 2011. The mission of West African Youth Association is to provide resources to empower oppressed West African youth who have been deprived of education and awareness of HIV/STD, and who lack the options to better their future. WAYA will empower these youth to fulfill their educational goals, and to heal. Our current project is to raise money to send 4 children to school from an Orphanage called Hebron Orphanage in Monrovia, Liberia. Funds that are generated thru this appeal will be sent DIRECTLY to the orphanage. Education costs, per year, are $500.00 per student. WAYA aims to raise funds to send four children to school this year. The school year begins in early August. Checks may be made to the order of: West Africa Youth Association Corporation. Please write "Hebron Orphanage" in the memo portion of your check.
Here are the images

To make a donation to the West African Youth Assn. contact the church at 630.584.2596 or scecoffice@sbcglobal.net