I Just Want A Happy Life!

I’m not sure where to even begin with this one. I wanted my roommate Javi to write a guest post to do the story justice (because its his), but he refuses to write in English (he’s Spanish) so I’ll do my best to recount it.

Javi has been taking incredible pictures in Liberia (check them out here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=278304&id=858825494&l=e7a5e0e541 He’s quite brazen and takes the camera everywhere: to the markets, the street corners, the soccer fields, the neighborhood high school, and then just the other night, he scored a press pass to the big soccer game.

His camera has been the key that has opened the door deeper into Liberian society than I could ever hope to explore. With it he has been able to engage in conversations with people whose stories make it clear how far this country has to go to repair the damages of the war. Tragically, I can’t help but wonder if a whole generation will find itself unable to recover from the scars of the past.

One night last week at the soccer game, two young men approached Javi. Visibly intoxicated, they told him they were former child soldiers. They recounted doing cocaine, heroine, and marijuana at the age of seven -- and then going out and killing people. They showed him the scars on their arms from the needles.

They asked for a picture, and then looked at a young man in the distance, who shook his head sternly. He was their commander. Javi was taken aback at not just the fact that they still had a commander, but even moreso that these kids, who had killed so many people, were clearly terrified of him.

“This guy must be totally insanse,” Javi thought.

The young man walked over, leaned in uncomfortably close to Javi’s face and said, “I’m monitoring you.”

Now at that point it would have been game over for me. I would have gotten my a** out of there as quickly as I possibly could. But not Javi (does this mean Javi is insanse?). Javi put his camera away and walked back over to the guy and started talking to him. Not only had he been a commander in the war, but he had also served in Charles Taylor’s Anti-Terrorism Unit (essentially his personal army, long story there).

“Do you know what the ATU was?” he demanded to know.

“Yes, I do.” Javi said…

He showed him his scars: bullet holes in his legs, huge cuts on his arms, and of course scars from the needles. He was only 23 years old. That means that he was only 17 when the war ended six years ago. He couldn’t go back to his village. They know who he is, what he has done. They are terrified of him. He is branded a killer.

But the most disturbing part of it was the one thing he repeatedly said, in an angry, exasperated voice: “That life if over. I just want a happy life!”

“They didn’t just steal his childhood,” Javi said to us later that night as he told the story. “They stole his life!”