A TALE OF THREE VILLAGES

A TALE OF THREE VILLAGES

1. KOKO VILLAGE, NIGERIA

Mr. Sunday Nana, his wife and four small children live in Koko Village, Nigeria . The village is like any other African village-picturesque, colourful and noisy. The Nana family's house, too, is the same as all the other houses in the village, with mud walls and a rusting corrugated iron roof, and with children and chickens sharing the compound.

There is one difference, however. Outside Mr. Nana's front are three large empty metal drums, the bright red paint now flaking away, but the skull and crossbones symbol clearly visible on each. And in a clearing 200m away from the village, next to a stream that the villagers get their drinking water from, is an enormous pyramid of identical drums, reaching to the sky. Some of them are badly corroded, their slimy contents of various colours - grey, dark green, bright orange, etc. - leaking out, down, on to the baked African earth and into the stream. Some have fallen down and rolled - or been rolled by playful children - into the bush. Some are smoking in the midday heat. Some are swelling, as if their contents are bursting to get out. Some have already burst. 

“They came on a Wednesday,” said Sunday, “Many, many big lorries. They took all day unloading them. No-one told us what was in them. They gave the Chief a brown paper bag-I saw him smiling as the lorries drove away. This was five years ago. Then three months ago, one of the brightest boys in the village - Thomas Agonyo - started university in Lagos. He came home one weekend with a new Chemistry book, and spent all day looking at the drums and writing things down and talking to himself and shaking his head. We all thought he had gone mad. Then he called a meeting of the village and told us that the drums contained poisonous chemicals. He said they had come from Italy. But I don't know where that is. Is it in Europe?”

Mr. Sunday Nana stopped, frowning, a troubled look on his face, "In the last five years, 13 people have died in this village, my own elder brother one of them. They have been in pain, terrible pain. We have never seen deaths like that before. Lots of our children are sick. We have asked the Government to take the drums away, but they do nothing. We have written to Italy, but they do nothing. The Chief says we should move our houses to another place. But we have no money to buy land. We have no choice. We have to stay here. “And they” ------ pointing to the mountain of death in the clearing - "are our neighbours."

2. PONNIMANTHURI VILLAGE, INDIA

"I can remember the time," she said wistfully, "when all the fields around this village were green and the harvests good". Her outstretched arm described a complete circle as she stood in the morning sun. "Then they built those monsters, those……." Her voice spluttered in anger as she shook her fist at a collection of ominous looking black buildings on the horizon, covered in a low-lying shroud of thick smoke. "They said that factories need leather to make shoes, handbags and clothes. They said our men folk would get jobs. They said we would all become rich."

We stood silent, each thinking our own thoughts. Yes, they told you all that. But there is so much they didn't tell you. They didn't tell you that to change animal skins into leather - which they call tanning - uses as many as 250 different chemicals, including heavy metals such as cadmium , arsenic and chromium. They didn't tell you that these chemicals are discharged into the environment from those chimney stacks and fall to earth for miles around, polluting the earth below. They didn't tell you that this would poison your fields, so that nothing will grow.

“They didn't tell us that the chemicals would be dumped in open fields and into our rivers,” sighed Vijayasama. We had been thinking the same thoughts. “They didn't tell us that our women would have to walk ten kilometers every day. They didn't tell us that we would get ulcer and sores on our bodies. They didn't tell us…” Her voice trailed off. There is so much they didn't tell you, I thought. “We don't buy leather shoes or leather handbags or leather clothes,” she said.

3. VOROBYOV VILLAGE, UKARINE (FORMERLY USSR)

"It happened on April the 26th 1986. I remember the date because it was my mother's birthday. We heard the explosion early in the morning. We didn't worry, because there had been explosions before from Chernobyl. But this one was bigger. Everyone stopped what they were doing and listened. Then we ran out into the garden. We could see a cloud of white smoke coming from the nuclear reactor." Natasha Revenko wiped her hands nervously on her apron. Tears came to the corners of her eyes, and slid slowly down her pinched, pale cheeks.

"It was a Saturday," she went on, still wiping her hands on her apron. "It was a lovely warm day, and the children played outside all weekend. Even when the dust began to fall, they still played outside. They picked up handfuls of it and threw it at each other, laughing. It was Wednesday before the loudspeaker van came to the village, telling us to keep our children indoors and not to touch the radioactive dust. They also told us to wash down our houses and roads with water. A week later the children began to vomit. Their hair fell out. They couldn't eat. They grew so thin, and sores appeared all over their little bodies. Two weeks after that, all three died - all three on the same day." She broke down now and cried quietly, as she had done so many times before. "They're buried over there." She pointed to the church graveyard. "Lots of village children are. And adults."

I touched her gently on the shoulder, leaving her to her bitter-sweet memories, and walked on through the silence. It was a ghost town. No one lived there anymore. They had either died or been forcibly evacuated. The fields were barren. Nothing grew. Nothing ever would again. There was no bird-song. No rabbit peered at me. No cow endlessly chewed. No horse neighed. Natasha caught me up as we boarded the bus marked MOSCOW. "Thank you for coming with me," She said. "I wanted to see the graves and the house again, before I die."

OR WILL THE DREAMER WAKE? (POEM) BY MEDIRA CHEVALIER

OR WILL THE DREAMER WAKE? (POEM) BY MEDIRA CHEVALIER 

Medora Chevalier is the 21st century poet. She is a well-known writer of present day. She writes about all contemporary themes. In this poem - Or will the Dreamer Wake? She writes about how the animals would become extinct if they are not protected.

*****

OR WILL THE DREAMER WAKE? BY MEDIRA CHEVALIER

Out in the East the jungle listens

The tigress, plaintive, growls in pain,

The great trees hear her breathing, shaking

Inside her still, the new lives wait,

These cubs could be the last ones ever

To freely live and roam and mate.

Our grandchild knows the tiger never

Or will the dreamer wake?

Far in the North the white bear snuffles

Down in her lair the gleaming snow

She waits for all the life she's making

Outside the crashing glaciers grow.

These cubs could be the last cubs ever

To freely live and roam and mate.

Our grandchild knows the white bear never

Or will the dreamer wake?

There in the West the song thrush warbles

She weaves her nest to hold her clutch

A long wait now to find a partner

The eggs are laid, there are not much.

These chicks could be the last ones ever

The last to fly and sing and mate.

Our grandchild knows the song thrush never

Or will the dreamer wake?

Deep in Ocean South the whale swims

Her song of birthing fills the seas

Thousands of creatures wait the moment

The solemn birth that they will see.

This child could sing the final whale song

The last to make the oceans shake.

Our grandchild never hears its mystery

Or will the dreamer wake?

Here in the centre, four directions gather

The path ahead leads up or down

Is this our last bright new world birthing?

Is this our waving as we drown?

This could be our last true moment

Knowing the truth, our choices make.

Our grandchild asks “That was the moment!

And did the dreamer wake?”

ENVIRONMENT

ENVIRONMENT 

(Interview with Wangari Maathai, Environmental Activist and Nobel Prize winner) 

Wangari Maathai started the Green Belt Movement and also fought for equal rights for women in Africa. She is the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Read the excerpts from her interview with NHK Radio (Japan).

NHK Radio: How did you become aware of the environment? 

W M: From the time we started, we were trying to respond to the basic needs of people in the rural areas; and people were asking for clean drinking water, for food, for energy (which is mostly firewood), for building material, for fodder for the animals. And all these come from the land. So we knew that what the people in the rural areas were asking for had to do with the environment. They did not have those things because the environment was degraded. So, from the very beginning we understood that we have to rehabilitate the environment.

The forested mountains were the source of water and the source of rain, so when you deforest you cause a shortage of water and a change of rainfall patterns and therefore people are not able to get food and water. Therefore, in order for them to have good environment that can sustain their livelihoods, it is important to have a government that accounts to them, that protects them, that protects their interests, that is concerned about their lives. 

NHK Radio : How is peace connected to a good environment? 

W M : Many wars that are fought in the world are fought over natural resources. Some wars are fought because the environment is so degraded that it is not able to support communities and so they fight over the little that is left. Others are fought because some people want to take a lot of the resources, to control them, and to keep many other people out.

Now whether this happens at the national level or at the regional level, or even at the global level, sooner or later there is discontent; and when that discontent is strong enough, there is conflict. So good management of the natural resources, equitable distribution of these resources, is important for peace. At the same time, good management of the natural resources is not possible if you do not have democratic space, respect for human beings, respect for human rights, giving other people dignity. 

That is why the three themes are related, like the African stool, with three legs and the basin on which you sit. The three legs: one leg is peace, the other leg is good governance, the third leg is sustainable management of resources. When you have those three legs, now you can put the basin, which is development. And if you try to balance that stool without those three, it won't happen.

We have not shared our resources equitably. We have allowed some people, especially those in power, to acquire a lot at the expense of the majority. And we have also engaged in conflict. 

NHK Radio : What was the environment like when you were young, and how did you go about saving it? 

W M. : When I was a child, which is almost more than fifty years ago, the environment was very pristine, very beautiful, and very green. We were a British colony, and the British government at that time started to clear cut the indigenous forests in our forested mountains because they wanted to establish commercial plantations of exotic species of trees such as the pines from the northern hemisphere and the eucalyptus from Australia. These trees are very nice, they grow tall, and they grow very fast, but as they grow they destroy all the local biological diversity. All the flora and fauna disappeared. So although we were getting commercial timber for the growing timber industry, we also destroyed our local flora and fauna.

As a result, these forests, which were the water towers, were no longer able to contain the water, so when the rains fell the water ran downstream and ended up in the lakes and ocean instead of going down into the underground reservoir so that it could come back to us in the form of rivers. One thing we noted is that not only did the rain patterns change, became less, but also the rivers started drying up. We lost our local biological diversity. So that's a lot of damage to our environment. 

That is why in 1975, at the very first United Nations Conference for Women in Mexico, many of the women were saying, "We need food, we need water, we need clean drinking water, we need fodder for our animals." And I was wondering, what has happened? These are things that were there twenty years ago when I was a child. The environment had changed; and that's when I started this campaign to restore the vegetation and to restore the land and to rehabilitate the forests.

NHK Radio : What happened when you started working with the women? 

W M.: Well, the first time when I told them, "Let us plant trees", the women said they did not know how to plant trees. So I asked the foresters to come and teach them, but they were very complicated-they are professionals. It became very complicated for ordinary illiterate women so I told the women, "We shall use our common sense, and just do what we do with other seeds." Women work on the farms. They're the ones who plant. They're the ones who cultivate. They're the ones who produce food, so I told them that seeds of trees are like any other seeds. So if they were to treat these tree seeds the same way they treat other seeds of food crops, there is no difference. I told them to look for old broken pots even and put seeds there. They will germinate and they will know these are the seedlings from the seeds they planted and we gave them plastic bags to be able to put those seedlings and to nurture them and when they were about half a meter long then they could go and transplant them on their farms.

In the beginning it was difficult, but they soon gained confidence and they became very competent foresters. So I called them "Foresters without Diplomas". 

NHK Radio: Why do you think they responded so well to your message? 

W M: It was a need. When the women said they needed firewood and building material, we responded to that need. Plant trees; then you will have trees for firewood. In the tropics, trees grow very fast. In five to ten years these trees serve as firewood, as building materials.

Once we had planted those trees, we saw the need for them to understand why we have to have good governance; so it became important to give them civic education so that they could understand how we govern ourselves, why we govern ourselves the way we govern ourselves, why we are managing our environment the way we are managing it. Because we were dealing with the environment, we gave them education both in civics and also in environment. That made them understand clearly why they should take up the responsibility of protecting their environment-that it was not the responsibility of the government or the responsibility of somebody else to come and rehabilitate their environment on their own land. It's them; it's their responsibility. 

NHK Radio : What transformations did you see?

W M: One of the bigger transformations that I saw was that ability of an ordinary, illiterate woman to get to understand and to be able to plant trees that in five or ten years became big trees and she was able to cut them and be able to give herself energy; to be able to sell those trees and give herself an income; to be able to feel confident that she had done something for herself. That sense of pride, sense of dignity that they are not begging, that they are doing things for themselves was very empowering. That transformation was very powerful. 

The other is the transformation of the landscape. Places where there was dust, there are no more dust. There are trees, even birds and rabbits. They come back and they make the environment very beautiful. There is a shade and sometimes even dry springs come back because the water is not running, the water is going into the ground. Very profound transformation.

And the other transformation that I saw was the willingness of the people to fight for their rights; to decide that they have a right to a good clean environment; to decide that they will fight for their forests, they will protect their forests, and they will not allow corrupt leaders to take their public land. 

NHK Radio : How do you think you can influence the rest of Africa? 

W M: Our efforts will inspire other people to stop wasting their resources and their youth in wars and instead engage in creating a peaceful environment, more peaceful states.

I'm very happy about the fact that now in Africa you see new efforts of ensuring that Africans engage in dialogue, that they invest in peaceful negotiations for conflicts, that we manage our environment. We must restore our environment and try to ensure that we do not fight, because we are allowing the environment, especially the land, to be degraded; and then we fight over agricultural land and grazing land. I see a lot of hope in what is happening in Somalia, what is happening in the Sudan, what is happening in West Africa. I see a lot of African leaders encouraging each other to engage in dialogue. 

NHK Radio: What is the one thing we can do ? 

W M : For me, my greatest activity is to plant a tree. I think that a tree is a wonderful symbol for the environment and when we plant a tree we plant hope. We plant the future for ourselves, for our children, for the birds. We plant something that will last, long after we are gone.

ABANDONED (POEM) BY DR. SURAYA NASIM

ABANDONED (POEM) BY DR. SURAYA NASIM 

Abandoned to the garbage bin,

With mosquitoes and insects

eating its tiny fingers away,

Little baby crying for help

as foul smells make its play,

irradiating from disposed bacteria.

Unheard shrieks of the baby's hysteria

die in eerie silence of the night,

"An outcast of destiny"

Its labored breath

racing in quick gasps

forced lonely like crap

with cyanosed lips

sea-blue nose and finger-tips,

Its tattered and torn dirty wrap

make it shiver in freezing grasp.

A filthy black cat

edges on to the holed bin

searching for easy rats

And finds its food

tearing at the babe's hair

with their sharp teeth

gnawing at its ears

to complete their feed,

As the cat jumps in

with a screeching meow

the rats let loose

a clicking squeak

A bloody chaos ensues,

The only sin of the infantBEING BORN.

BY DR. SURAYA NASIM

The poetry Dr. Suraya Nasim writes is straight from the heart. It has no fixed pattern. It doesn’t follow any particular rule. The poems come as a flow. His poems are simple and easy to read and hopefully easier to understand. English was one of his favorite subjects in school along with science. The prescriptions he writes are from the brain but the poems he writes are definitely from his heart. He was nominated for the Booker Award in 2013.