New Life

From a Governmental official in Chad, to impoverished refuge and discrimination in Côte d’Ivoire, to a basement apartment in the Bronx, tracing one Man’s journey...

Every Tuesday and Thursday Nadoum Bour comes to an English language class on the 11th floor of the Chanin building on 42nd and Lexington. He says ‘bonjour’ as he walks past the office, and into the classroom for the adult literacy class. Bour has been in the United States for eight months, he speaks French, a bit of Arabic and a few varieties of Chadian dialect. He does not speak very much English and has difficulty writing; chronic arthritis makes his handwriting shaky and barely legible. But Bour is determined; he attends the literacy classes, always sitting next to the other elder man in the class, Fieke, from Kosovo, who is also a refugee.

Bour is 6’3,” with a strong build and soft facial features. He moves slowly because of chronic back pain, and because he is from Chad, where people do not move with the same haste as New Yorkers. The only time he misses English class is when he has physical therapy, for his arthritis and his eyes. He has endured back pain for many years, since his days on horse and camel back as a government official in the Saharan regions of Chad. Chad is a land-locked country in central Africa, officially the Republic of Chad since its Independence from French colonial power in 1960. However, since 1965 the country has endured civil war between the North and South, countless tried rebel coup d’etats and more recently, the Darfur crisis in Sudan has spilled over the border, creating further unrest.

Bour has not revisited Chad since he and his second wife, Emilie were forced to leave in 1994. Bour had only just been appointed as the Chief Officer of the Douane, customs and taxes, when rebels, who threatened his life and seized his position, removed him. Although he came from a strong family heritage of village leaders, and had worked alongside the French as a customs official since he was 18, he was forced out, and almost killed because the Rebels wanted his desk and title, because they wanted control of the country’s imports and exports.

Chad is considered one of the world’s most corrupt countries. A few of the elements that constitute many of the conflicts we see in Africa are plaguing Chad; growing oil wealth, complex ethnic ties that transcend borders (which were created by colonization), and Presidents that aim to stay in power longer than their constitutions allow, and who will take military action when it doesn’t go to plan. Despite an ever-increasing insurgency Chadian President Idriss Deby has secured his Presidency since 1991, illustrating the long road of conflict that Chad faces.

Bour left his native Chad and his first wife to care for their home while he, Emilie and one of his sons sought refuge in Côte d’Ivoire. They knew someone who worked for the BAD, Banque pour Afrique Development, The African Development Bank normally works with micro finance and training, but somehow they managed to get Bour and Emilie into safety. According to the couple, they faced a great deal of discrimination from the Ivorian people. In the fourteen years that they resided in Abidjan neither of them were able to find substantial work; Emilie, who is 20 years younger than Bour, was able to sell fresh juices and textiles to make money for food.

Emilie, Bour nor his son were ever able to return to Chad, and because of their dire living situation in Côte d’Ivoire they made desperate contact with the one person they knew in the States. Bour’s niece had moved to New York from Paris in her youth, and was able to help them by contacting the International Rescue Committee. The IRC in the U.S. helps refugees, who are fleeing war or persecution by providing immediate aid, including food and shelter. Last August, after 14 years outside of their country, away from and unable to contact their extensive kin, they were resettled in New York City.

“They told us that it would be the most expensive city in America...but they also said it would be the easiest for transport. We wanted to be here because of our niece, she is the only person that we know.” said Emilie. “It’s good. But my English! Ah, I don’t know English.”

Emilie no longer attends the literacy classes at the IRC. She suffers from depression and anxiety, and the hour journey from their home in the Bronx to midtown increases her stress. Emilie only bore one son, who was killed a few years ago and she has suffered greatly since then. Although she knows that she is pre menopausal, she is trying to conceive a child, it is the one thing that she feels like she can create in this new life.

Emilie spends most of the day in their basement apartment in the Bronx. She buys vegetables and foufou (traditional West African staple) flour in bulk, and cooks traditional West African stews for Bour and their son, Pepe. The apartment was found for them by the IRC, a one-bedroom basement apartment, with a small living area in which they built a wall to create another room for Pepe. The exposed piping on the low ceiling echoes and clinks with use, but does not supply enough heat, as it escapes out of the thin paned windows. Emilie explains that the window allows mildew in, and that the superintendent always says he will come, but never does. Sometimes she yells as him, but he doesn’t understand French, and she can’t understand much of his English.

The apartment is cold, and there obviously isn’t enough money to buy more blankets or space heaters. The couple has been financially independent from the IRC for over two months. The resettlement aid is only for the first six months, and then the refugees are supposed to be self-sufficient. They receive food stamps, and Pepe works nine-hour shifts at a factory that produces VHS and electronic products. Bour, in his age and health is unable to work and Emilie doesn’t have sufficient English or confidence to find a job yet.

Emilie is unable to read, like, according to the United Nations Statistics Division – 87% of Chadian women. She is learning the English alphabet from the beginning, which is tiring when you are in your late forties and have not been to school, albeit a few years in primary school. Though Emilie and Bour do their utmost to create a new life here, it isn’t easy.
Emilie looks at Bour lovingly, “He used to write so well, you wouldn’t know that he used to drive around Chad in an issued Land Rover as the boss of the Douane...he has reverted back to being like a child” she said, referring to his how different he has become through the trials of the past 15 years and ability to communicate who he is, and what they need for their new life.

Writing the Epic

Gonnerman calls her book Life on the Outside the Prison ‘Odyssey’ of Elaine Barlett. The young reporter seems to have a place in our society, like Homer in ancient Greece, of telling epic stories of homecoming. In Homer’s the Odyssey we are taken on a journey with our hero, so that he might return home after 20 year of war, imprisonment and trial in order to bring social order back to his family and play the role of his lineage. Upon returning home, he discovers that it is not as he left it, and he must endure another battle to secure his role and family. Elaine Barlett fights her own war, with poverty and the Rockefeller drug laws, sixteen years of imprisonment, and emerges as a kind of hero – returning home. However, Barlett also discovers that her freedom must continuously be fought, even within her own home and within society’s blockades.

Gonnerman has been reporting on the National justice system in America for over 10 years, revealing the accounts of those who have endured the harsh hammer of American law. The stories she writes give the reader a look at the individuals who are all too often blanketed beneath terms like, ‘felon,’ ‘sex-offender,’ and ‘drug trafficker.’ Not only are we given the opportunity to see who these people are, how they entered the justice system, but also, what it is like for them to return home. Gonnerman reports on people who are marginalized by society by getting up close and personal with the folk themselves and letting them shine through in her words. Her ability to do this in a strategic manner gives the reader some understanding of the social and judicious constructs that make re-entry, or reintegration into society so difficult. Gonnerman writes for social change, using the age-old method of storytelling in order to highlight the problems in our justice system.

Gonnerman reports, like Homer in his epic tales, using a narrarative that tells the story from multiple characters’ perspectives. Gonnerman, in Life on the Outside was able to use all the characters that interact with Elaine Barlett in order to bring dimension and objectivity to her telling of the prison Odyssey. Gonnerman did this by spending more than two years up close and personal with the Barlett family, noting the food they ate, specific interactions and facial expressions. Unlike Homer, her narrative doesn’t change from third person, however she does use tools, like shopping receipts and letters from her children to color pieces of an intricately woven journey. Gonnerman’s talent for writing on the National justice system in such a human way is an inspired way of invoking social change and evading stigmatization in society.

Consuming Sunday

It was a cold Sunday in early November. Doug sat on the sofa in grey sweatpants watching Henry Fool. Rebecca was walking around the two-roomed Brooklyn apartment, in old corduroys and a sweatshirt; her mullet haircut was in disarray, and her eyes distraught. Doug shot her a helpless glance, and she slid on a long white down coat and went to the corner of Maple and Flatbush to the market, she went straight for the counter, asking the shopkeeper for Midol. She hates medication, but once a month she traipses down to the corner for a pack of aspirin, two extra-strength tablets. A young man with a doo-rag puts down fifty cents for a single Newport. She also pays in change and says ‘Shukrân’ quietly to the owner.

They hadn’t been grocery shopping in over a week. The fridge was rather bare except for some organic half n’ half, some sad looking spinach and a Tupperware with one of Doug’s homemade curry leftovers. It was his specialty according to Rebecca. He did not want to go anywhere today, and neither did she, but 20 minutes later she was showered, dressed in jeans, with her cowboy boots on – grabbing her huge leather and wicker basket from Morocco.

The Midol kicked in as she took the Q train from Prospect Park to Union Square. There are no Natural Grocers in East Flatbush. Park Slope has a few expensive, very fancy organic markets and one very functional Co-Op, but the couple had opted out from the Co-Op the day they had inquired and had been given a very serious run-down of the ‘rules and regulations’ of the community grocer. She enjoyed subway rides into the city anyway; she had only been in New York since July.

Rebecca had quit smoking in the spring. However, since Doug moved in she had been buying rolling tobacco. Doug smoked Parliaments, but was not addicted. Rebecca stopped and sat in the sun on a wooden bench in Union square and rolled a Bali shag quickly, loosing bits of tobacco to the wind.

There was a crowd in Whole Foods, but less busy than weekday afternoons, and a slower moving pace. She grabbed a rolling basket and went downstairs, starting at the cheeses because this is where she always lingered longest. She picked up different kinds, turning them in her hands, looking for the nuttiest, creamiest, and richest – but then checking the prices to compare. Normally she would buy a sharp, versatile cheddar for $4.00. But she picked up Brie, for $9.99, and put le bon homme in the basket. Whole milk and a dozen eggs for crêpes. Maple whole milk yogurt. Salted butter, imported – giving her a vision of langoustine with salty butter and fresh bread on summer days in France.

She stepped into the tea isle, and perused for a good five or ten minutes before choosing a Yogi blend, Organic Dong Qua women’s tonic is an effective and organic way to lessen fatigue, restore your energy and balance a woman’s hormones.

She always picked up pasta and sauce for the staple spaghetti bolognaise. It’s surprising she still liked pasta after having it so much growing up. Rebecca grabbed the other staple, garbanzo beans. Then she saw a can with a label saying ‘Eden Organic rice and beans.’ She loved rice and beans, and grabbed the can, half jokingly, she giggled and put it in her basket. She stopped and picked up some rice crackers with tamarind, imagining how nice and crunchy they would be alone. She was getting hungry.

The butchers were quick to help her. She hadn’t learned the direct, quick off the tongue New York style of ordering; she described softly what she wanted, a tenderloin for her Sunday roast, the best cut. No, the one below the filet mignon for $24.95 lbs.

Behind her the jams were aligned, labels perfectly lined, looking out at her. The Bonne Maman. The lovely shaped glass jars of confiture. She read one letter F of the three-letter word, and her mouth salivated as she put a jar of Fig jam in the basket without checking the price.

The vegetables were always organized and colorful, with colored men, all black, arranging, revamping the vegetable displays, smiling, and checking their watches. She always had the same battles, local or organic? In season, or exotic? She picked New Jersey tomatoes, beautiful fingerling potatoes – which remind her of her days in fine dining – a few apples for the Brie, a bright orange pepper, a bag of carrots, and a well endowed organic zucchini. She loved the spring greens in the big plastic box, hated the packaging – and always bought it. And one Costa Rican banana.

Upstairs, she squeezed her fingers around the bread to see when it was made. The baguettes were fresh baked at the perfect consistency. The chocolate was conveniently placed at the checkout lines. She sighed, as her hand moved with memory and habit to the dogoba chocolates, never below 76% dark. Rosebud or mint? Mint this time.

Her number was called and she passed checkouts 16-21, each with a pretty young, black female working the register. Rebecca’s boyfriend had recently pointed out the fact that “everyone” who worked Whole Foods was black, so far, he was spot on, except for the tall white guy with the poor complexion – but he was the floor manager.

$94.48. You saved -.20 cents on your bags. Credit or Debit? Debit. Cash Back? No.

When Rebecca got home Doug’s eyebrows raised, and he inspected her basket while she changed into comfy clothes. A banana peel was on top, she had eaten it with a few corners of the chocolate on the train-ride home. The crackers had also been opened, and one of the rows was missing. He picked up the can of rice and beans and made a face. ‘They’re not even black beans, its rice with garbanzo beans.’ He shook his head.

'Extra Sensitive' Sex Ed

IT’s a ten-minute break in a three-hour class at NYU and I’m conversing with the three other members of my group, all young women in their early twenties. We’re studying Globalization amongst a dynamic group of young students. I’m telling a story about my disappointment in a visiting Professor from last semester. One of my major qualms with the Professor is that he had brought some of the common HIV myths into our classroom. One day he had mentioned, while moving quickly from one subject to another, that condoms don’t prevent HIV transmission. I got shivers when I heard him say this, and again as I retold it to the girls in my class. All three of them looked at me, dark brown, blue and green eyes wide. Blue eyes looks at me and says, ‘That’s right.’ In a very factual tone, ‘Condoms don’t prevent against HIV.’ Green eyes blinked again and spoke in a soft tone, ‘I grew up in a really small town.’ She said, shrugging. Blue eyes continued, ‘it even says it on the package, does not prevent hiv infection, only against STD’s’ I looked at her, and took a deep breath, reminding myself that all three of them are proclaimed Christians and they have probably received their sexual education infused with fundamental doctrine, which teaches abstinence as the only way. Blue eyes could feel that I was about to refute her argument, which she was so used to executing in the classroom, and so she went on, ‘Like, in my junior high sex ed, our teacher told us that the HIV microbes are way smaller than other STD’s, and so they can, like, pass through the condom.’ Brown eyes chimed in, ‘yeah, and condom’s aren’t 100% protection anyway.’

In 2000 I lived in Tanzania and taught sexual reproductive health to high school students, as their peer. This was precisely one of the myths that we were working to eradicate during the two years I spent in Tanzania. It seemed there were generally two main problems, the first being the silence that still surrounds sexuality and STI’s and second, the Church’s damnation of Sex and Protective Education. I looked mainly at blue eyes, who had been telling me her learned truth as though it were fact. And I spoke as gently as I could, ‘HIV is a virus, and a sexually transmitted infection; it’s carried in semen and vaginal fluid. Condoms are effective against HIV and STDs. No it’s not 100%, but it’s your best chance if used correctly.’ I wanted to keep going, but I could tell that blue eyes was no longer listening, she had become uncomfortable and had reopened the newspaper to read. Green eyes had folded her legs close to her chest. Brown eyes checked the time on her portable. I looked around the room for someone to share my fear and frustration with. I wondered how many more of my peers at this prestigious school have been miseducated about the virus that causes AIDS. I balked at the fact that none of us had received sexual education since our debut as mere 13 year olds. What scared me the most is that when they went silent, so did I, class started again and blue eyes continued discussion in the same factual style. I didn’t tell them that women our age, 18-24 are at the highest risk of infection. I didn’t say that they have been victims to the false information, with no support in scientific findings that is still so common. I didn’t tell them that they can pick up condoms in the health center, durex, in purple package, our school color, and that if they read the back it would say Effective against pregnancy, HIV (AIDS) and STD’s. As my fear for our generation and the pandemic we face, I closed my eyes and prayed to God that their ignorance was safely cradled in virginity.

100 copies

How's this for journalism and social change?

Ms. Bartlett, who lives in Washington Heights, in Manhattan, met with Joseph L. Bruno, the Republican majority leader of the State Senate, who had endorsed her clemency and promised to buy 100 copies of the book, written by Jennifer Gonnerman.... —NYT

Further Gonnermania

Jennifer Gonnerman now writes frequently for New York magazine; her focus, now as ever, is on the people that society seems to barely notice (or else ostracize or demonize).

Here's a piece on food deliverymen; here's a recent piece on a home where sex offenders live. And here's her New York archive.

Documenting Life

In Gonnerman's book, Life on the Outside, it bewilders me how much detail is presented to the reader. The main character, Ellaine Barrlett's life is already extremely interesting, heart-wrenching and humanizing in its essence, however Gonnerman manages to sketch out facial features, exact times, emotions, telephone calls, what was bought and from which bodega, and from who, dialogue, and specific outfits. Her scrupulousness gives the story an even greater humanizing effect, humor, sadness... and also adds to its legitimacy.

I am perplexed at how someone else could ever write such a personal account for someone other than themselves? It is as though Gonnerman became a bar on Elaine's prison cell, a fly on the wall of apartment 13B, and a member of the family, it seems. I am extremely impressed with her ability to make the story so personal and devout to detail, while still being on the outside of Elaine's experience.