I was privileged to participate in a year-long international exchange programme that drew young adults from 88 nations of the world some 24 years ago. One among the objectives was to build the bridges of understanding among the world peoples. Today, I try to imagine the world without this exposure and I see clearly how myopic my perspectives would have been. I befriended those who spoke a language I did not understand, like beams and rivets of a bridge, affinity got shared amongst the unlikely peoples who practised faiths that often are in collision as a result of cultural influences ÔÇô from the Far East to the Great West, from Latin America and across Africa; we were all bonded by a common belief of seeking to understand the perspective of each other’s culture and correct stereotypes our socialization ingrained on our minds from early childhood. Bridges cast across the divide of race, cultures, nations and class brought about abiding peace for all of us spread across Canada and the United States, thanks to the Mennonite Central Committee’s sponsorship.
Bridges allow us to cross from one side of the river or lake to another end to discover what lies therein. The discovery is always an enchanting experience to suddenly learn that what you’ve known is not the absolute truth. This reality is best wrapped in the axiom “Go tsamaya ke go bona” (to see, travel the world)! Where we may drown in the deep, dark waters, bridges help us to reach the shore safely.
Walls on the other hand, shield us from gusty winds and storms. Yet boundary walls or “stop nonsense” as commonly referred to in southern Africa, prevent the neighbourliness spirit from thriving. Behind the tall walls that are meant to provide security against unwanted intruders, therein lies an unforeseen blight: meanness. Vicious pit bulls are trained to kill, rifles are loaded to end human life at no second thoughts. Females are exploited in unregistered brothels, while freight of illicit drugs and substance are kept safe behind the ring-fenced walls. Without a tip-off that could lead crime-busting agencies against these illicit businesses, the walls have provided a haven for shady dealings.
But President Donald J. Trump has lived up to his campaign signature ÔÇô to construct a wall along the United States and Mexico border. Similar to Botswana and Zimbabwe border situation, the poor economic and recalcitrant political state of Mexico has over the decades, led to a soaring influx of illegal migrants into the land of the American people. It is not the duty of anyone who is non-American to dictate for them the morality of how they must ensure their borders are safe. Self-protection is a right that every nation must enjoy, and if tightening border controls is a definite way to make sure undesirable elements are kept at bay, so be it. Notwithstanding the enjoyment of this right, targeting certain nations and blocking anyone from such nations as in the case of the “terror-prone nations” including Syria, Somalia, Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Sudan and Lybia has stretched the understanding of self-protection. Particularly worrisome is the ban on refugees from these countries that President Trump fears are led by fundamentalist regimes with no record of respect for human rights.
Refugees are people fleeing from persecution. These are not migrant workers who have a choice to live in their country of origin. They may be aliens, but total rejection of people in need, rejection of souls crying out for justice is un-American for if we were to rely on historical facts, the United States we see today was made possible, thanks to the hospitality of the Native Americans (Red Indians) nearly four hundred years ago. The Europeans fled religious persecution in England, the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland when they found the natives who assisted them to acclimatize to the harsh winters of North America. Imagine they were not welcomed in their large numbers ÔÇô what would have become of the white land we see today that President Donal J. Trump and his kin are regarded the majority citizens?
Hospitality is a virtue that is diminishing steadily in this fast-paced world we inhabit, not just in America. I live behind tall boundary wall in the affluent Village suburb. On 31 December 2013, God presented my family with both a challenge and an opportunity. Five boys aged 11 through 13 knocked on the gate. My then five-year old son and I walked up to see what was tapping on the metal gate that we could not see. There are lots of monkeys in the area. There they were: scruffy little boys asking to be fed. We reckoned the cows had come home to roost. We could not look in the other direction even without a dependable donor or financial muscle to do more than a bowl of pap and meat to improving their lives. As Christ-professing followers, the scripture: “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you took me in, I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you visited me,” flashed across our minds with profound impact as we considered on the best response to the plight of the five boys.
Sending them back to the classroom (Ya-skolong) was our first response to the needy boys because Nelson Mandela once said: “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” We knew not to tell a lie that there was a way around life without education, for we emerged from poor family backgrounds because of education. My family convinced the school administrators that these boys were victims of circumstances and in January 2014, all five boys were sitting inside the classroom after three years of having slipped through the system.
While we had adjusted our monthly budget significantly to accommodate our new members, their peers were liking the transformation and one day, our homestead was teeming with 45 children and youngsters from similar backgrounds needing assistance. They formed a choir and sang their hearts out to the Lord, when suddenly their love for music gave them the courage to ask to play instruments, which we had none at the time. We sent word forth to our friends of three decades and flew to Canada and the United States to collect gently used instruments for an orchestra ensemble. The music project aimed at keeping youngsters, who have had a rough patch to stay focused on acquiring a vocational skill, was founded on the backs of the initial five deprived boys, who came to our doorstep asking for a simple gesture of food. Months later, a nonprofit called Little Eden’s Justice and Peace Centre came into existence and it traces its humble origins from that one encounter with strangers.
The music project has been the most phenomenal intervention as a way to while time and creatively engage in constructive activity that gives them a sense of belonging by bonding into a community, while increasing their confidence levels. As an after-school program, it allows children from poor family backgrounds to enroll in music education free-of-charge as caring instructors continue to give of their time to help steer them in the right pathway.
United States has abundant resources to equip refugees with necessary skills to eke a living; America has the means to empower asylum seekers from oppressive situations to rise above the odds, and truly the U. S. has the facilities necessary to help these victims of warfare and political repression regain their self-worth to become the best they can become. But under President Trump, such people will not have a chance. What a shame and what a pity that a nation built on puritan ideals would shrug off the teaching of the Master and Lord when he shows us how to treat those who are different from us and how to show hospitality to those who are strange in our community.
But this is why the metaphor of the wall and bridge is important to employ. The initial five boys told us of how our neighbours who are held in high esteem have come out of their houses disturbed by the knocks, only to set vicious dogs after helpless boys for begging from the well-off. The five boys have shared the burden they carried from within of how certain individuals who bask in the glory of progressive society have pulled out rifles to scare them away. Even as the boys were knocking on ours that New Year’s Eve, they did so at their own peril. That is the effect of the walls we hide behind in the enjoyment of self-protection or to “stop the nonsense” from contaminating our purity that is our nuclear family. When Mexican mothers and children fleeing from all sorts of repression and economic hardship cry out on one side of the tall wall, their wails will be met by gunshots, shattering their hopes for a better tomorrow in the land of the freed, the land of the braves.
If there is any credit that President Trump must receive; it is to be consistent and dependable to those who elected him because they wanted to retain the white supremacy by ensuring that the immigration protocol that has been lax with Mexicans is no more. Besides, blocking freedom seekers of all kinds is un-American because that was the basis upon which the mighty nation was founded. As the ban comes into force on the seven nations ÔÇô the world peoples might need to spare kind thoughts for children, men and women who have neither instigated, nor participated in the atrocities that led them into the chaotic situation, where they must flee and seek refuge elsewhere. These people will be using many bridges to get across the expanse of waters in between, but the walls stretching two thousand miles will block them from reaching the Promised Land. Refugees are not criminals. They are people in need.
*Author is Founder and Chairman of Little Eden’s Justice and Peace Centre, [email protected]
