“You don change di battery?” an ever-observant child asks, noticing that my head lamp is considerably brighter today than it was before.The primary school children who live next door to me have taken to coming to my porch every night to study. One 5th grade girl named Fati asked me to write something for her to read. I began to write the story of Cinderella, but then thought better of it. Fairy tales tend to be the antithesis of gender empowerment and the last thing a little girl in Sierra Leone needs is another story about a weak female character who is saved by a man and a fairy because she had the good fortune of being born beautiful. These critiques occurred to me just as I was writing “After Ella’s father died, her step-mother began to treat her very badly.”
I paused, my pen hanging hesitantly in the air. Fati was living in a society where the fairy tale premise of Cinderella was not completely foreign. It is a world where a woman’s success is often based on luck and a rich husband, but it is also a world where girls have the chance to go to school. I decided I would alter the Cinderella story to make it a tale of hard work and determination not magic and good fortune.
Over the course of a week, I added to the story a few lines at a time so Fati could read them and learn the new words. In my Cinderella story, Ella and the prince are friends, but the king forbids his son to marry Ella because she is too poor. However, after Ella wins a competition to prove she is the most intelligent woman in the kingdom the King agrees to the marriage. Granted, my story is every bit as much of a fantasy as the Grimm brothers’ version, but I think it portrays a slightly better role model for an eleven year girl.
Fati may not be the most intelligent child I’ve met, but she has character and spunk which probably counts for more in life than simple intelligence. She’s the sort of child whose determination will push her to spend an hour struggling through a few pages of a story, who loves to talk, and who will stomp on a scorpion if it happens to cross her path.
One night, the children stayed on my porch later than usual. As it was approaching 10pm, one boy named Amara noticed how dark it was and was afraid to go home. He claimed he was worried about “kid-nappy-ers” as he calls them, but really he was worried about getting in trouble with his father for staying out too late. And what better way to avoid a beating than to get your teacher to walk you home? Surely your parents can’t complain that you were out too late studying.
Thus, Fati, our neighbor Alusine, and I all walked Amara home. After we left him safely at his porch, we made our way back across the path to our own homes with the beam of my flashlight guiding our steps. As we walked, I noticed a small creature scuttle across the path.
“Wait, point back”, Fati said, meaning point the flashlight back there.
As the beam of the flashlight fell across the creature, it began to run, but Fati stopped it with her flip-flop clad foot. She stomped on the creature until it lay in a still broken heap in the dust. A scorpion, Alusine informed me. “Santem Fati no bin see em ii get fo kill mortal man. Quick wi dat tail ii de kill posin, like snake no mo.” (If Fati hadn’t seen that scorpion, it might have killed someone. It can easily kill someone with its tail, just like a snake.)
I have to respect a girl who doesn’t even flinch when it comes to slaying a scorpion. Maybe I should write a version of a fairy tale where the princess locked in the tower slays the dragon herself…
