IBRAHIM'S GIFTS
Brignoli, Lyn Burr
IBRAHIM'S GIFTS From Greenwich to Ghana Lyn Burr Brignoli In the summer of 2000,1 received a Fulbright-Hays Group Projects Abroad grant and traveled with a group of teachers for six weeks in...
...Most Christians," he says, "don't believe in 'the spirits,' but they are described in the Qur'an both as angels and as other lower spirits...
...He waits until everyone has left the room, then leans over and says in a whisper, "I was very moved by what you said at the school today...
...I promise that I will...
...You being a Christian mother, you can help me to overcome my stressful condition...
...The spirit of the rock and the spirit of the tree did not want to move," Muhammad says...
...People walk back and forth, some interrupting to ask questions...
...I am a worried mother and I need somebody like you to keep me out of this stressful condition...
...But by courier, the cost was going to be prohibitive, in the order of $200...
...This has made all the difference, Mrs...
...Kindly direct me how to take good care of my son...
...with sunglasses, dressed in a white robe and a white hat draped in white cloth...
...What will become of my son...
...Hfter I return to Connecticut, I receive a letter, handwritten in clear block letters on one sheet of lined paper, both sides...
...The family has hired a tutor, who comes to the house several hours a week...
...One leg is a bit withered, suggesting Ibrahim suffered a stroke or some other birth trauma...
...Mrs...
...Sometimes there are deep rectangular pits nearby, as if dug for a corpse...
...I encourage her to let Ibrahim grow spiritually...
...You must encourage him in all that he can do...
...Bring him to me," I answer...
...In addition to traditional mosques, there are open-air ones where the men are lined up on mats and bend over in prayer...
...I sit down...
...Muhammad...
...The boys are dressed in bright yellow or orange shirts and brown pants...
...Can you arrange it...
...The ceremony continues inside...
...My background made me unique in the group...
...IBRAHIM'S GIFTS From Greenwich to Ghana Lyn Burr Brignoli In the summer of 2000,1 received a Fulbright-Hays Group Projects Abroad grant and traveled with a group of teachers for six weeks in Ghana, West Africa...
...These children know Allah in a way that you and 1 may never know him...
...His mother is teaching him to help around the house-washing the clothes, sweeping, and other chores...
...The director, an imam, is a tall man Lyn Burr Brignoli writes from Greenwich, Connecticut...
...I visit first- and second-grade classrooms...
...Who can account for these things...
...We spend the rest of our time at the school in various classrooms...
...Muhammad tells me they had to withdraw Ibrahim from school...
...She will give me a ball...
...People in the village are cruel to the handicapped and view them as cursed by God...
...Then, after a pause, he whispers, "I have a retarded son...
...Sister Lyn, do you know something...
...We are giving 500,000 cedis (about $83)-still, a generous amount, relatively speaking...
...Muhammad...
...God and Allah are One...
...In it she enclosed a color photograph of Ibrahim with the ball...
...She has very different features from her husband's...
...Several days later, as we are preparing to leave Tamale for the return trip south, Muhammad arrives at our hotel with his wife, a newborn infant strapped to her back, their son Ibrahim held by the hand...
...After we're greeted by the director, it is announced that we are making a donation of $500,000, a slip of the tongue that has to be later clarified...
...His own spiritual connection will be a great source of peace and joy for him...
...The students line up in rows outside the building, the tallest at the back, the shorter in front...
...Nobody will play with the ball so that it will be dirty.' And that, 'Mama send my picture to my white lady...
...Teach him the prayers...
...It is very hard," she says...
...At our hotel, we meet Muhammad, our translator and guide...
...Unlike most cities in Ghana, Tamale seems to have escaped European colonial influence...
...I had to remove him from school and wherever I went I had to move with him just to protect him...
...We visited schools and cultural centers throughout the country...
...How was your journey back home and how is your family...
...Muhammad in Tamale, Ghana, the mother of the special child (Ibrahim...
...We are asked to stand and introduce ourselves to the teachers, the imams, and the director, who are seated facing us in a classroom...
...I think they are given to us to encourage us from time to time, to help us acknowledge the invisible world around us...
...We exchange addresses, and then it is time for me to leave...
...The boy can now write a few letters and read a little...
...Thank you my dear sister Lyn and good luck...
...The names of people in this article have been changed...
...Can I do this merely by spending time with their children...
...by regular mail there were no guarantees it would even arrive...
...I would simply have to wait for someone going to Ghana who could hand-deliver the ball to Ibrahim...
...Suddenly, I feel self-conscious: I am speaking to a Muslim crowd and to imams...
...Can I tell them that even if the world does not value handicapped children, in God's unfathomable eyes they are of inestimable worth...
...He's good at them, she tells me...
...He has been worrying me about you, saying, 'Mama, send me to my white lady at the hotel...
...May our heavenly father in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ shine his blesses on you and all your family...
...If I tell you, you may think I am exaggerating things to pleased you...
...He is thirteen...
...Let hint pray and attend services...
...I know there is a school for handicapped children in Accra, the capital, but it is far away...
...We sit in an upstairs lobby...
...His own spiritual connection will be a great source of peace and joy for him...
...You are a second Christian who ever consoled me...
...If you came to know, ever since I got to understand that my son was mentally retarded, I thought over it and finally became stress which nearly developed into hypertension...
...The girls wear headscarves and long tunics over their pants...
...Mrs...
...When I ask him how old he is, he says seven...
...Allah has sent them to us to tell us something of himself...
...Meanwhile, I had contacted four mothers of handicapped children here who wrote letters of encouragement...
...In Ghana, one does not see Down-syndrome children...
...He is affectionate and gentle, and asks if I can please send him a soccer ball...
...No, no," says his father...
...At dinner, I am seated next to Muhammad...
...She says Ibrahim is handsome.' There is no day your name will not be mentioned in my house...
...God knows," she writes, "why he has linked our relationship...
...We also give a number of large plastic bags, filled with tablets of writing paper, pens, pencils, colored markers, and hard candies that we have carried with us as gifts for the various schools...
...The curriculum calls for the children to learn three languages-Arabic, Dag-bani, and English-and to study secular subjects, sacred Qur'anic texts, and cultural aspects of the Muslim faith...
...To be frank, I should have met you earlier...
...Muhammad...
...Applause, loud-loud, fills the room, and the imams are grinning at me...
...I don't want to tell you certain miracles that we had out of our knowing you...
...I had enclosed them in the package...
...After it was bulldozed and removed by construction workers, it mysteriously reappeared where it had been before...
...Our reception at the school in Tamale is almost overwhelming in its warmth...
...I make a point of calling on the girls, who seem to be treated as second-class citizens...
...He speaks Arabic and Muhammad translates...
...Several weeks later I received a second letter from Mrs...
...Children born with overt abnormalities are not allowed to live, or are hidden away, a source of shame...
...Hnthills, eight or ten feet high, stand in the grasslands of the savannah along the road from Ku-masi north to Tamale...
...I only pray that God will let you know that you have done a great work to save my life...
...It is generally thought they crossed the Sahara following the trade routes...
...I conclude my speech by saying, "Thank you for the opportunity to visit your wonderful school...
...When he was very young, children used to throw stones at him...
...I thought about that often after my return from Ghana...
...Sister Lyn, I hope you will remember me...
...Don't worry about what he can't do...
...These children are gifts," I say, and Mrs...
...Teach him the prayers...
...Muhammad writes...
...Finally, I was able to get a package to the family through a cousin who was traveling to northern Ghana for a research project...
...Look at all the things he can do," I answer her...
...I could see great devotion and also deep anguish in these women's faces...
...Muhammad looks at me in amazement...
...At first glance, Ibrahim is a handsome child, not noticeably handicapped...
...I am trying to remember exactly what I had said...
...Let him pray and attend services...
...she asks...
...At least, this has been my experience...
...I am invited to speak to the children, and they in turn are invited to ask questions...
...A child like Ibrahim may not be recognized by the village as being mentally handicapped until he is ready for school...
...I thank you very much...
...What kind of life will he have...
...A devout Muslim, he is soon deep in conversation with me about our respective religious traditions...
...Purposefully, I say Allah every time I want to say God...
...He is very difficult to control unless you apply force before he obeys...
...Some months later I receive yet another letter from Mrs...
...I teach religion to Down-syndrome children in my parish...
...At least, this is how I experience the children I teach...
...Or they see the mother as a witch who has cursed her child...
...I was so much impressed about the advice you gave me...
...Sister Lyn, many people laughed and teased the young boy to always keep my heart burning...
...I give Ibrahim a little flashlight and clip it to his belt...
...He doesn't take instructions so easily...
...The same thing happened with a tree...
...I looked into mailing the soccer ball from the United States...
...The climate becomes hotter and dryer, the growth more scrubby, as we travel farther north...
...Our driver says the ants have made the holes, using the dirt to build their anthills...
...When it is my turn, I give my name and where I live, and tell them I teach religion to mentally retarded children in a church...
...Originally, the children had the day off from school because of a teachers' meeting, but when word got around that "the foreigners" were coming to visit, the parents sent their children to school...
...His father describes how he noticed when Ibrahim was still very young that one hand didn't grasp things the way the other did...
...There are far fewer of them in the classes...
...We have manifestations of spirit in my tradition also," I respond...
...I remember wondering: Can I alleviate the suffering of these women by even one tiny drop-by bringing them the idea that they and their children are deeply valued...
...My dear Sister Lyn," it begins, "I hope by now you have returned to United States of America...
...These children know Allah in a way that you and I may never know him...
...Please I actually need more advice from you...
...She no longer feels so alone...
...Ever since we left you at the hotel, whenever I want him to behave well I will tell him, 'Please, the white lady says you shouldn't do that.' He will quickly smile and stops what he does...
...They will teach us, if we let them...
...He tells me about a rock in the town of Domango, not far from Tamale...
...In reading her letter, I find myself thinking about the time I began teaching Down-syndrome students, and about how I used to watch the faces of their mothers as they dutifully brought the children each week for religion class...
...Muhammad is a small woman, a Dagomba...
...Muslims first appeared in northern Ghana in the eighth century...
...He plays with it awhile, then asks me to remove it from his belt so that he can hold it...
...I feel frustrated, knowing that this time is precious...
...Increasingly, we pass mosques and signs in Arabic...
...ngrew up in the West Indies, and had an older friend who used to tell me, "It's pain that cracks you open-so then your real-real self can blow far away in the wind, sit down beside a person you never saw before, never even dreamed about...
...Sister Lyn, if you can kindly get me some books on how to care for such people, I would be extremely grateful to you...
...Yours faithfully, Mrs...
...It is late July...
...Please continue to write us and advise us...
...Fluent in Arabic, English, Twi, and Dagbani-the language of the Dagomba people of northern Ghana-Muhammad is highly educated and exceptionally sensitive...
...My heart is heavy as I see the pain and anger in her face, in her eyes...
Vol. 130 • April 2003 • No. 8
