The Dragons The Giants The Women is a memoir recounting Wayetu Moore’s escape from the Civil War in Liberia. The Story starts when Wayetu’s father and grandmother throw her a big birthday party when she turns 5 years old. A Civil War breaks out in Liberia, and the family flee their home. They walk and hide for three weeks until they reach the village of Lai. Wayetu’s mother who is studying in New York travels to Sierra Leone and engages a rebel soldier to smuggle her family. The reunited family then travels to the United States.
After reading She Would Be King by Wayetu Moore, some bookstagrammers suggested that I read this book. I want to say thank you because it did not disappoint.
I loved this memoir. It is a beautiful, linear, simple, and interesting story. The story started out very slow but once the things started rolling, I could not put the book down. The book describes the first Liberian Civil War between 1989-1996. The book describes the damage done by the civil war to the people of Liberia – especially the young people who were robbed of their childhood. According to reports, the war claimed more than two hundred thousand Liberian lives in a nation of 2.1 million people and displaced a million other citizens in refugee camps in neighbouring countries. I started this book with little knowledge of the Liberian Civil war. I learnt about the Gio, Mano and Krahn people of Liberia. I loved how Moore describes the war – the Dragon and the Prince. There are moments I kept reminding myself of Moore’s age. She lived through the civil war when she was 5-7. The book is divided into two parts: Life during the civil war and life after the war in the USA.
The conversation will bend and someone will always start a sentence with: If the war had not happened..
The family’s transition and immigrant experiences in the USA was a lot to unpack. Mam’s story was my favourite part. Aside from the civil war in Liberia, the author discusses themes such as identity, relationship, friendship, racism, and family. This story is unforgettable. I think I am going to talk about it for a long time just like the other favourite books on civil war “The Girl who Smiled Beads by Clemantine Wamariya and A long way Gone by Ishmael Beah”
So we--transplanted from Liberia and Nigeria and Ethiopia, from Ghana and Senegal and the DRC, from Kenya, from Zambia and elsewhere, pushed over the ocean by those scales and gnashing teeth, some before our parents and some after, some undocumented and some the first in their families born with blue passports-we practice what it is like to be black, to be white, to be American, to be anything other than who we are. Learn the words, the customs, the rage, the ways that our parents have not been here long enough to pass down.
We took the teasing, the name-calling, the misunderstanding, the 'Didn't you ride giraffes in Africa?" the "Did y'all have houses there?" the "Africans are too aggressive" the "Y'all Africans think you're better' the "Well, you don't look African" the "When I said that thing, I was talking about other Africans" the "Does anyone in your family do 409 scams," the "Are you even American?" the "blue black" the “You sold us” the "damned Africans" the "Did they have multiple wives there” the "Do you know voodoo:" the "Why is Africa so poor." the Why do Africans smell?" the "Mutombo" the "Grace Jones" the "National Geographic the "African Booty Scratcher" the "You don’t sound like, black person' the "My parents donate to Africa" the "black people are so sensitive" the overeager "YESS, girlfriend!" the "How did you know that?" the "Where did you go to school:" the "I'm not a racist, but the "damned black people" the "But why do they have nice cars and live in the projects!" the "My mom didn't really mean that thing she said. You know how the older generation is " the "Did you get any help on this paper?" the "If you talk about being black too much, you're the racist” the "We won't be able to give you that promotion this time" the I don’t see color” - we took it all.