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by Agnes Nyenopoh Dagbe (Author)
Footprints & Papa's Legacy is a portion of my life story, a life story that has its ups and downs, the good, the bad, and the ugly as described in a movie I once watched. Footprints & Papa's Legacy was intended for a multiplex, diversified audience: Western culture of USA and audience of third world country Liberia, West Africa, my birth country.
The story begins with a child of famous village parentage: mom, the daughter of the town's (Sasstown) famous Paramount Chief, regarded almost as a princess, a father taken away from illiterate parents and siblings to Nigeria by an educated uncle, and therefore the father was the only educated member of his family when he returned from Nigeria. He, a Methodist, married the famous chief's daughter in the Catholic church, a Catholic priest officiating over the wedding. The union produced three children: Joseph, Elkanah, and me. Joseph being the oldest and Elkanah the youngest. There was a fourth child who did not survive.
Our village royalty ended when Papa brought us to Monrovia, the capital city of Liberia to stay. We were now attending school with grandchildren from the USA who settled in Monrovia and named the city Monrovia and claimed Monrovia to be their city. I with my brothers completed high school and took up careers, nursing for me and accounting for my brothers.
Meanwhile, Dad, a well-educated man, now a politician, member of the House of Representatives, wanted more for his children, for his two sons, not for me. Reason given: I was a girl, a female.
In the early days, fathers were interested in the development of their sons and not their daughters. Their names lives on forever through their sons; on the other hand, daughters get married and drop their father's name. The baton was passed to me because my brothers showed no interest to receive it. So when my frustrated father passed it down to me, I grabbed it and ran with it. University education in the US landed me a UNICEF and World Health Organization (WHO) supported job when I returned home: director of the Physician Assistant Program. A call from President William V. S. Tubman who was always interested in protecting his citizens helped me on my one-month stay in the USSR. The gracious welcome given me by Ambassador Peal and his wife Blanch in London on my way from the USSR is a memorable treasure. The fake diplomat of the Guinea Embassy and what he tried to do to me in Paris is mentioned in Footprints & Papa's Legacy. Meeting candidate J. F. Kennedy on Berkeley Campus was an exhilarating experience for me. The favors of Shad Tubman, the president's son, while in Boston is also worth remembering.
Has anyone ever invited you to the residence of the ambassador of your country then kicked you out for no reason? Read Footprints & Papa's Legacy. Then there were the good Boston police officer that picked me up and carried my books. Can I forget the horse thief who was caught in the park putting my six-year-old daughter on his horse to whisk her away? And what about the Kenya student who left me on a San Francisco street, pushed me out of his car, it was 12 midnight. There is more. Read Footprints & Papa's Legacy.
My book includes the naked picture taken of me in my Moscow hotel room. A vision revealed my dad died twice before he physically died, and then there is the prediction, Liberia's civil war predicted in detail ten years before it happened.
Writing one's memories into a story for others to read is considered sharing your life with others to read and compare with their own, using your option to reject the bad and/or to embrace the good, hoping to learn from both.
