A missed phone call from my dying cousin!
…I felt guilty, but I thank God that she gave her life to Jesus Christ!
By James Kokulo Fasuekoi|Editor-Publisher
A SPECIAL TRIBUTE
My late cousin Yamah Bofa Darsee would call me at the end of her workday and we would talk for hours, only getting off the phone when one of us had to wake up early the next day for work or for an appointment.
This went on for many years while the both of us were still separated continents away when she lived in Liberia (Africa), while I domiciled in Savannah, Ga., a movie-magnet city in the U.S. Deep South.
By the time she moved to the U.S. around 2013-14, our conversation time even doubled, considering our juxtaposition. It didn’t take long when I introduced her to Martha who would later become my wedded wife.
The missed call from Bofa
But for some strange reason, just days before her passing on June 18, 2021(exactly one year ago), she called me twice, but I missed both calls. Worst of all, I didn’t return her call immediately.
It would take up to nearly three weeks before I would hear of my cousin’s untimely death via a text message from another cousin who lives in Africa. She had seen a post on social media on her death!
It was a grave communication error on my part. I had changed my phone number after returning from Africa about a month earlier but forgot to give her the new number.
Though the old phone was still partly in service via What’s Up, I acted carelessly and didn’t monitor it for a long while when I went back to work trying to make up for some lost time.
As a result, Cousin Bofa’s death left me perplexed, feeling guilty for a good while. I wondered again and again what it was that she had to say when she called. Could it have been something she wanted me to do? I asked myself.
Death didn’t give much warning!
My cousin and I usually visited Liberia just about the same period. We were both in Liberia in 2018 during the country’s national elections. And in 2021, Bofa was already headed back to the U.S. when I was arriving in April.
All the while she had no sign of any abnormality or illness. Being a nurse practitioner through a civil war that landed her family in Guinea, where she continued her practice, she was always well ahead when it came to her health plus that of her children and the family.
That’s why Bofa’s death still seems to be a mystery to many of her relatives and friends. It happened on the night of June 18, while she was still at work, away from her home in Howell, NJ, where she had resided since coming from Liberia.
Her passing was as swift as a Caribbean tornado; it came so fast without much warning! She was 51.
Yamah Bofa’s Christian life
Like most others who live in the border town of Yeala, Bofa’s parents were rice farmers and coco-coffee growers through which they raised funds to educate Bofa and her siblings.
In the center of the town, once sat a small Lutheran Church prior to the civil wars, whose congregation on any given Sunday didn’t exceed five or eight people which otherwise, indicates that locals there seemed to prefer other gods rather than Jesus Christ especially before the dawn of the 80s and 90s.
Yet, through God’s divine work and grace Bofa would accept Christ as her personal Savior plus the Baptism of the Holy Spirit at an early age, not in her home but in Ganta, Nimba County, at the Emmanuel Lutheran Fellowship center while still in nursing school.
After nursing school Bofa moved to Monrovia and joined the Paynesville Wesleyan Church, actively serving as an usher in the women’s department. Her final point of worship was with Mountain of Fire Miracle Ministries in Philadelphia, USA.
Through her, most relatives, including siblings came to know Christ Jesus and it all appeared to have been in line with God’s own plans for her life.
I first noticed Bofa’s thirt for the Word of God when she counseled me one evening many years ago. This happened over some complex dream I had. After narrating the dream, I heard her making this comment: “He reveals to redeem” referring to God Almighty (Job 12:22).
Once we got off the phone, I quickly ran for my Bible to check out the above verse. Thereafter we would discuss the Bible exchanging ideas with she and Martha lingering on the phone for hours talking about the Kingdom of God.
Though she was a very hard-working individual who eventually earned great wealth, considering the background she came from, the greatest of her wealth perhaps would be her own salvation plus bringing her family to know Christ.
Bofa cherished her family
My late cousin was someone who loved to celebrate her family which is one of many reasons I loved and appreciated her.
Having been separated for nearly a decade as a result of war, I met Bofa and her mother, Aunty Yassah, for the first time in Zorzor 1998 while I was on special press assignment, a time I was traveling with Mr. Alex Kulu who formerly headed the LRRRC, a national refugee agency.
Bofa and her mother were temporarily living north of the battled scarred city, in a shack at the old Mandingo Quarter. The community seemed frightening with the heavy presence of former ULIMO-K fighters who had last occupied the region before disarmament and electionss.
They pleaded with me seriously to try to reach our town, Yeala that was just about 8-10 miles north, to see my mother who they said, had grieved endlessly over news of my alleged “death.”
I rejected their request on security grounds and didn’t go further north but continued the journey to Voinjama, the regional capital which was our main destination.
But as I chatted with them a toddler came by, and just before I could inquire whose pretty little daughter was the girl, Yamah Bofa introduced her as “Our Stranger” she had brought into our family from Guinea. Her name was “Kadi” for short and I crouched and greeted her.
But from that moment onward Bofa kept me abreast of Kadiatou’s progress in school just as she had done in the past with the activities of her elder daughter Kolu.
In the middle of 2019, when “Kadi”, as she affectionately called her, graduated from university in Liberia, Bofa wanted me to be a part of the celebration. She emailed me dozens of colored pictures captured during Kadi’s graduation program and I posted them on my Facebook page.
Bofa exhibited deep care and love for her children, especially young Kadi who she treated like a baby.
When Kadi and her friend had to drop me off at the RIA in 2018, and both had to stay with us for hours waiting for me to board the plane before returning home, it worried Bofa. She was on the phone calling to check on us every hour and begging literally to have me let Kadi leave so she could get home and eat dinner because she hadn’t eaten breakfast since that morning.
Later, I called Bofa to joke about how she had been worried about her “baby.” And she laughed the most when I told her of how Kadi “beats her (Bofa’s) time” and how Kadi and her peer had attracted much attention from people when we stopped along the way so I could check my email. it was this type of story and fun Bofa liked for which I shall miss her.
“A life well lived but short!”
At her funeral on July 30, 2021, in the Ministerios Fraternidad Cristiana of Trenton, New Jersey, speakers after speakers variably described Bofa’s life as a life well lived although it became shortened by death!
Her Uncle Dr. Moses Galakpai who once worked as Health Minister in the government gave a brief eulogy at his niece’s funeral describing her life as “A life well lived but short!”
He framed Bofa’s life in just three sentences which is exactly what the deceased was: “Yamah knew what she wanted in life. She worked so hard to educate herself and her children. She was kindhearted and fed many people in Liberia.”
A New Jersey Bishop who preached at Bofa’s funeral also picked on the same topic as Dr. Galakpai, saying it was “A life well lived but short!”
He told the grieving audience, particularly, Bofa’s own family and children to take deep solace in the fact that Yamah got to know Jesus Christ before she was taken away.
“There’s no better way for one to die,” he said, adding, what’s important is that no one should die before his or her time.
What if Bofa’s death he said, had taken a different turn, causing her family to scramble around to give a long care, where people would say for instance “Oh, let’s fly her to Europe, or Casablanca and yet she still ended up dying.” Such a thing, added, could have even become harder for her friends and loved ones to bear.
he advised mourners “not to let the things of this world take their lives away from God.” “Everybody will die…from now, let us start preparing for heaven” he said.
He prayed against “untimely death” lurking over the horizon and made the audience recite the following after him: “I will not live a wasted life!”
Scholastic achievements
Until the 70s and 80s, most girls from Yeala Town like Bofa, were deprived by tradition of attaining western education. Firstly, native traditions at the time only viewed girls good enough to be housewives. Secondly, traditions also discriminated against them on the basis of gender.
But blessed with an uncle who was highly educated and already working as a senior medical doctor in the country, Bofa’s case became different from many girls of her time living in this region.
Her uncle made sure Bofa started on a good footing. After a brief schooling in Monrovia she was sent back to the beautiful countryside to attend the Zorzor Lutheran School, a boarding elementary school and a subsidiary of the prestigious LTI in Lofa.
Thereafter Bofa enrolled in the new Voinjama Multilateral High School and before long she was walking through the aisles of Dr. William R. Tolbert High School, an all-girls school in Gbalatuah, Bong County.
Following years of hard work, she graduated from high school in 1985 and in no time, she enrolled at Winifred J. Harley School of Nursing in Ganta, Nimba, Liberia and obtained a nursing diploma 1989. The institute has been re-named Nursing College of the United Methodist University.
Not feeling please with her achievements Bofa went to the University of Liberia where she graduated in 2012, receiving a bachelor’s degree in Sociology.
For decades she worked as a registered nurse for several hospitals and clinics in the Republic of Liberia and also in Guinea.
She left behind two beautiful daughters, Ms. Kadiatou Sabawu Barry of Liberia, and Mrs. Kolu Kortamai-Wesseh of the USA, plus a host of relatives.
Editor’s note: For the record, Global Ekklesia wishes to point out that many other great women including Liberia’s current Vice President Jewel Howard Taylor whose names aren’t mentioned in this article, came from the small town of Yeala where most girls were once deprived of attaining western education because of native traditions.
ALL PHOTOGRAPHS, INCLUDING BANNER PICTURE CAPTURED BY AUTHOR EXCEPT WHERE CITED OTHERWISE.