The Moth Radio Hour: Global Stories of Women and Girls
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Hey there. We here at The Moth have an exciting opportunity for high school sophomores, juniors, and seniors who love to tell stories. Join The Moth Story Lab this fall. Whether for an aspiring writer, a budding filmmaker, or simply someone who loves to spin a good yarn, this workshop is a chance to refine the craft of storytelling. From brainstorming to that final mic drop moment, we've got students covered.

Plus, they'll make new friends, build skills that shine in school and beyond, and have a blast along the way. These workshops are free and held in person in New York City or virtually anywhere in the U.S. Space is limited. Apply now through September 22nd at themoth.org slash students. That's themoth.org slash students.

From PRX, this is the Moth Radio Hour. I'm Fatou Wouri, and I'm one of the storytellers from the Moth's Global Community Program, and I'll be your host this time. In this hour, we'll hear stories about women, stories of passion and the struggle for social justice, stories about brains over beauty, how the truth sets us free, and the cost of tradition. ♪

I first met the moth at a righteous retreat in Kampala, Uganda, and it's been a love affair ever since. I remember bursting into tears the first time I shared my story during an intimate group session. And that really was also the beginning of my wondrous journey to developing and sharing my moth story to audiences around the world, which I'm excited for you to hear later in the show.

Our first storyteller in this hour is Mary Hamilton. She told this at one of our open mic story slams in Louisville, Kentucky, where we partner with public radio station WFPL. The theme of the night was voyages. Here's Mary live at the mall. All right, thanks. We embarked on a journey toward the sea of matrimony at the perilous age of 41.

Yeah, you'd think 41, a trip to marriage would be pretty smooth, but nobody had told my family. My sister called me up and she said, "You have to order engraved invitations." I said, "I don't think so. We're having a potluck." She called again. "People are asking me what to get you for a wedding present. You have to register at stores."

I said, "I don't think so. We're combining two apartments. We've got so many duplicates. We're trying to figure out what to give away." "But they want to give you presents," she said. "We know. That's why we're having a potluck. They can all bring food." Our simple invitations went out and I received a phone call from one of my aunts.

"I'm looking at your invitation," she said, "and I see this thing about bringing a dish for the potluck, and I'm wondering, is the dish supposed to be your wedding present?" "No, no, it's an ordinary potluck. You bring the food, take your dish home. It's just a potluck." My mother developed this obsession with nuts and mints. Required for a wedding, she says, "Every table must have nuts and mints. You have to order the mints. They can color coordinate with your wedding." And finally I said, "Mom, Mom, look.

Be in charge of the nuts and mints. They can be your contribution to the potluck. My brother called. Is Charles going to cut his hair? I don't know. Well, he's going to shave off his beard, isn't he? I don't know. Well, why don't you know? If you tell him he'll cut his hair, he'll shave his beard. Well, why would I do that? Well, of course you should do that. You're going to be marrying him. I said, but it's his head and his face. Laughter

And besides, he's going to be my husband, not my property. A couple of weeks before the wedding, my father called. Mary, I don't know. He's not from around here. We don't know his people. I said, I know, Daddy. His parents were older. They're dead. I'm not going to meet him either. He said, Mary, around here, men just don't make pies. Oh.

Yes, my husband. My husband-to-be had committed the grievous error of showing up at the Hamilton family Thanksgiving bearing homemade apple pies. Yeah, not buy the crust, open a can of apple pie filling and dump it in apple pies. No, measure the flour, roll out the dough, peel and cut the apples, homemade apple pies. Yeah.

Well, finally January came and we got married. A few months later on Easter Sunday, our phone rings and it's my mother. We're on our way to see grandkids to give them an Easter basket and we thought we'd stop by your place and give you your Easter gifts if that's okay. I got off the phone, told my husband about the call and he said, "Easter gifts? Were we supposed to have Easter gifts?" And I said, "No, no, no. Something's up. I just don't know what."

For my Easter gift, my parents gave me a lovely hair barrette. For his Easter gift, they gave him a deep dish Louisville Stoneware pie plate. Yeah. It was the closest I knew my parents would ever be able to come to saying, "You were right. We were wrong about him." It has been 20 years since that Easter.

My sister finally got to order engraved invitations when her own daughters got married. My brother still holds to the point of view that it is perfectly okay for others to legislate what people should do about their bodies even when they do not inhabit those bodies. My mother is now probably making sure everyone she shares the afterlife with are enjoying nuts and mints. Me and Charles

We're still enjoying sailing on that sea of matrimony. Him with his long hair and beard, still wearing it. And me, wearing a few extra pounds thanks to 20 years of fabulous homemade pies. That was Mary Hamilton. When asked how many years she's been married, Mary and her husband replied, "Not long enough." I think that's pretty cute.

Mary Hamilton loves listening to stories and pondering what makes a tale well told.

Our next storyteller is Esther Gumbi. She's from Kenya. And like myself, Esther is also a storyteller from the Moth's Global Community Workshops, where activists, writers, influencers, and leaders in communities living outside of the U.S. tell their stories. I can definitely relate to Esther's story. Her mother and mine seem to have a lot in common. They're both pretty strict. Here's Esther, live at the Moth.

My mother was born in Machakos, Kenya, a region that valued learning, a culture that emphasized to girls that they needed to put education first before everything else, including beauty. She pursued her education to the very end. She ultimately graduated with a diploma and became an elementary school teacher.

So, when she raised and gave birth to us, her five children, she made sure we understood that schooling would always come first. But you see, she was raising us in a different region. She was raising us in the Kenyan coast.

simply because during her time, it was the government of Kenya that would decide where newly fresh trained teachers would start their career. And in the Kenyan coast region, people appreciated beauty from the tender age and they emphasized less on education. In my community, girls were very beautiful, and I mean very beautiful.

Their ears were pierced and so were their nose. They put on mascara and they painted their legs and feet with henna. And I admired them day after day. And the more I admired them, the more I felt the need to blend in. I wanted to pierce my ears so badly. So from the age of six to the age of ten,

I kept on questioning my mother. I said to her, "Mama, can I have my ears pierced?" And year after year, her answer would never change. "Education first, beauty later," she would say. But you see, teenage years were fast approaching, and the need to look beautiful so as to attract the attention of boys was beginning to grow in me.

And all my friends had their ears pierced, and of course they had their boyfriends. I did not have none. And I blamed it all on my unaccessorized face. Thanks to my mother. On the weekends, my friends would come to play. And half of our playtime was filled with stories about their first teenage boyfriends.

how they were feeling so appreciated by these first loves. And of course, I had none. Then one Saturday morning, my friend Wanasha and other friends came to play with us. And this Saturday morning, she was looking beautiful. You see, she was wearing her brand new earrings.

They were round with a gold tone and with many sparkling beads. Oh, she looked beautiful. And those earrings were just popping against her beautiful light skin color. And I remember Mwanasha did not want to play with me as usual. She wanted to tell me something. So she pulled me aside and she started whispering into my ears. Oh, I got my first boyfriend. The kiss, oh,

These boys making me feel so loved. And on and on she talked. And I remember halfway feeling very angry. Angry at my mother. Why wasn't my mother allowing me to look like my friends? And I remember saying, enough, enough. I was going to pierce my ears. But you see, I was growing in a village where there's no Walmart or Claire's to go to.

get my ears pierced. So I had to do it the old school way, which is self-piercing with a needle and a thread. So I start assembling the tools that I would need to accomplish this dangerous beauty mission. I go to my parents' bedroom where the sewing kit is kept. I grab a middle-sized needle and

and I grab a thread, a black thread. I also grab a wall mirror that I would put on the wall to make sure that I pierce my ears at the right position. And I decide that the bathroom is the most safest place for me to pierce my ears, so I take my kit and off I go. I lock the door, and I take the needle, and I put the thread, and I put the wall mirror so that I could see what I was doing. I start pushing the needle, and...

pain but my pain is overshadowed by the beautiful Esther I'm imagining I will look like. Oh, my first kiss, my first boyfriend. After a minute, the needle pierces through my earlobe. I tie the thread and I repeat the process. I push, I start pushing again and after what seems like eternity, my second ear is done. I take a big sigh and

and take a minute to appreciate my beautiful me. I also decide that I need to hide my piercings away from my mother, so I decide I'm going to wear a head wrap. But my small brain does not realize this is actually going to make me stand out in front of my mother. But I do it anyway. It's 6 p.m., and my mother returns from her church event.

I go run, I grab her bag, I hug her, and I see her take a glance at my head rub, but she says nothing. So I assume we are cool, everything is okay. An hour later, dinner is ready, and I must serve it. I serve it, and I take my seat on the table.

We all eat peacefully until the last minute when I'm just about to put the last bite on my mouth. My mother calls my name. I begin to tremble and I drop the food that I was about to put into my mouth. Is there any reason why you have a headscarf? And before I can blink, she is right behind me. She pulls the head wrap. And before I can even blink, she slaps me twice.

And she proceeds to ask one of my sisters to go get a pair of scissors. And I'm just explaining myself, Mama, I just wanted to look beautiful. And before I know it, she slaps me again. And before I can blink, she takes the scissors and cuts the thread and just yanks them out of my ears. Mama, if you really want and love me, why? Why don't you want me to look beautiful? At this point,

She stops punishing me. She wants to talk. She takes a big sigh. She tells me about her girlfriends, who had put beauty first and what ended up becoming of them. Today, they were mothers with many children and living in abject poverty. She did not want me and my sisters to turn out like her girlfriends. She wanted the best for us.

As she's talking, a switch is flipping. I'm telling myself I must prove to my mother that I'm not like her girlfriends, that I am empowered and committed enough and self-confident enough to pursue my education and not allow beauty to distract me. Today, I proceed on. I go to elementary school. I finish it. I finish my high school.

And also go to university. Today, I have a PhD in entomology. I also have four sets of ear piercings. And my nose is pierced too. And I share a beautiful relationship with my mother. Thank you. And that was Dr. Esther Gumbi. When I asked her what she defines as beauty, she said...

Beauty is the hidden potential in people that can shine so bright that it becomes hard to ignore. To see photos of Esther looking beautiful in her lab with all of her piercings, go to themoth.org. Next up is a story from John Howe. John is the only male teller in this hour. He makes his wife the heartbeat of his story and she in turn fills him with strength.

John told this at a moth story slam in Seattle, where we partner with public radio station KUOW. The theme of the night was dedication. Here's John live at the moth. So out of the blue one morning, my wife is stricken with a series of grumball seizures. And shortly after that, we have a diagnosis of brain cancer. She has a brain tumor. Fast forward 17 months.

And at this point, she's in bed. Our son has come back from Humboldt State. He's helping care. And we're still trying to keep her alive, seeing if the next protocol of drugs might start to turn the tide. But nothing has turned the tide in 17 months. And so at this point, we'll hold...

popsicle to her lips or something to keep her hydrated or I'll have a bowl of apple juice or I mean applesauce and we'll hold that to her lips and she brain tumors sometimes impact speech centers she hasn't been able to talk very very little and she's her eyes have been closed she's laying there and and

So we'll hold the spoon to her lips and see if she'll respond and eventually she'll take a taste of it. And in our marriage, when we felt intimate, I would fall in love with her so many times and I would say to her, marry me. And she would usually say, I don't think my husband would like that. Or, you know, she'd say, okay. But

If you're lucky, you get to say I love you to a lot of people. And also if you're lucky, you get to say marry me to only one. And that was our words. So she hasn't said anything. I'm there next to the bed. I'm holding this applesauce to her lips. And she eventually opens her mouth and I'm looking at her.

And I keep looking at her, and I'm just shaking my head and thinking of our 24 years. And I'm saying, marry me. And I go back to my applesauce, and I hear, okay. And those were our last words. So if you have a beloved in your life, you can't know what you've got until it's gone. And ask her to marry you again, or him. Thank you.

That was John Howe. John is a sailor and an adventurer. He says, "I'm a father, son, friend, and brother. I was a husband. And even when each breath hurts, I'm still a lucky man." To see a photo of John and his beautiful wife Christine, please go to themoth.org.

When we come back, a story told by a teenager who must come to terms with her medical condition when The Moth Radio Hour continues. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and presented by PRX. This is The Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Fatou Wouri.

The stories in this hour are all about women. They are rooted in the fight for what is right and our innate ability to give love to those around us. It is in these actions, the fighting and the giving, that we're able to speak truths, have breakthroughs, and transform pain into power. Our next storyteller is Emily Racinos. She told this story at one of our high school grand slams.

The theme of the night was "When Worlds Collide." Here's Emily, live at the Moth in New York City. When I was like in first or second grade, I was trying extremely hard to fit in with this group of girls at my school. Now, what were these girls like? Well, they wore mini skirts. They thought that you needed to be dating, even though you were in the second grade. You needed to have a boyfriend.

Like I thought that came on came later in life, but not to them So I would try to blend in with them But there was one thing that made it really hard for me to blend in with these girls And it was the fact that I had this like giant lady walking behind me everywhere I went all day every day and She like casted a shadow over me like I remember like walking in front of her and like in her shadow Her name was Miss Johnson. She would like even shake a little bit when she got nervous. Oh

But she was really nice, but I either had to put up with her or I had to use this thing called the blind person stick. Now I knew the technical terms for it, but I wasn't going to call it that. I was just going to call it the blind person stick. And I figured that if I used this, everyone in school would label me as the blind girl. And that was exactly who I did not want anyone to see me as. So I dealt with the big lady instead.

And I had to deal with these things because I was diagnosed with conval dystrophy, which is an eye condition that involves you gradually losing vision very, very slowly. And at home with my parents, I would also try to pretend like nothing was going on, but they were like my parents, so they kind of knew what was happening.

But my little brother, who's two years younger than me, he was like six at the time, he would always be so lost in his video games and like Pokemon and Bakugan. He was always on his computer or Nintendo or whatever. So I was like, well, that's one less person I have to worry about.

So also with my relatives and stuff, like cousins, aunts, uncles, et cetera, I was also trying to pretend like everything was cool, nothing was happening, everything's perfect in life.

And then one day, all of my cousins are, like, gathered together, and they're outside, and they're like, we're going to play soccer. So me, being so smart and logical and not realizing that I have this eye condition, like, what I could see six months ago, I probably can't see now. So anyway, I still say I'm going to play this game. So they start playing soccer, and at some point during the game, I see, like, my cousin, like,

kick the ball in my direction. I'm like, "Okay, good." He's like counting me in the game. But then I lose sight of the ball because there's not enough contrast between this ball and the floor. So I'm kind of standing there like, "Oh my God, where is this ball?" I really just wanted someone to tell me what this ball was. So I'm trying to pretend that I'm not like an idiot and that I knew where this ball was.

So I know everyone's staring at me and all of a sudden like I hear my little brother somewhere in the background yell, "It's because she's blind!" And I just like felt my heart stop and like the world stopped and I was like, "Oh no, no, he didn't. He didn't say that." So I felt so, so hurt. I felt like he had slapped me in the face.

So I run up to him and I either like hit him or pushed him. I don't know. I did something to him. And so obviously, because he's like six, he starts crying. And then my mom comes out and she's like, oh, what happened? Why'd you hit your brother? And I'm like, well, he said I'm blind. And she kind of just looked at me like, um, okay, but you still don't need to hit your brother. And then she left. And I was just kind of there like, that's it. That's all you're going to say. I don't need to hit my brother.

So I kind of realized that, you know, my brother is really present in my life. He's not just in the background somewhere. So I kind of decide that I need to tell him what's going on. So I sit down with him and I tell him what my eye condition is and everything. And then I kind of let that settle in his mind for the next couple of days. And I come back to him and I'm like, so Wilfredo, my brother,

"What does blind mean to you?" And he says, "Blind is when you can't see at all, but you're not blind because you can still see a little bit." And then I kind of realized at this moment, like, maybe me trying to hide it so much is only really hurting me, and I would do myself a huge favor if I kind of started telling at least a little bit of people about it. Thank you.

Emily Racinos is now studying international relations at New York University. When I asked Emily what she's learned since being open about her progressive blindness, she said, "Blindness doesn't have to be an off-limits topic. She wants people to understand a sensitive issue in a way they otherwise wouldn't." Our next story is from Anne Moral. We met Anne in a global community workshop that was focused on stories of women and girls.

And this story was recorded in what we call our final share, where the workshop participants tell their stories for feedback in a very small group. There were only 25 in the room at the time. Here's Anne in Kenya. It's two years ago. I'm driving home from work, as you should. And...

It's Nairobi, so on a three-lane road, there's about 10 lanes happening, which is fine. It's normal. And as I'm driving, a car, which is overlapping, hits me, hits the car, hits my car. And it's a very gentle love tap. It's just like a whisper of an accident. And

I was going to just brush it off. It's the kind of thing where you know it's not even really going to show a scratch. But the man driving rolls down his window and starts shouting at me. Like, women drivers, why can't you keep the... And I'm furious. Like, he...

He did that. And then he hit me and he's screaming at me and he's driving past me slowly in traffic, still shouting obscenities at me. And I'm so angry. My hands start shaking. I'm holding the steering wheel. So what do I do? Nothing. I just sit. And a memory comes to mind. Since I was a kid, I used to be this tantrum-throwing kid. I was the kind of kid who adults were scared of. And

Something you learn very quickly if you're an angry kid, particularly an angry black girl, is that you should not grow up to become an angry black woman. At best, you'll be irritating. At worst, you will get killed. So right from an early age, I was told how to sit up straight, how to be quiet, how to bury that anger down and keep it within myself. And I'm nine years old, and my mom brings home sausages, a packet of 12. And...

I need to clarify that I love sausages. I know you're laughing. No, no. I loved sausages. And I have two brothers, one older by eight years, one younger by two. And once the sausages were brought home, as growing up, you know, to be a lady of decorum, we called a referendum about the sausages. We had a long discussion.

And we decided collectively that of the 12, I would get two, they would get 10, we would get up at 8 a.m. the next day on Sunday morning to make them together and eat them while watching cartoons. It was a very clear agreement. And I go to bed and I wake up and I smell sausages. And I'm so excited. Like my brothers love me so much. They decided to make the sausages for me. I don't even have to cook.

They go downstairs and they're sitting full, very full, on the table. And they're looking at me with the empty plates in front of them. And I feel the rage. My hand is shaking, but I'm a lady of decorum. And I ask, so where's my sausage? And my brothers just look at me and they're like, no, it's over. Nothing else.

This is when my memory fades to white. I remember only that I found, I had a wooden spoon in my hand, and my six-foot, 17-year-old brother was running away from me, and I am screaming. I hear my mother running down the stairs. She comes out, and she's like, hey, what are you doing? She gives the threat she always gives us as siblings when we fought, like,

Whoever wins, I'm going to spank, then I'm going to spank the loser next. But I don't even care. I'm so mad. And I look at her and in fits of rage and being so upset, I'm like, we agreed. And they eat the sausages and it's not fair and it's not right. And I'm so furious. And my mother listens. And when I'm finally calm enough for her to understand, she pauses and looks at me and says, okay, Haya, do it.

Yeah. The joy. The joy of the Lord granting you the gift of smiting your enemies with righteous anger. I was so happy. I was chasing them around the house and they could do nothing to me because I knew I was right and my mother said so, so there. And I'm back in the car shaking with rage and looking at this guy who's now driven past me

After he'd shouted at me and I hear it again. Okay. Hiya. Do it. Get out of the car. I walk down the highway. My door is open. My bag is hanging out. Money. I don't even care. And I go to his car window and I grab it. Like, hey, where are you going? You can't just hit me and drive off. The man is like, what is happening? I'm like, no, you can't do that. Park there.

Starts screaming instructions, telling everybody on the road what to do and how to do it. Watch him! Watch my car! Get the police! Da-da-da! We get off the side of the road and he tries to shout me down.

And at that moment, I was not a lady of decorum. I was that angry nine-year-old girl being like, you will not talk to me that way. Excuse me, I have been doing this since I was born. You want to have a shouting match? Lego. And we shouted each other until he finally pauses and he's like, okay, okay, okay, fine, fine. Madame, what do you want? And I wanted the same thing then that I wanted when my brothers took those sausages. I wanted an apology. And just like them,

He looked at me and said, "Okay, I'm sorry. Thank you." That was Anne Morao. We met Anne through her work with Zana Africa, where she educated girls on their sexual reproductive health and rights.

Anne is a Kenyan, a feminist, and a creative writer who beautifully describes anger as "inevitable. It is how you use it that counts." Instead of a photo, Anne sent us an illustration of herself that she loves. And to see that, go to themoth.org. When we return, we'll have a story from me about my grandmother. And it's a complicated one. When the Moth Radio Hour continues.

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by the public radio exchange, PRX.org. You're listening to the Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Fatou Wouri. This hour is all about women, and it's time to share a story I told. So with that, here I am, live at the Moth in New York City. My mother always says...

If you don't know where you're going, know from where you come. I was at a point in my life where I didn't feel as connected to my roots and I certainly didn't know where I was going. And so after several years of living abroad, I decided to return to my home country of Sierra Leone.

I was particularly excited to see my grandmother. She had raised me up until age three. She was the matriarch of our family. She was bold and vivacious, and she was the glue that held our family together. And so when I finally made it to Sierra Leone, the first person I went to see was her, my grandmother.

I remember driving up to her house where I had grown up and it didn't look as big as I remembered it. And there was my grandmother standing by the doorway and she didn't look as big as I remembered her. She stood there a little frail, but it didn't matter. I ran to her embrace and just hugged her and held her and inhaled her scent. I was finally home.

I spent that weekend with my grandmother and my cousins and my aunts and we're catching up, we were cooking and eating and laughing and they're reminding me that my name isn't Fatu, it's Fatu and you know, learn to say your name. And I also got to learn that my last name had roots, had ancestry, had home.

My cousins and I were getting to know each other again, and they did say to me that my grandmother wasn't her usual self, that she wasn't as lively or as outgoing, that she was a little bit more withdrawn. So one afternoon, I went to my grandmother's room and I lay beside her, and I said, "Grandma, what's wrong? Everyone says you're not as jovial, you're a little withdrawn, you're a little quiet. What's going on?" She simply turned to me and said, "Fatu, when the heart is full,

It cannot speak. In that moment, I had to remember that my grandmother had endured 11 years of civil war, that she had lost her husband, my grandfather, to the war, that she had lost her only two sons, my two uncles, to the war, and that most recently she had lost her eldest daughter, my aunt. I had to remember why my grandmother was so tired. And so I just edged closer to her,

once again inhaling her scent. A couple of days later, my mother and I returned to the capital city, Freetown, and listen, I hadn't lived with my mom for a minute. And we were getting reacquainted with one another.

She didn't appreciate that I didn't have hair, I was bald, she didn't appreciate my pierced nose. Apparently I was really loud and she would say things like, "This is not the daughter I raised." And I'd be like, "But Swami, this is who I am, accept me." And we would just back and forth, back and forth. It was awkward. But every Sunday we would have dinner together and we'd try to get to know one another and understand one another or something.

One Sunday, we were having our usual mother-daughter dinner when I got a call from one of my aunts. I picked up the phone and she said, Grandma, don't go. I could feel my mother looking at me and so I turned to her and said, Mommy, Grandma, don't go. Grandma is gone.

My mother quickly stood up from the table and said, okay, go to the spare bedroom, open the second drawer, pack everything that you see in there, pack your bags, and let's go. And so that's what I did. I went to the spare bedroom, I opened the second drawer, and I found all this white material, linen, chiffon, cotton, and recognized that my mother was preparing for this day when her mother would go.

I quickly packed everything that I saw in a bag, and then I packed my bag, and in 20 minutes, my mother and I were on our way to our mother's, my grandmother's house. The only thing I really remember from that night is as we drove up to my grandmother's house, the moon shone so brightly, and it was the only light that lit the entire street that was usually filled with life and joy and noise.

When we arrived, we got our bags, and the minute we entered my grandmother's house, my mother dropped her bags to the ground and let out a howl that could only come from the depths of her being. Her mother, my grandmother, was gone. My aunts rushed to my mother's side, and she sobbed in their arms, and I just stood there and watched.

My aunts took my mother towards my grandmother's room and some of my aunts went in and then my mother went in and as I was about to enter my grandmother's room, one of my older aunts came and shut the door in front of me. I said, "Antin, what's going on? I want to go inside. Mummy is inside. I want to participate in washing grandma's body. This is the most intimate part. I want to go inside. Why did you close the door?" My aunt just looked at me and said, "Fatu,

I cannot let you in that room. You're not a society woman. I knew what she meant.

She meant that I hadn't gone through Bondo, and Bondo is what we would formally know as female genital mutilation or circumcision. And the reason I hadn't gone through Bondo is because my grandmother, who is a chief Sowee, and Sowee is a female leader that does the initiating of young girls into the society of Bondo, had decided that I and my sisters would be the first girls in our family and in our community not to go through Bondo.

But her decision meant that I was now on the other side of the door, and I could not enter. I saw that my aunt would not relent. And so for the first time since coming home, I felt like an outsider, and I had to walk away, a little sad and a little disappointed. The next day was my grandmother's funeral, and in the morning, the entire community came to pay their final respects.

They had washed my grandmother's body and had laid her in the center of her living room, and she looked so regal and beautiful and at peace, wrapped in white.

I went to her bedroom and just sat for a moment trying to feel her presence perhaps for the last time. And I was lost in my thoughts when seven young girls, no older than 10, all rushed with all this energy into the room wearing big colorful skirts and they were decked in like white clay masks and they had so much energy. And for a moment there, they lightened the mood. And so I just watched them play.

A couple of minutes later, one of my older aunts walked into the room and said to the girls, hush, get yourself together. We have to go. And so I turned to my aunt and said, auntie, what's going on? We're about to bury grandma. Where are you going? She said, listen, in order to bury your grandmother, we need to take these girls to the bush and initiate them so that grandma can rest in peace. What do I say to that? My grandmother is a chief sowee.

In order for her to rest in peace, these seven young girls must go to the bush and be initiated. This is how I wanted my grandmother to go, the woman that I loved so much. So what do I say? And so I stood there silently and watched as my aunt took the seven young girls away to the bush.

A couple of hours later, I was told that we were ready to bury my grandmother. And so I walked outside with the entire community. My mother, as per the ritual, walked towards my grandmother's body for the last time and sprayed perfume on her body, turned her back, and walked away. I stood there with everyone else and watched as they hoisted my grandmother to her grave.

And in that moment, I had to realize that the place I come from, it's strong, it's bold, it's brave. This is the place that my grandmother came from. And my grandmother made the decision to give me this gift to say that I and my sisters would not go through Bondo. Therefore, her decision meant that wherever I decide to go in this world,

Whatever I decide to do in this world, I would be a different kind of girl. Thank you. That was a story I shared at a Moth main stage in New York City. I've told this story several times in several places, and each time it feels a little different. As you've heard, this is a complicated story emotionally. And I talked to my Moth coach, Sarah Austin-Ginesse, about that.

Getting to the ending of the story was difficult, wouldn't you say? Yeah, it was tough to find the right balance. What are some of the things that you were grappling with? I think for me, it was the story. It wasn't neat. I didn't have a happy ending to share with you. And so as apprehensive and as uncomfortable as that space can be, it was also really, I think, exciting for me. I was able to discuss it.

delve into new territory. And you stood with me on that. What can you say on the tradition of Bondo and how it still exists in community?

It's still deeply embedded in our community in Sierra Leone. 98% of Sierra Leonean women have undergone bondo. So you can't dismantle that through some development program over 5, 10 years, right? It's ingrained in our cultural, spiritual ways of life. And I have never been explicit about my experience.

my views on Bondo just because I recognize that my grandmother was a very big part of this culture. But I know, I believe it's not, it doesn't have a place in today's society. The other part of the story that was always so striking to me is the moment when you say the young girls are taken to the bush to go through Bondo and you say, "I wanted my grandmother to rest in peace and I didn't say anything."

Is that still a moment that you reflect on? I've spoken about this moment with my mom so many times.

Because I didn't understand why we had to do that. And I understood why I didn't say anything. I don't agree. It's not my proudest moment, but it's part of that honoring despite and regardless of your culture. And recognizing I really didn't have much of a say or power in that space. And my take on it has always been that as someone who hasn't gone through it, I don't have answers to this.

But all I offer through storytelling is how I heal and unpack the issue, but also bring nuance to it. I never imagined the first time I met Sarah and the Moth team in Uganda that I'd be sharing such an intimate part of my life with hundreds of people and now with listening audiences from around the world. It has truly been a humbling experience.

From our hearts to the microphone, our stories hold the love that can transform lives. And that's it for this episode of the Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time, and that's a story from the moth. ♪

Your host this hour was Fatou Wourie. The stories in this hour were directed by Michaela Blyde, Jennifer Hickson, Sarah Austin-Ginness, and Larry Rosen. The rest of the Moss directorial staff includes Catherine Burns, Sarah Haberman, Jennifer Hickson, and Meg Bowles. Production support from Timothy Liu Lee and Lola Okosame.

The Moth would like to thank the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for their support of the Moth Community Program, as well as Andrew Quinn and Rachel Stretcher from the Aspen Institute. Moth stories are true, as remembered and affirmed by the storytellers. Our theme music is by The Drift. Other music in this hour from Regina Carter, Boombox, and Mikasa. The

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by me, Jay Allison, with Vicki Merrick at Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. This hour was produced with funds from the National Endowment for the Arts. The Moth Radio Hour is presented by PRX. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching us your own story and everything else, go to our website, themoth.org.