【147-149】Mother of Boko Haram Leader Speaks Out

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*【147】AS IT IS

A Threatened Way of Life: the Van Gujjars of Northern India

June 17, 2018

Though they are Muslim, Van Gujjar women never veil their faces - except on their wedding day.

“They really invited me and welcomed me into their world, and really was taken into the family with an incredible amount of warmth and trust.”

Benanav noticed how the tribesmen cared for their herd of water buffalo. He found they consider the animals family members and would never kill them for food. Instead they keep the animals for the milk they produce.

“Every Van Gujjar buffalo has a name. Every buffalo, they say, has a unique personality. If a buffalo was to get sick, the family would be really wracked with concern…And if a buffalo dies they’ll bury it and mourn for it almost as if it was human.”

Benanav followed the tribe as they moved with the seasons over 44 days.

“In the fall and the winter they live in an area called The Sivalik Hills.”

They are a group of hills in northern India with a forest that provides enough food for the buffalo. By April, however, the area becomes very hot and the food is mostly gone, so they move to the cooler Himalaya Mountains.

There, Benanav said, the Van Gujjar find food and water for their buffalo all summer.

But India has begun turning some of it best lands into national parks, pushing out the Van Gujjar.

“Some of them have already been forcibly evicted from the forests where they and their ancestors have lived for over 1,000 years.”

The photographer also noted that the people he studied had a deep, or profound, connection to their environment.

“There’s a really profound relationship with the natural world. Maybe some of that comes from the fact they're living really in intimate contact with the natural world but also their perspective on it as something that is essentially sacred.”

The Van Gujjar are Muslims. Benanav said he found them to be among the more open communities within India, especially the women.

He says he experienced no barriers and he could spend time with the women in the family.

Benanav says his experiences have made him understand the differences in the many cultures around the world.

He noted, “As the world becomes a more homogenized place, I think it's really important to be remembering all of the different possible ways that it is to be human.”

Benanav has written about his time with the Van Gujjar in his latest book Himalaya Bound. He says he hopes it will expand the world of his readers.

I’m Jonathan Evans.

Julie Taboh reported this story for VOA. Susan Shand adapted it for Learning English and George Grow edited it.

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Words in This Story

nomadic– adj.a member of a group of people who move from place to place instead of living in one place all the time

caravan– n.a group of vehicles (such as cars or wagons) traveling together

unique– adj.very special or unusual

buffalo– n.a large animal like a cow with long horns that lives in Asia and is often used to pull plows

consumption–n.the act of eating

migration– n.the act of moving to a new place

meadow– n. field

evict–v.to be thrown out of one’s house or land

intimate–adj. having a very close relationship

homogenize– v. to make everything pure

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*【148】AS IT IS

Mother of Boko Haram Leader Speaks Out

June 17, 2018

Community leaders identified the woman as Falmata Abubakar. They said that Abubakar Shekau’s father was a local clergyman who died a few years ago.

Falmata Abubakar said she had never spoken to a reporter before VOA made contact with her. She added that she does not know where her son is hiding.
"I don't know if he's alive or dead. I don't know. It's only God who knows. For 15 years, I haven't seen him," she said.

Townspeople say they often deny being from the hometown of Abubakar Shekau because others may believe they have ties to Boko Haram.

Leader of one of the Boko Haram group's factions, Abubakar Shekau speaks in front of guards in an unknown location in Nigeria in this still image taken from an undated video obtained on Jan. 15, 2018.

Growing up in Shekau

Falmata Abubakar says her son left Shekau as a boy to continue his Islamic education in the city of Maiduguri. Maiduguri has been a center of religious studies for hundreds of years.

Abubakar Shekau was an almajiri. In the generations-old tradition, almajirai are sent by their parents to study the Quran, Islam’s holy book, in schools locally known as a tsangaya. In the classroom, a teacher trains the 20 or more, sometimes hundreds of, male students at a time to memorize the complete Quran.

Almajirai often go up and down the streets, asking people for food. It is thought that Abubakar Shekau did the same. His mother says that during his studies he met Mohammed Yusuf, the founder of Boko Haram.

Yusuf believed that a Western education violates religious law. Falmata says her son was brainwashed.

"Since Shekau met with Mohammed Yusuf, I didn't see him again," she told VOA. "Yes, he's my son and every mother loves her son, but we have different characters. He brought a lot of problem to many people. Where can I meet him to tell him that these things he is doing is very bad? He brought many problems to many people, but I am praying for God to show him the good way," she said.

In 2009, Nigerian security agents killed Mohammed Yusuf, and Abubakar Shekau became the leader of Boko Haram.

Students from Dapchi girls school return to school for the first day after Boko Haram invaded the campus in February, abducting more than 100 students.

Campaign of violence

Destroying schools is at the heart of the group's teachings. The United Nations Children’s Fund says Boko Haram forces have attacked more than 1,400 schools.

Members of the group attacked the first primary school in northeastern Nigeria in 2010 and 2013. The head of the school and his assistant were killed.

In 2014, Boko Haram killed 59 students at a federal school in Buni Yadi, Yobe State. It was one of the most deadly school attacks in Nigerian history. Currently, the school is being rebuilt.

In February of 2018, Boko Haram fighters kidnapped more than 100 students from a girls' secondary school in the town of Dapchi. The group returned the students a month later, but kept Leah Sharibu, reportedly because she refused to accept Islam in exchange for her freedom.

Her mother, Rebecca, and her brother say they believe that she is still alive.

In 2014, Boko Haram fighters seized about 100 girls from their school in the town of Chibok. The kidnapping made news around the world. The Bring Back Our Girls activists are still demanding the freedom for at least 100 Chibok Girls.

Falmata Abubakar says she can never condemn her son, but he has become someone she doesn't recognize.

"He just took his own character and went away. This is not the character I gave him. I don't know what this type of behavior is. It's only God who knows."

I'm Kelly Jean Kelly.

VOA’s Chika Oduah reported this story. Susan Shand adapted it for Learning English, and George Grow edited it.

Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page.

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Words in This Story

brainwash – v. to cause (someone) to think or believe something by using methods that make a person unable to think normally

character – n. the way someone thinks, feels, and behaves, someone's personality

primary – adj. of or related to the simplest things

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*【149】AS IT IS

Builders Turn to Italy’s White Gold

June 17, 2018

FILE - The Cervaiole marble quarry is seen on Monte Altissimo in the Apuan Alps, Tuscany, Italy, July 15, 2017. (REUTERS/Alessandro Bianchi)

A visit to modern day Carrara

Sculptors, other artists and designers of buildings have never stopped making trips to the Tuscan town.

M.J. Anderson, an American, first visited Carrara 36 years ago, when she started creating sculptures. She loved the look of the beautiful stone.

Anderson says she likes to take things apart. “The great thing about carving marble is that once that stone is gone, it’s gone. You can’t lament about it and this keeps you moving forward in the creative process," she said.

Sculptors like Anderson know they are dealing with something very special.

“There’s no surprises when you are carving it. The molecules are put together very well and there’s so many different kinds of marble here. That's what’s so special.”

That is what is bringing in orders and big money from all over the world. Carrara’s marble is in great demand in the Arab world and in countries like China, India and Thailand. Buyers want the material to use in the rooms and floors of their homes. Others want art made of the stone. For example, a few years ago, a request came for a huge block of marble to be used in a massive statue of Buddha.

An increase in the building of mosques and Islamic centers, especially in the Arab world, has meant even more demand and big business for some marble companies.

The Saudi Binladin Group, one of the world's largest builders, got control of 50 percent of Marmi Carrara in recent years. Marmi Carrara owns a third of the marble quarries that are operational in the area today.

“Just the name Carrara basically says it’s the world’s best marble. It is the most beautiful. It has a centuries’ long history of being the best marble in the world and people come here looking for and wanting the very best,” Anderson said.

-v1-

Current demand and environmental concerns

What is new is that the demand is moving away from the traditional markets.

Anderson noted that for a long time, Italy’s white gold has been shipped to American buyers. Now, she said, the buyers are from the Middle East, and they are the ones taking the marble. Ever since the days of ancient Rome, the stone has been shipped to other areas.

The great marble artists have historically been Italian, but now they come from all over world, and some have settled in Carrara. Students like 19-year old Xintong Gao come to learn and take their knowledge home. He said his love of art, painting, and sculpture brought him here from China and he set his sights on studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Carrara.

Working on the marble may be a labor of love, but it is no easy work, Gao noted.

Learning to carve the marble is not the only difficulty. Removing the stone from the mountains has been a problem for hundreds of years. Modern technology has made it easier. The marble industry employs thousands of people. For those who labor inside the mountains, it is sometimes dangerous work.

The marble mining is also affecting the countryside.

Environmentalists have been expressing concerns for years that the industry is destroying the mountains and affecting the appearance of the Apuan Alps. From far away, they appear to be covered in snow. But in reality, it is the bright marble that makes the Apuan Alps white all year round.

“It’s beautiful to see the quarries. … They’re fabulous, the way the light hits these walls of marble,” said Anderson.

Admittedly, she notes, the environmentalists are right to be concerned. “Of course, marble does not re-grow. It’s not sustainable. It was made billions of years ago. …. Marble is being taken out of here so fast that entire mountain tops are disappearing," she said.

I’m Dorothy Gundy.

Sabrina Castelfranco wrote this story for VOANews.com. George Grow adapted her report for Learning English. Caty Weaver was the editor.

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Words in This Story

carve – v. to cut

lament – v. to mourn

quarry – n. places where miners remove from the ground

fabulous – adj. very good

sustainable – adj. harvesting something like a crop so that it is not permanently damaged

We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section.

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