Raising A Doctor, With A Special Twist

Joanna Tisdale raised seven children in her day, all now grown. Then she partially raised hundreds more during her 30-plus years as a specialeducation teacher in the Sacramento schools.

But the unusual accent didn’t belong to any of those nowgrown children when the phone rang Tuesday morning and someone addressed her as “Mother.”

“Ma-der! This is your son … ” the crackly, longdistance call began.

Tisdale, 78, hadn’t heard that melodious voice in more than a decade. And yet it was different. The voice belonged to an 11-year-old boy the last time Tisdale heard it. Now the boy was a young man 22 years old.

“Ousman, where are you?” she asked.

Ousman Taal was in Banjul on the west coast of Africa, about 40 miles from the small rural village where Tisdale and her husband, Hall, first met him in 1980. The Tisdales had come to Juffure, the village where author Alex Haley first met the African storyteller who told him the history of his ancestors in 1967. That conversation later inspired Haley’s epic “Roots.”

Chief Mamabi Taal and his family provided a gracious welcome to the grass-hut village, but the Tisdales despaired over the unsanitary conditions, undernourishment and lack of basic health practices they witnessed. They learned that only five doctors practiced in the entire country of Gambia, so, of course, these villagers would never see one.

But they knew their concern was meaningless unless they offered help.

Speaking to the chief through an interpreter, they suggested taking a willing boy back to America to be educated in the field of medicine. Someday, the boy could return as a doctor.

The chief offered one of his own sons. Choose, he told Hall Tisdale. The American picked Ousman, then 8. His grandmother was Binta Kinte, widow of the storyteller who shared the stories that began with Haley’s great-great-great-greatgrandfather, Kunta Kinte.

And so, the Tisdales left with the task of making arrangements for the boy. Joanna Tisdale remembers the last time she saw the grandmother, Binta Kinte. She was waving goodbye while reminding Joanna Tisdale to give her greetings to Alex Haley.

The memory prompted one of Tisdale’s roiling, let-loose laughs. “They thought America is like a village,” she said. “Like we all know one another over here.”

The village made certain Ousman got the best food so he would be more healthy for learning. Already, he was their future. A year and a half later, on Dec. 22, 1981, Ousman arrived in Sacramento to begin a new life. He was 10. News accounts said he was tired, cold and thin. I’d say he was one brave little boy.

As Ousman began fitting into American life, attending Newcomer School in south Sacramento and joining a soccer team, Joanna Tisdale noticed he was different from many American children.

“This child had just such a sense of self,” she said. “You could tell he was loved and adored from the very beginning (of life). Loved and adored. He was very, very secure. You couldn’t shake that kid.”

She spoke of how the fathers in Africa raise the children, set the rules, are accessible for guidance and teaching at all times. “It is difficult in this country, parents always working,” she said.

Sometimes she told Ousman he must do this or that, but perhaps her look said she was unsure of how much success the endeavor would bring. “I am a Mandingo,” Ousman would proclaim. As if saying, don’t worry about me.

Tisdale loved the child, but less than two years later, found herself telling him she was sending him home. Hall Tisdale was fighting cancer.

“My husband was just too sick,” Tisdale said quietly. “I had to put all my energy toward taking care of him.” Hall Tisdale has since died.

Joanna Tisdale pulls out photographs of Ousman playing soccer. Another shows him with his first American teacher, Heather Brophy. Sending him back to Africa was one of life’s traumas for Tisdale. Her eyes well up every time she considers her lack of options then.

But here was Ousman on the phone from Africa, asking her to send for him. He had finished high school. His father was dead. He still wants to be a doctor.

“Listen,” Tisdale said. “If I live and breathe, I will bring you back.”’

An accomplished author and poet, but not a wealthy one, Tisdale plans to do just that. She has contacted some famous traditionally black colleges that might offer Ousman Taal a scholarship. What she’s less certain of is how to finance bringing Ousman over here.

She figures it’ll take $3,000.

“I can still realize my dream and send that village a doctor,” Tisdale said. Her phone number is (916) 421-5954 if you’d like to help. Her address is 1421 Tiverton Ave., Sacramento, CA 95822.

xxxx

The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Diana Griego Erwin Mcclatchy News Service