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The International Rescue Committee specializes in this kind of detective work from the other end of the equation--starting with the child. Since 1999 it has identified more than 1,600 separated children in Guinea. "The family is the best guarantor for the protection of these children," says Jacqueline Botte, the country program director for child tracing. If no biological relatives can be found, the IRC places the children with foster families or, as a last resort, at a transit center. But blood and memory exert a special pull. Kids separated from their families for as long as 10 years want to go home--home to the community of their earliest remembrance.
The journey back usually begins at a mosque or a church or a camp, when the names of children--and whatever scraps of information can be ascertained--are read over a loudspeaker. At an outdoor mosque in Conakry on a recent Friday, an IRC worker, Sheku Conteh, intoned the names of some 30 children. A lizard scurried up a tree whose base was ringed with well-worn plastic sandals and sneakers, while a woman performed her ablutions with a kettle. The men stood barefoot on a makeshift dais; women wearing scarves on their heads sat on the ground behind them; all listened intently. "If you don't know anything, it's O.K.," Conteh blared out. "But if you know something, anything, about this child, this is a big, big blessing."
The blessing of a reunion begins with the business of tiny scraps. A man faintly recalls the name of a child and thinks he might know the family. A woman remembers seeing a child with bright eyes heading off with that woman who sold cassava leaves. And with this small scrap, the IRC teams begin to try to undo a heartbreak. The work is painstaking, as it takes days and perhaps weeks to check out every lead.
By the time Esther Toure, an IRC worker, collected Aisha in Kissidougou, in southeastern Guinea, the child was running a fever from malaria. She barely spoke except at night, when she would cry out in her nightmares and wet her bed. She had been found only because the storekeeper with whom she had been abandoned called the local police. Amid the tidal wave of refugees moving from place to place, Aisha had been parked for a crucial moment in the vicinity of someone who cared enough to help her. Esther took Aisha back to Gueckedou, about an hour's drive south, where she and her family spoke Susu. She gave Aisha peppermints to gain her trust. Finally, one day Esther asked, "Who is your mother?" and Aisha responded, "My mother is Marie."
The word went out. On the radio stations in Kindia, Forecariah and Coyah, every place in Guinea where Susu is spoken, the announcement was made that a young girl named Aisha whose mother was Marie had been found. Ibrahim's brother Mamadouba heard the news. He went to the station to look at the accompanying picture of the girl. It was Aisha.
The family sent Mamadouba, the most educated of them all, to Gueckedou with a family picture of Aisha, her birth certificate and Marie's identification card. As he approached Esther's house, Mamadouba saw Aisha eating at the table and shouted her name. She continued eating. He showed Esther the papers, but she was wary. Why didn't the girl respond? She refused to let him take Aisha. He wept in disappointment.