My moment was at the North American Baha'i Youth Conference in 1981, held in Kansas City. I was 19 years old, and crazy enough to agree to drive with 5 other youth all the way to Kansas City from San Diego, each of us driving in 6 hour shifts for the 36 hour trip. Yes - no stopping, we'd drive the whole way. In Kansas City, I stayed in a hotel room with 20 other guys from San Diego, each of us laid out on the floor, around the bed, in the bathroom - someone even found some room sleeping on the floor of the closet. I was with my closest friends. There were Babak and Ali originally from Iran, Farzin who grew up in Italy, Scott from Long Beach and Daniel from Ethiopia.
Walking into the arena at the Kansas City Convention Center, I was stunned by the sight of 10,000 Baha'i youth from all over the U.S., Canada, Hawaii, Mexico and even as far as Europe. It was humbling, looking at all these faces of young people from different racial backgrounds and cultures, knowing that all of us believed in the oneness of mankind and the promise of a better world through the teachings of Baha'u'llah, whom Baha'is believe to be the Manifestation of God for this time.
After Baha'u'llah passed away in 1892, He named His son Abdu'l Baha to be His successor and the Center of the Covenant. And upon Abdu'l Baha's passing, He asked the Baha'is to turn to His grandson, Shoghi Effendi, to help guide the worldwide Baha'i Community in 1921.
In the photograph is Shoghi Effendi's widow, Ruhiyyih Khanum, a Canadian Baha'i who first met Shoghi Effendi during her pilgrimage to the Holy Land. She gave the opening talk at the conference. As a youth, she was my hero. She had gone on great adventures like riding in a boat up the Amazon River and driving across sub-Saharan Africa in a Land Rover, spreading the teachings of the Baha'i Faith. She had an incredible respect for indigenous cultures, and saw the dignity of each human being she encountered. Her life was what I dreamed of because I wanted to travel and see the world. She spoke about a new concept coming from the World Center of the Baha'i Faith in Haifa, Israel. It was about youth offering one year of service to a Baha'i Community in another country. I was in.
During the early part of the 20th century, Shoghi Effendi entrusted a great deal of responsibility for the growth and protection of the Baha'i Faith to a handful of Baha'is he called The Hands of the Cause. His wife was a Hand of the Cause and so was Mr. Ali-Akbar Furutan, a great educator and an advocate for youth. During the conference, every time I came into our hotel I would see Mr. Furutan sitting on a couch in the lobby. Each time I walked by I would smile and wave, too shy to say hello. One morning he was sitting alone, and he patted the seat on the couch next to him, motioning me to come and sit. We talked about what it was like for me to be a Baha'i youth and the only Baha'i in my family. I told him I wanted to do a year of service, but I had just finished my first year in the university and I wasn't sure what to do. Should I leave school and go for a year? Should I stay in school and wait until my degree was finished? Mr. Furutan smiled at me and said, "Why not do both?" I smiled back at him. His eyes lit up, knowing I had made my decision.
After trying for months to get a visa to go to school in Colombia, and finally being told that Americans were discouraged to go there due to the danger caused by the drug cartel, my good friend Cristy Athan returned from spending the summer in Ghana traveling the country and assisting the Baha'i Community. I told her about my dead-end with Colombia, and she asked me if I would consider Ghana. Sure, why not?
Just as everything was set for a couple of us to go to Ghana, a military coup occurred on December 31, 1981. The borders were closed and the airport was shut down. We decided to still go, waiting nine days until the airport reopened. After a twelve hour flight to London, we flew another eight hours to Ghana over the Sahara desert. The view is forever set in my memory. It was like a vast ocean of burnt orange, and I could see the paths that were originally used by camels on the Moslem Trade Route, carrying spices and fabrics into tropical Africa.
We arrived at Kotoka International Airport in Accra on January 12, 1982. At the bottom of the stairs on the tarmac, I was met with a machine gun pointed at my head while a soldier pat-down searched me. We spent that night at the Baha'i Center in Accra on Ring Road. The Baha'i Center was in desperate need of repair, with broken windows and torn screens. The Baha'is fondly nick-named it the Mosquito Center.
That night I sat in the dark in the foyer watching military tanks roll down the street in front of the Center while listening to the sirens announcing the start of the curfew for the night. Anyone caught out on the street after dark would be shot on site.
What on earth had I done coming here?
Thanks for sharing. As mentioned in an earlier communication, you are SO fortunate and blessed to have met Hand of the Cause Ruhiyyih Khanum in person. It sounds like this conference was instrumental in directing the course of your life.
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