“I got a piece of science homework back yesterday,” he goes on. “The teacher held it up like this in front of everyone and he said, ‘Dikko Iisaa: very, very good.’ I felt that if I reached up I could touch the ceiling.”
“How did the others do?” I can not help but ask.
“My neighbour got three out of twenty, and he was angry. He poked me and said, ‘Are those girl’s trousers you are wearing, Mopère? Are they your sister’s?’ I kept quiet; if I had answered back he would have said it again much louder and the whole class would have laughed at me. There is nothing worse than when the whole class is laughing at you, is there?”
“No, there is nothing worse than that.”

We share a companionable silence. A chicken scrabbles in the dust nearby.

“I fell off my chair in class last week,” says Iisaa brightly. “They laughed like hoopoes, all of them. The teacher asked me why I had done it, so I said my neighbour pushed me.”
“Why did he push you?”
“He didn’t, to tell the truth. I just fell off my chair. One minute I was copying something from the board and the next minute I was on the floor. Sometimes I lose my head like that.”
Iisaa seems about to say something else, then shrugs and looks away.

“Do you eat in the morning before you go to school?”
Bingo.
“No. I drink, though. When I get up in the morning I fill a huge beaker with water right up to the brim, and drink it. It makes me feel full.” “What about at midday?”
“No, I just drink. I have another beaker of water.” I can’t believe I am hearing this.
“So that’s why you black out in class.”
“Yes, maybe. And if the teacher mentions rice or bread or something like that, I start day-dreaming.” He laughs. “Sometimes when I am copying from the board I write down the names of foods by mistake.”
I can not bring myself to laugh with him about this. I have known Iisaa a long time and he has never disclosed to me this most basic fact, that he gets through each school-day on two beakers of water. But then, I have never asked the right questions.

“So when I see you doing your homework in the afternoon, you have not eaten all day?”
“Yes. That is quite a hard time. There is always a lot to do. If I could sleep, it would be okay. Daaniido wanaa tampudo.” This is a familiar Fulani proverb - it means, a sleeping person is not a suffering person.
“Do you eat in the evening?”
“Yes, I go to my aunt’s house in the evening. She does not like me but she lets me eat porridge with my cousins.”
One bowl of millet porridge. Millet is the staple crop in the Sahel, but has less nutritional value than other cereals. That is why the millet sold in Western supermarkets has a picture of a budgie on the front.

“Why do they call you Mopère?” I ask. Iisaa winces.
“Mon père,” he says. “They know that I follow Iisaa Al Masiihu. They say, ‘You’re shameful - your surname is Dikko so why have you become a Mopère? You are worse than a dog.’”

Every day Iisaa bears these insults at school on account of following his namesake, Jesus. Since he came to town for his schooling two years ago, he has coped with poverty, hunger and rejection - quietly and without self pity. After all, study is sweet.

Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied.
Blessed are you who weep now, for you will laugh.
Blessed are you when men hate you, when they exclude you and insult you and reject your name as evil, because of the Son of Man. Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, because great is your reward in heaven. (Luke 6:20-23)

Iisaa’s brother, Amadou, is in the year below Iisaa at school, and is in a very similar situation. If you would like to correspond with Amadou or Iisaa, or help them out financially, please contact me.

For the record, Iisaa wants to become a journalist or a university lecturer; Amadou wants to become President of Burkina Faso. Watch this space.