Shelly-Ann Thompson, Freelance Writer
Sharon Kelly-Stair and other Rastafarians at Bobo Hill, Nine Miles, Bull Bay. - CARLINGTON WILMOT/FREELANCE PHOTOGRAPHER
SHARON KELLY-STAIR was a director at the Ministry of Education, principal of Ferncourt High School in St. Ann and was a lay reader in the Anglican Church.
Now she makes knitting bags, and occasionally teaches spelling, maths and reading to children at Bobo Hill, Nine Miles, Bull Bay, St. Andrew.
Gentle Edwards was a licensed firearm holder and security guard with United Protection Services. He owned a house in St. Mary. Wherever he worked his company would provide him with housing. Now he lives at Bobo Hill and does tailoring and makes brooms for a living.
Petrona Simpasa was a part owner in a health and beauty spa in England for 13 years. She was also an accountant for a company (she wishes not to name) that has branches in London, Italy and New York. She is also formally trained at the tertiary level in bookkeeping, accounting, and personnel administration. Now a Rastafarian, Simpasa lives between Bobo Hill and Whitehouse, Westmoreland, and makes bags for a living.
These three persons share a common feeling. They made a similar choice. That choice was life over death, they say.
HONOURABLE EMPRESS SHARON KELLY-STAIR
This former university lecturer and lay reader in the Anglican Church, Claremont, St. Ann, has been living on Bobo Hill since November 2000. Kelly-Stair, who was married twice and has no children, decided to relocate to Bobo Hill because "I saw light."
She understood the Rastafarian faith from a friend, the Honourable Empress Michelle Brand, who was a lawyer and later became domiciled on Bobo Hill. "She manifested the life of Christ and that drew me to the foundation," says Kelly-Stair. "Her livity helped me to see a light and walk in it."
It's no denying that she was a teacher; her eloquent speech gave her away. Having been schooled at St. Andrew High School for Girls Kelly-Stair says Jah blessed her with a profession of being a teacher. She graduated from the University of the West Indies (UWI), Mona, with a diploma with distinction in theory of education.
Professionally, at UWI she did research methods in education in the Faculty of Education and was a political institutions and philosophy lecturer within the Distance Education Unit in the Faculty of Social Sciences.
Kelly-Stair was also an appointed executive director of the National Council on Education. At Ferncourt High School in Claremont, St. Ann, she "spent 13 beautiful years" as principal. At Hydel Junior and Senior High schools, in its formative years, she was director at the institution then located on Ardenne Road in St. Andrew (now at Ferry Road in St. Catherine). Kelly-Stair also taught at Rusea's High in Hanover.
Outside of teaching, she was a consultant with United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). "I helped to organise their 1996 Education For All Conference" and also wrote conference papers and did research for the organisation.
However, for almost five years, Kelly-Stair has given up all that and has become a member of the Bobo Hill camp. She says she didn't want to keep her job and be at Bobo Hill, as it's a whole different world.
"Living on Bobo Hill, the kind of experience one is blessed to have. I'm honoured and privileged to live here," she says. "It has taken me to an understanding of life that with all things I had done before I had not had that level of understanding of the black race, and for me it has been a real educational experience being here. When Bobo Hill is described as the highest college, I am in full accord as that is what it is. And we cannot overemphasise the love of the Black Christ in flesh and the glorious blessing that his service provides for one's own personal self-development."
She says as a Christian that life leads to death. "No one out there was able to show me any kind of reasons that suggested that God lived. The Anglican worship a dead God-Jesus. As an educator I could not receive reasoning happily," says Kelly-Stair. Kelly-Stair now worships a Trinity-Priest, Honourable Jacob Abraham Emmanuel; King, Honourable Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie; and Prophet, Honourable Marcus Garvey. Kelly-Stair says these persons are not dead, but have been reincarnated as Hedi Amen. "It's just a manifestation as we will see him and will know him. They are reincarnated into us celestially until we see them face to face again. They live in us and they talk through us to you," explains Honourable Priest Bobby (Burnell Adolphus McDonald), one of the senior priests at the camp.
She gives thanks to Honourable King Charles Edward whom she says saved her from a world of sin and woe. "I was so amazed, enthralled, never seen anything like this before - a community of love," says Kelly-Stair, noting that she has travelled to many countries, such as Belgium, France, America, St. Vincent, Trinidad, and "never imagined such a place existed. There is a place where no one is rejected, people are healed; that one is loved. A place that leads you into life. I came here and I was taught by learnt teachers of the highest colleges of the earth ... I was and still am seeking to get understanding to live," says Kelly-Stair.
She says her father, Edwin Henry, thought she was mentally ill for wanting to become a Rastafarian. Like her, her father once had a negative picture painted in his mind of Rastafarians. "Many people believe that Rastafarian represents a machete-wielding locks man. But Rastafarian represents love, never changing to accept something else."
Kelly-Stair says she went to Bobo Hill at 49 years old having been wearing eyeglasses since age 10. She recalls that she couldn't see without the glasses with a high degree of proficiency. Having very bad near-sightedness, she visited top doctors more than once trying to rectify the problem, but would only in turn be given different strengths of glasses. "By testing eyes every year they would up the strength of the glasses." However, she met Honourable Priest Harold George Mitchell, a bush doctor at Bobo Hill, who told her to remove the glasses, as they were a crotch on her spirituality. Kelly-Stair says Mitchell gave her herbs to cure the problem, and it did. Now she sees and reads clearly without spectacles.
"That in itself is a remarkable thing," says Kelly-Stair.
Since being on Bobo Hill, Kelly-Stair has learnt a lot like the manufacturing of knitting bags. She says the skill has brought her self-reliance and it is the highest profession that she has had to enter into by producing own craft for oneself. "A woman who can earn her own bread anywhere in the world," she notes. The bags are sold, along with those from other manufacturers on Bobo Hill, on wholesale to vendors at the Craft Market in downtown Kingston; vendors in Montego Bay, St. James; and to visitors on Bobo Hill. "So we can feed ourselves. So we don't have to be beggars or murderers."
She is not entirely out of the teaching profession as occasionally she teaches the children of Bobo Hill subjects like maths, reading and spelling in the Jerusalem School room at the community.
HONOURABLE EMPRESS PETRONA SIMPASA
"I and I are about life," says Honourable Empress Simpasa. She says as a black woman Babylon (the white man's world) captured her brain and system wanting her to live their way of life. Simpasa notes that the pressures and confinements of the world is one that led to death of the black man as it only profits the white man.
In the early 1990s (1992 or 1993), Simpasa arrived on Bobo Hill, after accepting an invitation from a friend - who was a Bobo - to join in the celebration of the centurion birth of High Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie. While on Bobo Hill, Simpasa says she communicated with Honourable Priest Charles Edward, founder and leader of Ethiopia Africa Black International Congress (EABIC), and her life was transformed. "The Bobo brought I to his father and he teach I how to live and how to survive," says Simpasa strongly.
Looking at Simpasa it would be difficult to identify that she was within the beauty profession. Having obvious cracks on feet, presumably from the frequent wearing of sandals, teeth that are discoloured and fingernails that are overgrown. Simpasa, who didn't reveal her age noting that she is from creation, from beginning of time itself, was born in Whitehouse, Westmoreland. Raised and educated since age 13 in England, Simpasa was one of three persons who owned a health and beauty spa in that country.
Simpasa says she was having success in England that she was regarded as a 'Black Buppie', a successful young black person the opposite of 'White Yuppie' meaning that one has made it. These achievements Simpasa was able to attain having received tertiary training in personnel administration, with emphasis on accounting; bookkeeping and basic training. She also did a six-month junior training at a fashion store (the name she cannot recall) in London.
Apart from owning a spa, Simpasa also worked with international companies that had offices in London; New York, United States of America; and Tokoyo, Japan. Simpasa was in a job post for 13 years before returning to Jamaica.
"I'm not in that world anymore because it is a world of death," says Simpasa with a fading British accent. Simpasa says she was almost dead and was at the point of running away. She explains that she wanted to get into the waters of England and swim until she reached Africa. "That's what I wanted to do, whether I would reach, I was dying anyway."
Simpasa says in her relatives and friends' eyes she was living a successful life. She had a car, house and lived in a "comfortable" apartment. "But that system of X is death and destruction for life," says Simpasa. "Living in a world where I was working 9 to 5 and dying in the process."
The comparison Simpasa gives between the lives she led and the one she now has she says she is now living while before she was dead. "I was created in Ethiopia (and) brought up in an opposite system that does not sustain life. An Ethiopian woman should not live like any other nation. Certainly not like European. Living someone else's reality (one cannot be happy) can only live in your own reality," notes Simpasa. She says that the black man should know self then life of prosperity will follow or else the black man will lose his own reality. "Now I live and do the will of the father. I try with all my might to keep his principles and encourage others to do so that they might live. It's about life the livity of life."
She says Edward formed the EABIC and it was an excellent move as the congress rescues the black woman out of hell. She has been mostly at Bobo Hill travelling back and forth from Whitehouse. Since 2005, she has not left the camp since April 20, the anniversary celebration of Haile Selassie's visit to Jamaica.
Honourable Priest Gentle Edwards
Edwards, 35, was a security guard and a licence firearm holder with United Protection Security Company for seven years. His role was protection of property and individual within the company. Before this, for three years, he was a backhoe lifter for a construction firm in Kingston.
He was also accomplishing for himself having owned a house in Bottom Linston, St. Mary. Now Edwards has traded security for tailoring; a skill he learnt from his parents. At Bobo Hill he makes drapes, sheets and pants.
In 2000 Edwards made a decision and moved to Bobo Hill. He said five years ago his spiritual calling started to seek for something that he couldn't find or at the time explain. He was experiencing feeling that he couldn't explain so he started seeking for answers. "Seeking for fulfilment whether it's a house, job or car and when I get it I assume this is what I need and when I do I realise I still is not happy. So I keep seeking," he says. Edwards approached persons from different spiritual background but was neglected, also by a Christian, whom he says that he thought could be able to give him clearance if there is a true and living God and assists him in understanding what he was experiencing. "No one could give me a clearance and have I heart at ease and I decided that I will not be left alone to hell."
His fulfilment, however, came. While watching a cable channel he saw a feature about Bobo Hill. He says he saw Empress Sharon Kelly-Stair, and other members relaying their story about the camp. Before seeing this feature Edwards had only heard of this foundation but by watching the feature he became fascinated by these "strange people" he saw on the channel. "Just know a different fruit has it as a strange look - different from that of the world," says Edwards. He says his curiosity sent him seeking for the camp. "I ride from Portmore (St. Catherine where I lived and worked) to Bobo Hill on (a) bicycle." There he spent about two to three days before he left for work. Edwards returned to work wanting to keep his job while and honouring the Sabbath. However, he says when he asked his supervisor if he could keep his Sabbath by not working on the seventh day he was only told by the supervisor that the arrangement is not possible. Edwards says he resigned the following day after speaking with his supervisor and returned to Bobo Hill.
"Here, we see all things put in place at one (unity). Moving towards self away from what has been put up on you." A few of the satisfaction Edwards note he received from the Bobo Hill family come from Exodus 20 the 10 Commandments. Others he says are from the Holy Book - The Bible - as he gets a more clearance (understanding) of self and life while living in unity on Bobo Hill.
"Heart clean and will see righteousness. Righteousness found in first epistle John 4, 'love of God'. Love brothers to be a part of God. Salvation so deep one don't have to pay." He says all this can be found in Deuteronomy in the Bible.
"I seek clearance and now I am comfortable with it."
Why would someone leave their fulfilling career to live at Bobo Hill
All who did a trod wid the father and all who was with Christ them heart a go change from the world to Christ. The inspiration will come to I to leave and come to the father. It's like a magnet so if you were on the magnet with Christ anytime it comes you will have to leave it's a spiritual heart contact. It's not something simple that someone can just get up and do. You have to be called and when called you have to come.
- Says Honourable Priest Bobby (Burnell Adolphus McDonald).
- Seek first the Kingdom of God the living shall be yours. Many of us were lost now we know of self. Know self more so we can have life more abundantly. Hence leave the world including profession and come to Christ to abide with him.
- says Honourable Priest Delroy Williams.
- Some of the principles at Bobo Hill that members should follow
First principle: Get self clean and be truthful and upright to the world. By speaking clean words in the right time, right place and the right doings. Sharing, giving and strengthening each other.
Worship services:
Monday service: Around 8:00 a.m. or 9:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. worship at sanctuary - praying, reading psalms, singing and having lecturers.
Wednesday service: similar to Monday's
Friday morning: A two-hour service to prepare for Sabbath on Saturday
The Sabbath: No fire is lit, no spending of money, no playing of radio or television it is observed as a free day for praising. Service at 6:00 a.m., finishing 12 p.m. then rest until 2:00 p.m. when worship begins and ends at 6:00 p.m. After which another two-hour service begins ending at 9:00 p.m. After this service, members are free to do whatever they may until the other Friday.
21-day monthly purification: On the first day of menstruation the women of Bobo Hill should put up a red flag to signify that they have started their journey. Women move in house (a secluded area) with all preparation like food, clothes, working materials for whatever craft and small children. The women will stay there for 21 days; however, for the first seven days they are not allowed outside of the building unless it's a medical emergency. During the first seven days no use of spiritual documents and from the eight-day on the women are allowed to use spiritual documents. While on their journey for 21 days they must not be seen or heard outside. The women will signal if she needs anything but is however checked on daily. At the end of the 21 days they will be free to attend services and walk the grounds of the hill, such as the gatehouse, food house and generally move around the court (environs of the camp) freely.
It is believed that the daughters (women) are not fully clean during their 21-day monthly purification. Hence the daughters stay inside their apartment as the women have their own building where they stay during this time. During this purification they must not physically associate with the men of the camp or do any form of physical work. After seven days the daughters can do work like knitting or sewing for the next seven days.
This purification is done for the building of women and is an ancient principle of the natural levity whereby the daughter remains in seclusion from the rest of the community while she is on a journey. It's a time to bond with children, and affords her to become more self-known and self-aware. It's a natural method of earth (birth) control without pills or any other contraception. So the women of Bobo Hill spends a regular seven days with their king man and another 21 days alone. It also helps to free her Kingman for other duties to support and strengthen her or as a priest or craft man.
The Beginning of Bobo Hill
Ethiopia Africa Black International Congress (EABIC) foundation was put in place to the public on March 1, 1958. However the work for the congress began back in 1948 by Charles Edwards a Rastafarian, now Honourable priest of the congress.
In the first setting, Honourable Priest Charles Edward gathered 3,000 students (persons) at the foundation at 54b Spanish Town, St. Catherine in 1958. The congress in the following years was settled at about four different locations. Having been at Rose Town, Trench Town known as Galilee; Waterhouse; Sunlight Street; and Davis Lane in Kingston.
However, between 1971 and 1972 the congress moved to Bull Bay, St. Andrew. First the camp settled on the seaside of Bull Bay, but later removed to the north up into the hills, one mile off the main road. Honourable Priest Bobby (Burnell Adolphus McDonald) says that Marcus Garvey prophesied that in order for them to be leaders they should be on the hill from the top.
Currently there are 230 persons living at Bobo Hill, and approximately 1,000 persons locally and internationally who come and go with priests living and holding congresses in Ghana and Costa Rica.
Members of the Bobo Hill community do not pay property taxes, while they have an electric plant that generates their electricity and they receive water from a nearby dam and from the Chalky River.
