Читать книгу Escaping the Cult: One cult, two stories of survival - Kristina Jones - Страница 18

‘Doe, a deer, a female deer. Ray, a drop of golden sun. Me, a name, I call myself. Far, a long long way to run.’

I sat cross-legged on the floor, gleefully singing at the top of my voice. Everyone was smiling and singing along with pure gusto. It was movie night and every occupant in the Bangkok commune we now called home was crammed into the dining hall to watch The Sound of Music. Movie night was our weekly treat. Talking was allowed, you got to sit with your family and everyone seemed to lighten up and be in a good mood. It was the highlight of my week and I loved it. If you’d been naughty you were not allowed to go. As a motivation to be good it was so effective, I would have done almost anything to be there. The Sound of Music was my favourite film in the whole world. I knew every line, every lyric. That’s because we watched it almost every movie night.

The Shepherds controlled which films were suitable for us to watch, based on their orders from HQ. Films had to be moral, suitable for children and with a Christian message. That limited the choice somewhat, as did the fact we didn’t have money to rent or buy alternative films. The only other movies I remember watching were Jesus of Nazareth and Heidi.

As we lined up to enter the living room, a Home Shepherd who was guarding the door had told us that only those who spoke in tongues would be allowed into the room to watch the movie. The door policy was usually either the tongues test or having to quote a verse from the Bible. Some of the kids made a real meal of it, throwing their hands up in the air theatrically to try to impress the adults with their spiritual talents.

One of the boys from the JETTs group went into show-off mode. With his eyes squeezed shut he scrunched his face and began shouting out in what we were told was the language of angels. ‘Sheeba dee ba dee ba deee. Hambala abahala eba.’ I watched him with disgust, appalled by what, to me, was such an obviously phoney display of spirituality. When it came to my turn I just clammed up. I always felt self-consciously stupid whenever I had to say anything in tongues. I think I knew even then the whole thing was ridiculous. But my reticence caused me to miss the first fifteen minutes of the movie because he wouldn’t let me in until I got it right.

Once inside and when the film started, there was still no guarantee you’d get to watch it. At regular intervals it was paused for a moral teaching and group discussion. Sometimes it took over three hours to reach the closing credits. But I didn’t care. Movie night was the most fun we ever had. And most importantly of all, I got to hang out with my mom and dad.

Our new routine was so strict that my parents were increasingly isolated from us, as were we siblings from each other.

At mealtimes we had to walk in single file and sit at communal tables with our age groups. Seeing my mother across the hall feeding a baby in a high chair was like a stab in the heart. My brothers and I had worked out a way of communicating through secret winks; getting an ‘Are you OK?’ wink from them cheered me up enormously.

Matt in particular looked exhausted, with big dark rings under his eyes. He’d been put on the ‘early birds’ programme, which meant getting up an hour before the other kids for extra study and prayer time.

The only quality time I got to spend with my family members was for a few hours on a Sunday, designated Family Time, when we were free to do whatever we wanted. Usually my brothers and I would pile into our parents’ bedroom, sit on the bed and talk, talk, talk – telling my parents all about what we had learned that week. Sometimes we played marbles, but given how tiny their room was we always ended up losing the balls under the bed, spending more time crawling under it to get them than we did playing.

My brothers and I were so desperate for their attention we all jabbered at once, trying to be the cutest, the funniest or the sweetest child. The competition was intense and the time so short that it was impossible to tell them the bad things – the beatings, the bed-wetting and the horrible children who picked on me. Family Time was always over too quickly. I tried so hard to be brave and not to let them see me cry when it was time to go back to the dorm. It wasn’t lost on us that Mom and Dad also battled hard to do the same as they kissed us goodbye.

There was a moment of family joy, though, with the birth of my brother Guy. I had been secretly hoping for another girl. I still badly missed Thérèse, but when Guy arrived, all pink and cute just like Vincent had been, I fell instantly in love with him. He was in the nursery with Mom so she was able to breastfeed him herself (as she had all of us), but she certainly wasn’t able to focus entirely on her newborn. New mothers were expected to share their milk and breastfeed other babies whose mothers were away FF’ing or fundraising.

Every day in the Bangkok house seemed to bring a set of strange new rules or procedures. Survival depended on adapting quickly. For example, using more than two pieces of toilet paper for a wee or three for a bowel movement got you a hard spank for being wasteful. The rationale was that we didn’t have money to spare and God expected us to be thankful for the gifts we had; therefore over-using a roll of toilet paper was deemed a very unspiritual and selfish thing to do. To ensure we got the point we had to go with the door open while an adult hovered over us. It was so humiliating. Even getting permission to use the toilet in the first place was a minefield. Children weren’t allowed to talk until spoken to so you couldn’t just ask outright. I was told to raise one finger in the air if I needed to pee, or two for a bowel movement.

Sometimes you held your aching arm in the air for ages, bursting to go but desperately trying to hold on until someone deigned to notice. If a teacher didn’t like you they often pretended not to see you on purpose, getting twisted fun from a child’s discomfort. Asking to go when there were lots of people about, such as in school or at mealtimes, was so embarrassing. I hated having to use my fingers to announce to a roomful of my classmates what it was I needed to do.

Some time ago Grandpa had stated in a newsletter that children should be able to go eight hours during the night without needing the toilet. Asking to go at night got you a beating, so the only option was to hold on as best you could. The agony of trying to sleep with a full bladder was awful. But if you wet the bed you got a beating too. It wasn’t much of a choice – ask and get hit, wet the bed and get hit. The first time that happened to me I spent a sleepless night on cold, wet sheets, ashamed and afraid, dreading morning and the inevitable public humiliation.

The initial sense of safety I had felt in the first few weeks after moving to Bangkok quickly dissipated. I began to show clear signs of disturbed behaviour. At dinner I stole a knife from the dining hall and hid it under my pillow until bedtime when I took it out and carved Clay’s name into the wooden frame of my bunk.

Uncle Titus caught me. Without a word he dragged me into the toilet next door and went at me with the fly-swat. He hit me so hard I fell over. He ordered me to stand up and he hit me again. I collapsed against the wall. This time as I struggled up he ordered me to hold onto the towel rail for support. I gripped the rail so tight my fingers went white as blow after blow rained down on my bare buttocks. If I cried out he followed with a harder hit. I bit my lip so hard my tooth went right through it, making it bleed. When it was finally over I couldn’t walk.

As quickly as a light switch turning on, Titus’s violent rage turned to gentle concern. He picked me up, carried me onto my bunk and carefully placed me on the bed. He stroked my hair, wet with my tears, away from my face and shook his head. When he spoke it was in a low, sad voice, as if he was the one who was in agony. ‘Natacha, I did not enjoy that. Why did you make me do that? Why did you put me through the pain of hurting you? Do you know why I just spanked you? I spanked you for Jesus. Jesus loves you. I spanked you for your own good and to help you become a better little girl. You were a bad girl but Jesus wants you to be a good girl. Together we are going to help you do that. Do you understand why I had to hurt you? It was to help you.’

I nodded.

‘Now give me a cuddle and say thank you.’ He had tears in his eyes.

Hugging the man who had just beaten me senseless was the last thing I wanted to do, but I wrapped my arms around his neck, placed a kiss on his cheek and mustered up a watery smile.

‘Thank you very much for helping me, Uncle Titus.’

‘Now let us pray to Jesus for forgiveness and thank him for this special time we have had together.’

It was normal to have to hug and pray with the person who had beaten you. They made out it was for your own good. If you refused the post-beating cuddle you risked another, so you smiled sweetly and said nothing. It was how the game was played.

So many of the adults seemed to take pure delight in their power to punish us, perfecting their own versions of torture methods for children. Older children got what was called the board – a plank of wood drilled with holes. As it swung to hit you air rushed through the holes, which made it sting more. In a sadistic twist, children were often thrown into the shower first. The board on a wet bottom was excruciating. Many poor kids faced that at least once a week.

Aside from my three little friends I was not a popular child. I was skinny, with scraggly thin hair and freckles – an obvious target for bullying. There was a girl one year older than me called Honey. For some reason she took an instant dislike to me. Every day she found new ways to taunt me, whether it was nipping my arms as she brushed past, dropping my books onto the floor or kicking me from behind in class. She was an angelic-looking little girl with long dark curls and chocolate saucers for eyes. All the adults thought she was adorable. I don’t think I ever saw her once get the swat. But her skills as a manipulator meant she was certainly responsible for several other kids getting it.

One evening in the mess hall she picked up my dinner plate, pretending to smell it, then spat in it. This went unnoticed to anyone but me, of course. She gave me a little smirk of satisfaction. I glared at her, promising myself that this time I would have my revenge.

My opportunity came a few days later. It was monsoon season and during a break from the downpours the teachers let us out to play for half an hour. I found a large hairy grub on a bush and placed it in my pocket. After nap time I made sure I was the last child in the line, hanging back for just a few seconds – long enough to open her drawer and throw the grub inside. I spent the rest of the day feeling nervously self-satisfied. At bedtime I was really looking forward to the moment she discovered it. But she didn’t. I went to sleep disappointed, and by the time I woke up had forgotten all about it.

At lunch we were told to prepare ourselves to write an ‘Open Heart Report’ before dinner. Both adults and children did these once a week, although in other communes they were done daily. In theirs the adults had to fill out a form detailing the sharing, writing down the full details of who they had sex with and on what nights. They were supposed to write it all up in unexpurgated detail, saying what positions they did, whether they had full sex, oral sex or just foreplay. The reports were passed on to the Shepherds, who dished out any relevant punishments and sent edited versions on to David Berg. It wasn’t unusual for someone to later see their reports referred to in a Mo letter, either as good examples or through naming and shaming anyone who came across as a doubter.

For children, the reports were just as bizarre. We had to write down what bad thoughts or spiritual battles we’d had and any moral lessons or victories we’d learned that week. We also got asked about our toilet habits – how many poos we’d done and whether they were soft or hard. Sometimes, after the Home Shepherd or your teacher had reviewed your report they would take you out on a ‘walkie talkie’, which was usually a walk around the garden, during which they would discuss points from your report, particularly those relating to your NWOs (Need Work On) – a list of areas you admitted you needed to work on, for example trying to be more humble or less selfish.

But the reports weren’t just about ourselves. We also had to include any unspiritual or bad behaviour we’d seen other kids do.

The teacher went round every child asking them to admit verbally to anything naughty they had done or thought. If you didn’t admit to something you were called a liar. So it was easier just to confess something – anything. That was horrible enough. But what was far more unpredictable was what others said. It wasn’t in my nature to get others into trouble. I had too much empathy, especially with the naughty kids or the cry-baby ones. But if you went for more than two sessions claiming you hadn’t seen anyone do anything bad you were accused of hiding something or covering up for someone. So you were left with the choice of a telling a blatant lie or saying something as mild as you could get away with. I usually opted for the latter and prayed that what I said wouldn’t land another child a serious beating. Other children, like Honey, relished it. She never failed to take the opportunity to twist and exaggerate a tiny misdeed out of all proportion.

It didn’t occur to me to be worried about the grub. I definitely knew I hadn’t been spotted putting it in the drawer. But of course I hadn’t bargained on the fact that little snitches like Honey have eyes in the back of their heads. She had seen me pocket the grub in the garden and carry it into the house. The first words out of her mouth at the reporting session were: ‘Natacha put a dirty thing in her pocket.’

I flustered for a few minutes, pretending it wasn’t true. But my face gave it away.

Of course picking up a garden pest and putting it in your jeans wasn’t the greatest crime in the scheme of things, and this time even the teacher could see that. I might well have escaped a spanking but for my own complete inability to be devious. Before I could stop them the words blurted out of my stupid mouth: ‘I put it in Honey’s drawer. I’m sorry.’

The pain of the beating was only slightly lessened by the joy of hearing Honey’s squeal when the teacher dragged us both into the dorm and opened the drawer. The big fat grey grub was sitting there on her favourite blouse.

But if I had thought the worst thing Bangkok could throw at me was crazy rules and punishments like the plank and the wall, I was wrong – far worse was to come.

I had recently learned that the little girl with the braided hair on the cover of Heaven’s Girl was in fact inspired by Grandpa’s real granddaughter, Mene.

Grandpa often referred to her as Merry Mene in his letters. She was one of his favourite grandkids and lived with him. Of course I still didn’t know where that was because the location still needed to be kept a strict secret so that the Antichrist couldn’t find him and kill him.

Once I learned Mene was Heaven’s Girl she became my real-life heroine. I imagined her running through forests zapping people with her special powers. If I could have chosen to meet any of Grandpa’s family in real life it would have been her. But the mere mention of the name Davidito, his adopted heir, still brought me out in a jealous rage. The fact he was a boy probably didn’t help. I way preferred the idea of a princess instead of a prince leading me into the fight at Armageddon.

Uncle Titus called us into the dining room for group devotion time. He stood in the centre of the room with a thick sheaf of papers in his hand. ‘I have something very important to read today’, he intoned in his low voice. ‘The whole family is here because this is an issue that affects all of us. There are many reports of second-generation family members behaving in ungodly or ungrateful ways. This will not be tolerated.’

He explained that in his hand were a series of letters Grandpa had written about Mene. As she reached her teens she had started calling up demons. Every night the demons came to possess her and trick her into being naughty. She saw demons everywhere; she talked to them and even invited them into her bed. Grandpa had tried so hard to make the demons leave Mene. He had carried out exorcisms where he prayed over her as much as 50 times a day and had been forced to beat her up with a big stick. Sometimes the exorcisms made her faint or throw up, but Grandpa said this was a very good thing because it proved the demons were leaving her body.

I stood to attention, listening in stunned silence. Uncle Titus continued in his pained-sounding voice.

‘I am going to pass around copies of another letter. I want you all to read it carefully. As you will see it is a recording of a real conversation between Grandpa and Mene. You will see with your own eyes how much Grandpa loves her and wants to save her.’

With shaky hands I looked down at the sheet of paper.

It began with the explanation that Grandpa had handed Mene a large rod and asked her to feel ‘how heavy it is’.

Then he and Mene spoke back and forth: ‘Slap her! Slap her good! Knock her around! Let her have it! The Lord took hold of her head … and yanked it around and back and forth until I was afraid I was going to yank her head off or break her neck! God was so angry … And then I hauled her and slapped her, I don’t know how many times tonight, hard, right?’

‘Yes, sir.’

Mene didn’t seem to be answering back, pretty much just saying ‘Yes, sir’ in agreement. But that didn’t seem to be enough for him. He ordered Mama Maria and Sara to tie Mene to her bed without food and water, for days if needed. ‘I don’t care if you wet the bed, dear, your hands are going to be tied to the sides of that bed at night. If you don’t get rid of those demons, you may have to get whipped in bed, caned in bed.’

After we had finished reading you could have heard a pin drop. Every single child in the room was stunned into their own silent world of terror by what they had just read. The piece of paper in my hand felt so tainted. I wanted to tear it up.

‘So, children,’ said Titus, ‘Grandpa has sent us some very important lessons today. Some of you in this house are reaching this same tender age where demons will also come to test you. Do not to be tempted to make Mene’s mistake by calling them up and playing with those demons. Do you hear me? Reject the demons. Reject them! I want to hear you promise Jesus. Say it. We will reject the demons.’

Clearly worried voices recited back: ‘We will reject the demons.’

It got worse. Titus said what we’d just read was not in fact the end of the story. It had been written some time ago. But Mene had not heeded her lessons. She had continued to trick poor Grandpa with her pretty face and sweet ways by pretending to be cured, while all the time secretly bringing more demons into his home.

As a last resort to help her learn the error of her ways Grandpa set up a special school for her on a very remote island. To keep her company he had sent other naughty, evil children to join her. They were what were called DTs, detention teens. If any of us tried the same tricks we too would be sent there. But even the school hadn’t worked for Mene. Grandpa could see now she was simply a hopeless case – a plaything of the devil himself.

For days after hearing all this I felt nauseous. I got on my knees and prayed extra hard, asking Jesus to help me be really good and not fall foul of evil like Mene. I felt completely betrayed by her. How could my heroine have trusted the devil and let him into her heart? I was so angry with her that if she’d been in front of me I think I would have wanted to beat her too.

But Merry Mene wasn’t the only problem for the group. The original group (back when it was known as the Children of God) had been formed in 1968, over 20 years ago. The first tranche of babies born in those early days had reached their teens a few years earlier. Ever since then reports had been reaching the Shepherds of teenagers getting into fights, rebelling, drinking alcohol or, worst of all, trying to escape the communes. The leadership saw a crisis on their hands. Without getting the situation under control it was feared younger kids would start to follow suit.

In Word Time we were read countless more Mo letters about the problems of ‘teen terror’. There was story after story of ‘ungrateful, ungodly’ children who had failed to appreciate the ‘loving family’ they had been born into.

Eventually we were told Grandpa had set up special camps, called Victor Camps or TTCs (Teen Training Centres), to fix the problem. Young teens would be sent to them before they had a chance to turn bad. In the camps they would do a combination of physical labour, prayer and fasting. That would help them stay on the path of righteousness and ensure they didn’t follow the bad examples of others.

Once again rules made by leaders far away tore apart my family. Now aged 12, my eldest brother, Joe, was sent to a TTC. My dad promised him that it would be great fun and that he’d get to do lots of activities and sports to help him grow strong. The look of dread on his face as he kissed my parents goodbye told me he didn’t believe a word of it.

Less than a week after Joe was sent away my father announced we were moving to a different commune. I couldn’t wait.