Letter from Monrovia:"You had to practically jump over bodies to cross the road," Herbert Grigsby told me. "When the rebels captured central Monrovia, they made us line up along the street. A female fighter went up the row asking people which tribe they belonged to. One man had a cigarette, and told her he was a Mandingo.
She told him, "that's the last cigarette you'll ever smoke', put her boot on his head, and cut his throat open. And none of us were allowed to frown. They made us smile".
Unsurprisingly, the softly spoken, would-be marketing manager fled Liberia. In 2000 he escaped with his family to Ghana, as Liberia's second civil war in a decade consumed the country. In 2006 he returned to find the community shattered, many of those in his neighbourhood killed, and his home smashed.
Just one year on, he sits in a Monrovian classroom with a dozen other former refugees, learning to use Microsoft Excel. He is just one of the almost half a million exiled Liberians who have returned in the past two years. "At one stage, almost seven out of every 10 Liberians fled their homes," said Mengesha Kebede, country director for the United Nations High Commission for Refugees. "The entire interior of the country was emptied. But what we have seen since has been the most successful return movement ever, anywhere in the world. The challenge though, is that in many cases people are literally coming back to nothing."
Such was the devastation caused by the war, the agency is now going beyond its mandate to simply register and protect those who fled, to offer reintegration schemes and skills training for the former displaced.
But a bleaker portrait of life in post-war Liberia lies on the outskirts of the capital. The ministry of health, unfinished when the war broke out, is now a squalid eyesore; an irony not lost on the people living there.
Many here are former combatants; little more than boys when they were recruited to fight, but now unable or unwilling to return home because of atrocities they committed. The same is true at the vast, hulking ministry of defence, likewise never completed, its darkened corridors home to as many as 100 children and former fighters aware they face eviction at any time. Some say they have been living here for more than a decade.
Although the year-old government of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, a Harvard-educated economist and former political prisoner, enjoys the patient support of Liberians, walking through the cluttered streets of Monrovia it is obvious the pace of progress has been achingly slow. The 15-year civil war has left Africa's oldest republic without electricity or running water, and unemployment is about 85 per cent - the highest in the world. Sexual violence is also rife, attested to by the colourful "Real Men Don't Rape" billboards which dot the city.
In the slum neighbourhood of Sonowene, hundreds of people weave uneasily between immense heaps of smouldering rubbish, and a large open viaduct of sewage cuts its way through the township. At the maternity clinic, a man furiously complains.
"In the delivery room, sometimes mothers will almost choke on these fumes. We had one waste collection last year, on inauguration day, but since then nobody has come. The government should take charge, but they don't have the capacity, they don't have the trucks." Chillingly, he tells me they sometimes find the bodies of children, buried in the burning rubbish.
Liberia's budget is £120 million (€182m), hardly sufficient to rebuild the country, and many ruefully acknowledge that without the support of aid agencies and UN peacekeepers, the country would again collapse.
The Irish Army is due to withdraw permanently in May, having been the foremost security force in the country since 2004. Liberians have come to learn that the appearance of different troops means different things, and what the Irish signify, one person told me, is "a show of muscle. that something serious is happening".
The tactic of patrolling confidently and often, with a fearsome array of hardware on display, has succeeded in subduing the warring parties without a shot being fired.
One trooper sums it up with characteristic Irish candour: "They know when they see us not to start anything." But despite their stern reputation, the troops seem to have developed a genuine rapport with people.
While eating at the barracks mess, Capt Richard Kilfeather, from Sligo, answers a call on his mobile. The conversation is brief. "Hello? Okay. Bye." When asked who it was, he tells me, "Just some bloke. I was out on patrol last week and he asked my name. He got so excited because his name is Richard, too. He asked if he could have my number, and he hasn't stopped calling me since."
"One of the things that still rattles me is you hardly ever see old people," said Comdt Máirtín Coffey. "It's even more pronounced when you're in rural areas. You very rarely see anyone over 35. I'm looking forward to seeing some normal grey hairs when I get home - so long as they're not my own."
The Irish have also gone much further than other contingents in raising money and volunteering for humanitarian projects. At the time of writing, more than 200 tonnes of schoolbooks, donated by military families and the Catholic Church, await distribution to the fledgling education system.
Is he sad to be leaving? "Of course," says Capt Kilfeather. "We've been a big part of what's happened in the country. But the Irish have done their time here. A different role is needed now; more like a civilian police force.
"The strange thing is a lot of people back home don't even know they had a war here. But I suppose they can only read what's in the newspapers."
In spite of the dire hardships faced by people in this demolished corner of Africa, there is a palpable sense of hope. "You know," says Herbert, reflecting on his prospects. "Nowadays I think my wife loves me more. She sees potential in me. That I can decorate her and feed my family, get a good job. I have hope in the future. And I want to thank UNHCR. One day I would like to repay them."
Adam Kula is studying for a masters in journalism at the University of Ulster in Coleraine, Northern Ireland. Last year, he won a competition for young journalists, run by The Irish Times and the UNHCR, which resulted in him spending five days recently in Liberia