I don’t know how long we walked for, but I think it was from December to April. We just kept walking. We came from southern Sudan with other “lost boys and girls,” walking all the way from our village to escape the fighting. Our parents were killed; there was no one taking care of us. There was an attack, and we just ran. There was no transport, just our feet. All we were thinking about was how to survive.
We were relieved to reach Kakuma camp in Kenya, but the refugee camp was not a good place. Every two weeks they gave us food, corn and beans, but it was not enough to eat more than one time every day. It was hot; no rain. I lived in a small house with ten other girls. I made a friend who came from a village near mine who had lost her whole family. Her name is Alauh and we became very close. We went to school at seven in the morning and came home at noon; the girls then took care of the children. During the day we were fine. But when nighttime came, we were always in fear. People in Kenya did not want us there; they did not like refugees. At night they would come and demand that we give them money and food. We had no money, just our food, and if they took that, there would be nothing to eat. When you tell them you have nothing to give, they might kill you, and there was no one to find you, no one to care. It would be easy for the government to say they never knew about you. We all had to protect each other.
We knew we had an older sister, Adut, who left our village before we were born, but we did not know what had happened to her. She never knew about us at all until she found our other brother, Giir, living in a refugee camp in Uganda. When we talked to Giir on the radio, he gave us the news that she would be looking for us. Then we began to hope.
Deng and I were there for four years without knowing what would happen to us. We thought, “Maybe now we have a chance to be safe.” Adut was petitioning the United Nations to get permission for us to join her in Seattle, where she herself came as a refugee in 1992. When we heard from her, we were so very happy. We went through the process of interviews and medical examinations, and then we had to wait to see if we passed or failed. The letters arrived. Deng and I went together; we got our letters, and then we opened them. They said we passed.
It was very hard to leave my friend behind. I told Alauh that God would protect her. Maybe we will meet again sometime, but you just don’t know. I cried, and she cried too. Now there is really no way to know what has happened to her. I talked to her once on the phone, and I told her, “Just keep going. Continue with your education. Maybe God will help you.” She said, “Yes, maybe God will help me too.”
Now we go to Garfield High School. People there ask me, “Where do you come from? Why did you leave there?” I say, “I come from Sudan. There was fighting there, so we had to leave.” They ask me, “Do you want to go back when the fighting is over?” And I say, “Yes, I would love to go back.”
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