It Was a Terrible Time

In 1991, it was a bad time for me because of the civil war between Somalis. First, I lost my younger sister who was six years old. Not only my family was affected, but also all weak people like women, kids, and the elderly. Those types of people are the ones that most of the time been killed or wounded. I was really very lucky where I was not among those innocent who were killed with no reason. Secondly, I fled from my beloved land with my family because of the civil war and lived in the bush area about two months before we crossed the border between Somalia and Kenya. In a short moment, we became refugee in the neighboring country, Kenya. There were lots of robbers who were at refugee camp at night and force people to give all their belongings otherwise they would kill them. It was so cold in the refugee camp because our houses were made of palm leaves. Also there was a lack of food. We used to wait for what we would get from the UN. Most of the aid was either delay about a week or fell in to hands of some people who didn’t want to give to the refugees. It was tough to get water at the refugee camp. The people would stand in a line about four hours for small wells, which a person would pump to get water. Finally, the power of my country went in to the hands of warlords who are ruthless and unkind. Those inhuman warlords didn’t want anybody alive but themselves. They made check points that you couldn’t cross if you don’t pay money or they would kill you if you don’t give them money. For instance, there was a man who was driving a car and they asked to give 1000,000 shillings. He asked them if he can give less than that amount, but they said go and talk to our boss, he is sitting there. The man went to talk to the boss, but there was a dead body over there and he decided to pay the amount. What he understood was that they would kill him if he keep talking to them. That is the sad story that happened to me the year of 1991.