Read Online The Translator: A Tribesman's Memoir of Darfur by Daoud Hari - Free Book Online
Authors: Daoud Hari
Tags: General, Biography & Autobiography
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bombing and helicopters in the distance; other villages were dying.
On the third day of our flight we came to a water point where some of our people were waiting for us, including Father. He had some of our camels and other animals in his care. He already knew about Ahmed and looked much older on account of this news.
Fifteen of us, the younger men, decided to ride camels back to the village to bury the dead and retrieve the hidden supplies of food and clothing. The attackers would have taken all they wanted by now, burned the village, and gone away. We needed to bury the bodies before the wild dogs and jackals destroyed them. We gathered some tools for burial and rode back.
The village was mostly gone—sixty or so scorched black spots where a whole world once celebrated life. The nunus of millet, many mattresses and blankets, mounds of trees, and parts of huts were still smoking, which we smelled long before we entered the wadi.
Thirteen bodies were on the ground, mostly near the eastern side of the village, where the defense was made. The Sudanese troops and Janjaweed had of course removed their own dead, so these thirteen were the defenders of the village and some who had come to help.
I found Ahmed. The effects of large-caliber weapons and perhaps an RPG round were such that I barely recognized his body, but it was Ahmed. I dug a grave as we do, so that he would rest on his right side with his face to the east. I put the pieces of this great fellow in the deep sand forever.
“Goodbye, Ahmed,” I said to him. And I knelt down there for a long time instead of helping the others. It was raining a little.
Finally, I did stand and go help the others.
After we retrieved some hidden supplies and packed them on our camels, we prepared to leave. Mixed deep in the ashes of the smoldering huts were of course the bones of the old people who had refused to go, but we could do nothing for these now until the rains would reveal them. The wild animals would have no use for these fired bones.
A few birds were singing in the trees. Not many, but a few.
Well
, I thought to myself,
they will come back in time, like the people
.
But for now it was ashes and graves. This had been a good village.
8.
The Seven of Us
When we caught up with our people we men stayed mostly together with the wounded defenders, going back and forth to the women for the food and for the traditional medicine and teas they would prepare. In this way our village, though now a moving line in the desert, was still the same people helping one another.
The people of other villages joined us here and there, until we were a great mass of people moving across the land. Every morning we would have to bury several of the wounded who died in the night. It was good for some of them to die, since there was no morphine or other medicine. You can usually see in a man’s eyes if he will be blessed to die before morning.
On the fifth day we came to a remote and grassy valley, and some of those with animals to sustain them decided they would hide there and make a temporary life. Those with no animals had no choice but to continue on to Chad.My mother and sister were among these who stayed—she would go no farther. My father would keep moving with some of the animals and the other people while they needed him. The camels provided wonderful milk and rides for the children, who were suffering. He would come back to Mother with our animals when he could. In this way, my mother and sister became what the world calls IDPs, which means internally displaced persons—refugees who are still within their home country.
And in this way, too, the other people continued on for seven more days, walking to Chad, marking their way with graves.
Six of my old friends and I began to scout ahead on our camels. We would take water to the people from the water points we knew. This was becoming critical, because the rain time was over and the little wet spots in the desert quickly dried. We
On the third day of our flight we came to a water point where some of our people were waiting for us, including Father. He had some of our camels and other animals in his care. He already knew about Ahmed and looked much older on account of this news.
Fifteen of us, the younger men, decided to ride camels back to the village to bury the dead and retrieve the hidden supplies of food and clothing. The attackers would have taken all they wanted by now, burned the village, and gone away. We needed to bury the bodies before the wild dogs and jackals destroyed them. We gathered some tools for burial and rode back.
The village was mostly gone—sixty or so scorched black spots where a whole world once celebrated life. The nunus of millet, many mattresses and blankets, mounds of trees, and parts of huts were still smoking, which we smelled long before we entered the wadi.
Thirteen bodies were on the ground, mostly near the eastern side of the village, where the defense was made. The Sudanese troops and Janjaweed had of course removed their own dead, so these thirteen were the defenders of the village and some who had come to help.
I found Ahmed. The effects of large-caliber weapons and perhaps an RPG round were such that I barely recognized his body, but it was Ahmed. I dug a grave as we do, so that he would rest on his right side with his face to the east. I put the pieces of this great fellow in the deep sand forever.
“Goodbye, Ahmed,” I said to him. And I knelt down there for a long time instead of helping the others. It was raining a little.
Finally, I did stand and go help the others.
After we retrieved some hidden supplies and packed them on our camels, we prepared to leave. Mixed deep in the ashes of the smoldering huts were of course the bones of the old people who had refused to go, but we could do nothing for these now until the rains would reveal them. The wild animals would have no use for these fired bones.
A few birds were singing in the trees. Not many, but a few.
Well
, I thought to myself,
they will come back in time, like the people
.
But for now it was ashes and graves. This had been a good village.
8.
The Seven of Us
When we caught up with our people we men stayed mostly together with the wounded defenders, going back and forth to the women for the food and for the traditional medicine and teas they would prepare. In this way our village, though now a moving line in the desert, was still the same people helping one another.
The people of other villages joined us here and there, until we were a great mass of people moving across the land. Every morning we would have to bury several of the wounded who died in the night. It was good for some of them to die, since there was no morphine or other medicine. You can usually see in a man’s eyes if he will be blessed to die before morning.
On the fifth day we came to a remote and grassy valley, and some of those with animals to sustain them decided they would hide there and make a temporary life. Those with no animals had no choice but to continue on to Chad.My mother and sister were among these who stayed—she would go no farther. My father would keep moving with some of the animals and the other people while they needed him. The camels provided wonderful milk and rides for the children, who were suffering. He would come back to Mother with our animals when he could. In this way, my mother and sister became what the world calls IDPs, which means internally displaced persons—refugees who are still within their home country.
And in this way, too, the other people continued on for seven more days, walking to Chad, marking their way with graves.
Six of my old friends and I began to scout ahead on our camels. We would take water to the people from the water points we knew. This was becoming critical, because the rain time was over and the little wet spots in the desert quickly dried. We
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