Sudanese lost girl’s journey leads to US citizenship
Nov 14, 2006 (HOUSTON) — Her smile dawns softly, then sows a warm light across her quiet face. Even in the midst of household tumult – children chattering, television blaring – Martha Dawud Thiew appears serene and happy.
That tranquility has been hard-earned. Thiew survived a perilous journey from a small village in southern Sudan to an apartment complex in Houston.
On Wednesday, Thiew will become a U.S. citizen. It will be a proud moment for Thiew, who beams with delight when she speaks of her life in this country. It will also be a marker of the progress of the Lost Boys and Girls of Sudan, a group of 3,800 refugees who spent years in refugee camps before being resettled in the United States. Most were only children when they were left orphaned and homeless by civil war.
Thiew, among the first to enter the U.S. in December 1999, was one of only 89 girls brought to this country as part of the resettlement. Many girls were killed during the war that forced them to migrate or sold into slavery. Others were placed with foster families in the refugee camps and then forgotten during resettlement efforts.
The seven years since have taken the refugees from adolescence to adulthood, from early months straining to master a new language and a new world to lives as college students and fledgling professionals. Some have gotten married. Others are becoming citizens. Many are seeking out ways to reach back and help those still in Sudan and the refugee camps of Kenya and Ethiopia.
Thiew’s story reflects those struggles and successes.
She is 31 now, the mother of four and the wife of Idris Negi Kyana, 33, also a Sudanese refugee from the same Mabaan tribe. She works the night shift as a dishwasher in the Houstonian Hotel – which the elder George Bush called home during his presidency – and attends the Bellaire Presbyterian Church. Her English, though halting, is impressive for someone who did not speak a word a few years ago.
And her smile tells the story of her life better than any word in any language can.
It tells of her joy to be in a safe place, with food and shelter and no fear of enemy attacks. And in the trace of shyness, it tells of quiet sorrows for the losses she has endured.
“In my country, people are fighting. Too many people fighting,” Thiew says, as she recounts the strife that forced her from her home. “We are living outside. No school. No food. When it is raining, you must hold your baby like this.”
Thiew curves her arms like a cradle, sheltering an imaginary infant.
She fled her village of Liang in 1996, when northern Sudanese forces attacked and burned it to the ground. She and Kyana had time enough only to whisk their one-year-old son from bed and to rush to safety in a nearby forest with other villagers. Then, like the other Lost Boys and Girls, Thiew and her familiy began to walk across hundreds of miles of unforgiving terrain. Many withered from hunger and thirst, were devoured by lions, or killed by enemy gunfire. The survivors straggled into refugee camps in Kenya and Ethiopia.
Thiew remembers having nothing to eat, and very little to drink. One cup of water would be shared by several people. “If you drink it all, some people are going to die,” she said.
“I was thinking that maybe someone is going to kill me, maybe I am going to die,” Thiew said. “I see people fighting close to me. I asked God to help me.”
The Ethiopian refugee camp where she lived for three years, bearing two more sons, was not much better. They lived in a makeshift tent, crowded by other people from their village. They could eat only one meal a day, or there would be nothing for the next day.
She still winces when she thinks of her children’s hunger. “If your baby is crying, then you will cry, too.”
They were approved for refugee status in late 1999, a year after they applied. They came straight to Houston along with 476 other Lost Boys.
Legend and exaggeration portrayed the U.S. as fields of tall buildings that grew taller, with no open land, no places for children to play. The greenery of Houston, despite its urban centers and skyscrapers, didn’t fit their image.
“We think this town is not America yet. I think, we will rest here then go to another place,” Kyana said with a laugh. “I think America is only tall buildings.”
But they quickly grew to love their new home. And Thiew says she has never looked back.
Within two weeks, Kyana had found a job as a dishwasher and now works as a maintenance man for their apartment complex. Thiew started working nine months after they arrived. Their fourth son was born here three years ago.
There are still reminders of their lives in Sudan, but now they are alchemized with signs of their new lives in Houston. Thiew still cooks traditional Sudanese food, but she buys the ingredients at Fiesta, a grocery store catering to Latinos. Her children still speak Arabic, but have added flawless English. One son is also learning Spanish.
The sofa in Thiew’s home is still decorated with hand embroidered doilies that Thiew and her sister made for a traditional Sudanese Christmas ritual.
But, on one wall, there is a banner purchased at a local flea market. At the top is the Houston skyline, in the middle a photograph of her husband, at the bottom the Texas flag.
“Maybe next time, I will go and make one of my family that I will send to Sudan,” Thiew said. “And I will say: ‘Look, we live in Houston!’ ”
(AP)