Oure Cassoni refugee camp was a mind changer for me
From seeing refugees as victims to survivors
To grasp that the opposite of love is indifference
That the Zaghawa people will always survive
After all they are camel pastoralists
A tough life that has in a way prepared them for
Chronic neglect by the world at large
And a genocide by their neighbouring Janjaweed
From Osman who collected a dictionary of the Zaghawa language
In camel symbols and Arabic
To Zahra who my head midwife with a wicked laugh
Changing the way (abolishing female genital mutilation)
Things work
To Adam who always was there to make sure our work
In the refugee camp could continue.
This book was published in 2009
Here we are in 2025 and despite hope
A few years ago
With women completing the revolution
To oust dictator and genocidair Omar El Bashir
To situation where yet again
Two asshole generals
Fighting for the spoils
In the meantime
Unleashing a nasty protracted genocide
Through mass rape, killing, poisoning of wells
Stealing of cattle, torture
We the people around the world
Looked on
While El Fasher was walled in
Decided to keep quiet
Now a small amount of attention
As yet again the word
"This (genocide) will never happen again"
sounds more hollow than ever
All I can do is raise awareness
Of the plight of these wonderful people
That have shown me
Humour, resilience and dignity
This post will expand as I have done before
May we dare to care
Namaskar
Ashis
802 blogs about Africa and my past work
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