You see photos of refugees in the media, but how much do you know of their gut wrenching lives, turned upside down in the blink of an eye. Here’s one such story:
Like the time I ran into Marcus Sawyer, once a wealthy attorney in Liberia's capital, Monrovia. Sawyer owned holiday homes in South Africa, an apartment in the south of France, real estate in Dubai. You name it, he had it. He had some big clients in the country, including influential government officials.
One day rebels invaded the capital and Sawyer, his family and thousands of Liberians were forced to flee and seek refuge in the city's soccer stadium, the former home of the national team, The Lone Stars.
Suddenly it was home to more than 50,000 internally displaced people, or "IDPs," and would become Sawyer's new residence for the next six months.
"I never imagined in my wildest dreams I'd end up like this," he once told me, "sharing an outdoor pit latrine with a thousand people, sleeping in the same room with dozens of strangers. It takes some getting used to.
The last time I saw Sawyer he had become a shell of his old self -- dejected, depressed and despondent.
[From an article by Jeff Koinange, CNN]
No comments:
Post a Comment