They Poured Fire On Us From The Sky: The True Story of Three Lost Boys from Sudan

Shortly after Alepho left, the boys at Natinga began receiving their military training. Benson grew even more determined to leave, knowing that he would have no control over his life once he was recruited as a soldier. His family had no news of Yier once he joined the SPLA, until Benson reunited with him in Kapoeta. Benson knew that he could not take Benjamin with him with the latter’s injured leg. He began to prepare for any opportunity to escape alone, telling no one his plan.

A month after his arrival, Ajak took Alepho to register at school in Kakuma. There were seven subjects, and it was just a month before the final exams. Nevertheless, Alepho persevered and spent all his time preparing, and he passed with high marks: He was ranked second out of a group of 150 boys. Even as he settled into Kakuma, Alepho continually thought about Benson, Benjamin, and Joseph, keeping his ears open for any news of them from Natinga.

Some months after Alepho left Natinga, Benson overheard some older boys making a plan to escape by night. He joined them despite their protestations that Benson was too young. They walked for 36 hours without any food or water, the hunger, thirst, and exhaustion forcing them to drink their own urine to survive. The boys finally stopped to rest, but Benson was worried that they wouldn’t be able to get up again, remembering how people died like this in the Ajakageer desert. He continued on his own, managing to pass a police post and reaching a collection of tents in Lokichokio.

One of the men at the tents gave Benson some food and water and instructed him to find the Sudanese in the United Nations compound. With help from different people along the way, Alepho made it to the Sudan Relief Rehabilitation Association and told them about the other boys still in the desert. One of the men there offered no sympathy for the other boys but allowed Alepho passage on a truck headed to Kakuma.

At Kakuma, a sick and weakened Benson was relieved to find Lino, who took him to reunite with the others. Benson was thrilled to see his brothers and cousins looking so well; only Benjamin and Joseph were left to join them now. By the next day, all except one of the other boys had made it to Kakuma from the desert. They were attacked by Turkana men on the way, and one of the boys was shot and killed. A few weeks later, Benson heard that the boys back at Natinga had been told that the escapees had all died along the way. He wondered whether Benjamin would lose all hope at hearing that.

One afternoon, Benjamin noticed a convoy of soldiers preparing to leave Natinga. Three older boys snuck into the truck, and Benjamin joined them. All four of them were discovered, but Benjamin lied and said that his mother was in one of the vehicles ahead. The older boys were taken back, but Benjamin got away with the lie. He finally made it to Kakuma and reunited with the rest of his family.

With everyone reunited except for Joseph, the boys settled into life at camp. However, by their second year there, camp officials began building a huge, barbed fence around the area and announced that all refugees would be counted.

After the headcount, supplies began to be distributed every 16 days via ration tickets. Overcrowding and logistical issues meant that people often missed their turn to collect rations and would have to go hungry until the next collection slot. Over time, the rations were also drastically reduced. Dwindling resources and increasing difficulties saw many of the boys in the camp turn to crime.

Benson and his family managed to keep their spirits up by sticking together, sharing whatever little they had, and playing games and telling jokes to pass the time. Despite all the hardship they experienced, they did enjoy a good education via the schools that the United Nations helped them build.

Life was relatively good at Kakuma until the famine of 1996. This saw a drastic reduction in resources and school facilities at the camp. All the hardships that the refugees had faced so far, including this, meant that there was now increased conflict and fighting within the camp. The boys at camp learned about the rest of the world through their schoolbooks and the occasional movies they watched; however, Alepho lost all hope for peace, for their future, and for the possibility of a place in the world they learned about.

One day late in 1996, Joseph suddenly appeared at Kakuma. He had spent years fighting and was haunted by all that he saw. It took him a year to begin talking about everything he had been through, and he told Alepho about some of his experiences.

As the rations decreased over time, Benjamin finally learned that refugee life meant a choice between food and education. If one didn’t want an education, one could “make a business for […] survival” (276). If one wanted an education, however, one had to consume the minimal food ration doled out and try to focus on school. Benjamin and his cousins chose this, but the hunger often clouded their vision when they tried to read.

After six years in Kakuma, Benson came to hate the word “refugee.” The Kenyans looked down on the Sudanese refugees even as they exploited them. They forced the refugees to build, clean, and work for them and pocketed the resources sent for the refugees from across the world. Benson felt hopeless, convinced that there was no country where he could be truly free.

Some of this hope returned when Benson first heard about the process to relocate the so-called “Lost Boys” to America. However, he worried about passing the interview and about his file going “missing”: “Files were often ‘missing,’ but every Lost Boy knew that they were taken and sold. If you had no file, you had no hope” (281).

Once Alepho learned of the possibility of going to America, he found a new purpose and motivation to focus on school despite the hunger. He studied hard to learn about America and practiced his English. He finally took the interview two years later and passed; he kept the hope alive, waiting for his name to turn up on the board.

The orientation process for the boys’ move to America began in 2000. Benjamin’s process was a little messy, but it still looked like he might be able to leave for America after Alepho and the others; however, Emmanuel and Peter’s files went missing. Alepho’s heart ached for Peter, who would be left behind.

Alepho passed his final exam, the Kenyan National Certificate of Education, in January 2001. All that was left to do was wait to leave for America, and the call finally came. Before the boys left, members of their community gathered to give them advice. They urged the boys to focus on their education, stay away from drugs and alcohol, and behave appropriately with women and expressed their joy that the boys were finally getting out.

Joseph was the first to leave, with Alepho, Benson, and Lino on the next plane. As it took off, Alepho contemplated the homeland he was leaving behind, wondering whether it would see any peace again.

Benson was nervous about flying in the Sabena, the Belgian airbus. Once it took off, however, he found the flight relatively quiet and comfortable. He was amazed by the TV screen in front of his seat but couldn’t figure out how to operate it and put on the movie he wanted to watch. He was also puzzled by the Americans’ choice of salad as food.

Santino, who was sitting next to him, informed him that there was supposedly a toilet on the plane. A disbelieving Benson went to investigate, and after observing a man leave the space following a loud flushing sound, he realized that the space labeled “Lavatory” was the toilet. It took him a while to figure out how to flush the toilet, and he explained the process to Santino once he returned to his seat. Together, the two of them marveled at how Americans did things.

On the plane from Brussels to New York, Alepho awoke drenched in sweat from a dream in which human skulls were talking to him, advising him to find peace in his heart. He pondered the question for a while.

In the New York airport, as Alepho and some of the others were waiting to board a flight to San Diego, an American man named Payson approached Alepho and struck up a conversation. He had a friend in Sudan once and inquired about the current situation there. He also offered to buy the boys some soda and was amused rather than offended by their obvious displeasure at its taste. Payson left his number with Alepho, asking him to call sometime.

Aboard the plane, Benson thought about how it had been 14 years since he left his home in Dinkaland; he would have to adjust to a completely different life in a new home now. He thought about everything he had heard about America, the good and the bad. More than anything, he looked forward to being able to get a job and earn money on his own. As the pilot announced the plane’s descent into San Diego, Benson contemplated that this was where he would find his destiny.

Benjamin was the last to arrive of the first group of Lost Boys approved for resettlement in America. He arrived on the day of 9/11, following which the resettlement program in Africa was halted for security reasons until 2004. By this time, other refugee groups took priority, and peace talks were underway in Sudan; Peter and Emmanuel therefore remained in Kakuma.

At the time of the book’s publication, the Lost Boys of Sudan were scattered across 30 cities in the United States. They continued to struggle in different ways and are considered “among the most badly war-traumatized children ever examined” (309). While there are tens of thousands of Lost Boys, there are far fewer “Lost Girls”: Many of the girls in Sudan were raped, killed, and enslaved during the attacks, and less than 2,000 made the journey from Sudan to Kenya.

Judy A. Bernstein, one of the co-authors, thanks the people who made this book possible, including Benson, Alepho, and Benjamin, who bravely relived their experiences for the book. Reliving some of this trauma has also helped them heal. Bernstein asserts that personal accounts of war are important, as they serve as reminders of war’s real, “tragic and lasting consequences on people’s lives, particularly children’s” (312).