I hadn’t had anything for breakfast and my stomach was paying the price. I was always a picky eater in America, but here my selectiveness was beginning to hurt me. The irregular bumps of the unevenly paved road wasn’t helping either. I couldn’t bear to look outside, fearing the ultimate demise to my queazy stomach. I moved my head between my legs, but it was to no avail as my stomach continued to hurt. I was lost. But that’s exactly how I liked it. To be adrift in a world of uncertainty. Two things had pushed me to South Sudan; Deng and a personal quest that started in California a long time ago.
One summer during high school, I interned at the University of Southern California. Going from New York to Los Angeles may not seem like the biggest change of scenery but combined with my newfound independence, it seemed like two different worlds. No longer would an adult dictate what I was to do and I could suddenly walk to anywhere I wanted to go. I had my array of choices. I could do anything I pleased in my free time and whatever I did, it seemed like the right move. When I was seven my family went to Paris. They often poked fun at me that in Paris, one of the most beautiful cities in the world, my eyes were glued to the sidewalk and I wasn’t looking around. This time was different. I examined every store front, every distinct character on my bus, I contemplated my next lunching experience and enjoyed the parks. Time allowed me to do all of these things. Instead of speeding by, it strolled letting me enjoy every waking second. And when I finally entered my routine of getting to “work” and getting back, I was oblivious that time was accelerating. Finding my bus, Armando’s food truck and even my daily trek past the Church of Scientology became second nature. Before I knew it, I was packing my bags and saying my goodbyes. I would never forget that feeling though. The feeling of being lost, in a world where everything is new and being able to digest whatever came my way. Ever since then, I have yearned to make time crawl like it did that summer.
It was Deng’s smile that I remember most of all. He told us riveting stories. He had escaped genocide, escaped countries, he hadn’t seen his brother, daughter or wife in close to ten years, he had spent months in detention facilities and after that, this man, who spent his whole life escaping, and finally thinking he had found refuge, was to be deported. But out of all his horror stories and the narrow escapes he told us, it was his smile that resonated the most. It was spring break of my junior year in high school, and my family and I had traveled to Israel. While on vacation, I was planning on interviewing subjects for my history project. When I got wind that Deng, a South Sudanese refugee, was staying in my aunt’s village in southern Israel I knew it would make for a great interview. And like the tagline of a horror movie, I had little idea of what I was getting into. He chuckled while telling us stories of genocide. He chuckled! He wasn’t a sadistic man. But a kind one who had witnessed more things than any human should have. A kind man who, was visibly nervous, naturally laughed to fill up the negative space. Horror story after horror story, my mom, my brother, my aunt and I all fell in disbelief and a silence overtook us all. To break the silence, Deng flipped the script and asked us questions. “Do you hear about South Sudan in the news?” We all knew the answer but after a while, only my brother spoke. “No. We care too much about what Paris Hilton ate for breakfast than what’s going on in the rest of the world.” It was true. I can never look at tabloids the same way without thinking of Deng. Every time I see how short Kim Khardasian’s marriage lasted, I think of genocide. Ironic isn’t it?
Unlike my persistent stomach ache, the convoy finally stopped. Fellow aid workers began to exit, no doubt snickering about me. This is what I wanted, wasn’t it? To be immersed in a new land, so new that time would go so slowly and allow me to take in everything. This wasn’t New York to L.A., this was America to South Sudan. First World to third. Even though I had wished that time would speed up and I could finally return home, I knew that I would be thankful for my time here.
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