Valentino Achak Deng

Valentino Achak Deng: The name of a long and very burdensome life story that starts from the city of Marial Bai in South Sudan and extends to the city of Atlanta in the USA. It was a long book, Valentino Achak Deng's autobiography, novelized by Dave Eggers.

The life story of Valentino Achak Deng is a very painful story of a young child who became a refugee as a result of the Islamic regime imposed by the dictator Omar al-Bashir and the oppression of the Christian population living in southern Sudan.

Valentino comes from a family of Dinka tribesmen, and the country began to fall into disarray after the "September Laws", the capital Khartoum's 1972 Addis Ababa Agreement, which brought sharia law to the whole country and gave South Sudan a degree of autonomy, was ignored.

The unrest escalates and becomes unstoppable when government militias called murahaleen attack Christian villages and the resistance movement, the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA), responds to these attacks. Khartoum's aim is to impose sharia on Christian Sudanese. When these attacks begin, Marial Bai's children begin to flee the city. Without even looking back at those they left behind. They flee without even knowing whether their family members survived these attacks.

In an environment where the risk of life is at its highest level and with the fear of new attacks, they start walking towards Ethiopia. This dangerous journey ends with them crossing the Gilo River and reaching the city of Pinyudo. During the long journey, they imagine that Ethiopia is a very beautiful country, that they will live in beautiful places there and receive a good education. Along the way, the number of children has reached a level that can be expressed in the hundreds with new participations.

The sight they encounter when they arrive in Ethiopia is also demoralizing. Hundreds of children are in complete disappointment. They have come from one miserable country to another. They benefit from the United Nations' refugee aid program in Pinyudo. Here too, Ethiopian soldiers do not leave the children living in the refugee camp alone. The Ethiopian army takes action to expel the United Nations refugees from their country.

While children are dying of yellow fever and malaria and their numbers are diminishing due to these diseases and they are struggling to survive, another long journey begins, again on foot. This time to Kenya.

Another dangerous journey to Kenya ends in Kakuma. A life that will last for years awaits them in Kakuma, again in a United Nations refugee camp. There is no news of their families. All the people they knew in their lives that they left behind in one day, they have not even heard of them for years, let alone having the hope of seeing them again.

While the children are concerned with their own lives, they are disconnected from the world. They find the opportunity to receive a certain level of education in the Kakuma camp. In the same days, they start running after the planes passing overhead, thinking that they will drop food on them. Bombs fall on them instead of food. They lose eight of their friends.

They are in a miserable state due to vitamin deficiency and malnutrition. Finally, they are placed in the USA, Canada and Australia. Valentino is among the chosen children. After a long wait, the day to go to Atlanta has come. The flight from Amsterdam to Atlanta via Nairobi is cancelled while Valentino is still on the plane. Because that day is September 11, 2001.

When they learned that a country they had just learned the name of was under attack, Valentino and his friends thought it would be safer to go back to Sudan while they were still waiting on the plane. When everything returns to normal, the journey to Atlanta begins again.

When he arrives in the US, what he sees greatly affects Valentino. Over time, he adapts to his new life. This child, who has experienced almost every pain that can be experienced at a very young age, is accepted as a member of the Lost Boys Foundation in the US and is now under a kind of protection. In this way, he begins his education. He attends the meetings of this foundation with other lost children and takes on active roles in the organization.

Valentino learned that his family was alive in the last days of the Kakuma camp. He was able to talk to his father, albeit with difficulty, via satellite phone. A father who has not seen his son for years tells his son never to return to Marial Bai. Valentino listens to his father and does not return to Marial Bai.

Today, there is a foundation called Valentino Achak Deng. The income from the book I read goes to this foundation as a donation. Valentino has opened a school in Marial Bai. The foundation devotes all its resources to the education of Sudanese children in need in various parts of the world.

There are many lessons to be learned from Valentino's use of such negative, miserable living conditions, which are likely to lead people astray, as the basis for such positive action.

Weak people are always the ones with plenty of excuses. Reading Valentino is very beneficial for a person to feel good about themselves. When I saw what I saw with my own eyes in Sudan, I thought this must be the lowest point of the world.

Photo: Arda Tunca archive.