Friday, January 02, 2009

Tears of the Desert - Halima Bashir and Damien Lewis

Tears of the Desert - Halima Bashir and Damien Lewis (2008)
Halima Bashir grew up in the Sudan, and was a bright schoolgirl who was able to go to medical school, and become a doctor. During her time training, conflicts began to escalate in Dafur. Civil unrest meant she treated a group of school girls, some as young as seven years old who were brutally beaten and gang raped. Also coming to her clinic were rebels who had shotgun injuries.

This put her in danger, and she herself was taken and abused and attacked. Seeking asylum she escaped to the UK, where she met up with her husband and started her own family. Refused asylum, she took her story to the public, and upon appeal was granted residency.

A well told autobiography,this memoir brings home the horror that is occurring within the Sudan, and all the misery of what happens when countrymen turn on each other. In the epilogue she does a good job of trying to explain how and why this has happened. 3/5

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