Ethiopia: Beyond survival, a journey defined by possibility

In my earliest memory, my mother is crouching over a small pot of boiling water in Dima Refugee Camp, one of the settlements in Ethiopia’s Gambella region. The fire hissed in the cold night air as she urged my siblings and me to stay close, warning us not to wander beyond the dim circle of light. In the camp, darkness often meant danger. 

I grew up among people whose only wealth was hope, a community fractured by conflict and poverty, where justice felt distant and unreachable. Those early nights planted the first questions that would later shape my life.

I was born in Dima, after my parents fled Sudan [1] due to the conflicts of the 1980s. War had stolen their home long before I arrived. No child should have to witness what I experienced in the camp: women humiliated without consequence, children abused, entire communities shattered…

Even as a child, I sensed that without law, the powerless often suffer in silence. I began to ask questions that still guide me today: Who protects the vulnerable? What does justice mean if it never reaches those who need it most?

My mother never had the chance to attend school. She carried a quiet strength that shaped my understanding of resilience. My father was orphaned by war. He left school in ninth grade and joined an armed force, because life offered him few other alternatives at the time. 

[1] South Sudan was part of Sudan until its independence in 2011.