Word: salan
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...relative has just made the journey. In the past, fleeing Somalis would travel by boat through the Suez Canal, but now that Egypt has tightened its border controls, the preferred route is overland to Libya, then by boat. His mother tries to talk him out of it, telling Abdi Salan that the trip is too risky and life will be hard even if he makes it. "I'm a man now," he tells her. "And in life, sometimes a man must suffer." FROM MOGADISHU TO KHARTOUM With a schedule of northbound buses in hand, Abdi Salan announces that he will...
...Somali students let him sleep on their couch. They also direct him to a café where smugglers are known to pass. There, at around 10 p.m., he meets the man he hopes will get him to Libya. At a corner table in the dimly lit café, Abdi Salan listens intently to the local man, who speaks Arabic in a faint voice. (Abdi Salan's native tongue is Somali, but he understands enough Arabic to get by.) The man is tall, lean and dark, wearing a flowing white Arab robe and headdress. He is flanked by a pair...
...halt and tells the Somalis to hop off the back. One of the smugglers points north toward a distant, green landscape: "There is Kufra," he says, the oasis outpost in southern Libya. For more than an hour, the Somalis walk along an unpaved road toward what Abdi Salan fears is nothing more than a mirage. FROM KUFRA TO ZLITAN It's disorienting to be back in civilization, and Abdi Salan's legs are cramped from the long walk. But he must get his bearings quickly, and make his next move. He has arrived at a smugglers' bazaar: Libya has become...
...ABDI SALAN, refugee...
...because it offers the steadiest flow of outgoing boats. As the Somalis approach the edge of Kufra, a swarm of Libyans comes to greet them. "Tripoli! Tripoli! Benghazi!" the local men bark. "Where do you want to go? We have food. Do you want a place to stay?" Abdi Salan has little choice, agreeing to spend $150 for a hot meal, two nights' lodging and a jeep ride north to Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city. The Kufra smugglers convince him that there he can obtain a foreigner identity card, to avoid any trouble with the Libyan authorities. It will...