The voices of despair
By: Sara Alam (Lansdale, USA)
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My father was 10 years old during the Liberation War of ’71. He told me many stories about the war, but the story of his separation from his family during a siege of his village is the one that resonates with me most:
“We had just sat down to eat when we heard truck engines bellowing through the village. As quiet as villages are, we were able to hear loud noise from a mile away. Putting down the morsel of rice that was in our hands, we went over to see. That is when we saw them… at least 50 to 60 Pakistani Army trucks ploughing their way through.
And that is when it all began: extinguishing the flame of the hurricane lantern, abandoning our homes and heading for the trees. It did not take long until they started to open fire and we ran for our lives. Bullets whizzed over me as I crawled through a rice paddy field, the sky lighting up like fireworks. I saw many fall in front of me, but I could do nothing to help but go on. Hearing them coming my way, I sunk back into the field and waited at the river bank, unable to cross it. I stopped breathing in fear that they might hear me, capture me, kill me. I was alone, my parents nowhere in sight. All I could do was pray that I stayed alive for one more day. A group of soldiers idled on the road nearby, their boisterous voices laughing and talking, full of hate, full of filth. Eventually, they heard a noise from nearby and followed it — I took that chance to get out of there as fast as I could.
The only way to move about was at night. I felt as though I had been walking for miles; I was tired, my feet cracked and dirty, my stomach growling. Gradually in the darkness, I lost track of the road and slipped back into the rice paddy field where I pierced my toe by stepping onto a thorn. I screamed silently, as my toe bled incessantly. Unable to see, I gave up trying to remove the thorn and kept walking, trying to evade the soldiers. The bleeding continued, but the pain eventually numbed away. After what seemed like hours, I saw something off in the distance, like a light flickering; it was a small house in the distance. Dozens of questions crossed my mind. What if the soldiers were using it as a base? But what if they weren’t? What if it was just a normal house with normal people inside? I could get help. They could tell me if they saw my family.
Taking a chance, I limped across the yard to the front door. My heart, beating more times than I could count, stopped as I pushed the door open and ten thousand voices shrilled, resonating through my body and into the night.
At least 100 villagers were hiding inside, my parents amongst them.”
