Escape from a War Zone

All I remember is hearing loud bangs and then dropping to the ground. 

I was 13 at the time, just a typical teenager. It was cold in our house, so I had taken my 2-year-old cousin down to the entryway, hoping we could step outside to get a little sun and warm up. 

But as soon as I felt the sunlight on my face, I heard the gunshots. I pulled my cousin close and shielded him on the ground, where we lay trembling.

I wondered: Will we survive, or will we die right here? Those were the kinds of thoughts running through my head for a full 15 minutes, until I realized the gunfire had stopped.

That was the day my family finally decided to leave Syria. And though I didn’t know it then, we were leaving for good.

Growing up in Syria, my life was normal and happy. I’m from Daraa, a city in the southwest part of the country, and I lived in a house with my mom, Nsrin, who worked as an accountant, and my younger brother, Ali. (My father passed away when I was 9.) 

Our neighborhood was full of people and very lively. You would always see families walking and kids playing in the street. I can’t remember ever being scared for my safety. 

In fact, Syria was such a safe and stable country that refugees would come to Daraa to escape violence or unrest in their homelands. Every day at school, I studied with students from war-ravaged places, like Iraq and Palestine. Now I’m one of them, and I never expected that to happen. 

In 2011, everything changed. That’s when fighting erupted in Daraa (see “The Conflict in Syria,” below). Ali and I stopped going to school—it wasn’t safe to travel there each day—and couldn’t leave our home to do normal stuff, like play soccer or see friends. We’d stay inside, watching TV and leaving only at certain times to grab necessities, like food. Imagine being cooped up, with no end in sight—that was my life for an entire year. 

When we finally decided to flee, in 2012, we were lucky. Daraa is close to Jordan, so my family was able to drive there to stay with my mother’s sister. I couldn’t say goodbye to my friends, but I figured it wasn’t a big deal. I thought we’d be gone for two weeks, maybe two months at most. 

After two years in Jordan, my family received great news: We were moving to the United States. For refugees like me, the process of being admitted to the U.S. can take a really long time (see “The Long Road to a New Life,” right). In August 2015, a year after we were approved, we finally arrived at our new home in Michigan. 

So far, I like my life here. My classmates have welcomed me, but until my English gets better, it’s hard for me to really get to know them. That’s just motivating me to work on my English, though. Someday, I hope to be an ER doctor or a dentist. 

I’m so grateful for this opportunity to start over. Still, I’ll never forget my old life. I wonder where my friends are, the ones I didn’t get to say goodbye to. Are they safe? 

I may never know, but every single day, I hope so.