The “Sagittaire” evacuation of around 100 people from Sudan on the first French flight out of the war-hit country after a “complicated” rescue operation Photo The Mirror Etat Major des Armées/AFP via Ge
Sudan – “I feel overwhelmed. It has been a horrific experience for 15 days. Everybody wants to know our story of how we got evacuated but nobody realises that it was our home. I lived there for five years. I used to come back on vacation and bring presents and such but I left everything there. I really have nothing here.”
Sharon Dreyer is a South African teacher who spent the past 15 days praying to God that she would make it out of war torn Sudan alive. Leaving her apartment with nothing but a backpack, she now recalls the terrifying experience of trying to make it out of Sudan alive.
While everyone wants to know about her evacuation, Dreyer’s eyes fill with tears as she talks about the moments leading up to her leaving the country. Leaving behind the life she spent five years building, leaving her home which has now been destroyed and not knowing if she will ever get her life back. It creates a pit of sadness that can no longer be contained. With tears starting to form in her eyes, she talks about her life in Sudan.
“Yesterday morning when I went to Pep to get myself winter pyjamas, I just burst out crying. I thought that was my home for five years. I had to leave everything. Everyone of us that left, that was our livelihood. We don’t know what is in our future. We don’t know if we are going to go back there.”
Her apartment, which is in Khartoum, was half destroyed due to the ongoing war taking place. After witnessing her apartment being bombed, getting out of there alive was “only through the grace of God”. It was through her neighbours, who are a part of the United Nations and her friends, that she was able to be evacuated. They were taken to the Rotana Hotel which was only a little bit safer than where she lived.
The experience on the ground in Sudan
According to Dreyer, the war between General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and the Rapid Support Forces paramilitary group, led by General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo took everyone by surprise. While there was a sense that something was “brewing”, this level of violence was not expected.
“In April we heard they were going to sign a treaty to say who would rule. We thought something might happen or might not happen and nothing did … Nobody suspected on the Saturday morning [for the war to break out]. We heard like a bang and then all of a sudden we heard the shooting.”
Dreyer has an intense love for Sudan evident by the way she speaks about the country. With such love in her heart for Sudan, she breaks down and tears flow down her cheeks as she talks about the horrifying scenes that followed.
“I cannot stop crying. I try to be brave. The whole time we were out there for the 15 days, we could not cry because all we needed to do was get out. What was more irritating was when people wrote to say go to the embassy. I saw a tanker being blown up in our street. So how was I going to get out of there? Even the South African embassy, all of them were with us in the bus because they had to escape … It has been so much for me. Seeing dead bodies and the smell. I sometimes still get that smell of the dead bodies that were lying outside our flats.”
When the war broke out, many of her students’ parents reached out to her to find out how she was while also trying to get her out. Unfortunately, it proved to be an impossible task with every nearby area being filled with fighting. Those who have escaped, Dreyer has kept in contact with them.
The situation in Sudan worsens everyday. Almost 70% of all hospitals in Sudan have shut down with more than 500 people being killed during the war. More than 100,000 people have fled Sudan since heavy fighting broke out with a further 340 000 being displaced.
To hear more from Sharon Dreyer about what she experienced, listen to the podcast here:
