If your country was being invaded, and there were not enough adults to repel the attackers, would you recruit children to help with the fighting? That is a terrible dilemma which has been faced in recent years in a number of African countries, and it provides the context for Cola Bilkuei’s autobiography Cola’s Journey: From Sudanese Child Soldier to Australian Refugee. It is a story which is exciting and deeply disturbing at the same time.
Cola lived in a traditional Sudanese village until he was recruited, against his own will and against that of his parents, into the Sudanese People’s Liberation Army, which was trying to defend southern Sudan against incursions from the north. Each village was expected to provide a few boys, and the boys who had been recruited set out on a very long and arduous walk across the country to a training camp which operated in Ethiopia.
Eventually Cola escaped, and then travelled from country to country in Africa, crossing borders illegally, living on the goodwill of strangers, and encountering many hair-raising adventures until he made his way to South Africa, and then finally obtained resettlement in Australia. Along the way, a number of people had robbed or mistreated him, most had just turned away from him, but some had shown kindness and generosity. The book made me want to be one of the generous people.