The Promise of Freedom

This year marked the 25th anniversary of my arrival in the United States, and as the cliché goes, it feels like yesterday. Memories of war and life in a refugee camp penetrate my consciousness daily. The life of cruel suffering, being witness to genocide, and struggles as a refugee and later as an immigrant are part of my ontological makeup. Such events change you in previously unimaginable ways—fostering emotional strength but also existential fatigue. 

I left Bosnia at the end of 1992, almost a year into the war. It was a cold and miserable day but the overwhelming emotion of leaving my father, as well as the fear that a sniper or a mortar shell might end my life, made me forget about my body’s reaction to the weather. The buses were lined up, forming a convoy of women and children bound for the Czech Republic. Some cried, some held the tears back in a futile effort to battle the reality of the absurd situation. The bus I was on was first in line, and it filled up pretty quickly. There was nowhere for me to sit, so I alternated between standing and sitting on my suitcase.

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