The Newberg Graphic
| A Lost Boy’s journey continues | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| David Mathiang, a refugee from Sudan, graduates Saturday from George Fox | ||||
When David Mathiang arrived at George Fox University in 2005 for Genesis, the school's summer orientation program, he was in for a surprise - everyone was white. His high school track coach had warned him, saying, "I know you're a really nice guy and you get along with everybody, but George Fox is a very small school and everybody's white ... don't freak out." said Mathiang, a Sudan native. "At Genesis ... I didn't see any black person at all - he was right." But skin tone wasn't the only difference between Mathiang and the new classmates he would graduate with three years later. Instead of growing up in America, Mathiang spent much of his childhood in African refugee camps, where he was a member of a group known as the Lost Boys of Sudan. Mathiang was born in Sudan, in the midst of a civil war between the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA) and the Islamic Sudanese government. In 1987, when he was about 4-years-old, Arab soldiers raided his village, shooting the men and taking the women. Mathiang hid in a bush, then escaped and joined a group of boys walking to safety in Ethiopia, a two- to three-month journey. The Boston Globe newspaper reported that when the refugees reached Ethiopia, about 300 adults looked after 33,000 boys. Relief workers named them the Lost Boys of Sudan after "Peter Pan's" Lost Boys, a group of orphans who cared for themselves in Neverland. The Lost Boys of Sudan lived in a refugee camp until 1991, when the Ethiopian dictatorship fell and the country erupted into a war of its own. Ethiopian militia drove the boys across a river and back into Sudan, where they were attacked and bombed by the Sudanese military. So they fled the country again. This time, the Lost Boys took refuge in Kenya, at the Kakuma Refugee Camp. The approximately 11,000 boys were joined by refugees from all over Africa, eventually exceeding 60,000. The United Nations and international aid organizations provided assistance and the boys attended school. Mathiang made it through the ninth grade. Then, what he thought was a rumor began circulating: the United Nations was attempting to send the boys to America and Australia. "It was kind of like dreaming. I thought they were joking, it's not going to happen," Mathiang remembered. He wondered how the thousands of refugees could make it into the country. "How big is America?" he asked. It was big enough, and in 2000, after passing a series of medical checks, background checks and interviews, Mathiang became one of 4,000 Lost Boys to come to America. "I was like, oh wow, so exciting!" he said. But his new home, with foster parents in Seattle, was not quite what he expected: it was snowy, cold and dark. "At 4 it got dark; a long, long night," he said. "I was kind of disappointed `cause I didn't see sun at all." Still, he quickly began adapting to his new life, learning English and enrolling in high school, where he participated in soccer and track. "Running is all about individuals, if you're good you're good, if you're not you're not," he said. "My first time running on the track, I was going really, really good - all the JV was in the back." His athletic endeavors paid off, and by the time Mathiang graduated in 2003, he had been recruited by "so many schools, I was so confused about where to go." He was advised to go to a smaller school, and after hearing that a Sunday School friend, Zachariah, was going to attend George Fox, his mind was made up: "When I heard that, I'm like wow, I'm going right now!" He attended community college in Seattle for a year, then enrolled at Fox. Despite his coach's warning, he was surprised to see no black people at Genesis, but had little trouble fitting in. "I made like five friends at Genesis, and they became my good friends until they graduated," he said. And once he started classes, he found a few other black students. Mathiang majored in sociology and participated in track. In 2006, he obtained his American citizenship. On Saturday, he graduated, receiving a bachelor of arts degree in sociology. "It was a pretty good experience, I like it," he said of college. "I had fun." He explained his philosophy of getting along with everybody: "For me, it's all about like being peaceful and being friendly ... I think first before I say something that'll offend you." He credits this to the way he was raised, but explained that, growing up in refugee camps, he basically took care of himself. "I think the war saved me, (because) being through the hardships, you learn things the hard way," he said, adding that he often didn't have enough to eat. "I've been through a lot of difficult things ... I'm used to doing my own thing on myself, (with) no mom, no dad telling me what to do." And he thinks the forced independence gave him a life advantage: "I feel bad that there was a war, but good that I learned things." Although he has not returned to Africa since his move eight years ago, he hopes to in the future. His family remains in Sudan, and he talks to his dad "once in awhile." "In my family, I'm the first person to have a college degree," he said. "Since I was a kid, my goal was to go to school, (because) I don't want to be like my parents, so if I can go to school I can be a different person." What's next? Mathiang doesn't have his future mapped out, but he hopes to find a job where he can work "with people, just dealing with people so I can know them more." Ideally, he would like to work with the United Nations in refugee camps, "`cause I know how that thing goes, what's good and what's bad." | ||||
