Meeting Her Majesty the Queen

I have been through lots of ups and downs over the last year. At the beginning of the year, I had to deal with the trafficking of my young sister. She is now safe in Khartoum.

In September 2016, I started a master’s degree in Migration and Diaspora Studies. I was honoured to be awarded a SOAS University of London refugee scholarship that covered all my tuition fees and accommodation. I live in a beautiful suite in London House, Goodenough College. I have already made lots of friends and am doing very well in my studies.

Having said that, I struggled a bit at the beginning of the academic year. When I decided to go to London to start my MA course, I did not have enough money to live on. The scholarship covered my tuition fees and accommodation, but not my basic needs such as food, clothes and so on. I worked for about ten months before I started the MA course, but did not have money as I paid all the money to release my sister from the smugglers.

Frankly, I had £50 in my bank account when I travelled to London and did not have any source of income at the time. But I did not want to miss the opportunity of pursuing my dreams and that is why I had to start the MA course.

On my first day at SOAS, I saw students queuing by the gate and wondered what it was for. After coming close to the queuing area, I noticed they were queuing for food. I then asked one of the students who told me that it was a charity distributing food for students for free. The student asked me if I wanted to line up with her and I joined her. While introducing each other, we found out that we will be in the same department. After that, we became friends and are still good friends.

For about six weeks, I would queue for free food once a day. Basically, I was eating only once a day. Sometimes, I would retain a piece of bread from lunch and eat it later in the evening. But, it was not as bad as it sounds. I have been through a lot of difficult times and this was nothing compared to some of the things I had to endure.