The Lost Boy: A never-ending journey, part 1

Lives Less Ordinary

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, Personal Journals

4.6 • 814 Ratings

🗓️ 4 August 2024

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Salva Dut is one of Sudan's so-called 'Lost Boys.' Separated from his family at the age of 11 when the civil war reached his village in 1985, Salva walked for weeks to reach safety in a refugee camp in Ethiopia. There, he lived out most of his teenage years, amongst thousands of other orphans. Like most of them, Salva had no idea what had happened to his family. With little adult supervision, the boys developed their own systems of organisation. That was to prove vital when in 1991 they were driven from the camp by a new conflict. Salva was 17 by this point, and he'd become a leader amongst the boys. In total there were 17,000 of them. They set off in groups, first back towards Sudan, then south, towards Kenya. When they emerged from the wilderness after many months, aid workers were astonished to find them still alive. They shared their story with the world. The United Nations recommended almost 4,000 of the Lost Boys for resettlement in the US, and Salva's name was among them. By this point, in his early 20s, Salva had been separated from his family for a decade. A reunion seemed impossible. He would be boarding a flight and leaving the continent of his birth behind.

The second part of Salva's story will be broadcast on the next edition of Lives Less Ordinary

Presenter: Mobeen Azhar Producer: Jo Impey

Get in touch: [email protected] or WhatsApp: 0044 330 678 2784

Transcript

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0:00.0	You are about to listen to a BBC podcast and I'd like to tell you a bit about what goes into making one.
0:06.5	I'm Sadata Sese, an assistant commissioner of podcasts for BBC Sounds.
0:11.1	I pull a lot of levers to support a diverse range of podcasts on all sorts of subjects,
0:16.0	relationships, identity, comedy, even one that mixes poetry, music and inner city life. So one day I'll be helping
0:23.8	host develop their ideas, the next fact-checking, a feature, and the next looking at how a
0:30.3	podcast connects with its audience. And maybe that's you. So if you like this podcast, check out some
0:35.9	others on BBC Sounds.
0:40.5	Whatever happened in my life, whether good and bad, I let it go.
0:44.8	I don't look back.
0:46.6	And I don't think about it.
0:49.0	I just like go forward and see how far would I go?
0:58.0	Would I be able to find water? Would I be able to find something to eat?
1:06.8	Will I take next step to be able to survive for today? It happened, move on, and keep looking forward, don't look back. Salvat Dut keeps him putting one foot in front of the other
1:15.0	he's a survivor whose will to keep going
1:18.1	has taken him across borders and continents
1:20.7	some might say he's already lived many lives.
1:41.1	This is Lives Less Ordinary from the BBC World Service.
1:42.6	I'm Mabin Azar.
1:47.9	Our guest today is one of some 17,000 children, many of them orphans who fled the long and brutal Sudanese civil war in the 1980s and 90s. They walked
1:54.9	thousands of miles to find safety in neighbouring countries. Their journey was perilous to the extent that many just didn't
2:03.3	make it. So when aid workers found survivors re-emerging after months or even years in the wilderness,
2:10.6	they call them the lost boys. Because after we trace our journey to Ethiopia and then
	...

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