What is a refugee?
What is a refugee? As a writer for RESPECT International, I have tossed around this word so often of late that I confess it becomes easier to associate it more with a number or a statistic rather than with a real person.
The word refugee as defined by the 1951 Refugee Convention is "a person who is outside their country of nationality or habitual residence, and has a well-founded fear of persecution because of their race, religion, and nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion."
At the beginning of 2007, 32.9 million people were of concern to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), an agency established by the United Nations General Assembly to lead and co-ordinate international action to protect refugees worldwide.
Of those 32.9 million people, 9,900,000 are refugees and 12,800,000 are internally displaced persons (IDP's) or those forced to move from his or her home because of conflict and persecution but still living within their own countries.
By definition, a man I interviewed recently is a refugee but neither the definition nor the numbers come close to describing the troubles he experienced.
Macedo's mother from the Krahn ethnic group in Liberia became the target of ethnic cleansing and in 1990 he and his siblings were forced to leave their homeland.
They travelled along the Ivory Coast, around Guinea, snaked around Sierra Leone and finally ended up in Ghana where Macedo lived for 11 years until 2006.
"I came to Ghana because it was relatively safe as opposed to other refugee camps where I was forced out because of political upheavals in those countries."
Oftentimes, he went to bed hungry, sick, thirsty and frightened. He did not bathe "because you could not afford to lose what little water you had to drink. It was eat or be eaten," he said.
He prayed for the darkness to come and when it did he prayed for light, because neither of them, light nor dark, brought about peace "to your health, your stomach or your mind. And because you are hungry, sick, weak, unclothed and unroofed, the very sun, rain, moon, land and air are seen as weapons of destruction."
It was a life where children were stolen from their homes and killed "just to perform rituals…violence was the order of the day."
As problems arise in my own life, I am reminded of Macedo's story and in comparison my problems seem so paltry. Taking a shower takes on new meaning as I think of all the people who do not have the means to use such a precious resource in this way. And when I walk my dog in inclement weather I cannot help but consider it a blessing that I have the luxury of even owning a pet.
Even in daydreaming, I am reminded that somewhere someone dreams, not of a nicer car, clothes or a better career, but that millions in this very minute are just daydreaming of a life of basic human rights, who would give anything just for an hour, a minute or even a second to be without fear of persecution or death.
Unfortunately, Macedo's story is not unique but after engaging with him for the better part of a month he humanized the statistics, brought the numbers to life, gave a face to millions of nameless, faceless people I have not met yet know exist and helped bring new meaning to a word I have used countless times over the last six months.
I am grateful to Macedo for teaching me the meaning of this word and for his story that leaves an indelible print on my soul.