Memories from a refugee camp in Syria

My dear Muslim Sisters,
Today I shall continue to tell you a little story about the life of Muslim women in a Syrian refugee camp. My story shall be about a second type of fear I experienced during my time in the camp – namely, the fires. You see, the tents were placed in rows, and the distance between them was of approximately 1,5 meters. When one of the tents caught fire, the neighboring tents were automatically also lit. As a result, fires usually caused ravages in the camp. While I was there, I survived two major fires (judging by the number of tents that burned and by the extent of the flames). I shall now tell you a little bit about the first one.
It took place two weeks after I was transferred to the camp. Back then, the camp was still relatively small, and it was surrounded by an iron fence. Across the road, there was and unfortunately still is, the camp for the Muslim refugee families from Iraq and Syria, as well as the supply warehouses. It was starting to get dark when, all of a sudden, I saw the first flames. I was the first fire I had seen in my life. I reckoned it was the same for many of my other Muslim sisters from the camp. In no time, panic started to spread amongst the sisters, as the flames grew bigger and bigger. At one point, they seemed to be as big as a 9 story building, and the fire started to spread throughout the camp, from one access gate to the other.
As the fire extended, the panic grew bigger: the sisters took their children and started running in disarray to the edges of the camp and they began, with their bare hands, to pull at and tear through the thick wire that served as a fence. Honestly, I dread to remember the fear, which was so great that many of my Muslim sisters succeeded in tearing the fence just using their hands, without using any wire cutters or other instruments. The fire reached colossal proportions and the worst, the most terrible part was that the flames eventually reached the warehouse where the gas tanks were being stored. Of course, they exploded with a powerful, deafening noise, while the flames went higher and higher, seeming to reach the sky. Fragments from the gas tanks started to fly though the air in all directions, threating to hit someone.
Everyone from the camp started to run towards the surrounding fields. Now, the panic spread, as even the military guards seemed to be very afraid. Thinking that we might escape and run away, they surrounded us with their cars, and blinded us using their strong projectors. As the military guards were trying to prevent us to save ourselves, the panic reached its peak.
After only 10 minutes, the guards finally understood that there is nowhere to run and that we must all save ourselves, so they calmed down a little bit. But they could not put out the fire for a very long time. The heat, the flames, the strong blasts and horrible noises – I still cannot find the words to describe how terrible it was and how frightened I felt.
But in those awful moments, all of the sisters started to gather in one place and comforted each other as best they could: some were trying to calm down and soothe the children that were crying, others prayed for Allah’s help so that He can put an end to the nightmare, others hoped that their tents would be spared from the flames that seemed to devour everything around, through the Infinite Mercy of Allah All Mighty. The fire lasted for about 2-3 hours, although it felt like much longer. Finally, the flames died out and we could return to the camp, to see what we could rescue from our tents. Luckily, thank Allah, the part of the camp where I had my tent was not damaged.
It was not until in the early hours of the next morning that everything settled down and all that reminded now of the fire were the pieces of blown up gas tanks that were sitting around, scattered throughout the camp. After a few days, the cause of the fire was finally established – some workers that were storing gas tanks in the warehouse were smoking while they were unloading them from the trucks. Their negligence almost cost the lives of my Muslim sisters and myself. I felt angered but managed to calm myself by thinking that it was the Will of Allah, as everything that happens to us during our time in this world is. I am sure that many of my Muslim sisters from the camp will remember this fire for the rest of their lives and I hope that they learned the right lessons from this trial by fire. As for myself, my lesson was that Allah is All Powerful and all Merciful and that He protected me that evening. Everything is Allah’s Will, and he can defend us, if the finds us worthy, or He can punish us, if we prove to be sinful.