-part 2-
Salaam aleikum va rahmatu Llah va barakatuh. My dear readers, in today’s post, I shall continue to tell you about the fires inside the refugee camp. This story shall be about the second biggest fire in the camp, considering the amount of material losses and the great toll of emotional impact on the camp’s “residents”.
As I might have mentioned before, the camp is divided into several sectors, which are separated by roads. The day was coming to an end and it was just a few hours before nightfall, and I was cooking inside my improvised kitchen and talking to one of the Muslim Sisters I knew from the camp. Usually, when a fire starts somewhere inside the camp, panic rapidly spreads through all sectors and everyone rushes to offer some kind of help, according to their strength and capabilities. I think I have told you before, my dear readers, that the soldiers who guarded the camp would rarely allow the water tanks to enter the premises of the camp during a fire, even though, with their help, the flames would be put out in just a few minutes. We all felt that the soldiers did that on purpose, to make us struggle and suffer even more.
The children that were on the road during that late afternoon, started running and screaming that a fire had started. My smallest daughter suddenly entered the tent and started panicking. I tried my best to calm her down but did not manage to do it. We had to exit the tent, so that I could at least see the extent of the fire. Because I was feeling overwhelmed I could not bring myself together at that time to go and offer my help. Initially, I thought it was just one tent that caught fire, but I was wrong. The tents started catching fire one after the other. The noise was awful. Moreover, the kerosene tanks the Sisters were keeping in their tents started exploding, causing the flames to go even higher. The worst part was that, not even at this terrible time, the soldiers did not allow the water truck to enter the camp, and we, the “residents”, could not manage to put out the fire by ourselves.
The flames were coming in the direction of my tent like a giant, hot wall. Everyone was screaming and the children were simply terrified. All we could do, at that point, was to pray to Allah for mercy, to ease our suffering and bring a small miracle to make the soldiers allow the water tanks to come to the camp. The fire was getting bigger and bigger, a lot of the tents were already burning down. The Sisters ran to the gates and begged the soldiers to allow the water trucks to come inside the camp. On the other side, the drivers of the tanks were also trying to convince the guards to let them through. Blessed be Allah that, ultimately, we managed to convince the guards that night, the water trucks entered the premises of the camp and the fire was eventually put out.
For me, this event took a high emotional toll. That day, a lot of the tents inside my sector burnt down or were severely damage. And even if a long time has passed since then, I still remember every detail from that day, and I feel the same anxiety and panic as I did back then, as if I am experiencing it for the first time. Oh, Allah Almighty, protect us all from evil and wrongdoings, watch over us, and guard our lives. Ameen.
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