The Silence We Carry

By: Ehsan Ahmed Awad

April 15th 2023, was a day that began like any other. I was rushing to go to an extra math class, flipping through my notes, barely finishing breakfast. I was hopeful. Finally, I had mastered those math equations and was able to aim for that A star. I believed the future I always dreamed of would be mine.
But on a simple, ordinary day, everything fell apart.
That morning, rumours of “war” spread, starting with the clashes and gunfire near Khartoum International Airport and the presidential palace. We all brushed it off, saying, “War? That cannot be true. It’s probably just another protest”. No one calculated that what began as mere whispers would turn into a living nightmare
I’ve come to realise that the war did not break us with its noise and chaos. Sometimes, it breaks us with the silence. This war did not just destroy buildings, but it shattered youths’ dreams and hopes, it broke and displaced souls. The war did not begin with the sound of gunfire only, it started with the awkward dinner pauses, the ones parents had when they heard the gunfire and saw their kids crumpling with fear, unable to make them feel safe.
This is not a story of violence; it is about the weight of war carried silently by Sudanese people, the displacement, the crushed hopes of youth, children, and parents. This seeks to echo the silenced voices that carry the weight and burden of the shards the war has left us with.
The Emotional Weight of War
War doesn’t break you with the noise. Sometimes it will be with the silence.
It did not only live in the gunfire and bombs. It lived in the quiet moments, leaving people with the wreckage within themselves. The war has followed many of us, in the awkward dinner pauses and the long moments spent staring at our phone screens, waiting for any good news. The guilt follows your chest after laughing and remembering the others still suffering.
Even though many have escaped the pain and violence, we still carry it with us. It’s hidden in the routines, in unfinished conversations, and in the sleepless nights.
There’s a heaviness in us all, the grief of losing something special we cannot seem to name, the restlessness of being alive when everything and everyone else is falling apart.
The guilt we carry is carried in different shapes among us all. For some, it’s the guilt of leaving their loved place that carries memories and love. For others, it’s the guilt of staying. The constant guilt of surviving when others couldn’t. Guilt for thinking of a future while your country, your people, your loved ones are crumbling.
But we don’t say, we don’t even allow ourselves to live it. We’ve been raised to be strong, to appear put together, even when we are falling apart into pieces inside. We’re taught to hold it in, carry it alone, which causes many of us to feel alone in our feelings. The truth is, we are a population grieving the same loss together: our home, our safety, and our future.
We are all grieving, hurting, and trying to survive the same invisible war within us. And in all of this, life continues to move forward. Exams still happen. Jobs still expect you to show up. You’re told to “keep going” when everything you want is to cry, breathe, or even break, so you’re able to understand what’s happening to you.
The safe space became silent for many, which was preferable to vulnerability and revealing the indescribable pain. We constantly tell ourselves that surviving is enough, and maybe it is. But deep down, we feel that ache of uncertainty, which has become a constant companion; it follows us all with the constant questions of “where will we go?” “Will it ever end?” “What’s my future going to be like?” “Where do I belong now?”.
What I didn’t know was that you can leave a place, but the silence comes with you.
The heaviness that followed us. Grief, that had no shape. Guilt that snuck in, for leaving, surviving, for simply thinking of a future for a brief second. Which rarely spoke it. Being told to be strong and hold together because nothing “really happened”.
But then came the leaving. For me, it felt unreal, like a little “vacation” or “trip”. They told us, “Don’t pack too much, it’s just a few days, maximum a week”. Little did I know that those few days would turn into a few weeks, and those weeks would turn into a month, and that month would turn into a year, and now it’s two.
One day, my biggest concern and focus were the exam, thinking about finals, school and graduation. The next time I was somewhere I thought I always knew, but it was different, unknown, strange. Even though it was strange, I missed it, I had to leave it. I was then somewhere else I didn’t even think I knew, holding onto the little things I was able to carry. No goodbye. No closure. Just distance.
Displacement was not just about crossing the borders and leaving the fear behind. It was about losing your rhythm. Losing your corner of the world. Losing your sense of belonging, your safe, nostalgic place. I still remember the rush I had taking my old “lucky” pencils. Suddenly, the sound of my own name now, the sound of my own name in a new place, feels unfamiliar. Even though we’re scattered across different cities and countries, the pain remains within us, and the longing endures. Hidden in every message from home, in every memory of the streets we once walked, every silenced phone call from loved ones stuck there.
What I did not know then was that you can leave a place to escape the pain, but the silence will always follow. The ache of uncertainty, of where we will go, will it ever end, will I ever feel whole again, it follows us everywhere we go. In this endless pause and defining silence, I wonder: “Will we ever find the words of our silence?”
The Hope We Carry
But even in this silence, there was something else, a quiet resilience growing in the shadows. Amid the silence, we found small moments of hope that glowed like embers in the dark: the gentle laughter of a friend or family member that reminded us of simpler times, an older brother’s steady voice promising safety when he himself was terrified inside. The warmth of shared meals with neighbours who didn’t have much but still gave everything. These small acts of kindness that were not necessary taught us that home isn’t just a place, it’s in the memories we carry, the many traditions we carry everywhere we go and refuse to let die, and the love we refuse to surrender.
Even though we were forced to leave our home, we learned to find pieces of home in new places, new faces, and the stories we all shared together to keep our spirits alive and ready to fight the pain.
The realisation that hit me one day was that surviving was not about making it through another normal day; it was about finding laughter, joy, and hope for tomorrow, despite the weight of today and yesterday. I learned to hold on to the pieces that war and loss can never take from me: the way our music still lifts me up when I long for my home, the way I still dream of building my future, and the way I remember the sunset that turns the sky gold.
We all carried the promise of home, no matter how far we were forced to go. We all promise to go and build for it, to carry it in our hearts with honour and pride despite its flaws. The hope inside us will never end, even if we have to build it stone by stone, and it is destroyed again; our hope remains. Holding onto the memories of home, laughter, and resilience. The one we found in our parents, who never give up, who always believe there is a bigger plan that God wrote for us, and we should trust.
Even now, the scent of Tamiya and Gurasa takes me back to our kitchen, proof that some things war cannot steal from us. And in that, there is hope that one day, the stillness will break and our voices will rise strong and clear, to tell the stories that have been buried for too long. We may not know what the future will look like yet, but we know that we will rebuild, even if it bears no resemblance to the world we once knew. Because this pain will not be the end of our story, it is only the beginning of something new. Something that proves we are still here, still strong, still hopeful, and still dreaming of the day we return to our beloved home.

Shortlink: https://sudanhorizon.com/?p=6088