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My Slave Story

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Submitted By happychappy
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My Slave Story
Even after these years of freedom I can still remember my life as a slave. At night the pictures, sights, sounds of ruthless slavery.
I am Nkakawak. I was 12 years old when I was taken from my village. I never got to say good bye to my family that day. I had been playing with my sister. She got away, we were playing hide and seek. I was hiding behind a row of small bushes, when two men and a woman grabbed me. I’ve never seen any of my family since.
That day I walked for miles, my feet bled and blistered, but I was forced to walk on. I collapsed with dehydration, but they whipped my back till I got up. My face and throat stung from crying and screaming for my family, but they would whip me till I stopped.
We walked for days and days, I thought I was hallucinating when I saw the coast. The cool sea breeze refreshed me, but not for long. I was stuffed onto a sweaty boat, they’re must have been 200 hundred of us crammed onto a boat that was built for just 50.
I was held under deck with the rest of us. Iron shackles and course rope detained us. We were treated like animals, probably worse. Most were too ill to cry or talk. I watched dozens die, from lack of nourishment, exhaustion, a broken heart. Their bodies were thrown overboard and if you protested with the overseers you’d be thrown over too. Many tried to commit suicide, I don’t blame them, my mind had thought the same thing, but I wasn’t going to let them make me like them. There were no toilets so the floor was littered with diarrhoea and vomit. The smell was horrific something no-one should ever experience no words can describe it.
Then it came, we were wrenched from under the deck and hauled out into the open. The sun blazed so bright it gave me a migraine.

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