Salva Mawien Dut Ariik: A Brief Summary

Friends and family are two things vital to keeping a person sane. The loss of your friends and family, can cause a person to go insane - especially when those few people are the only ones you hold dear to your heart. In 1985 Sudan, a civil war broke out, and millions died from starvation and war. Many others fled to inhospitable refugee camps in Ethiopia, Kenya and neighboring countries. Those who fled became known as the ‘Lost Boys of Sudan’. Salva Mawien Dut Ariik was one of those boys who were fortunate enough to survive the war, and escape to a place like America. However, Salva had his share of problems along the way as well. He faced starvation and pain, misery and death, even though no pain was worse than the pain of the loss that Salva
Salva ran into many obstacles; pain- emotional and physical. However, his biggest obstacle was losing his friends and family. At the beginning of Salva’s story, Salva’s emotions were so wired by the worry for his family that he could not understand a soldier’s motions and mistook them to be the signal for death. This shows how difficult losing family was to Salva and how it affected his life. Shortly after this situation, Salva underwent the death of his friend Marial. The author describes this like so, “Salva shook with terror inside and out. He clung to Uncle like a baby or a little boy, hanging on to his hand or shirttail when he could, never letting Uncle get farther than an arm’s length away. He looked around constantly: every movement in the go: every movement in the grass was a lion stalking, every stillness a lion waiting to spring,’’ (pg.40). This excerpt shows Salva’s fear caused by losing his only friend on the journey. His fear was so great, that Uncle had to practically drag him forward. This also shows Sava’s dependence on his family and friends and the impact their loss had on him. Linda Sue Park describes this mutualism well to the point, “If it hadn’t been for Uncle, Salva might have gone crazy with fear,” (pg.