The war started in Somalia on 31st December 1990. I remember it was a sunny afternoon and I was standing in the front yard when I heard the sound of machine guns. I ran inside and everyone was sitting in the living room. I didn't know what was going on, but I knew one thing, this was not good. I remember my dad telling us to remain inside. The noise got louder and louder. When it was sunset I could hear this whistling sound. After the whistling there was a big explosion. That night I was really scared. We couldn't sit on the chairs, we had to sit on the floor, so flying bullets and shells would not hit us.

The next day was the same, but this time the fighting was getting close to our area, so we had to move closer to the airport. All my family came together and we walked all the way to the airport. We walked because we could not take cars, because the soldiers would have thought that we had money and they would have robbed us.

When we got to the airport, we stayed in government houses for nine days. On the tenth day we left Mogadishu in a small jet plane. We were in the air for ten hours and then we moved to Ethiopia for one year, then our uncle sponsored us to come to Australia. We were waiting to come to Australia for one year.