Alaa's story

I feel like running, running, running in the streets till my headscarf flies in the sky and I fly after it…

Sometimes I feel like being totally crazy, but I can’t… It’s the first time I say things like this, maybe it’s not my talk, or maybe it is my talk that I can’t express, or I’m scared to express…

Why do my parents treat me like this? I look at the girls my age, how they’re living their lives, and I envy them, I wish I could be like them in their confidence and freedom.

I wish a ship would carry me to a distant island and throw me on its shore, far away from the world from everything, especially the war.

Speaking of the war, all the war was on one side and Mum was on the other. Why my Mum kept telling me things that I’d already seen, is something I’ll never understand.

Alaa – Born 1996 – Al Shuja'iyeh/Al Montar


14 year old Alaa is experiencing the same emotional ups and downs as any teenager her would be experiencing at 14. She's finding herself in the world, among her peers, among her environment. But she's experiencing much more than your average teenager - she's finding herself amidst an ugly war, a war that children like her can't comprehend. She sees how it affects her mother, her neighbors, her teachers and she can't understand where she fits in and why everything around her is the way it is.

Come hear Alaa's story on the 30th and 31st of October at the Goethe Institute Hall at 7.30pm.