Many of the refugee men, women, and children who come to settle here in the Memphis area are from Somalia. The country of Somalia is receiving a lot of international press coverage right now due to unusually arid conditions that have contributed to widespread malnutrition among the people living there this year. Adding to the bad news are reports that there is a tremendous amount of difficulty in getting food relief to the starving because of the local militant group that denies there is a problem and access to much of the areas affected.

One of our volunteers who has been so faithful in volunteering her time and energy to tutoring some of our friends in ESL suggested a book that she thought provided great insight into what the lives of our Somalian refugee friends may have been like prior to coming to Memphis. The book, “Desert Flower”, is the first of three books that make up the story of Waris Dirie’s life.

I have so much trouble coming up with the right words to adequately describe what I’ve come to learn about these souls that we serve, and the burden God has placed on my heart for them. Using the same tiresome comparisons seems to almost dishonor their struggles. So I am always looking for better ways to express myself to those whose hearts I am trying to engage in this work with me. Today, I am grateful to have found, between the covers of this new book, a new way to do that.

In her book, Waris Dirie describes a nomadic, pastoral, childhood that revolved around the animals that her family owned. Camels, I learned, are the most treasured animal in Somalia. They can go for as long as a month without water, and yet the females still produce milk which provides liquid nourishment in the most arid of climates. Somalia is said to have more camels than any other country in the world. Their lives are so dependent upon the animals that just about everything is referenced to by that fact in one way or another. The price of a bride is paid in camels. Even a man’s life is measured in camels. A price of 100 camels must be paid by one clan to another for the murder of a man. Somalians have a long tradition of oral poetry that passes along the lessons of the camel from one generation to another. But the deep dependence Somalians have on their animals is not limited to the camel. They raise cattle, goats, and sheep as well and their dependence on their animals is reflected in the way they treat them. This, for example, is borne out by the fact that they think it very wasteful to slaughter an animal except in cases of extreme emergency or in a very special event, like a wedding. The codependent nature of the relationship Somalians have with their animals is described in great detail in Waris’ story.

Waris describes an early childhood experience of tending the herds of the smaller animals, as was expected of the younger members of her family. Her daily rituals included the evening chore of milking and she remembers the nightly experience of watching the desert sky grow dark and the bright planet of Venus appear in the sky, signaling the time to herd the sheep into their pens. Other nations, she said, call Venus the planet of love. At this point in my reading I recalled that many in my generation here have often referred to Venus as the planet that we equate with all things female, including the act of mothering. Waris goes on to say that in Somalia they call Venus “maqal hidhid,” meaning “hiding the lambs.”

I find it compelling that “hiding the lambs” is signaled by the appearance of the planet we here in the West equate with love, the female, the mother. Tears welled as I contemplated the comparison. The act of safeguarding “the lambs” is, in so many ways, how I see my role as I work with Asha’s Refuge assisting these beautiful, innocent, trusting souls that come to us for help, struggling to keep their heads above the water in a world so foreign to the simple lives they once lived.

As I link arms with them in friendship and help them navigate through their new lives here in America, in one small way after another…and another…I am helping. I am doing what I’ve done with my own children, in a way, as they’ve grown up- coaching them, helping them, but not doing it for them, encouraging, loving, watching out for dangers and doing my best to protect them from those dangers- as they’ve grown into their understanding of how this big bad world of ours operates. So much of this work is a willingness to simply be a constant loving, nurturing, and watchful presence. To simply be a mother. I am helping in the work of “hiding the lambs.” What an inspiring thought.