At over six feet tall, with his dark skin, dressed in a full-length white tunic topped by a skull cap, 'Abdi' stands out on the streets of Kathmandu. You might think him an unlikely tourist, or perhaps a visiting imam at the local masjid. But Abdi is neither. He is a refugee. It is six in the evening, and Abdi (refugee names throughout have been changed) sits on the edge of his bed, smoking, while his seven children line up their prayer mats to face Mecca. His wife, Nadifa, sits behind him, massaging her forehead, as Abdi explains why he and his family fled Somalia.
"It was 1992 when I was shot," he says. "My family had a delivery van I used to drive. One day I was stopped by some members of the majority Hawiyé clan, and they made me give them everything I had. When I got home, my father was furious, so he reported it to the Islamic Courts, who were ruling the country at the time. They went and found the men who robbed me, and they punished them – they might have even killed one of them." Abdi takes a breath, and continues: "But the clan didn't forget what happened. A few weeks later, they came to the house and shot my father in front of me. Then they killed my brother and kidnapped my sister. They tried to kill me, but I got away. Look, I still have pieces of the bullets inside of me." Abdi calls to one of his sons to fetch an x-ray, which clearly shows a large piece of metal in the chest. He holds out his arm, and I run my hand over the raised bumps where more shrapnel is lodged.
As horrifying as Abdi's story is, it is not out of the ordinary for Somali refugees around the world. And the same holds true for those in Kathmandu: Amina's mother and brother were murdered; Dalmar's father was killed and his sister kidnapped; and both of Nadif's parents were assassinated. Everyone I speak to has an equally terrible story to tell. Among others from Pakistan, Burma, Iraq and Iran, there are today 72 Somalis among the more than 300 'urban refugees' currently living in Kathmandu. This last is an official term used to describe asylum seekers living outside of designated refugee camps. As Nepal is not a signatory to the 1951 UN convention on refugees, almost everyone other than the roughly 107,000 Bhutanese refugees who have been living in UN-overseen camps in the southeast of the country would be considered an illegal immigrant.
The tragic irony of the situation is that not only do none of the Somalis want to remain in Kathmandu; none wanted to come to Nepal in the first place. Indeed, some say they were told they were going to Naples, and then found themselves deboarding a plane in Nepal. One refugee, Taban, stares out of the window from his wheelchair as he recounts how he came to the country. "The Hawiyé came to my house and raped my sister in front of me," he says. "I ran out the door, but they shot me in the back and hit my spine. The bullet's still in there." Taban pauses and notices his catheter tubing sticking out of the bottom of jeans; embarrassed, he tucks the yellow tube back out of sight. "My mother sold our house and paid a smuggler to take me to Europe," he continues. "We flew from Mogadishu to Dubai and then to Delhi, where we lived for three months. Then we flew to Kathmandu. We got a hotel room while we waited for the next flight, but the smuggler disappeared the same day. I didn't want to come to Nepal. I was supposed to continue on to Europe. That was three years ago."