Afghanistan

Omed

Omed was beat up and picked on because he is from a tribe discriminated against by terrorists, and because his sister works and his mother was a teacher.

Writing by Elizabeth Thayer
Photography by Lindsay Silsby
Omed Chess Wm
Omed
Omed Chess Wm
©2017 LINDSAY SILSBY / TSOS Omed

Writing by Elizabeth Thayer

Photography by Lindsay Silsby

JANUARY 2017
WRITTEN BY TSOS TEAM MEMBER ELIZABETH THAYER

Omed loved his country, but he wasn’t happy in his school. He was beat up and picked on because he is from a tribe discriminated against by terrorists, and because his sister works and his mother was a teacher. They had rocks thrown through their window with warning notes. That is why they left.

“I loved my country when I was there. I played and went to school. I like Chemistry so much and I want to be a famous chemist in the future. I want to have a future, therefore my parents took me here with all the problems and difficulties. I want to be a useful person and to catch my desire and I’m sure I will do that. From now I have to do my best.”
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What would you do if you had to leave everything behind?

By the end of 2025, more than 117.8 million people worldwide had been forcibly displaced by war, persecution, or human rights abuses — and 45 million of them are children.

They arrive in refugee camps and countries seeking safety and carrying little: legal papers, if they're lucky. A backpack. A child's hand in theirs.

What they carry that we can't see is heavier: fractured families, homes they'll never return to, professions they loved, friends and relatives they may never see again.

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