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No room for comfort and joy... when you've left everything behind to survive.
In South Sudan, Shede and thousands like her are fending off hunger and malnutrition in Wedweil Refugee Settlement. With very little to call their own, comfort and joy can seem far from their day-to-day reality.
Shede: ‘I did not come with anything. No table, no teapot, no chair, no bed. Nothing.’
It wasn’t just belongings that Shede lost as she fled the conflict in Sudan, her brothers were killed and she’s unable to make contact with her husband. Now she tries to make a temporary shelter feel like a home for the girls, but it’s hard: ‘I need clean clothes, a bed and a blanket.’
How your support makes a difference
When every essential is unaffordable, the support programme we deliver with our partners, Smile Again Africa Development Organisation, based in South Sudan, is a vital lifeline. For Shede, it offers a rare chance to feed her youngest daughter, Saida, and granddaughter, Mariem, both aged six, a nutritious meal.
No one chooses to be a refugee, but together, we can support families like Shede’s to forge a new life while they wait for the end of war.
This Christmas, you could help families like Shede's find comfort and hope during upheaval, uncertainty and conflict.
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Christian Aid has been operating in the Sudan and the current South Sudan since the 1970s and we opened our field office in Juba, South Sudan, in 2008.
