A Man of Good Hope review – a refugee’s tale

The harrowing life story of a man buffeted across Africa by violence and loss is testament to the human spirit

Asad Abdullahi was eight years old when he awoke one day to find his mother pressed up against the door, peering nervously through the cracks. He joined her and saw five armed militiamen in their front yard, who started pushing, kicking and breaking down the door. They made a hole in the wood – and then one shot his mother in the chest as he clung to her leg.

This shocking killing ended with savage speed Asad’s contented childhood in Mogadishu. With his father in hiding as the Somali capital descended into chaotic meltdown, the young boy was swept aside on the tide of mayhem, migration and misery that swamped so many of his fellow countrymen. And thus begins an incredible story that starts with an innocent child drifting though dusty desert towns and concludes with a married man struggling for salvation in South Africa amid sometimes fatal hostility to foreigners.

Continue reading...