Slave: My True Story

Nazer's autobiography is told with a child-like voice that conveys innocence and honesty. Told chronologically, it begins with a happy, carefree childhood with her family in remote Sudan. She shares tribal traditions, wonderful family memories, and her perspective of the Arab and British influence on her people. She also covers the painful aspects that address female circumcision, poor health care provisions, and infant mortality. Her childhood is interrupted around 12 years of age (as the Nuba tribe does not record birth dates) when she was abducted and raped in a violent Arab raid on her village and sold into domestic slavery in Khartoum. There she was physically, mentally, and emotionally abused continuously for eight years serving as housemaid, car detailer, laundress, cook, seamstress, and 24-hour nursemaid; never receiving a vacation or any other compensation. Sadly the same tactics used during the ancient slave trade are still employed today. Equally effective are the perpetual impoverishment and loss of any familiarity. Although several opportunities for escape were presented over the years, Mende became too brainwashed and fearful to take advantage.

Mende eventually came of age, started to attract the attention of adult male visitors to the household, then was "traded" to a family in London. She eventually escaped and was granted amnesty within the UK with aide from fellow Sudanese and British supporters. One of those supporters, Damien Lewis, is the co-author of the novel. Both he and Mende dedicate their time and resources supporting human rights organizations and government assemblies. She has since learned that her parents survived the raid and are alive near her village and communicates with them periodically. Unfortunately with her sensationalized trial, publicized battle for political asylum in the United Kingdom and the release of the novel, came noteriety that prohibits her from returning to the Sudan. Thus Mende's ultimate plea for the abolition of slavery everywhere is coupled by a simple desire to see her family again.

This is a book is a testimony to a young woman's outstanding courage and unconquerable spirit.

Phyllis
APOOO BookClub, Nubian Circle Book Club


'My life as a modern-day slave'   February 21, 2004
10 out of 13 found this review helpful

By Joseph Winter
BBC News Online

On the surface, Mende Nazer is a bright, bubbly, confident young woman, quick to break into a beautiful infectious smile, which lights up her whole face.

Nothing to suggest that she spent eight years of her life as a slave after being captured from her village in Sudan's Nuba Mountains.

But the smile soon disappears when she talks about her past and her eyes start to well up with tears.

"I still have nightmares," she told BBC News Online in London three years after she managed to escape to freedom.

She was just 12 when one night her village was targeted by Arab slave raiders, who snatched her away from her loving family to be a slave in far away Khartoum.

The story of her capture and life in servitude, published in her book Slave, reads like something from the Middle Ages but it happened in the early 1990s and she says this is still the lot of many young girls from southern Sudan.

She worked from first thing in the morning until late at night, washing, cleaning and ironing, without any pay or days off, sleeping in a locked shed in the garden. At first, her mistress thought she was unclean and diseased, so she wouldn't let Mende touch the children.

But after a while, looking after the children and cooking for the family were added to her list of duties.

She only ate the scraps left by her mistress' family - "like an animal," she said.

Eating these leftovers on her own in the kitchen was particularly demeaning for her, as sharing food is a central part of her Nuba culture, where no-one eats alone.

She was often beaten and on one occasion, after preparing fried eggs instead of poached eggs, her mistress "seized the ladle out of the frying pan, and thrust the burning hot metal against my forearm.

"I cried out in agony, as she ground it, sizzling, into my skin," she wrote.

Her left arm is still badly scarred.

'Terrified'

This is the life she was leading at the start of the 21st century.

Then, a train of events began which would eventually lead to her freedom.

Her mistress's sister, married to a Sudanese diplomat in London, had twins, so she was "given" to her to help her out. "Well, it's easy for us to get you another abda [slave]... whereas I understand it's impossible for people to find one in London," the wife of a slave-dealer told her mistress.

Her new "owners" returned on holiday to Sudan, leaving her in the custody of some colleagues and she realised this was her chance to escape.

But she spoke no English and had no concept of claiming asylum or how to survive in a bustling city of eight million people.

She went up to anyone she saw on London's streets who looked like they could be from southern Sudan and greeted them in Arabic.

After receiving endless quizzical looks and dismissals, she found someone working in a garage from Sudan and who knew someone from the Nuba Mountains.

A few days later, they waited for her outside her owner's house and told her to run away.

What was that first taste of freedom like?

"I was terrified that they would come and capture me again," she says.

After eight years of being beaten and threatened into submission, physical freedom was one thing, mental emancipation would take far longer.

Family reunion

When she first escaped, her family was taken to Khartoum and told to try and persuade her to return home.

They were told she had been kidnapped and forced to renounce Islam and convert to Christianity.

But once the family spoke to her, she was able to tell them her true story and is now in regular contact with them.

But she can't go to Sudan and so once every three months or so, her mother makes a day-long trip by lorry from her village to a town where there is a telephone, so they can talk. She hopes one day to meet them again - if she can get them to another country.

Although Slave has already been published in Germany, she says she is worried that the publicity surrounding its release in the UK might cause more trouble for her family.

"I could keep quiet because I've had my freedom but while others are still in slavery in Sudan, a part of me is, too," she says.

Launching the book and traipsing from one media interview to another, stoking up all the painful memories, is hugely stressful but she says this is the one thing she can do to help those she left behind.

Last year, a study estimated that more than 11,000 southern Sudanese had been abducted in 20 years, many of whom probably remain in bondage.


A great book about a horrible nightmare   October 24, 2004
Pharoah S. Wail (Inner Space)
10 out of 11 found this review helpful

I read this book a few months ago and have been thinking about it ever since. Mende's story is not one that will soon leave you.

From the official review here, as well as the customer reviews, you know the basic outline of the book already, so I won't go into that. One of the things that has most stuck with me about this book is Mende's gentle tone. Given what she has lived through, she could be furious and hate the world and no one could blame her, but she doesn't seem to be that way at all. Even after all she has felt and seen, she seems to have an innocence about her. Mende's life has been a nightmare, but there were a few times in this book where she says stuff that is really funny. I never thought I'd be reading this book and burst out laughing. It's quite a testament to her spirit and who she is. I cannot even begin to imagine living through the events of her life, much less coming through them and retaining her magical spirit and sense of humor.

She is certainly a better person than I.

Many of the generalities of her story weren't new to me since I've read on the subject of today's slavery in Sudan before... but still. The details, and her way with words will haunt you. I was in tears at least ten times throughout my reading this book. Also, if you really pay attention to this book, you realize it's not over. It's a masterfully crafted, circular way of telling the true stories of these remarkably strong, tortured women.

Mende's story is not directly related to the Darfur atrocities happening now, just in that it is a different region of Sudan. A couple of the motivations are different, but many/most of the horrific acts being perpetrated against Black Africans in Darfur are the same as what Mende and her region (Nuba Mountains) have been experiencing for a long time now.

It's impossible to hear these stories, or Mende's specifically, and not be infuriated by the United States' government's lack of caring. While yes "we" did recently label these events as genocide, that same resolution also went out of its way to say that it was not recommending any action be taken. How lovely of us. We're happy to write down on a worthless piece of paper that yes it's genocide, but being that it doesn't negatively affect us economically or politically, we can't be bothered with it.

I'm sure that piece of paper really means alot to the thousands of people everyday who are having their homes destroyed, having their families murdered right in front of them, being gangraped, getting infectious diseases in cramped refugee camps, etc...





Erases the Reader's Sense of Denial That Slavery Lives   May 14, 2004
Donald Mitchell (Boston)
7 out of 7 found this review helpful

You may think you don't need to read this book . . . but you really do.

In the back pages of better newspapers and at forums of those looking into human rights abuses, tales of slavery in Africa are told. When you read or hear those stories, it's hard to fathom . . . almost in the same way that tales of Africans brutally uprooted from their families in the 1700s and 1800s to be brought to the United States are hard to fathom. Somehow that sense of psychological distance keeps a person from being as outraged as by exploitation of children in factories in the third world to make athletic shoes that well for $150. If you read Slave, your sense of distance will be removed. And your outrage will be enormous. I hope you will read this book . . . and find ways to help solve the problem it describes.

Slave is the autobiography of Ms. Mende Nazer, a black Moslem from Sudan. She grew up in a typical rural village where cattle and farming provide the livelihood, much as they have done for hundreds of years. Her tribe had only recently stopped using ceremonial scarring to "enhance" the beauty of the men and women. The tribe still practiced witchcraft along with the Moslem religion. Female circumcism is still practiced there (another important subject for human rights supporters).

At around age 12 (for her people keep no track of birth dates), her village was attacked by Arab raiders who slaughtered many people and took away the young people between ages 8 and 12. In the process, the raiders sexually abused the captives before taking them to be sold. After being resold, Ms. Nazer found herself on the way to Khartoum where she was bought to be a domestic slave for a wealthy Arab family.

The abuse continued in the home. Ms. Nazer was treated with contempt and beaten for any reason that the woman in the household chose to employ. One of the beatings was so bad that it was life-threatening. She was denied the ability to practice her religion (which requires prayers five times a day) despite the fact that it was the same religion as her owners follow. She worked from dawn until the week hours of the morning, with no time off. Ms. Nazer feared for her life if she did not follow orders, and was really too young and inexperienced to know what else to do.

At that point, the owners' relatives in London arranged to have Ms. Nazer shipped there to serve as a slave for that family . . . doing the same kind of work for a family of five. Although she was not beaten in the same way, she was worked even harder here. Finally, she was able to spend some time on her own, met a Sudanese man and got help in escaping (while taking out the trash).

At that point, it became very difficult for Ms. Nazer to obtain asylum in the U.K. Officials there felt they could send her back to the Sudan and all would be well. But, there are a few complications. The slavers who took her originally seemed to have some relationship to the army in Sudan. The U.K. family included the press attache to the Sudanese embassy. So Ms. Nazer's story is an embarrassing one for the Sudanese government, which says that it opposes slavery.

After a storm of protest in the UK and on the Continent, Ms. Nazer received asylum. But although she can talk with those she knows in Sudan, she cannot visit them without grave personal danger.

Ms. Nazer is an intelligent woman who is skilled in languages. She was at the top of her local school before she was abducted. In the process, she developed some skill in speaking Arabic which probably made her ordeal somewhat easier. But she didn't know any English, which made the UK escape all the harder. The book's material reflects her nuanced observations about her life, her captors, her owners and those who befriended her. Mr. Damien Lewis, who was a journalistic witness to her escape, has done a fine job of helping her turn the recollections into first-rate prose.

So how much do slaves go for in Sudan? According to Mr. Lewis, the going rate is about $150. How cheap is our respect for human life and dignity?

I hope that we can all find ways to help eradicate this horrible practice . . . and aid those who have been victimized by it. Taking square aim at making the Sudanese government reform itself sounds like a perfect place to begin. Where can we hold the next protest?


A struggle to freedom   May 15, 2004
Chelsea Fontes (BakMiddleSchooloftheArts_WestPalmBeach_Florida)
7 out of 7 found this review helpful

When I bought `Slave' I just thought it would be a fun read that I could put down and pick up anytime, but it ended up only taking a few hours because of the intensity of it and the none-stop action. It's about Mende Nazer, her life as a slave, and her struggle to freedom. Reading about slavery and the abuse that came with it horrified me to the point I couldn't put the book down until finding out whether she gains her freedom or not, and for that matter, even lives or not Mende spent most of her life as a slave and even now still hasn't fully adapted to a world of freedom, although it's only been a few years.

As Mende struggles through every day life, which is basically chores and beatings: mental, physical and sexual, she always finds something to bring her back to a good, peaceful place. Whether it be thinking about her Nuba tribe, which was her home for only about 12 years, and village stories, or even the masters kids which are the only people who treat her nicely and equally. In fact, they are the only people who even recognize her as a walking, talking human. As she talked about her life I realize that other slaves had/have an even worse life than she. Mende had a big advantage over many of the other slaves because she could speak some English already and was older so she had more good memories to hang on to.

While reading this I thought of all the times I got mad over doing laundry or getting hurt in a fall, but this was nothing compared to Mendes world. When first getting her period she didn't know what was happening and had no-one to help and guide her on this important new stage in life. And when a little boy tripped her and she fell, dropping some glasses on the way, she wasn't scolded like many of us would be; she was beaten and put to blame. There are so many slaves in the world today but many people just pass it by or are oblivious to it and even those who do know don't educate others. . Until reading this book I could honestly say I would be in the category of `oblivious people,' but now I understand much more about slaves and there lives from getting captured to brutal beatings from there "masters."

`Slave' gives a voice to all those who had none and were being held captive. It is an up-to-date account of a girl who lost her freedom and her strain to get it back. It opens your eyes to the world of slaves, slave trade, and the authenticity of it all. `Slave' is an eye-opening book that you won't be able to put down.