Evacuation Insurance
After working as a kindergarten teacher at the Khartoum American School in the capital of Sudan for almost three years, Deana Welker was getting ready to leave the country when her contract would be completed by June.
"I've been here for three years. This was it. I had my flight booked for June 2. I have a new job starting in Malaysia next year. This was my last year [in Sudan]. I had a date set for a shipping company who was going to come and pack up my apartment and ship it to Malaysia," Welker told Sputnik.
When the military conflict broke out in Sudan on April 15, Welker was terrified, as she never had such experience before.
"We were in our apartments in Amarat [district of Khartoum] and our apartment building is right on the main road. I'm sure it started in a lot of locations, but they were literally shooting in the street in front of our building. I spent the day on the floor in my dining room listening to artillery and gunfire. That was my only room that didn't have windows. That was kind of harrowing, literally sitting on the floor and cringing all day long," she said.
As the main airport in Khartoum was shut down because of the heavy fighting in the city, Welker understood that it was impossible for her to try to leave the country as planned in June. Similar to other innocent civilians trapped in the war-torn city, Welker wanted to find a way to escape as soon as she could.
Fortunately, the administrative staff members at her school had already been busy working on a way to evacuate the teachers, as there was a special evacuation insurance clause in her contract.
"My school was lucky in the sense that, in our contract, they had an evacuation insurance clause. Our admins were working hard. But everything was literally like, moment by moment, trying: ’Okay, that didn't work. We’ll try next.’ At least, we had that. We were very lucky. When I signed my contract and saw that in there, I'm like: ’Oh, that's nice.’ Now, I’m like: ’Thank God, Oh, my God. That now just became the most important thing in our contract,'" she said.
Thanks to the efforts of the administrators at her school, Welker was able to leave her apartment building with a group of about 20 teachers.
"For us in Amarat [district of Khartoum], I believe it was Sunday night [April 16]. Literally, I got waken up in the middle of the night by a phone call that was basically telling all of us in the building to pack a small bag and get out. That's because soldiers had already entered our building and we didn't know. They had been in the building downstairs and held our security guards, who were not armed, at gunpoint. They were able to get them [the soldiers] to leave. But they felt that they would be back. They were telling us that we needed to get out. In the middle of the night, we snuck out the back door and walked through the dark streets to this little suite hotel around the corner off the main road," Welker said.
However, Welker’s group had to relocate to another bigger hotel on April 19, as the smaller suite hotel was running out of basic supplies such as food, water and fuel.
Left Behind
When her group moved to the bigger hotel, they even helped some people related to the US embassy to join them at the hotel.
"We had actually brought US embassy people from the smaller hotel with us. We got them out. Our guys made extra trips to help them get out to the bigger hotel," she said.
However, what happened on Sunday night, when the group was ready to evacuate from the bigger hotel, dealt a huge blow to Welker mentally.
"Basically, it was 3am Sunday morning. My superintendent called us. There were about 20 something of us. They called us and said: 'Pack, get dressed and wait.' And then we found out that they [US embassy people] got picked up by helicopters and left us behind. We thought they would come back to get us, as we sent our guys to get more of their people. But no. That was kind of devastating. We just sat there in the middle of the night," she said.
Out of desperation, Welker shared a post on Facebook (banned in Russia) urging her friends to contact US Senators and Representatives.
"The news we are seeing is that, given the chance for an evacuation, they are only concerned with getting US Embassy staff out. None of the rest of us. Please write, call, email... please beg them to fight to get ALL of us out!" she wrote in the post.
Fortunately, the tireless efforts of administrators at her school finally paid off as they were able to secure a safe passage for her group with assistance from the French embassy.
"A couple of hours later, we got another call: 'Everybody downstairs!' That's when our superintendent had gotten the news about the French Embassy inviting anybody and they would take anyone. They were working on an evacuation, but they would have to cut off at a certain number of people. She [the superintendent] said: ’We called them. They've put our names on there. They're expecting us. We're on the list. Hopefully, nothing goes wrong.' We had to get there though and that was harrowing," Welker said.
Her schools arranged four vehicles for all the teachers and their family members to be transported to the French embassy.
"We had four vehicles. Just people who had cars. We were packed into these personal little cars. I mean really packed in. Ours was an SUV and we had a little more room. We had 9 people and a child. We just caravanned through again more gunfire, shelling and whatever, and finally made it over to the French embassy," Welker said.
After waiting in the French embassy for almost a day, Welker joined other evacuees on another nerve-wrecking journey to the airfield where the French military airplanes were waiting for them.
"We spent all day sitting on the floor in their place [French embassy]. We evacuated with them that night by bus. They had four buses that drove us to an airfield that they had in the north of the city. There were many checkpoints. We went through SAF [Sudanese Armed Forces] checkpoints and RSF [Rapid Support Forces] checkpoints. It was really nerve-wrecking. But there was only one checkpoint, which I was pretty sure it was a RSF checkpoint, where they got on and harassed people. They were asking to see everyone's passports. But I think they [the French embassy] had made arrangements," she said.
The convoy Welker traveled with was escorted by a vehicle carrying a number of French soldiers.
"At first, I felt much relieved that they [the French soldiers] were there. It wasn't until we were on our way and we went through our first checkpoint, I thought to myself: 'I kind of hope that they're not making us a bigger target.' I mean the last thing they want is to get into a gunfight or an altercation with the other [Sudanese] soldiers. I don't think the Sudanese soldier groups really wanted that either. In my mind, I think if they see there is [this group of French soldiers], there's a less likelihood of them doing things like robbing us," she said.
Once Welker’s group arrived at the airfield, there were two C130 airplanes operated by the French military waiting for them. Along with about 400 other evacuees, Welker flew to Djibouti and arrived within three hours.
The French military in Djibouti arranged visas for Welker’s group and helped them to check into a local hotel. Welker was able to book a flight from Djibouti to her hometown of Raleigh, North Carolina the next day. After two stops in Dubai and Houston, Welker finally came back home on Wednesday night local time.
Lost Memories
Welker expressed her gratitude towards the French embassy and the French military by sharing a number of posts on her Facebook page, calling them "our heroes."
At the same time, she began to worry if it's possible to retrieve any of her belongings that she left behind in her apartment in Khartoum.
"I'm sure some things are going to already have been looted and gone. It was a furnished apartment. I didn't have any furniture. But what's sad to me is that I had some décor and some stuff that I've been carrying for memories from the US, some stuff from Mexico and some stuff I bought in Sudan. These are the memories of these places that I don't want to lose. For example, I had three paintings I bought in Sudan. There was one where they painted strictly with coffee. And the picture itself was a man with a donkey cart. That's a daily thing you see in Sudan. That's a very strong memory," Welker said.
Before coming to teach in Sudan in 2020, Welker worked as a teacher for three years in an international school in Mexico, where she had to leave because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
As a kindergarten teacher, Welker felt sad that she wasn't able to say proper farewell to her students in both countries.
"The year I was leaving Mexico, we were in quarantine from COVID. I didn't get to say goodbye to them other than through zoom either. And now this happens [in Sudan]. I don't get to say goodbye to my kids again when I'm leaving the country. It's terrible. I can't believe this is happening again when I'm leaving the country," she said.
Even before her shocking experience in Sudan, Welker was already aware of possible dangers when picking a new job.
"When I was looking for jobs, I saw a posting at a school that, years back, I would have been very excited to apply for. But currently, I was like I don't think I want to go there. It was a school in Taiwan. I get a feeling that Taiwan is going to be the next Ukraine and I really don't want to be there for that," she said.
Nevertheless, Welker said that her experiences in Sudan wouldn't discourage her from working as a teacher in other countries, while adding that school teachers in the US would also face dangers from the mass shootings taking place on regular basis.
"Malaysia, I feel good about it. It's not stopping me or giving me any fear about going somewhere internationally, but I am being a little more particular. There's never any guarantee obviously. You could have trepidation about going internationally. But look what happens in the schools in the US. Do I want to be there? Not really," she said.