By Ola Fattah
Tuesday marks the four year anniversary of the conflict in Yemen.
How has my life changed during the wartime?
We are still suffering every day and every night, and I don’t know whether to laugh or cry about it.
Walking the streets of Yemen four years ago was very different to what it is like now. The damaged and destroyed buildings and shops break my heart.
I grew up in Hodeida – an area that has experienced very heavy fighting.
My father is one of the nearly three million people who have been forced to flee their homes due to the conflict. He built our house over decades – it’s where my siblings and I grew up and where we have so many precious memories.
Every day, he prays that it won’t be destroyed, because it’s the only thing we have left.
My family now live with me in Hajjah.
A few months ago, we were a family that consisted of 10 members. Today, there are nine of us – as I lost my youngest brother in Hodeida.
His death was a shock to us all. We don’t know what happened. The only thing we know for sure is that he is one of the thousands of people who died due to the continuous violence and unwanted war.
People in Yemen are dying every day in different ways: some from cholera or because of malnutrition, women die while giving birth and others die by airstrikes, gun shots and missiles.
You can see a story of suffering in everyone’s faces. They are so tired – physically and emotionally. They have spent hundreds of hours hiding in basements and corners during airstrikes or ground shelling. They have been waiting in long lines for water and cooking gas.
One of the mothers in the village told me, ‘Sometimes my children cry all night because they sleep hungry and I can’t help but cry with them because what else can I do? It’s not in my hands.’
This is the reality of life in Yemen.
Since the war started four years ago, I have become the only breadwinner in my family, as my siblings and father stopped receiving their salaries. My father keeps telling me he doesn’t know what we would have done if I wasn’t working.
Sometimes I feel tired and exhausted, but I have to be strong for them.
Last week, when there was an escalation of fighting in Hajjah, I was terrified.
We live with an unpredictable future, and I don’t want my city or my home to get destroyed because of clashes and airstrikes.
My heart aches when I think about the Yemeni people: those who have lost their homes, those who have no income to support their family or mothers who are pregnant and malnourished.
Life is particularly tough for women and girls, who are more likely to experience malnutrition, as when families are short of food women are the first to eat less, even though they are working hard.
CARE Yemen, where I work as a monitoring and evaluation officer, and the aid community are doing their best, but the need is increasing each day.
#4YearsOfUSWarOnYemen
Source: News Agencies, Edited by Website Team
