Lost & Found

One year ago, the Lost Boys of Sudan came to Houston in search of America, a future, safety and an education simple things that got somewhat complicated in the translation

A A A Comments By Jennifer Mathieu Thursday, Apr 18 2002

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It is a bright, sunny day outside, and a boom box in Jacob Guot's bedroom plays the joyful sounds of Awilo Longomba, a musician from the Congo. When a visitor says how beautiful the music sounds, he quickly takes the tape out of the player and offers it as a present. It is one of his few special possessions.

Deron Neblett

Jacob works in the laundry at a Memorial Hermann hospital, but he would like to go to college.

Deron Neblett

Most of the Sudanese refugees live in the same complex -- usually four boys to a two-bedroom apartment.

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After the offer is politely rebuffed, Jacob insists, and finally the tape is accepted.

"Why do Americans do that when you offer them a gift, first say no and then say yes?" asks Jacob, confused. It is one of the many cultural nuances he still has to grasp.

Jacob is one of the boys who says he really wants to return to Sudan. His country needs doctors, lawyers and engineers, he says. That is why education is so important to him. He hopes he can be a piece of hope for his country.

"If you go back without education, what are you going to do?" he asks. "Nothing. It's like that."

But after all that he has been through, and all that he still wants, Jacob insists he is fortunate. His yellow pages of "Points" are full of sentences thanking Americans for giving him and his friends a place to live, to be safe, to have food. He says he hopes that with America's help, there will someday be peace in his homeland and he will be able to get back there for good. The only thing he would like to emphasize is that people in this country don't need to call him a Lost Boy anymore. It is a title he doesn't think he or his friends want, or need.

"I say, 'Why do you call me a Lost Boy?' because I am found now," says Jacob, standing in the middle of his tiny living room, pressing his hand to his chest. "If someone says we are lost, I say we were lost. For a long time. But if someone says, 'Are you found?' I say yes. And God is good."