“I Could Finally Get Back to Living My Life”

“I was taking the flock of sheep out to pasture that morning, and I was singing. I was walking and didn’t realise I was about to step on a landmine.   

I remember screaming and seeing my mum running towards me. She was crying.   

The explosion had thrown me several metres away.   

The people from my village took me to a hospital. An hour’s ride on horseback, then by car.  
 
They had to amputate my foot. I then waited several months to get a prosthesis, but I kept being told that there were no suitable materials to make the one I needed. So one day I tried to make it myself, out of wood, but it didn’t fit.  

Three years later, thanks to the advice of a relative of mine, I learned about EMERGENCY and its Rehabilitation and Social Reintegration Centre. There, I received my first real prosthesis: I was so happy, I could finally get back to living my life.  

Even today, 24 years later, I continue to visit the EMERGENCY Centre for my prosthesis to be continuously shaped and adapted to my body.  

Thanks to the commitment of the staff here, and their kindness, I can continue to lead my flock to pasture in my village.”

— Othman, landmine victim and EMERGENCY patient in Sulaymaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan