Proud to serve adopted country: A ‘Lost Boy’ from Sudan makes his home in Air Force, in Omaha

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.omaha.com/news/military/proud-to-serve-adopted-country-a-lost-boy-from-sudan/article_cf5ac630-d9d4-5c3e-bd60-d95818ea881f.html




KENT SIEVERS/THE WORLD-HERALD
Staff Sgt. Deng Pour and his wife, Benane Pour, were both born in southern Sudan and forced to flee their country because of war. Deng Pour came to the United States as a 16-year-old in 1999 and joined the Air Force in 2006. He became a chaplain’s assistant in 2011 and was assigned to Offutt, where he met Benane. He recently returned from a deployment to Africa, where he worked with refugees from South Sudan, which once again is being torn apart by war.


POSTED: THURSDAY, JULY 3, 2014 1:00 AM
By Steve Liewer / World-Herald staff writer

Staff Sgt. Deng Pour wept as he got off the Air Force jet in the East African nation of Djibouti last October, returning to the region where he started his life.

“Going to Africa, I was so excited to be back, to the place I was born,” he said of his recent deployment.



But Pour loves his adopted country, the one whose uniform he now wears. And his childhood as a refugee from war-torn southern Sudan gives him a deep appreciation for the freedom that Americans are celebrating this weekend.

He was one of the “Lost Boys” of southern Sudan, some 20,000 orphaned or dispossessed refugees who spent their childhoods in Kenyan refugee camps. Pour was one of 4,000 who emigrated to the United States.

FULL story and video at link.

[freshwest]

1. What a beautiful story. Thanks.