ANGEL

Kidnapped

“I was coming back from the church choir and some distinguished people approached: ‘Do you want a ride?’ ‘No, I’ll take the bus,’ The man then lets me into his car. ‘I have to get off here,’ I tell them. They pull out a gun and a knife. From there on it was hell.”

Angel is 22 years old and Congolese; when she was kidnapped, she was 15. “They threw me into a room where there were already other girls: ‘They are selling us!’ 

I understood everything and…”

Angel stops. It’s too difficult. “Wait, wait, are you sure you want to go on?” “Yes. My therapist keeps telling me that talking about it is good for me.”

“I was locked up for five months, I don’t know where.” Then a white man came, he said ‘We are leaving’”. The criminal organisation provides her with a fake passport and she starts the journey to be sold. South Africa, Malaysia, India, “an Arab country.” Then Italy. “At the border they split us up to search us. For the first time I find myself alone, without the man who would not even leave me even to go to the bathroom.” This is my chance. “I said to myself, it’s now or never. I started crying and I told everything to the policewoman,” who immediately understood and referred her to a shelter.

“When I went to the asylum interview, they didn’t even let me speak, I got special protection from Italy.”

And then the happiness of going back to school. So much so that during her school-work programme at a centre for people with disabilities she is contacted by HR: “You are very good,” they tell her, “would you like to work for us?”

“Now I am graduating as a nurse, I have a permanent contract and live on my own. I’m going to graduate and dedicate my life to getting those people arrested.”