“The Arabs soon came to the market too; they killed with machine guns and swords, stealing livestock, killing men because they were a threat. I remember a 12-year-old girl who cried because she witnessed her mother and father getting murdered, the men shot her because she couldn’t stop crying. She was used as an example for the rest of us child slaves, so that we may not express emotion.”

Francis Bok gave a lecture entitled “Escape from Slavery” in the Memorial Union on Wednesday to raise awareness against slavery.

The lecture was a part of the Human Trafficking series.

Bok was a slave for 10 years. From the mere age of 7, he was taken captive from south Sudan by the Arabs, and was forced to be a slave for 10 years. He described in vivid details how it all began.

“I was playing with my brothers when my mother sent me to the market alone for the first time. This was the last talk I ever had with my mother and siblings, because they were murdered with other community members as Arabs came and kidnapped the villagers that could ‘perform,'” he said. “The people who refused or fought back were burned alive, like my family.”

Bok explained the horrors his people went through that day. He described it as a living version of the movie “Hotel Rwanda.” The film is about genocide among the Tutsi and Hutu people. Throughout this movie, innocent people are killed simply because of who they are.

It was a massive genocide, exactly like what Bok lived through. Bok continued to explain the first day when he met his new master’s family.

“The family ran toward me yelling what sounded like ‘abeat,’ which in Arabic meant black slave, spitting and peeing on me, looking down upon me, and these were the children,” Bok sadi. “The master treated me like a son, for I tended to his cattle. He wanted me to call him ‘Father,’ but I refused.”

Bok said he always worked hard for his master and never questioned him. It was his obligation as a slave to say yes and never respond with a no or question anyone or anything.

One day he took a risk and questioned his master.

“‘Why am I a slave, why doesn’t anyone love me?’ It took a while for him to respond and he said, ‘Don’t ever ask questions,'” Bok said. “He left and came back saying the reason why I was a slave was because I was an animal and he severely beat me. Since then I started to work even harder, so that I could run away to get help.”

He attempted to escape and got caught. As a punishment, his master took Bok to his neighbors to witness what happened to another slave who had just had his arm and leg chopped off for questioning his master.

This slave told him, “Don’t ever say no.”

Finally, after Bok’s third attempt, he managed to escape.

“I ran all day through a forest and eventually found a trucker who drove me to another village. I then met a Muslim who helped me greatly, and paid for a train ticket so that I may go to a refugee camp and from there I went to Egypt,” Bok said. “In order to come to America, among other things, the [United Nations] made me take a 100-question test. I came to America and had the choice of living in Texas, Arizona or Iowa. I chose Iowa, they had Sudanese groups.”

He calls Ames his second home as he had his two jobs here and lived off of Lincoln Way.

After he started speaking out and telling his story, Bok was approached by the American Anti-Slavery Group, of Boston. Bok joined and moved to Boston and now speaks at schools such as Harvard.

“Slavery isn’t history it is still happening today,” he said. “Education is success. Do not leave these stories here, take them with you. I invite you to join the fight.”