This is a Blast Box Media Podcast. It was a very sunny morning. I remember waking up and the sun was beaming from the window in my bedroom.

I'm from Somalia, so it's a very nice warm country.

Let me tell a little bit about Somalia.

We have the longest coast in the world.

We are a society of poets, and well, you're not going to get any poetry from me just warning you.

I woke up that morning and people were cooking my mother had the usual caterers. You know, I come from a what you would call a privileged Somali family.

My grandparents were doctors. My mother was an accountant who worked for the Somali government,

my dad was an electrical engineer, but what this day was really strange.

What made it really strange was we had these amazing catress in the house.

There was a lot of colors. I mean I thought whose birthday are we celebrating today?

It certainly wasn't mine.

All of a sudden my neighbor's daughter comes up to me and

she says, oh lady you must be really looking forward to today, you know it's a big day

for you. I remember saying well I don't know what you are talking about

because it's not my birthday in case I have noticed I love birthday celebrations

and she was eight years old.

This eight year old continued to talk to me and she told me what was going to happen to me this day.

At this point, I'm having this out-of-experienced body situation.

Within seconds, I hear my sister screaming in the other side of the house.

When I say screaming, it was like an animal was being massacred.

And within seconds I heard,

Get Leila, get Leala, it's her turn.

...