Sama Masoud, Baladi News, Damascus Countryside
People of Muadamiyat al-Sham in the western countryside of Damascus have suffered all forms of death; they died of shelling, sniping, burning, and suffocating, but the harshest of which was starvation. At the end of 2013, the city has witnessed approximately 30 deaths by starvation, including children, newborns and women in addition to the elderly.
Today, four years after the beginning of the siege, the state of famine is knocking again on the door of the stricken city where 45 thousand civilians live.
Oum Samer, one of the residents of Muadamiyat al-Sham, shares what's left of food with her relatives and neighbors and says: "We are of one blood and we share one goal which is to get rid of this tyrant". "I cook a little of bulgur wheat with water to make a soup", she added. "It's a soup without any spices or flavorings, whereas one kilogram of salt "If available" inside the besieged city had soared to 12 thousand SYP. We are nine people at home, every day we eat soup which I used to make as an appetizer before the siege", Oum Samer added.
Oum Samer lives with her nephew, his wife and their son, but, as she says, she can't eat well while her neighbors' children are hungry, so she shares what she cooks with them.
Nothing in the city resembles life, but the continuous noise of children who either cry all the time or play and run.
Mahmoud, Oum Samer's 8-year-old grandson, says: "I don't like soup because I don't feel full, but my mom says it's really healthy and makes us feel full." Mahmoud wants to eat rice or even a sugar sandwich (a sandwich with butter and sugar), but such food is impossible to get in the besieged city, where one kilo of rice had soared to 6000 thousand SYP while one kilo of sugar reached 9000 thousand SYP, If found.
Though he likes to stay late, Mahmoud sleeps early in the city that didn't see electricity for four years because his mom says: "Sleeping is good for hungry children; it makes them forget their hunger and soothes my broken heart when I stand hopeless against their starvation."