In this excerpt, Garang tells his story of how he became a lost boy when war destroyed his village. Walking with thousands of other orphaned boys, Garang travels thousands of dangerous miles from southern Sudan to a refugee camp in Ethiopia.

Hussein, the narrator of My Name Was Hussein, lives in Bulgaria. His Muslim family takes great pride in their religion and traditions. But soldiers soon arrive in their village and force all of the Muslims to adopt Christian names, thereby inhibiting their freedom and identities.