Looking through the window overlooking the freeway passing behind the high-rise apartment building where he lived in Benghazi, Libya, Aliyu noticed how the automobiles sped pass one another. It was already 3 pm, and he had been standing there watching these cars for an hour. He could see his two other half-sisters whose fathers were both foreigners in his mind. He remembered how, one day, Patricia's European father came down to Ghana and took away his daughter back to his country. Six months later, his other sister, Cecilia was also snatched away by her Chinese father back to Taiwan. During these two occasions, he could see the face of his Mom disturbed by justification each time one of them bid a farewell to their Mom.

The departure of Patricia, his eldest half-sister was particularly cruel to his Mom. Tears flowed freely down her cheeks as she held Patricia's wrists firmly, saying adieu. Back then, Aliyu had processed for several days to ease his Mom's pain and bind the wounds to her aging heart. Being the youngest and the darkest of his two half-sisters, he was left to clean up the emotional mess left behind by his departing half-sisters.

Growing up, Aliyu's Mom and his other two half-sisters lived in one room under a leaky zinc roof between four brick walls. Every night, before they go to bed, they had to first place empty Milo cans in strategic locations to catch leaks when it rained. Aliyu was never drawn to going abroad just to become rich. He was driven to leave Africa by the pain of the past. '

"I'm going to work hard, Mama, so I that I can have something." Aliyu assured his Mom before deciding to travel by road to Libya. His Dad was a drunkard and irresponsible.He was mean and violent when he had too much. He walked out early in marriage but would visit his Mom once or twice a year-drunken and demanding sexual satisfaction. By the time his visits ceased, Aliyu's Mom had had another baby-who died during birth-and a broken jaw from his father's unlenting blows.

Aliyu was told his Dad left his Mom for another woman when he was only two. He returned to his Mom's fold when he got broke and Aliyu was six. He left her again for a younger woman when Aliyu was thirteen, returned when he was 21, left when he was 22 and came back when he was 24. It was indeed irritating to see Aliyu's Dad jettison his Mom, once fortune begon to smile upon him and, only to jettison her during hard times. There are some women who will forgive a husband his sexual peccadilloes as long as he cherishes and provides for the family. Aliyu's Mom was that sort of woman. Dad was an elderly gentleman; he was old-fashioned, but often tended to regard pretty young females as delectable young ladies.

The pain of Aliyu's past led him to become weaved into slavery in post Muammar Gaddafi's Libya. Aliyu was only one of the so many youngsters in Africa who parents and the societies in which they lived in had failed them.