Dear friend, before I was born, my parents lived in and had their own villa in Mogadishu. Not a tent. Not a thorn tree. A real house with a door that locked, windows that faced the street and a big blue gate.

My father wore a clean ironed shirt to work. My mother wore a Somali dress and carried papers and notebook in her hand.

They could both read and write Somali and spoke Italian. They still do. They read the news. They wrote letters. They have university degrees.

My father had a job. My mother had a job. They paid for things with paper money, not with goats or EVC as we do now.

They drank tea from cups that matched. They slept in a bed – inside four walls, without my father keeping one hand on a gun.

They were ordinary people. They just wanted to eat anjera and drink tea for breakfast and go to work.

My mother laughs about it sometimes, but her eyes stay dry and steer to her past memories.

She says: “Guri Muqdisho aan ka ahayn, ma aanan garanayn. Xuduntayadu halkaas baa taalaa.” We did not know any home other than Mogadishu. That was our roots.

Then the civil war came in 1991.

Their clan became a curse. Neighbors turned into enemies. One night, they left everything. The house. The jobs. The cups that matched. The books. They ran with nothing but the clothes they wore, their faces and names they could not change.

Now my mother owns goats, sheep, cows and even camels. She inherited them from her parents who were nomads. My father owns an AK-47.

I own a story about a house I never saw.

Sometimes I close my eyes and try to imagine it. A door. A window. A light. A bed inside four walls. Expensive paintings on the walls. No gun.

My mother says: “Hanti waa laga tagaa, laakiin aqoonta lagama tago.” Wealth can be left behind, but knowledge cannot.

So I learn. For the house I never saw. For the life they lost.

May you never have to run from your own name,

Hibo

Kismayo. Southern Somalia. The blue ocean. Painted houses. Bougainvillea on walls.

Mogadishu. Mogadishu is a memory my parents carry like a small stone in their pocket.

The Flight. One night. No car. No taxi. Only feet. Walking east into bush. No map. No destination. Only away from bullets.

The Relative’s Camels. Somewhere in the middle. A cousin who still had a herd. That is how city people become nomads. Not by choice. By survival.

Galgudud. Dry earth. Acacia trees. Thorn bushes. No rivers. No schools. No hospitals. But clan soldiers – if you keep moving. We have walked for years. The rain does not come here anymore.

Galgala. Mountains in eastern Puntland. Stone and thorn. Where the maps are being redrawn for new resources. Where the fighters pass through. Where a woman watches her son walk three days for water that is barely there.

Wherever our teacher sets up the chalkboard. That is our school now.

The Forest. Where my father hides at night. No name on any map. Only moonlight, shadows and men with guns.

The next well. Always ahead. Never here. That is where we are going.

My mother says: “Khariidad la’aan, noloshu waa socod.” Without a map, life is just walking.

May you know where you come from, where you are, and where you are going.

We walk.

Inta libaaxu wax qorista ka 
baranayo, sheeko kasta waxaa 
sheegan doona ugaarsadeha. 

Until the lion learns how to write, 
every story will glorify the hunter.

Läs berättelsen bakom Aadmi Stories:

Read the story behind the Aadmi Stories:

Read the first Aadmi story:

Ali is twelve. He does not go to school. He is not angry about this. He herds camels instead. Every morning, he takes his father’s 23 camels to a dry rangeland. He knows each camel by name.

Dheeg (Spot) has a white ear. Qoslay (Laugh) makes a sound like a sneeze. Hilow (Homesick) is his favorite because she is always quiet, chews slowly, and lets him lean on her legs when he is tired.

Ali talks to the camels. He tells them about his day. The camels do not answer. But they come close to him when he sings.

He wants a radio. So the camels can hear music too.

Ali is not a child soldier. He is a boy who loves a camel named Hilow.

Inta libaaxu wax qorista ka 
baranayo, sheeko kasta waxaa 
sheegan doona ugaarsadeha. 

Until the lion learns how to write, 
every story will glorify the hunter.

Read the story about the Aadmi Stories:

Read a postcard from Somalia:

Khadra wakes at 4 a.m. every day. She boils water on a small clay stove. She adds cardamom, cinnamon, and too much sugar. Her teashop is an iron sheet, with plastic tables with few plastic chairs.

Her first customer comes at dawn. An old man with a limp – bakoorad. He drinks three black tea cups in a row. He never pays.

Khadra tells: “He was my father’s friend before the war. You don’t charge memory.”

She has a chipped yellow cup, color fading. She only gives it to people who are sad. She says the chip holds the sadness so the person can leave with less.

Khadra wants to buy a second table with blue color. So two sad people can sit at once and share stories that lighten their shoulders.

She is not a war widow. She is a woman who makes really good tea, value memories and care for people who are sad.

Inta libaaxu wax qorista ka 
baranayo, sheeko kasta waxaa 
sheegan doona ugaarsadeha. 

Until the lion learns how to write, 
every story will glorify the hunter.

Läs berättelsen bakom Aadmi Stories:

Read the story behind the Aadmi Stories:

Read the next Aadmi story:

Gad World was created with a vision: to humanise those who have been dehumanised. Alongside our coverage of conflict, we want to tell stories of daily life – of ordinary people, their traditions and the places that carry them. From this idea, Gad World Postcard was born.

The Somali social worker and journalist Wilo Abdulle took the concept further. As she began gathering these accounts of daily life in Somalia, she gave them a name: Aadmi – stories of what it means to be human.

She does not portray a woman who lost her husband as a “war widow” – she portrays her as a woman who makes really good tea.

Jesper Holm – a designer, illustrator, and entrepreneur based in Uppsala, Sweden – created the illustrations for Wilo Abdulle’s stories. His process is story-driven, with the narrative dictating the visual direction.

“This means I am style-independent, choosing the medium that best serves the story,” he says. “This often leads me to learn something new with every project.”

When Jesper Holm first read the Aadmi Stories, he felt an immediate need to find something authentic, fragmentary and dreamlike.

“I wanted to capture a sense of memories, pieced together in the present,” he says.

He returned to his own past and to his family’s memories.

“Paper, nearly 50 years old, is gently brought to life with the watercolours of my childhood. Thick pastels, given to me by my mother’s best friend when I was young, create the effects. Small images from then and now bind the whole together.”

Wilo Abdulle is moved by how Jesper Holm’s illustrations capture her stories with striking precision.

“The images speak so powerfully. They are so beautiful they give me chills.”

Both Jesper and Wilo return to the same idea: authenticity. To capture something real.

Wilo defines the word Aadmi in simple terms: Human being. A person. Not a statistic. Not a victim. Just human.

And Aadmi Stories: Short portraits of ordinary people. No war as identity. No pity. Just humans.

So what is her own story? And what has this project meant to her?
(At the end, she shares a note – something to carry with you as you read her stories.)

Wilo Abdulle is 59 years old and was born in central Somalia. In 1982, as the Cold War burned across the Horn of Africa, she became an internally displaced child and grew up in the capital Mogadishu.

From early on, her life stretched between two worlds inside her homeland: half her family lived in the city, half were nomads.

“Every school holiday, I left the city walls, roads, and lights and became a nomad kid again – walking with the goats and sheep, helping my mother and siblings under a wide, open sky in Central Somalia towards the disputed border between Ethiopia and Somalia.”

Years later, just before Somalia shattered into civil war, she left for Sweden. She arrived as a refugee – an unaccompanied young girl, distressed but hopeful, carrying an entire world within her.

And just like that, she found herself caught between continents, Africa and Europe.

“Sweden is where I grew into adulthood, earned my university degrees, and found my calling as a social worker.”

“I worked alongside people in their hardest moments, and I learned – not as a theory but through what I saw again and again – that every human being holds an unbreakable core of capacity and agency, no matter what circumstances shroud them.”

Wilo later trained as a radio reporter and worked as a radio journalist for Swedish radio, SR International.

“My colleagues really appreciated my storytelling,” she recalls. “That’s where I came to love the simple, radical act of stepping back and letting people tell their own stories.”

Then, unexpectedly, she left.

“That was the time I naturally felt the need to leave Sweden and go back to Somalia. There was no visible reason. I just went.”

For the past thirteen years, she has lived between Somalia and Kenya, back in the landscapes that raised her.

And then, it happened.

“One day, at home, a friend asked me to be part of a postcard project. The only guiding thought was simple: Humanise people who have been dehumanised.”

Wilo says it brought together everything she believed in and was skilled at: the social worker’s faith in people, the journalist’s ear for human truth.

The idea was to ask people to write postcards from countries at war – about culture, history, food, the everyday life that survives and what is meaningful for them to write on a postcard.

“I loved it instantly.”

When she started talking to people, explaining the project idea,  she kept repeating the same phrases: human story, human life.

One day, she paused.

“That phrase – humanising people who have been dehumanised – echoed inside me,” she says. “What does it really mean to be human? To tell a story that restores someone’s humanity?”

She sat with the question.

“And out of that stillness, the word came. Aadmi. It surfaced from the deepest part of me.

“Human being. Nothing more, nothing less.”

In that moment, the project felt fully born.

“These were not just helping people to write postcards or human stories. They were Aadmi Stories – simple, true, ordinary and sacred all at once.”

That is how the Aadmi Stories began.

She has been gathering them ever since.

Read the first Aadmi Story:

Gad World skapades med en vision: att mänskliggöra dem som har avhumaniserats. Parallellt med vår konfliktrapportering vill vi berätta om vardagslivet – om vanliga människor, deras traditioner och platserna som bär dem. Ur den tanken föddes Gad World Vykort.

Den somaliska socionomen och journalisten Wilo Abdulle tog konceptet vidare. När hon började samla in dessa skildringar av vardagen i Somalia gav hon dem ett namn: Aadmi – berättelser om vad det innebär att vara människa.

Hon skildrar inte en kvinna som förlorat sin man som en ”krigsänka” – hon porträtterar henne som en kvinna som gör riktigt gott te.

Jesper Holm – en designer, illustratör och entreprenör baserad Uppsala, Sverige – har skapat illustrationerna till Wilo Abdulles berättelser. Hans process är storydriven, där berättelser driver visuell riktning, säger han:

– Det betyder att jag arbetar stiloberoende och väljer medium baserat på vad som bäst passar berättelsen. Ofta leder det till att jag behöver lära mig något nytt i varje projekt.

När Jesper Holm läste Aadmi Stories för första gången, kände han ett omedelbart behov av att hitta något autentiskt, fragmentariskt och drömlikt.

– Jag ville fånga en känsla av minnen, sammanfogade i nuet, säger han.

Han återvände till sitt eget förflutna och till sin familjs minnen.

– Papper, snart 50 år gamla, får mjukt liv med min barndoms akvareller. Tjocka pasteller jag fick av min mors bästa vän som ung skapar effekt. Små bilder från nu och då binder ihop helheten.

Wilo Abdulle berörs av hur Jesper Holms illustrationer fångar hennes berättelser med slående precision.

– Bilderna är kraftfulla i sitt uttryck. De är så vackra att jag får gåshud, säger hon.

Både Jesper och Wilo återvänder till samma tanke: autenticitet. Att fånga något äkta.

Wilo definierar ordet Aadmi i enkla ordalag: Människa. En person. Inte en siffra i en statistik. Inte ett offer. Bara människa.

Och Aadmi Stories: Korta porträtt av vanliga människor. Inget krig som identitet. Ingen medömkan. Bara människor.

Så vad är hennes egen historia? Och vad har det här projektet betytt för henne?

(I slutet delar hon med sig av en anteckning – något som kan vara bra att bära med dig när du läser hennes berättelser.)

Wilo Abdulle är 59 år gammal och föddes i centrala Somalia. År 1982, medan det kalla kriget brann över Afrikas horn, blev hon ett barn på flykt i sitt eget land och växte upp i huvudstaden Mogadishu.

Från tidig ålder spände hennes liv över två världar inom hemlandet: halva hennes familj bodde i staden, den andra hälften var nomader.

– Varje skollov lämnade jag stadens murar, vägar och ljus och blev ett nomadbarn igen – jag vallade getterna och fåren, hjälpte min mamma och mina syskon under en vidsträckt, öppen himmel i centrala Somalia, mot den omstridda gränsen mellan Etiopien och Somalia.

År senare, precis innan Somalia splittrades av inbördeskrig, gav hon sig av mot Sverige. Hon anlände som flykting – en ensamkommande ung flicka, tyngd av oro men fylld av hopp, bärandes på en hel värld inom sig.

Och precis så fann hon sig fångad mellan kontinenter, Afrika och Europa.

Sverige är platsen där jag växte in i vuxenlivet, tog mina universitetsexamina och fann mitt kall som socionom.

– Jag arbetade sida vid sida med människor i deras svåraste stunder, och jag lärde mig – inte som en teori utan genom det jag såg gång på gång – att varje människa besitter en obrytbar kärna av förmåga och handlingskraft, oavsett vilka omständigheter som omger dem.

Wilo utbildade sig senare till radioreporter och arbetade som radiojournalist för Sveriges Radio, SR International.

– Mina kollegor uppskattade verkligen mitt berättande, minns hon. Det var där jag lärde mig att älska den enkla, radikala handlingen i att ta ett steg tillbaka och låta människor berätta sina egna historier.

Men, oväntat, gav hon sig av.

– Det var en tid då jag naturligt kände ett behov av att lämna Sverige och återvända till Somalia. Det fanns ingen uppenbar anledning. Jag bara åkte.

Under de senaste tretton åren har hon levt mellan Somalia och Kenya, tillbaka i de landskap som fostrade henne.

Och sedan hände det.

– En dag hemma frågade en vän om jag ville vara med i ett vykortsprojekt. Den enda vägledande tanken var enkel: Att mänskliggöra dem som avhumanisterats.

Wilo säger att det förde samman allt hon trodde på och var skicklig på: socionomens tro på människan och journalistens öra för den mänskliga sanningen.

Idén var att be människor skriva vykort från länder i krig – om kultur, historia, mat, det vardagsliv som överlever och vad som känns meningsfullt för dem att skriva på ett vykort.

– Jag älskade det direkt.

När hon började prata med människor och förklara idén med projektet, kom hon på sig själv med att upprepa samma fraser: den mänskliga berättelsen, det mänskliga livet.

En dag hejdade hon sig.

– Den där frasen – att mänskliggöra den som avhumaniserats – ekade inom mig, säger hon. Vad innebär det egentligen att vara människa? Att berätta en historia som återupprättar någons mänsklighet?

Hon lät frågan sjunka in.

– Och ur den stillheten kom ordet. Aadmi. Det steg upp till ytan från mitt allra innersta. Människa. Inget mer, inget mindre.

I det ögonblicket kändes det som att projektet föddes på riktigt.

– Det handlade inte bara om att hjälpa människor att skriva vykort eller mänskliga berättelser. De var Aadmi Stories – enkla, sanna, vardagliga och heliga på en och samma gång.

Det var så Aadmi Stories började.

Hon har samlat in dem sedan dess.

Läs en Aadmi Story från Somalia: