Cowering in a strange apartment in downtown Benghazi,
eating cockroaches to survive as the sound of gunfire
rattles up from the streets below - it's a far cry from
a young boy's dream of playing basketball in the NBA.
But then 27-year-old Alex Owumi had just joined the
official team of Libyan dictator Colonel Gadaffi.
In an incredible turn of events, Owumi found himself
caught up in the early days of the country's civil war
before managing to flee to Egypt, where he joined up
with a local basketball team and went on to lead them to
championship glory.
Now playing his basketball in the UK, Owumi has written
a book, published this week, to tell his incredible story.
he Journeyman point guard started to realise things were
a little odd the moment he got off the plane in Libya to
a rapturous welcome from fans.
It got weirder when he arrived at his apartment to see
pictures of Gadaffi and his family on the shelves before
being told he would be playing for the Libyan leader's
team.
But things really got crazy when he visited the homes of
his teammates - living in some of the city's most
impoverished areas - and saw them gathering guns and
ammunition, preparing for revolution.
In an interview with the website Buzzfeed he recalls: 'I
was thinking, Man, y’all are not about to beat the army.
'Like, there is no way that is going to happen. And it
ended up that they took over the second-biggest city in
Libya.'
One day, when the driver who normally took him to
practice failed to show up, Owumi called his coach who
told him to look outside his window.
He climbed onto the roof of his apartment building and
looked down on a crowd of protesters marching on a line
of Libyan soldiers.
'I figured the soldiers were just trying to disperse the
protestors,' Owumi told ESPN, 'I went downstairs to get
some water, came up the steps and all of a sudden the
soldiers were shooting at the crowds.
'I dropped the water, ducked down, and it was like ants
scattering. People were dropping everywhere.'
He raced back into his apartment to send an email to his
family but couldn't get a connection. He tried the phone
but that was out of order too.
When he went to leave the apartment his neighbours
called him back inside.
They told me to stay inside, that it wasn't safe,' Owumi
said. 'I had one of those big steel doors, so I just
slammed it and locked the door.'
Owumi was stranded in his apartment without food or
water for two weeks. He saw his neighbour being
assaulted and Molested and feared he'd never get out of
the country alive.
'I basically ran out of food, water, and electricity. After
two or three days I was saying to myself, "OK, the Libya
army is going to shut this sh*t down and these people are
going to clear the streets. This little baby revolution, this
mini-revolution will be over.'
But it wasn't - after surviving on insects and whatever
else he could find, one his teammates managed to fixe
him a place on a bus leaving to Egypt.
The journey was fraught with difficulties, they passed
numerous checkpoints manned by menacing-looking
soldiers brandishing AK47's.
Eventually they reached the town of Salloum on the
Egyptian border, where the two teammates were handed
a drink and a box of crackers each.
They had hoped to make it to Cairo but ended up sleeping
on the streets of the border town for several days.
Owumi tried to contact the American embassy for help
but his calls went unanswered.
Without the necessary immagration stamps in his
passport he had to bribe a bus driver with $200 American
to take him to Cairo.
Shortly after arriving and quite out of the blue, Owumi
got a call from his coach in Libya who told him the El-
Olympi team in Alexandria was looking for a player.
Although he was desperate to get home, the offer
seemed interesting, he could do with the money and it
would only mean staying in Egypt only another two
months.
El-Olympi went on to win the championship and Owumi
was named their most valuable player.
He added: 'For some reason, I thought of Egypt as a
safe haven. The pictures I have in Egypt are just me
being happy. I never would have thought that staying in
the Middle East would bring me some happiness, kind of
give me some mental rehab, but it did.
Source-DailyMail
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