It was the 2nd of February, 2012, Kenda’s best and worst day ever, as she told Orient Net.
On that ominous and cold day, Kenda, a 19-year-old university student, woke up early to find her city, Damascus, covered with snow. She rushed to the balcony and filled her eyes with the image of the unusual visitor which turned the city into a picturesque view.
The white snow washed Kenda’s soul with fresh hopes and made her feel more encouraged to go on in her decision to take to the streets with her friends not to play with snowballs or to build a snowman but to join in a peaceful demonstration that she and her friends have been coordinating with other groups.
After drinking her coffee and listening to her mother’s advice for half an hour about being cautious and avoiding taking part in any demonstrations, Kenda took the mini bus to al-Mezzah neighborhood where she met with her friends and other groups and started chanting loud “Freedom, Freedom” while they were waving the national flags.
The happy moments soon vanished when security men and Shabiha answered their calls with bullets and fire. The demonstrators ran away, many were wounded while Kenda was arrested with her group.
Two armed men pulled Kenda into a car where she was handcuffed and taken to a security center in the center of the city.
After 2 yearlong suffering in Assad detention centers and torture chambers, Kenda was released psychologically traumatized and unable to communicate with others.
Kenda’s parents managed to take her outside the country where she received intensive psychological therapy for one year. After she recovered, Kenda decided to tell the whole world her story and share her own tragedy with others, particularly women who were subjected to brutal rape and torture.
Kenda told Orient Net that she doesn’t like to recall all the details of her arrest but all what she can say is that she and her friends were seeking peace and freedom only but "Assad’s Shabiha pulled like sheep to the dark cells in their jails."
“Our crime was that we dressed white wedding clothes and stood courageously demanding to stop all kinds of violence, killing and military operations in Syria, but our wedding party ended tragically in a 2x3 meter-cell in which 24 women from different parts of Syria were inhumanly put together.”
Kenda goes on saying that each woman in the prison had its own story that could summarize the meaning of patience and show briefly the brutality of this oppressive regime.
“I am telling you my own experience in the detention center, our story in that horrible place which violates the dignity and humanity of every human being and breaks ruthlessly all the moral values of humanity.”
Kenda spoke also about the ordeal of other women who were with her in the prison saying that she would never forget the screams of Nawal, a woman from the city of Homs, while she was being tortured to oblige her to confess to doing a crime that she had never done, nor would she forget the screams of Om Ali and Om Ismael and many others from different cities in Syria.
In that tiny cell, Kenda along with other women spent unforgettable days; they suffered from head and body lice which invaded their clothes and dirty blankets. They also had different kinds of diseases such as flue, bronchitis, food poisoning and urinary infections.
Kenda concludes her long and painful testimony by saying that Syrians deserve to live freely and peacefully and that whenever snow falls, she remembers that day when she felt free and light as a feather or as a snowflake for some moments until Assad’s black ravens captured her turning her sweet dream into a hell-like nightmare.
However, Kenda still misses those moments when she cried in a loud voice for the first time in her life “Freedom”. She can’t stop herself from crying when she recalls them though her doctor advised her to forget all about her past in Syria in order to recover, but Kenda says: “How can I forget the moments when I dressed in white in such a Damascene day and became the bride of freedom?”
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