Malika and Paragon, I'm attempting literary fiction and one of the characters is Somali because the story is based on something that happened to me long time ago (which involved a Somali man). In a nutshell I would say the book is about humanity; in the end we all are carved from the same wood even if we come from different origins. And write what you know, that is like the first thing every writing teacher ever tells you, and they are right! Unfortunately this story haunts me, and I have this strange obsession to write it down! Unfortunately I am no longer in touch with this Somali man I met a long time ago. He had AMAZING stories to tell and some of them will make their way in my book (lucky for me I wrote in a diary then!). This book, however, is a work of FICTION, for the sake of making it a tad more interesting. There are also so many details I never got to know from this man, had I known I was going to write a book about it afterwards, I would have been interviewing him LOL. So I'm really trying to fill in the gaps and make it believable. Unfortunately where I live there are not a lot of Somalis, but I am planning to get in touch with some real people (not that you aren't real, but you know, face to face . I have some ideas of how to go about it through a friend of a friend... In the meanwhile, I'm reading my "text books" which are helpful on some level to understand the facts and am also reading lots of the threads here. I find your culture just as intriguing as I did years ago, but am just now starting to understand a fraction of it! Luckily the rest of the book (the other main character) is all familiar stuff to me, so I'm only really struggling to make this one piece believable. Thanks both of you, I'm sure I'll be back with some questions soon enough... and good luck with your writing Paragon,we just have to keep at it and then one day maybe, we'll publish? K

Thank you Malika for the book suggestion, I actually have two of Farah's books coming to me soon, but neither is the one you told me about but rather is more recent work. I checked on Amazon and it looks really interesting (was able to read the first 6 or so pages online), will have to go back to the library for that one! I am reading everything I can get my hands on about Somalia, but the more I read, the more questions seem to come up! Some things are just not in the books... I think, however, I'll keep reading and making notes and then come back here later to discuss. I still have 5 books to go through plus the ones that I don't have yet - phew. I guess I know what I'm doing this summer vacation LOL

Hey Ibtisam, no worries for "hijacking" my question, those links from Adam-Zayla were interesting for me, too, especially the wardheernews one led me to other interesting articles! So... thanks for sharing (and for the help) K

WOW! Thank you Adam-Zayla for the link to the pics, your country is amazingly beautiful! And I have been reading the stories ppl wrote about going to school, it's all very helpful (and also funny And osman_nz, your post was GREAT, very informative. Thanks for the tip on the clans, I don't want to offend anyone here... As to where ppl come from, are most Somalis living outside of Somalia from a certain area or just from everywhere? What I'm getting at is that if my story's character is from the south and living in the US, is that realistic, or is there more for example North Eastern ppl in the US? This might be a really ****** question, sorry. I would assume that ppl are from everywhere, but maybe it was rather the "city people" who left opposed to nomadic ppl from the rural areas? Thanks again and I'll be posting more questions during the summer while I study all the books I got on Somalia... K

Hi, My name is K and I’m new here. I’ve been reading this site for a while though,and find it very informative and interesting! I'm not Somali myself, but rather am writing a book (fiction) in which one of the main characters is Somali. The story takes place in the US in the late 90’s, but of course all characters have a “history” and so now I’m in the process of doing tons of research, reading books on Somalia to “build” my character’s background. However, some stuff is just not in the books. For example, my character doesn’t have a name yet but he was born in Somalia in 1962. I am thinking of Abdi or Abaadir, but I don’t know enough about Somali names to know if these particular names are linked to a certain clan or are universal in the entire Somalia. Or if they bring up any connotation I should know about- Any insight on those two names? Here are some other things I’m wondering about… What was life like in Somalia after the 60’s? In the rural areas especially, what were homes like, or day-to-day life? What about school? Was it far away? Did everyone go? I read somewhere that Somali language didn't come into schools until 1972, what languege were the schools before this? How many years did children usually go to school in the 70’s? How was school in Somalia different than school in the US? Did kids play games? Did they work to help the family? I am particularly interested in the rural areas, maybe mostly in the southern part of the country, although I am not completely set on the location yet (where my character comes from originally), I still need to do more research. I also have many other questions, some about clans and then also especially about the process of leaving Somalia and moving to Europe or America, but I think I’ll leave those for later. I’m not sure what you all think about me coming in here asking all these questions, I don’t want to upset anyone. But.. I am also really interested in learning more about the Somali culture and people! So will you help me? Thanks in advance, K