‘Hi Jamie,’ said the message from a friend, ‘a bit out of the blue but if you’re at home there are two Sudanese refugees walking to Birnam today – coming from Land’s End. They’re raising awareness and money for Sudan and have just left Perth. If you or anyone else are interested in supporting them with a few steps or tea or a cheery hello, I’ll send more info …’

This was two weeks ago on a foul Sunday afternoon. It was freezing cold and the rain was pelting. I replied that I would be around and was quickly connected to the supporters’ WhatsApp group. I was able to follow their progress as they made their way up the back roads from Perth, avoiding the lethal A9, the main north-south artery through the Highlands.

A little later I walked down to the end of the village and there, by the 30-limit sign, was a group of bedraggled figures. It was about three o’clock, the light was fading and the rain continued to bucket down. In the group were the two South Sudanese walkers, Giel Malual and John Kuei; their Afghan logistics manager, Gulwali Passarlay, also a refugee; Olive, their AirBnB host for the coming night; and a couple with Sudanese connections who had been following their progress and happened to be in the area, with their dog.

The whole party followed me home. Giel and John climbed out of their sopping clothes and we hung up what we could, knowing they wouldn’t have long to dry. We lit the fire, made tea, rustled up some biscuits and all, including the dog, squeezed into our small sitting room. There we settled down to hear their story.

Both Giel and John had arrived in Britain by perilous routes as young men. Today Giel – tall, handsome, charming and a survivor of ethnic cleansing – is well known within the refugee community as a speaker and advocate for refugee rights. John, shorter and quieter, is the driving force on the road. Their project – The Long Walk of Freedom for Sudan – was to walk the length of the United Kingdom to raise money for schools for children displaced by the devastating and seemingly intractable conflict in Sudan.

My friend was wrong about Land’s End. They had in fact set off on 19 December from Dungeness in Kent, where they had both originally arrived on small boats. I met them in Birnam on 11 January, and they finally made it to Duncansby Head Lighthouse, the most north-easterly point of mainland Scotland, ten days later, on 21 January. In thirty-three days they had walked over 800 miles, much of it in the worst weather imaginable.

They had decided to walk in winter, Giel explained, in solidarity with the suffering people of their home country, the children especially. Across the region there are now ten million displaced children, half of whom will never return to education. The money raised by the walk would go to build primary schools for these children, now in refugee camps in Chad and other neighbouring countries. 

Supported by Asylum Speakers, a charity that helps refugees tell their stories, Giel and John aimed initially to raise £35,000, enough for one school. By the time they reached Birnam they had already raised over £50,000. Today, a week after completing the walk, the fund stands at £110,000 – enough for at least three schools. (You can still donate here.)

In the warm coccoon of our sitting room it felt surreal to be in the presence of such extraordinary determination and courage. There wasn’t time to hear much of Giel’s and John’s personal stories, but they both projected a certain openness, an air of quiet, calm confidence, and a gratitude for our modest hospitality which they might easily have taken for granted in the circumstances. 

I sensed that they had both been tempered by hardships of a kind we cannot imagine, their hearts opened in a remarkable way by personal suffering. Unsurprisingly, they had been met by a corresponding kindness along the way. People had been unfailingly generous and hospitable, they told us, feeding them, offering free accommodation, walking with them and, of course, donating; their experience of ordinary human connection flying wholly in the face of far-right rhetoric.

All too soon they were back into their damp clothes and on their way again, heading for their accommodation for the night, just outside the village. The house was quiet again and we were left wondering whether the whole thing had really happened.

Next morning I was in the café with a friend and suddenly there they were again. They had returned to the 30-limit to pick up the route and were walking through the village. We went outside and invited them in. The café staff made them hot chocolate and we chatted for a little while before the road beckoned and off they went with a cheerful wave, a hard day’s walking ahead of them. 

It had happened, their passage bringing light and inspiration to counter the dark energy that seems to course through the world in these equally dark January days.

Pictured above, l to r: Giel, me, John, my friend Dave, and Demba from Senegal (chef at the Birnam Oak Café).

Gulwali Passarlay tells the story of making his way alone, aged twelve, from Afghanistan to the UK, in The Lightless Sky.