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In a way, war correspondents are the soldiers of journalism. When everyone else is coming out, they are going in, risking their lives, driven by the belief that "the story must be told." For CBC reporter Mellissa Fung, that story was Afghanistan. She went there twice on assignment. First, in 2007 and then again, one year later.
On October 12th, 2008, a Sunday morning, Mellissa was covering a story at a refugee camp, outside Kabul, when her life changed "just like that." As Mellissa was leaving the camp, a car drove up, armed men jumped out, grabbed her, threw her in, and took off. Mellissa had been kidnapped. She had no idea why, or who the men were, or where they were taking her. Eventually, they forced Mellissa to hike for several hours through the mountains, until they got to a hole in the ground, barely big enough to stand up in.
For the next 28 days, Mellissa lived in that hole - praying, writing in a notebook and surviving on cookies and juice - until she was released to Afghan and Canadian officials.
Now, Mellissa has written a book about it all. How she survived in that hole. How she confronted her kidnappers. And how she refused to give up. It's called 'Under an Afghan Sky.'
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