The New Road bus station in the heart of Kano is a scene of bedlam.
Men, women and children are milling around, with huge bundles and baggage in all shapes and sizes, waiting to be loaded onto half a dozen buses. Others are already onboard. They're in a desperate hurry to head south, leaving behind this troubled city in the north of Nigeria.

The exodus was prompted by the radical Islamist group Boko Haram, which carried out multiple bombings on Jan. 20 that claimed nearly 200 lives in and around Kano, the largest city in the mostly Muslim north. The attacks have shaken residents in Kano and particularly the Christians, who are a majority in southern Nigeria but a minority in the north in a multiethnic country of more than 140 million.

Kemi Ezioha, a 32-year-old businesswoman and mother of four boys -- who was born and raised in Kano -- says she fears for her life.

"In the bomb blasts, they normally kill both Christians and Muslims," she says of Boko Haram. "But they threaten us in church. We can't go to church. We can't pray. We can't do anything. So the whole thing is just too much. The whole thing is just hopeless. Everyone just wants to go. We are not safe."

Others standing nearby, like Glory Ndudi, nod vigorously in agreement. Ndudi is wearing a red T-shirt and a deep frown etched on her forehead. Her five children have already taken their seats on a bus.

"Everywhere we are running. We can't sleep. In the night, we can't sleep. We can't stay. We want to go. We are tired. Can't you see the way I'm feeling? I'm shaking here. I don't want to die here," she says. "I'm tiredl; I'm crying. Let's go. I'm going now, now, now, now."