ERIE - A teenage Somali refugee who spent the past 10 years mostly blind can see once again after doctors successfully removed a cataract from one of his eyes.

Tears trickled down 16-year-old Hassan Yakub's face as he counted his father's fingers Tuesday - one day after having surgery at Erie's Saint Vincent Surgery Center and ten years after cataracts began clouding his vision.

Hassan and his family fled their home in Jamama, Somalia, during the eastern African country's civil war when he was a child, according to his father, Ibrahim Yakub who spoke through an interpreter.

After a 200-mile trek, they then spent the next 15 years in refugee camps, where Hassan developed cataracts around age 6.

"He woke up and his eyes were all itchy. Two days later, he couldn't see," Ibrahim Yakub said.

The family came to Erie in March and took Hassan to a doctor who diagnosed him with cataracts. He will likely have a cataract removed from his left eye in four to six weeks.