Refugee stories
Simon’s Story
Stories From Detention Centres in Australia
A poem by Juan Garrido Salgado
Refugee Stories
The following testimonies are by refugee people. They are true stories.
It is important for refugees to tell their stories, when they are able to. Recounting their experiences can be empowering, giving refugees an authentic ‘voice’. This is particularly important when official policy and the media perpetuates false representations of refugees and asylum seekers.
It is also important for the Australian community to have access to these stories, as they are grounded in a reality which many of us have no experience or understanding of. Listening to these refugee stories, we can begin to understand our world, our community and ourselves better, as well as develop a true and deep empathy for others.
For twenty six year old Simon Deng, the journey from his village in Sudan to his new home in Woodville, South Australia has been a long and arduous one. Simon’s gentle eyes and lilting voice give no hint of the horrors he has witnessed since leaving his village in Sudan in 1990.
Simon’s journey began when he was twelve years old, not long after the military junta took power in Sudan in a bloodless coup in1989. From 1989, real power in Sudan rested with the then Governor of Darfur, an Islamic hardliner. This man promoted the policy of ethnic cleansing including the murder of non-Muslim men and the rape of non-Muslim women as well as forced conversion to Islam. Simon, a Christian was encouraged by his mother to escape after his village was bombed in 1990. With a large group of people consisting mainly of young men, Simon walked a distance of approximately 600 km along the River Nile from his village in Sudan to the border with Uganda. He finally arrived in Kenya in 1993. He says that the group survived the long and dangerous trip by eating wild fruit and leaves and occasionally hunting for wild animals. Many in the group did not survive the journey as they became weak and tired and were killed by soldiers from the National Islamic Front. Some were killed by wild animals and others died as a result of hunger and thirst or diseases such as malaria, cholera, typhoid and dysentery. Simon says it was a question of survival of the fittest. He attributes his survival to his faith in God.
Simon forms part of the five per cent of the population in Sudan who are Christians. Seventy per cent of the population in Sudan is Muslim. Islamic law (Sharia) was introduced in Sudan in 1983 by then President Jaafer Mohammed al-Numeiry. Theft, adultery, murder and related offences are judged according to the Koran and alcohol and gambling are prohibited. The majority of Muslims live in the north of the country whilst the Christians live mainly in the south.
After finally arriving in Kenya, Simon spent ten years living in a refugee camp which was set up by the UNHCR. He recalls that the locals were very hostile towards the refugees and would often attack the camp at night and kill refugees. Fortunately, he had the opportunity of attending school and continuing his education whilst living in Kenya. During this period, he was devastated to learn that both his mother and brother had been killed in Sudan by the National Islamic Front.
Simon applied for asylum in Australia in 2002 after learning that one of his cousins had come here to live. He arrived in Australia in May 2004. He now lives in a sparsely furnished house at Woodville with three of his cousins.
Simon has managed to obtain employment at a chicken factory in Wingfield. Many of his fellow workers at the factory are also Sudanese. His working day begins at 2am and finishes at 11am. As he does not own a car, he relies on his cousin to drive him to work or he uses taxis. Whilst he is grateful to have found employment, he says that it is difficult work and physically taxing. He would like to find a job with more conventional hours which would allow him to study nursing.
When asked about his impressions of Australia, he described it as a good country with friendly people. One of the things which shocked him when he first arrived was the public expression of affection between males and females. He says he misses many things about Sudan particularly the sense of community. He finds it very difficult to socialise with people here as he finds that everybody is busy. Fortunately, the Sudanese community in Adelaide is close-knit and supportive.
At twenty six, Simon has spent more than half of his life as a refugee either fleeing violence or living in refugee camps. He has witnessed atrocities that have no doubt scarred him for life. Nevertheless, he is enthusiastic about life in his new country and keen to integrate. Like many refugees, he is testament to the strength of the human spirit.
Hatred
Felony they know
Making others low
Bombs explode
Warplanes roar; belching deadly hatred fumes
And nature protests against the strain,
As trees shake and sway.
And wild beasts scamper away.
The feeble knees tremble and stumble,
Over cliffs and clefts,
Hill and valleys,
Plains and platoons:
Sore afraid with fragile fragmental hopeless hopes.
Robbed and devastated they wander
And roam the land
Making nature enemy - and - friend.
Wild berries they ate
Hostile beasts feast on them,
Babes die in mother’s laps
And fathers defend families.
Bleak future fortune-
Their plight was great
Joys turn to sorrows
And the once sapphire sky
Was not pleasant to their eyes
As hatred has produced the deadly fumes.
Stories From Detention Centres in Australia
From Nauru:
“We do not have enough water for going to toilet, taking bath and washing our clothes. For example in one corner of the camp there is one water store in which most often only one water tank is delivered every day and here are almost 500 people consuming water from the same tank. An interesting story is that when Mr Philip Ruddock came here our water stores were all full. And we tried to utilize our best. Most of us take bath when it rains heavily. However, the water is spent very soonly. And in the rest of the day and night our toilets are awfully smelling and thousands of flies and mosquitoes are in each toilet.”
From Port Hedland:
“I am 17 years old. I came in Australia when I am 16. Tomorrow I will turn 18. … I have been in this centre for 22 months almost two years without contact or heard about my family … I know you can’t do anything, you will just give me hope.”
From Maribyrnong:
“I was received your letter and I was happy so much … please you give information about our situation to Australians, because some people have not any information about detention centres. Today I had two visitors who came to my visit for the first time, one of them was journalist and another was a girl – 25 years old. They had not any information about detention centres and couldn’t believe and the girl was crying after we talked to her … we don’t must look our situation like sentimental people, and you must look very deeply to these circumstances, so that what we are eating and we have a lot of suffering are on the second level. The first level is you must see why the people are coming here and why for a long time are staying in detention centres … we don’t must be sensitive and don’t must cry, because the cry make happy the enemy. … I will write for you difference between camp and zoo. In the zoo, the humans to care for animals; but in detention centre the animals to care for humans.
From Woomera:
“I want to write to someone outside, because I don’t have anyone outside and I need to write some letter because I forget everything in this two years in the prison … I am very happy this time because I learn some good Australians support us. Please, we need freedom like every human. I have two years and I didn’t hear anything about my family in my country … please don’t forget us, we are humans.”
From Port Hedland:
“My dream is to be free one day … I would like to thank you again very very much for your help through sending the phone card which was very helpful because I could talk to my family … in fact I didn’t expect that there are good people like you in Australia. I wanted to have friendship with people like you a long time ago because I needed a lot while I’m getting bad treatment from ACM staff because they don’t recognise the value of humans and they are Australians.”
From Port Hedland:
“I escape from Iran and I came here for some protection but I’m sorry for myself and for this Government because they gave us detention not protection … I saw this Government what they say to people about us. They told us this people is criminal or terrorist or boat people is not normal people. But we are just human like other people … I was a wrestler in my country and very famous … but now I lost everything from my life, I lost my love, my life and I think if I stay in here maybe I lose my mind … from two week ago I decide to go back to my land and actually I don’t know what happened to me in my country but just I know to die in my country is much better than death in detention or in this hell.” (The writer was deported one week later.)
From Port Hedland:
“I am a boy and I’m 15 years old from Afghanistan … I am nearly seven months in this detention and in Australia I haven’t any family or friend that I can talking or writing letter to them. I have been happy after received your letter. The people they living in your country … they wake up every morning they see their parents or their children or beautiful view, but I saw blood and the children whom they only have one arm or one leg. I saw death of my friends, I saw bombing and demolition every day. My brother killed by Taliban and other one ran away to highlands … I am coming for peace of freedom for calm living not for to be prisoner. I need your help for changing of my life.”
From Maribyrnong:
“Unfortunately today in Australia detention centres we see hundreds of people do hunger strike, riots, suicides, so many mentality problems and increasing every day and all of these problems are just because of contempt and pressure on the refugees.”
“In my life always I have been happy to be useful and I used to work hard. But now in detention centre I have to eat and sleep only and waste your taxes and my life. What a strange puzzle! I have lost all of my opportunities and really I am not able to return to Iran. And in Iran I have no place to live and I will sleep on the street. … We do not want money. We do not want gifts. We need only your hearts and your minds. … I sleep about 12 hours and eat only half meal per day. I have become only 52 kilograms and my hair has become white and I have lost two of my teeth. My memory has become very weak and I’ve forgotten many of the matters related to my professional job.”
From Woomera:
“I am from Afghanistan. I am 15 year old and I haven’t any family or friends in Australia. I am in detention for nearly seven months. My parents and brothers and sisters are in Afghanistan now but I do not hear from them. I have lived in the small village for long time and I saw fighting and bombing around our area and some of our villages people killed by Taliban soldiers and I afraid of killing and ran away … thank you Trish for writing - thank you thank you thanks everybody. I love you.”
A poem by Juan Garrido Salgado
“My only wish is to hold my children in my arms
- in whatever country” ~
Words of an Iraqi father
My family is somewhere in this world
Years of silence grown between us
Distance is a blind fog lamp that can’t find the shore
To draw hope in the sand as a gift for my children
I see them every night through the stars
Playing with the moon’s tears
The sea was the only window I could find to flee
the darkness
All I have is a Temporary Protection Visa:
My key for freedom, my key for prison
Day and night I have only one dream:
a boat on the sea
My visa is my morning’s bread, my water
A ball in the park, new friends
A walk through life in a new land
My only wish is to hold my children in my arms
- in whatever country
I am a refugee
I am a father
I am from Iraq
- A poem by Chilean-Australian Juan Garrido Salgado
Juan has had published three books in Australia and one in Chile. His most recent book was published by Picaro Press and translated into English by Peter Boyle, titled “Unmoving Navigator who fell in love with the ocean’s darkness”
