Transcript

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Student:
So, we have to flee from where we naturally live into a different society. We need to find some safe place.

Man:
I went to Malawi, from Malawi, South Africa, South Africa to Australia.

Student:
They stopped at various locations and one of them was Malawi. So, I was just born on the way.

Narrator:
The refugee journey is often long and dangerous. People may cross many borders in their search for safety.

Music

Student:
We didn’t say to anyone that we were leaving, we just left at 4 am in the morning. We left our home, everything, we just took our clothes and went to Turkey.

Student:
We rented a car to Syria and we left the country.

Man:
The journey to get to Pakistan is a really dangerous one. Hazaras are mainly in the centre of Afghanistan. And to get to Pakistan we have to pass Pashtun territory which is very dangerous. I was hidden at the back of a truck. The guy who smuggled me from Afghanistan to Pakistan was heavily paid.

Man:
I had to flee by moving place to place in the jungle until at last we couldn’t find any place to hide.

Woman:
We crossed over to Thai border and we were placed in a temporary camp.

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Narrator:
When people first seek asylum they may live in a refugee camp or an urban area in another country. Conditions can sometimes be as dangerous as the places they have fled.

Man:
We came to Kenya Kakuma Refugee Camp.

Woman:
It is a desert. It is hot and windy.

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Man:
The temperature’s more than fifty degrees all the year. The desert storm all the year. The sanitation is poor. No food for the refugee and no education for the kids. It’s really very dangerous.

Woman:
It’s not a good place but UN settle us there.

Man:
I lived in Kakuma Refugee Camp for six years.

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Man:
Initially we were provided six bamboo poles for each family with one plastic sheet. So, we had to frame our shelter with these six pieces of bamboo.

Woman:
Seven thousand refugees had to make themselves a shelter.

Man:
There is no water distribution system. No toilet. We experienced a number of fatalities. I remember some people attempted suicide.

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Woman:
When we first settled in the refugee camp I was three years old. So, I pretty much grew up in the camps.

Man:
Our children, they just wandering in idleness. We started a kind of home school.

Woman:
I started learning Karen, a bit of English, very basic.

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Woman:
You don’t know what’s going to happen. You could be ten, fifteen years in a refugee camp fighting for survival. You might not have an education. You might not be able to hope for a future.

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Student:
When we arrived in Syria 2010 Syria was a safe country. I had an uncle there so we went to his house. I went to normal school in Syria.

Student:
Staying in Turkey was very difficult. I didn’t like the situation because my Dad didn’t have any work there we relied on our aunty to send us money and also we weren’t allowed to go to any schools.

Student:
During that time we applied through UN to come to Australia and we did an interview, some blood tests and this stuff and they accepted us to come to Australia.

Student:
They called us and said that you have an interview with the Australian Embassy at Istanbul. We had an interview with the Embassy and then waiting for six months for the medical tests and then after one year being told that our medical tests are expired and we have to do them again. And then waiting after that for six other months. I actually wanted to go back to Iraq and say that is my fate if I get killed there, that’s it, I don’t care anymore.

Narrator:
Refugees come to Australia in different ways. Refugees can arrive in Australia through the UNHCR Settlement Program.

Man:
In 2005 UNHCR announced they would take all of the people. That makes good and bad feelings. Most people they like to go home but when this doesn’t happen the only option left to go for a third country resettlement.

Woman:
America and Australia Embassy went in, start interviewing refugees. The process of interviewing and medical check and cultural orientation took about a year.

Narrator:
Under international law everyone has a right to seek asylum in another country.

Woman:
We were in Pakistan for a month and then my father came home one night, he found someone who is going to help us and he said that if we give him good money he will take us out of Pakistan as well to a better place.

Woman:
Because we didn’t have any documentation we had to fake an Iraqi passport. We got a visa for Malaysia for two weeks and then we were able to be smuggled to Indonesia.

Woman:
We were in Indonesia for a month. This was the month that my Mum gave birth to my little brother.

Woman:
In Indonesia we had to stay for forty days in a remote area where nobody could identify us.

Woman:
After ten days the smuggler came and told us ‘This is the boat going to Australia. I know your wife is sick but it’s up to you if you want to go.’ And my Mum said ‘No, we should go on this boat, if the police here catch us and send us back it’s just like a death penalty for us’.

Man:
It was a tiny, wooden, very old boat which could hardly fit the seventy three people who were on the bus. Everyone was panicked and we were lied to once again ‘No, this is not the boat, the big luxurious ship is somewhere waiting in the sea. We can’t bring it to shore because it will alert the authorities.’

Woman:
We had Iraqi people. We had some Iranian, Afghan people. We had children with us as well. We had pregnant women.

Woman:
There was a storm. I was so scared, our ship got holes and we had to throw the water out with anything we had.

Man:
It was the fifth day that we realised that we will start to run out of drinking water soon.

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Woman:
Finally, the Australian Navy ship came to us. They tried to send us back and we said ‘No, we will not go back’.

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Woman:
April, 2007 we got our visa to come to Australia.

Man:
I had to live in the camp for ten years before I came here in 2007.

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Man:
We came by plane with QANTAS, we found all the passengers white. My daughter started crying and I told her, I said ‘Look, these people are going to live with you forever, you have to get used to them’.

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