She never remembered ever having a home, they were always travelling; her Mummy, Daddy, her twin brother and two sisters. She once asked : “What is Taliban?” and was given a sharp smack and told never to utter that word again.
Across hills, through eerie forests, between mountains, wading across rivers, her clothes sticking to her. Across dry, scorching deserts where it was hard to breathe.
It always seemed to be at night they moved, they tried to sleep during the day. She knew no different. It was a way of life; every day travelling and hiding.
It took two years to get all the way from Jalalabad to the village. Oh the village! There were tents to sleep in, they could queue for food, she shared a bed with her sisters, there were children to play with.
They stayed there a long time. She felt safe. She thought it was home. But, it wasn't!
One night she was woken up and forced to walk away from the village. They were joined silently, spookily by others, nobody she recognised. There were men in black with masks, holding torches and guns. She just followed, traipsing in the cold, the dark, the rain.
People were hurriedly jumping onto a boat. She was pushed forward, her Daddy lifted her on before clambering onboard himself. It was rocking from side to side.
It was dark, they were now moving. Rain poured relentlessly. The boat went up and down, backwards and sideways, water was coming in, everyone was wet. She was frightened. Why had Mummy and Daddy brought her here?
Then, they landed, she just wanted to go back to bed, she was tired. But they were herded like cattle, pushed and shooshed across a beach into a forest, it was still raining, she was soaked through to the skin. It was dark but she sensed she was somewhere different. There was no village, no bed, no home!
She can't remember how long they stayed at the forest, it was cold, dark, wet. Her Daddy made fires, but it was smokey. She coughed, shivered and sneezed and kept falling asleep.
One time when she woke, she was surrounded by different, strange people. They were smiling, she couldn't understand what they were saying. She was helped up and carried to a van. Then she went back to sleep. She stayed in hospital all winter recovering from pneumonia .
Meanwhile, her family had been found a home. After being moved from a detention centre to hotel rooms, they were finally moved into the second floor of a Town house.
She learned her first words of English in hospital; and, when she was discharged and taken to her new home, she proudly declared:
“My name is Tabana, I speak English”. For the first time ever, she saw her Mummy laugh. Her Daddy just smiled and wiped away something from his eye. The family were happy.
Tabana loved school. She discovered that she was good at maths, she learned so much and made friends. Her special friend was Dorita who came from Poland. They helped each other. Nobody spoke Pashton, but it didn't matter, she got so much help.
“Why no school at weekends? What's holidays?” There was still so much she didn't understand.
Tabana clung to every word of her teacher Mrs Pugh, but couldn't understand why she wore make-up, “ Mummy doesn't wear make-up”. Mrs Pugh laughed.
“Mummy said there are no schools where we're from. Why?” Mrs Pugh replied that she didn't know, and, maybe one day Tabana could tell her.
It was one afternoon in class whilst she was reading a story, that Mrs Pugh noticed Tabana crying. She paused and went over to her asking what was the matter?
The story was about a little girl's journey on a boat. Tabana sobbed that she has bad dreams about falling off a boat and drowning.
When school ended that day, Mrs Pugh met Tabana's Mummy. Tabana explained everything about their journey, the boat, her life travelling and hiding. She was still only six!
Mrs Pugh was so moved, she wrote down this story and vowed to tell the world about the true human plight of refugees.
Some days later as she was telling me, we overheard a voice grumbling: “How much are these refugees costing us?”
We both looked at each other and;
I added this footnote:
If you think education's expensive. Try ignorance!
This composition is published as part of our Refugee: Poems of Courage collection, presented in collaboration with Poems Not Bombs, part of the Forest Poets collective.
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