Refugees

Imagine that your mother or father arrives home from work one day and tells you that the police are about to arrive to arrest the whole family, because of your family’s religious beliefs.  You are told to pack a small backpack and be ready in 2 minutes. A family friend drives you overland to Darwin where you climb aboard a yacht. Your parents hand over thousands of dollars in cash. Six weeks later the yacht leaves you on a Japanese beach.  Police arrive and take you to a detention centre which is prison and home to refugees like yourself from various parts of the world, all speaking different languages. Only a few other people speak English.  The guards, canteen staff, doctor etc. all speak Japanese.  Your parents tell you that they are applying for refugee status in Japan, which means you will be allowed to live in the country, go to school there and eventually get a job. 

1.      What would you pack in your backpack?

Water bottle, food, seeds, change of clothes

2.      What would you miss most if you had to leave your home, your school, Australia?

I would miss my lifestyle, my family and friends

3.      What would be some of the problems of living in a detention centre in a foreign country?

problems would inculde sanitiation, sleeping arragngements, rationing food and water and developing relationships with the people around you

4.      What would be the biggest challenges for you if you and your family were accepted as refugees?

some of the hardest challenges would incude getting past language barriers and getting a job and completing my education

5.      Why is this ‘imagine’ story a very unlikely one?
In Australia, we are very fortunate to be free of war and have no outstandign problems with other countries