"Wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow.
"
– Anita Desai
Part 0:
"Wherever you go becomes a part of you somehow."
This quote by Anita Desai now means more to me than I would have ever thought it would, I
didn’t fully grasp the depth of the quote until I looked back on my own journey and the
experiences I have overcome -- and the journeys of those all around me who might’ve gone
through something very similar who have also been shaped by places all around the world.
Part 1:
When I became an immigrant, I was 7 years old, fleeing from my home country, Syria, because
of the war, which might make me a refugee in some people’s minds, but I don’t see it that way.
Sure, we moved because of the war, just a mere kilometres from where we lived. I vividly
remember waking up to the sound of rattling windows and the ground shaking due to nearby
bombings or landmines. I also remember the distant sound of gunshots, wondering if they would
ever make their way over to us, but I could never say I wanted to move. Syria was my home
after all.
Amidst all the chaos and commotion, me, my cousins and my brother were able to make fun of
it all, collecting empty bullet shells, playing around in abandoned trenches, and talking to our
grandpa about the war he served in a few years back, he was sent back after he got ill, luckily,
he wasn’t badly injured.
Although everything I've just described has not been all that positive, some moments were
similar to any other child growing up: going to my grandparents’ house, where my brother and I
would get absolutely spoiled; going to the farm and helping out with picking grapes; and
perhaps most importantly of all, spending time with loved ones every night—we used to live with
our cousins with our aunty and uncle.
Leaving Syria felt like I was losing everything I had. Back then, I didn't realise what the big deal
was I was used to all the chaos.
Syria was home to all of my friends, family and even pets. My life was in Syria--
But as I've gotten older, I realise my life can be anywhere, like Oodgeroo Noonuccal said, “let
no one say the past is dead. The past is all about us and within”
Part 2:
When I first came to Australia, everything was new, different : the weather, the language, the
people, the buildings, the music, everything. I thought to myself a line from one of Oodgeroo
Noonuccal's poems: the past “I am away” away from my culture, language, family, everything, I
was away from my life as a whole and it made me feel incomplete – like I didn't fit in.
My friends weren’t the same as they were in Syria, I wasn’t even sure I had friends in my first
few years of coming here since I was bullied for not being able to speak English, I didn’t know I
was being bullied at the time, I didn’t know much at all. As I grew up and moved schools
however I began to fit in, find myself again.
Time passed, enough so that I'd spent more of my life in Australia than I ever did in syria. I'd felt
at home being in Australia but a part of me always worried about losing my past becoming so
caught up in the present that I forgot about my past, the quote “let none tell me the past is
wholly gone. Now is so small a part of time, so small a part” by oodgeroo Noonuccal
seemed to encapsulate my worries and answer them so clearly.
Part 3:
Years later, I returned to Syria — not to stay, but just to visit.
I was nervous going back, what if everything had changed, I certainly had
