Wonderland

I am standing in an entrance, staring at the door in front of me, which only one year ago I thought was the “way in” to Wonderland

A land so far removed from Alice’s.

A land full of white tents, tired and miserable people, and a crowded health centre. In my Wonderland, children leant their heads against the stones in their vegetables gardens to rest, afraid that their tents would collapse. The inhabitants of this Wonderland were not products of previous centuries, nor were they ever cave dwellers. They used to live in cities, yet they were treated as primitive beings. As a result, all they have left is faith and hope.

It is difficult to compare your own life to life in Wonderland, your house with the tent, the school and the dormitory with the scrapheap in the camp, and your friends with the unhappy girls in the tent next door.

I kept looking for a way to escape, kept wondering to myself if I would ever get out of this land.

Hope of life was the trigger for change; the tent became a container, a white one no less!

One year later, this Wonderland became a small metal room, but at least it was white, the colour of cleanliness and hope.  And I became more hopeful and more optimistic.

After a few months of waiting, we finally slept in the containers and enjoyed a good night’s sleep that reminded us of home. Of course, we slept well when the sky was kind to us, but when it “wept” it was a disaster. It made you think that the roof would collapse on your head. Even the sound of a single raindrop was frightening and very unsettling.

And yet, I ask myself “why do I miss that Wonderland?”

Probably because that was where I became a resilient and determined individual.

A very different person to the one I was before!

I often used to wish that I could live in a normal house once more, one made of bricks and stones. I often asked myself “will I ever yield to serenity at night and manage to fall asleep?” And because wishes do sometimes come true, I was notified that I would be moving to a proper house. I still had my doubts however and wondered about my relocation.

I asked myself whether it was time for me to migrate once more, the way birds do. Was it time for me to gather up the remains of all my memories, both bitter and sweet? Did I have to say goodbye once more to those who had taken the place of my friends and relatives? It is so very painful to part from friends with whom you have shared sorrows, joys, the heat and the cold, in tents and containers, in snow and rain or under the searing sun; people who walked with you, friends with whom you laughed when they laughed and cried when they shed tears. This is the second time I stand and stare at a large doorway, but this time it is not the entrance but the exit from Wonderland. It is the last day, and I find leaving so hard, there’s a lump in my throat as big as the mountains around the camp and there are tears trying to escape from under my eyelids. I feel the two scenes – the entrance and the exit – colliding inside me. The same person who was there to greet us is now seeing us off, but his expression is very different. And thus, I leave the place that taught me determination and patience.

As soon as I walked into the house, I felt I had been thrown out of my familiar surroundings and into a reality that didn’t actually provide peace. Instead, I fell asleep cradling my sorrows. Yes, I felt sad once more. The sadness of a refugee never ends. And yet this new place isn’t full of the noise made by the children in Wonderland. There is no piercing wind at night and the rainy days are almost inaudible. Even so, I miss all that!! I apologise for repeating myself, but it is my life that has become a series of repetitions.