Somewhere in the Unknown World Read online

  She said, “Get ready, you are leaving and going to a more permanent camp.”

  We said, “What? We have a friend. He went outside.”

  The official shook her head, and said, “We have to go.”

  * * *

  We were taken to another place outside Stockholm, a refugee camp that had once been a five-star hotel and resort, owned by a smart businesswoman who decided to sign a contract with the Swedish government. When we arrived, we were greeted with hugs and a lovely welcome, the welcome we had all been afraid to dream of. The staff were trained to greet the wealthiest people in the world, so that was how they treated us.

  The name of the place was Skebo Herrgård. It was a series of big manor homes around a small square, framed on one side by a rushing river and on the other by the tall mountains of Sweden. In the middle of winter the lawn was covered in snow. All the walkways had been carefully plowed. The trees stood reaching for the sky with their bare branches. A bright sun shone. It was the Christmas season, and whether you celebrated it or not, the mood was everywhere and you could not help but feel it.

  I was there for two to three years. We didn’t go to school or work. We ate, slept, had fun, walking everywhere our feet could take us. It was the most beautiful place I had ever been. In the spring, the river gushed and rippled over the rocks. The birds sang their mating songs. The wind blew warm breath on our sorry, hurting hearts. We could drink as much coffee as we wanted. The chef and the staff prepared beautiful meals for us; they smiled and greeted us warmly. But we were lost in the free world, floating particles. We were not normal. We couldn’t trust anyone. Yet our surroundings were so peaceful, we felt as if we were in a strange kind of hell. Everything that had mattered was gone. I prayed secretly. Perhaps we all did. No one wanted to be identified as a probable terrorist, so we prayed hiding in our rooms. We prayed for a return to what was and a future that could be. We were held in a place that felt as if war didn’t exist, in a world that we knew was fraught with fighting.

  My friend and I were placed in a room with the only other Afghan in the camp, a young man who was trained as a pilot in Italy and had refused to return to the motherland when war broke out. He was a great liar. He’d get things donated from Swedes and tell us that he’d bought them. He was older than me and the kind of man who wanted the people around him to feel indebted. At first, we believed his claims, but he was not a careful man, so soon enough we realized what was going on, but we let him live his lies anyway. It was a reminder of a human tendency that was familiar in the strangeness of Skebo Herrgård.

  When the opportunity came to apply for asylum in Sweden, I took it. My application was denied. I applied again. In fact, I appealed to the Swedish Immigration Court, challenging the rejection, citing how the United Nations office was not responding to my letters, how the Red Cross said it could not help me, how no one in the free world wanted to offer me safety. I challenged it on the basis that, from Afghanistan, I had believed in the promises of peace proclaimed by the democratic nations of this world and worked on its behalf, and now I was left homeless.

  I was on a mad quest. I watched YouTube and I taught myself Swedish. My ability to speak English and Swedish made me much beloved by the other refugees in the camp. I could help them fill out forms. I could translate what other people said into refugee-speak. They started calling me, in a joking way, “Baba Teresa.” In that capacity, I could ask the lovely hotel staff the questions that had been bothering me since my arrival: How do I improve my humanity? I said, “If I am human, what is my right? How does a human being, biological in every way, get documents of their humanity?” It was not long before there was enough concern that I was sent to see a psychologist.

  * * *

  The camp psychologist got to know me well. At first, she was unsure about my mental health. She was baffled by my request for a certificate of my humanity. She asked me if I believed I was human. I said of course, but other people weren’t so sure, so I needed help proving my humanity. She then offered to provide me with such proof. “But why?” I asked her. “What is the difference between you and me? How come you are more human than me, in a position to observe and certify my humanity? After all, did we not have the same blood, the same makeup? The same dreams, even? Why are you more successful in your humanity than I am in mine?” I told her that if she was going to give me a certificate of my humanity, she would have to show me hers first. I had to know who had given her the authority to determine human certification.

  I had been a human in my country, a human in a war. I told the psychologist that the war was a war on terrorism but I was not a terrorist. I told her about the warlords, the communists, the religious thinkers, and the powerful humanitarians all doing battle in my country. I told her that I was just a human being and that many of the human beings in my country hate war. We were victims of war—to be specific, of the Americans and the Russians and their allies and their battle for power over people. She listened to me and took notes. Finally, she said, “You are not sick.” She was then the first in a long time to say, “Thank you. Please come back to talk to me so that I can learn from you.”

  I would not have returned to her office if it was only for her to learn from me. I was also learning from myself. I was in so much pain, and my pain was so focused that I was unable to learn from myself. It took her taking the notes during our meetings and then reciting them back to me for me to know what I was saying, thinking, and feeling.

  My dependence on the psychologist got me thinking about Sweden in a more general way. I came to understand that if I stayed in the country, I would be dependent on the government for a long time. It took eight to ten years to get citizenship, assuming that my appeal for asylum was accepted. I started thinking about being independent again, being the maker of my destiny, the maker of my life. I began thinking about America.

  * * *

  I connected with my USAID supervisor, Natasha Kelly. I asked her once more about the Special Immigrant Visa. I applied. With Natasha’s support and verification of my history, I made a case for coming to the United States, the source of so much hurt and so much hope all over this world.

  On Facebook, I started asking political questions, demanding a response to my question on humanity. I asked again and again in long rants for a person who could grant me, and my country folk, the gift of a certification of humanity. One day I got a response from a woman, an activist in a place called Minnesota, asking me for my story. Her name was Diedre. In the span of a week, we became friends. After learning of my story, she offered to help me with the visa process.

  * * *

  It was springtime once more in Skebo Herrgård. The birds sang their songs. Refugees walked in groups of two or three on the green lawn. I was talking to a group of Eritreans, helping explain some concept about life in Sweden, when one of the staff walked over to me and handed me two envelopes. The first and the bigger envelope was from the US embassy. Inside, there was that long-destroyed Afghan passport, made new again, its blue cover firm and stiff, and then a letter granting me US residency. The second letter was from the Swedish Immigration Court, granting me Swedish residency. I started crying. We all did, all of us refugees, so hungry for some hope of a place to make a home. My fellow refugees from around the world decided they would have a big party for me with cake. We jumped. We danced. We hugged. The big question was, Which country to choose? They had both chosen me, on paper, at least.

  I thought of my family. I knew I would have a better, easier life in Sweden. But if I went to the United States and worked hard, then I would be able to send money home, as much as I could earn. I thought of my mother, my baby brother, and my sisters in our house, now I’ve learned without my father. For them, I could not trust my fate to a country. I had to take it into my own hands once again. I chose America.

  On Facebook, Diedre asked me where I was going. I told her about New York City or Washington, DC. She said, “Why not Minnesota?” I asked, “Is Minnesota even a state
?” I told her to give me five minutes. I googled Minnesota. I saw that it was indeed a state, and that it was in fact a state in the heart of the country. I wrote her back and said, “Will you help find me a host?”

  Within three days, I was set to leave. After a brief Skype call with a lovely woman named Gayle Denicker, I had a host family. One of my Swedish friends who worked at the hotel gave me a loan to pay for a one-way plane ticket to Minneapolis–St. Paul International Airport. Another friend at the hotel, seeing my empty pockets, placed a twenty-dollar bill in my hand.

  * * *

  I arrived in Minnesota in June 2015. Gayle and her husband and Diedre and her husband met me at the airport. As they drove me to their home in Minneapolis, I heard police sirens. I saw homeless people with their bags and shopping carts beside them. I saw broken concrete and uneven sidewalks. I thought, I’ve made a mistake. How can America go into the world and speak of humanity, of peace and prosperity, when there are so many within its own borders looking for help, searching for meaning, worth, a chance at a good life?

  * * *

  In America, I work sixteen to eighteen hours a day. During the week, I am an office manager at a community college. After work and on the weekends, I am a Lyft driver. I live modestly in a small apartment. Every dollar that I do not need, I send to my family in Afghanistan. It brings me pride. Because of me, my family is middle class, they have food to eat, my baby brother can go to school. Because of me, they are not lost in Afghanistan. Someone in America sees them clearly and loves them completely. I have been in America for three years. I am now twenty-nine years old. I am engaged to a woman my mother has chosen in Afghanistan. I’ve not met her but I know that she has a master’s degree in Islamic studies. Will I be able to sponsor her and marry her here? I don’t know. I don’t know when a life will begin beyond this one where I work hard and take pride where I can.

  In this life, I have learned that Afghanzada is as much a human as anyone else in this country or any other; I am as human as you are.

  —AFGHANZADA ACHEKZAI

  Part III

  PLEASE REMEMBER

  9

  Officially Unconfirmed

  IF I HAD a picture of me then, you would see that I was a boy with caramel-colored eyes and short curls on my head. My legs were thin and my arms were long. If I’d had a camera, you’d see: a boy taking deep breaths of the dry air, raising his arms high over his head and then letting them fall down. The dust that swirls in the clearing would look like turmeric in the wind. I didn’t have a camera, so there are no images of myself from then, no scenes from my boyhood but the ones I carry inside.

  * * *

  Every day, once the animals had been cared for, I played a game of soccer with my friends in a field of short grass on the outskirts of our village until the sweat dribbled from our faces and our chests started aching. It was then that we would go rest in the shade of a big tree at the field’s edge.

  We were country children from Eritrea. We were used to life in the wide openness of the old farms. We were good at taking care of the animals, setting the cows out to graze by the river, herding the bleating goats along the dirt roads to new patches of green, and being by ourselves.

  For fun, we scared the hens that pecked at the bugs in the weeds by pretending to run at them. We would not do this to the hens with chicks. That would have been too mean. We had a code of conduct we lived by: we should have fun but be kind. My friends and I obeyed this Christian rule at all times.

  * * *

  My mother died when I was just four months old. She contracted malaria. Without proper treatment, a recovery was not possible in the rural farms of Eritrea. She left my father with two sons, my older brother who was three at the time and me.

  My father did not know how to take care of us, especially me. My grandmother took on the responsibilities of caring for me. I knew her as my mother.

  I believed my grandmother was my mother until I was eight years old. I grew up believing that my father was my older brother, that we shared the same parents.

  * * *

  I was just a child and I loved the warm blowing wind and the bright sunny sky on my heated skin. I took deep breaths to slow my beating heart from the soccer game, then made my way to my place beneath the canopy of leaves to sit with my friends. My best friend rolled the soccer ball toward me. My hands were young, plump, and full.

  That fine day, the other boys left us to go attend to their chores. It was just my best friend, Adam, and I sitting beneath the umbrella of the leaves of our favorite tree, looking at the yellowing grass of the open field. The cows with their sharp horns and bony backs grazed in an uneven line along the slope of a hill. We sat in the dirt, scratching at our thin legs. The mosquitos had been fierce that morning when we’d taken the cows out to graze.

  I told Adam that my big brother was coming back from Asmara, the capital city, soon, and that he would no doubt have candy for me.

  I told him about how lucky I was to have such a good brother, one who loved me so much.

  My best friend was a sensitive boy just a year older than me, a kind kid who was always gentle and honest, but his look grew pensive in my talk, his brow furrowing.

  I said, “I don’t understand why my brother loves me so much, but he does.”

  My friend said, “I know why he loves you so much, Michael.”

  I said, “How do you know?” He looked a little nervous, so I prodded him, “Come on. You can tell me anything. We are best friends. What do you know?”

  He said, “Michael, your big brother is really your father.”

  I said, “What?!” Then I started laughing. Who did he think I was? I shook my head. I slapped the hard ground beside me with my palms. The orange dust flew around us.

  My friend waved his hands in front of his face to carry the dust away and said, “Michael, I’ve never lied to you. Why would I lie to you about this? This is serious. I heard my mother and an auntie talking about it. They were wondering when your grandmom would tell you the truth.”

  My laughter was gone by the time the dust had settled. My best friend was being mean, not at all being a good Christian. I let the silence grow between us. My throat grew thick. I could not fathom what he thought he was doing, making this cruel joke.

  The landscape before me swam in a pool of sudden tears. I tried to blink them away.

  I said, “No, you misheard, Adam. My mom is my mom. My dad is my dad. My brothers are my brothers. We are a family.”

  He got up, wiped his hands on his shorts, looked down at me, and said, “Michael, I’m sorry, but I know what I heard and I’m your best friend and if I didn’t tell you the truth I wouldn’t be. I think you should go talk to your grandmom.”

  I got up, too. I told Adam I would talk to my grandmother and then I would visit him later when our chores were through to let him know that he’d misunderstood. I handed him the soccer ball. He accepted it. He nodded sadly at me, his head bobbing up and down slowly, his mouth in a tight line.

  We walked away from the tree together. There was nothing left to say to each other. We parted ways in the village. I looked at his back, shoulders low, head to the side, walking with both his hands holding the soccer ball in front of him.

  At the open door to our house, I waited for a moment, looking at the older woman tending to the fire with a stick, a pot boiling on top of the flames. Her familiar hands moving steadily from one task to the other, unaware of my presence. The tears I had blinked away filled my eyes once more. Wet streaks ran down my face.

  From the doorway, I said, “Mom?”

  She turned immediately toward me.

  She said, “Yes, Michael?”

  She saw that I was crying. She rushed toward me, wiping her hand on the scarf tied to her waist.

  She said, “Michael, what’s wrong? What has happened to my boy?”

  She pulled me close and I could smell the spices she’d been cooking with on her clothes. She was making zigni for dinner. I could sm
ell the spice of the berbere, the ginger, the cumin, and the cloves. I held tight as I leaned my head into her soft, familiar body.

  I mumbled into her clothes, “My best friend said you’re not my mom. Adam said you’re my grandmom. He is a liar.”

  My words turned into a wail. Her hands pulled me tighter to her body for a moment, and then I felt them loosening. She took my arms in both hands. Normally she would say, “That is nonsense, Michael,” but that day was not a normal day. In her growing silence, I knew what I would find when I looked up. When I felt her hand gently cup my chin I shook my head for a moment.

  In the wash of my tears, I saw the face I loved most in the world, its soft lines folded into brown flesh, eyes darker than my own, framed by wrinkles, looking down at me with a look of sorrow.

  Tears filled her eyes. She shook her head—as surprised as I was by the moment before us. A hand went to the base of her throat as she cleared it.

  She said, “Michael, my dearest boy, your best friend Adam is not a liar.”

  She pulled me toward the pot of beef simmering in tomato sauce on the hot fire.

  She said, “Michael, come inside and we’ll talk.”

  When we were both seated, she used the same scarf she’d wiped her hands on earlier to wipe the tears away from her eyes.

  She said, “Michael, I didn’t want to upset you. I have wanted to tell you but I didn’t know how.”

  Those words were the needle that pierced me through. My muscles grew soft. I curled physically into myself. I mourned the death of my grandmom as my mom. I felt for the first time the loss of the woman who had given birth to me, the woman who was my mom but had never been in my life. Grandmom’s voice flowed past me but I had lost all ability to hear her words. I was young and I could not understand how her love for me and my love for her would not change despite the knowledge that had fallen upon me beneath that cloud of leaves where my best friend had offered me a truth I had not been looking for.