Life as a refugee is an education in all that is best — and worst — in society
her first-grade vocabulary can express. But the child answers his questions without flinching. It is the mother who breaks into tears, the mother whose voice cracks and wavers, her attempts at English splintered by exhaustion.
My breath hitches. In the comfort of my well-appointed house, far from where women and children flee the horrors of the Ukraine-Russian war, unbidden memories rush in. Snippets of conversations. Scraps of places. Fragments of fear and wonder and curiosity and anger and excitement.
“That’s the age I was when we came to the U.S.,” I tell The Hubby. And with those words I open a past I keep under lock and key.
I rarely speak about my early childhood experience as a Cuban refugee child. I don’t talk about my first unsettling months of school, about grappling with a new language and unfamiliar customs, about my family’s struggles to find its way in a foreign land. After all, I live in a city of refugees and exiles and immigrants. These stories are common, and while the characters may change, the message is the same. Leaving home, willingly or not, is never easy. Displacement invariably translates into deep wounds, both visible and invisible.
Now, in looking back, I recognize that being a refugee was probably one of the most defining experiences of my life, certainly the most influential of my childhood. The person I am today owes a debt to the child who grew up inhabiting two worlds. It imbued me with an abiding gratitude for my adopted country but also an understanding of how perilous even the best situations can become.
Life as a refugee is an education in all that is best — and worst — in society. It also is a form of shorthand accessible to anyone who has undergone the same. Once a refugee, always a refugee of the heart.
Watching Ukrainian children trundle across borders alone or with their mothers and grandmothers is a heartsearing sight that has become way too common in the past few weeks. Millions have walked and motored to safety, others have been killed in the process. As
Russian atrocities continue, many more will follow. Several leaders have publicly called the Ukrainian exodus the largest movement of people in the shortest amount of time since World War II.
Unfortunately, this great migration is not unique.
Nor is it even the first refugee crisis of the past decade. What we’re seeing in real time on our screens is one of many calamities caused by greedy, powerhungry megalomaniacs. Images capture these for posterity.
Remember that photo of the 3-year-old who drowned, along with his mother and brother, in the Mediterranean while fleeing Syria with his family? It prompted international soul-searching in 2015, but that was quickly eclipsed by other refugee crises. Our memory is short and our sympathies fickle.
I won’t bother to speculate on the reasons why some catastrophes, including this one in Eastern
Europe, receive more sustained interest than others. Plenty of pundits are already doing this, pointing fingers, stirring up conflict and division. My plea is different: Do not forget the other refugee children, the ones who have slipped off stage, away from the camera. They, too, deserve our attention.
The Afghans and Syrians immediately come to mind, but also those in Yemen and Iraq, Sudan and Ethiopia. Because we don’t see them doesn’t mean their needs are any less. The act of fleeing war or persecution or famine, transcends language, culture, geography. As the world continues to wrestle with unending upheavals, so should our compassion.
(Ana Veciana-Suarez writes about family and social issues. Email her at avecianasuarez@gmail.com or visit her website anavecianasuarez.com. Follow @AnaVeciana.)