| Friday, March 3, 2000

(Note: In the year 2000, I wrote this short story as an entry in the national student writing competition organised annually by D&AD and The Guardian. It won and an edited version was later published in The Guardian with a different title. This is the original, unedited version.)

The world has gone mad and I’m alone. I didn’t realise I was stuck in this world of lonely chaos until the day seven months ago when our next door neighbour popped round to our house. He came around on a Monday evening to blow my father’s brains out of the back of his skull. Beforehand, he was tied up by my next-door neighbour and his friends and forced to watch whilst they were gang raping my mother. Then they were both left lying in a sweaty bloody mess on our kitchen floor.

Sorry. I should have said that he regularly came around on a Monday evening to drink a couple of beers and have a chat. He and my dad talked about football, joked over how badly the ministers were running the country and how little spare time they had now that ‘information technology’ was being introduced at work. That’s what I should have said.

It’s just that, in my mind, when I shut my eyes and think back to those Monday evenings, the image that’s stuck on replay is the one where I look downstairs to see my father opening the front door; then the door burst open and my next-door neighbour is hitting my father in the face with the butt of a rifle. The other men are helping to tie him up. They drag him into the kitchen where my mother is and sit him down at the end of the table. They push my mother over the other end and make him watch while they laugh and rip her apart.

I was so scared. I hid upstairs until there was silence. I closed my eyes tight, tight and wished for all of these images to go away; if I closed my eyes they would all go away. When I went downstairs, the men had disappeared but my mum and dad were lying still on the floor. Dead still. I ran and ran and ran. Somebody help me, please. Help me. Help me quickly, now. That Monday evening, when the soldiers came to town, everything was burning. No one could help.

In the refugee camp they told us that they would sort me out and make it safe. Two months later I was in Britain. A very far away country. But safe, at least it was safe; and British people are so very tolerant with their traditions and their spirit of fair play.

At last I could stop being scared. When I arrived they sent me to prison. I did not understand why as I had not committed any crime. Why were the men who raped my mother and killed my father and burnt our town not in prison? I don’t understand.

On 29 February they sent me here and let me live in a house with other refugees. Bosnians, Croatians, Kurds, and Afghans. There’s just me here from Somalia. Mostly we spend our days staring into silence. It’s hard to explain things in another language. Especially those things.

You just have to look in someone’s eyes and hope they will see that you’re in pain far away from here; hope they’ll take notice; hope they might know how your body can be in one place but your heart and your thoughts stuck in another, very distant, place. Don’t be afraid. Try looking into this person’s tired, hollow eyes. You’ll see.

Sometimes when I walk in the streets here people look at me. I look into their eyes and try to speak to them. Some of these people are kind and help. I do not often feel like laughter but some laugh with me; this is a good feeling. Some laugh at me, others ignore me. One person called me a ‘sad black bastard’. His eyes were afraid too.

The people from the Refugee Council help me a lot. They help the next-door neighbours here to understand a little and they could help you. Many people here are very concerned. Concerned about enjoying themselves and cars and computer games and big shopping centres full of clothes.

I don’t want to take your money or your job or your car or your wife. I am not a thief. Nor am I a murderer, vandal, rapist or any kind of criminal. I don’t want to hurt anybody. I am a human being. Just like you. The world has gone mad I am alone. I’m hurting inside and I need to understand it all. Just like you. If you see me in the street you won’t know any of this, of course. If I look at you and you feel afraid, it’s only because I am. I want to look into people’s eyes and be happy, not afraid. Just like you.