Somewhere in the Unknown World: A Collective Refugee Memoir

Kaw Thaw is born in a small village in Burma to parents who do not love each other. They reserve their love for their children and the Karen people—one of the largest minority ethnic groups in Burma. After his sister drowns, Kaw’s parents move the family to the borderlands between Burma and Thailand, where they become resistance fighters. As he learns more about the Karen people, Kaw gives up his Burmese name and renames himself Kaw Thaw, meaning new country.

Shortly after finishing high school, Kaw leaves his family for a refugee camp in Mae Sot, Thailand. At the camp, he falls in love with a woman who is independent, driven, and fun. They are not formally married, but agree to a union, and have three sons together, who are given Karen names. Kaw applies for an educational program in Chiang Mai, Thailand’s second biggest city. He is amazed by the city, and applies for a college scholarship in Bangkok. For four years of college, he immerses himself in city life, and knows he will not return to his sons and partner in the refugee camp.

Kaw takes a job as a translator and aid worker for Karen refugees in Bangkok, and meets an American woman named Jill. They work together for two months, then talk over email and phone for four years after Jill leaves Thailand. Eventually, Jill and Kaw decide to marry, and Kaw travels to America on a fiancé visa. On the plane to America, he reflects that leaving without saying goodbye is like a death, but he accepts the consequences of his actions. Years later, Kaw is in Minnesota working for a nonprofit supporting Burmese refugees. Jill is pregnant, and Kaw thinks of his sons in Thailand often. Kaw reflects that he would give everything up to experience a simple life in his home village.

Hawra Alnabi, a Muslim Shia woman, follows her aunt and uncle through Wadi-us-Salaam cemetery in search of her grandfather’s grave. She has not been in Iraq since her family fled the country when she was three years old, shortly after her grandfather was murdered. He had been a vocal critic of Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship and, encouraged by American propaganda, organized protests against the government. Although the rebels had some early successes, Hussein’s forces ultimately regained power, and Hawra’s grandfather and uncles were targeted for their part in the protests.

Hawra’s father and uncles fled to the nearby marshland to hide, but her grandfather refused to leave his wife and other family members. When he was killed, the family had no choice but to flee. Thirty thousand families fled Iraq as a result of the war; many, like Hawra’s, were brought on US warplanes to a refugee camp on the border of Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Hawra’s family lived in the refugee camp for five years before her youngest uncle applied for the entire family to be relocated to the United States. The night before their interview and medical examination, Hawra and her family stayed in a hotel in Riyadh. Hawra fell in love with the city and the sense of freedom she felt there. The application was successful, and the family moved to San Diego, then to Minnesota.

After the terror attacks on September 11, 2001, Hawra and her siblings were bullied and isolated by fellow students and their teachers because they were Iraqi Muslims. Eventually, her parents agreed to home school them. The family gained citizenship in 2003, days before the fall of Saddam Hussein’s government. She returned to Iraq in 2009 with her husband, a Saudi Arabian. Visiting the cemetery, she is moved by the sacrifices made by Iraqis for freedom.

Shortly after Afghanzada Achekzai is born in Kandahar, Afghanistan, his family is forced to flee the country in the aftermath of the Soviet-Afghan war. The family lives in a refugee camp in Pakistan for several years before receiving permission to settle in the city of Quetta. At the age of 19, Afghanzada returns to Kandahar to work for an American aid organization; his family soon joins him. Soon after his family arrives, Afghanzada starts receiving threatening messages from Taliban fighters angry about his work with Americans. After months of hiding, Afghanzada decides that remaining in his family’s home is too dangerous, and pays a human trafficker $25,000 to get him out of Afghanistan. As he rides to the airport, Afghanzada fears for the safety of his people.

The trafficker gives Afghanzada a plane ticket and three passports. He is joined by two other Afghani men, and the group travels to Dubai on fake passports without incident. The men are shocked by the wealth and stability they see at the airport. After six weeks in Dubai, one of the men decides to return to Afghanistan. The other two travel to Serbia on their Pakistan passports. In Serbia, another connection sends them to Sweden, their final destination. Before landing, the men decide to destroy all three of their passports and enter as refugees.

Upon arrival in Sweden, the men are separated and interrogated for hours. Afghanzada is shocked by the treatment, since he considers Sweden a beacon of human rights. He feels like he needs a certificate to prove his humanity. After years in Swedish refugee centers, he applies for an American visa. He is accepted and moves to Minnesota, working and sending money back to his family in Afghanistan. He is surprised by the poverty and violence he finds in Minnesota.