By Rowan Mc Ewan

Today, my mother, my brother and I are preparing to move out of our apartment. Last night, my mom was explaining how traumatic moving can be, and she stated all the times she’d moved in her life. One of the places she listed was Libya, our departure from which was one of our most troubled times yet. For those who don’t know, in 2011, there was a revolt in Libya against the government of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, which spurred on the First Libyan Civil War. My immediate family and I were refugees in that war, and we had to flee along with many others on a treacherous journey across the Mediterranean Sea. But rather than tell you the details, I’ll leave the talking to my seven-year-old self, who has written a very special work outlining this traumatic time.

The ferry which took many Americans to safety (taken from the stern of our own ferry)

CHAPTER 1: When we got on the ferry

When Daddy’s boss, Mr. Mike, felt that Libya was not very safe, he decided that we had to move out. So we did. But the only vehicle Schlumberger decided we could take was… the ferry. That was because the airport was closed and planes couldn’t land. So we drove to the ferry terminal. And on that blustery night, the wind was tossing the seas up and down, making the ferry wobble and totter. Anyway we boarded the ferry, having to wait a very long time to get on the boat.

CHAPTER 2: When we got our seats

We (The Kid Team) went first. Those guys lifted us up onto the boat. Some of us were very heavy. Now that we were on the boat, it was the parents’ turn to get onto the boat. But there was just one problem… the parents were too heavy to be lifted onboard. So how did the

parents get onto the boat? They just stepped onto the boat, minding the gap between the boat and the platform. Then there we were; in the cargo hold. We had a long wait to get to our seats. After that, Mummy and Adrian almost fell downstairs when they were trying to get upstairs. Then Daddy and I went upstairs. We had finally gotten our seats. Well, we stayed on that ferry for forty hours. Thank God for our handheld games and computers, otherwise we would have been very bored. Then, on Friday, I finally fell asleep and had a dream. You can see what happened next…

CHAPTER 3: When we were off

All of a sudden, I woke up, and I looked out the window. We were far away from the city. I had to say, I also felt the boat moving. We were then riding the waves of the sea. The sea tossed the boat about. Almost everyone vomited! Some of us (like me) were scared. I thought we were going to sink! But, believe it or not, the boat did not sink. The boat kept rocking and pitching until that night, after a long ten-hour journey, we had reached Malta. I was relieved. Phew!

The fishing village in Malta where we had lunch

CHAPTER 4: When we reached

We were told some of us were staying for two nights, and leaving on Sunday. We didn’t, though. We left on Wednesday. Malta was gallons of fun (and not as bad as I think either)! We went sightseeing and made new friends. We went to an aviation museum, saw glass being blown and visited the old hilltop capital of Malta called M’dina. But my favorite by far was when we visited Marsaxlokk, a fishing village on the southeast coast. We walked along the beach, had an appetizing lunch of fish, and we later bought some souvenirs. We even saw a ‘pink parasol’! It was a good end to our journey. The End

And that’s the story of how I departed a war-torn country, leaving behind my friends once more. Now while this story may have had a happy ending, many others weren’t so fortunate. Just

three weeks shy of us leaving Libya, another ferry never made it across the sea. In fact, it capsized and every one of its three hundred passengers died. I even remember seeing the news of a child’s body washed ashore. It was grim.

Today, as Christians and Catholics, let’s remember and pray for the disadvantaged in our society, particularly refugees, because they might just have quite a story to tell, and some may never get to tell it.