Refugee The Diary Of Ali Ismail 〈Real〉

Remember that I, Ali Ismail, age sixteen, once had a favorite cup (chipped blue ceramic). I was afraid of spiders. I hated boiled okra. I wanted to be an architect, not because I liked buildings, but because I liked the space between buildings—the shadows where children play.

I drew a map in the condensation on the window of the bus heading to the coast. My mother thought I was drawing a cloud. But I was drawing the olive grove behind our house in Homs. The one where my brother and I buried a tin box of marbles in 2011. The marbles were blue like the sky before the jets came.

But tonight, I am a cartographer.

War exported me. Bombs exported my neighbor, the baker. Fear exported the girl who sat in front of me in chemistry class (she could name all the elements, but she couldn't name a single safe country). refugee the diary of ali ismail

First, you lose the sound of church bells (or the call to prayer, depending on your street). Then you lose the specific smell of your mother’s stove—lentils and cumin. Then you lose the ability to walk down a street without looking up at the rooftops.

When the water started seeping through the floor, Tarek took off his leather shoes. He didn’t throw them overboard. He held them up.

Today, I stopped being a number.

I realized something strange:

The father of three behind us starts to pray. The teenager from Idlib is laughing—hysterically, I think—because the moon is very bright and we are all going to die in a raft meant for ten people that holds forty-seven.

We don’t run away from death. We scoop it out with our finest possessions. Remember that I, Ali Ismail, age sixteen, once

If you are reading this, and you have a house key on a ring in your pocket, please understand: I am not a burden. I am an export.

I have to close the notebook now. The water is getting higher. Tarek is handing me his left shoe.

We are asking for your .

Tonight, the stars are very bright. The coast guard’s light is a white dot on the horizon. It might be rescue. It might be return. I don’t know which is scarier.

The engine dies. The sea is black and greedy.