Liliana Irambona
ABC Great Southern
17 June, 2015
By Karla Arnall
To commemorate Refugee Week 2015, former refugees reflect on their first impressions of the country they now call home. They live in Katanning – Western Australia’s first regional Refugee Welcome Zone.
The first thing I remember: leaving Tanzania for WA with one day’s notice
Liliana Irambona, 16 (left), with her cousin Ansila Manirakiza, 18, lived in Katanning after being born in Tanzanian refugee camps.
(ABC Great Southern: Karla Arnall)
“I remember getting on the plane from Kenya and I was crying and I was screaming so loud. There were people staring at me. “The people. That was the first thing that got into my mind. “What are the people going to look like? What are they going to think of us? Their language? It was pretty intense.”
Liliana Irambona remembers the day her parents told her they were moving to Australia. It was a Sunday in September 2006. The seven-year-old was told to say goodbye to the Tanzanian refugee camp she had been born in. “I found out on Sunday, that’s when I heard we were going to Australia and we just had to say goodbye to all of our friends and cousins. Then on Monday, that’s when we left. Less than a day to say goodbye to everyone.” Liliana believes her parents kept the move from their second eldest daughter for safety reasons. “Mostly you can’t trust anyone. It was more like a secret.”
Where ‘people are so busy’
Her parents had fled conflict years earlier in their home nation of Burundi, a landlocked country in East Africa bordered by Rwanda. Their growing brood took a long flight from Kenya to Perth. The transition from refugee camp to Australian capital city came as a shock for the young child. “It was big. It was really, really big and people are so busy. There were people working there, people working here. I was scared of the people, because when you’re in Africa you hear stories about white people so it was kinda scary.
“You mostly hear stories like, ‘if you go there, they’re going to turn you into soap’ and stuff like that. When you grow up it was funny, but when I was younger it was scary,” she laughed. After the initial shock, Liliana found solace in reuniting with family in Perth. “To be honest, I was really happy. I was happy to move to a new country a new place where I could have my freedom and be happy because we already had cousins who live here so it was so good to see them again.”
A bittersweet move
The family eventually relocated to Katanning. Family ties and affordable housing formed the basis of the move. The now 16 year-old Liliana is a Year 11 student at Katanning Senior High School. “I want to be a nurse. I just want to help people, those who are in need.”
Whilst bittersweet, she sees her journey as a necessary one. “To me refugee is something big. It’s like a new page for some people who never had the chance to start a new page. For those who come from a different country, like from Burundi to Australia, Tanzania to Australia, to start a new page, a new chapter in their lives. It’s a new chapter in life. “It was hard saying goodbye to the families still back there [in Africa], but it was good.”
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