Africa, a project for mothers without news from their immigrant children

Luka Atanasio – Vatikan Sidad

Let’s try to think for a moment in one of our children, and perhaps a teenager, travel alone or with friends. Once he arrived, at the end of a car flight or during a train trip, if WhatsApp did not send us reassured or not sent to us that everything was fine, we entered an initial excitement. If it happens, unfortunately, this is done after a time after the planned access without receiving any signal, real panic will be turned on in the family.

Young people are forced to migrate

Imagine now that we are parents in the other half of the ball in the world, and that we have a child, because of a conflict that has been unleashed in the region in which we live, through an environmental disaster, for persecution or “simply” of poverty, is forced to migrate. Its flight will not be made on regular flights, in trains, or in cars and regular roads, but most likely, in excessive pocket cars to the point that they are incredible. On his journey to Europe today, it turned today into an indelible castle where it is impossible to enter those who come from the south of the world, and our virtual son will be in the hands of travelers from unclear people, and he will surely suffer from violence and will likely die (more than 31,000 people have died in Medaranoliano since 2014, and not the account of those who die before that. Throughout this period of time, which can extend for years , The possibilities of communication with families are very limited.

Mothers who ran out the news

Young people who leave and stay during the trip do not contact their home for many reasons. Because they confiscate their cell phone, because they do not have money for credit, but also because, especially in moments of suffering, they choose not to know my mother or my father not to make them understand their inconvenience. In the debate about the phenomenon of deportation, often, it is exploited and understood slightly, as the voice of those who are still at home is suspended waiting for the news completely missing.

“Mamas” project

For this reason, “mothers” were born (Mothers), A press project that was implemented in cooperation with Average. It aims to contribute to discussing a different perspective, from the perspective of migrant mothers, with their feelings, the thinnest months waiting for a phone call, and often, the belief that their children have died. “Mothers” He wants to contribute to the human character to the phenomenon and restore meat and the heart to children, and sometimes children, who leave, behind them there are emotions, love, feelings, pain, in addition to a lot of beauty.

Leave each other without saying “Goodbye”

The first of the three planned tasks “Mothers”In the end, there will be a documentary with the voices of mothers from three African countries, in Gambia last September. “I cried, I always cried, for a while I stopped eating,” says Maria, 51, who is a widow with eight children, and farms from Berkama, the city of South Bangul, the capital of Gambia. I did not say goodbye to my first child … and I maybe I was really dead. He did not even remember the last words that we told ourselves. In fact, Jeref, like many other children, left at night, without saying goodbye to his mother. “If I had told her in advance,“ I would not have allowed me to leave, and above all, if I saw her crying, I will not find the power to go. ”And his guest, with only 16 years, alone and in the hands of the travelers, he needed a lot of strength. Emilia, he regularly sends money to his big family and the building of a brick house is funded. “But I have never said anything to my mother, not even later. I am always afraid to suffer. ”

Gambia certificates, the first phase of the project

“I can no longer see my mother folded with tiredness, and work without stopping for us,” says Lamine, who has been working in Missina Square for years, from Varvini, north of Gambia. “So I started looking for ways to leave, collected some money and left.” He is also at night, without telling his mother anything. “I was associated with news,” says Amina, Lamine’s mother. “I remember terrorism when I see the pictures of the dead and the apostate ships. When I received the call, I couldn’t believe it was my son.”

In this amazing story of abandoned mothers of uncertainty, children who realize the suffering they cause and the danger of trips is about to do, but at the same time with children who want to do anything for the sake of love of their mothers, we understand a lot about the relationship between the mother and the child in Gambia and other areas of Africa. When listening to the voices of these women, on the one hand, we can better focus on immigrant immigration policies that are unforgiving, on the other hand, from different angles, we can imagine feelings similar to our cars.