Updated February 13, 2015 12:58:02
An exhibition of 15 portraits of South Australian former refugees provides a sometimes unnerving look into the experiences of those who now call Australia home.
When 18-year-old Rachel Nyiramugisha is asked to recount her earliest childhood memory, the smiling African-Australian pauses and recounts a story that surpasses her youth.
Hers is not a story of happily playing in a sand pit, receiving toys at Christmas, or squabbling with one of her five siblings.
It is a chilling recount of the night, when she was just 3-years-old, that armed rebels kicked down the door of their home in a refugee camp and tried to kidnap her older sister.
They had planned to take her away to rebel camps and use her as a sex-slave or wife for the soldiers.
"That's the most horrific thing a young girl, at the age of 15, could ever experience in her life," Ms Nyiramugisha said.
Ms Nyiramugisha's father put himself in the way and was in turn taken from the house and beaten.
It is a choice he still pays for dearly today, with the beating resulting in several cracked vertebrae.
"To this day he still battles with back pain," Ms Nyiramugisha said.
Adversity in refugee camps
Ms Nyiramugisha was just 16 months old when her parents fled the Democratic Republic of Congo after Rwandan soldiers invaded their village.
"We had to escape very quickly as the violence accelerated," she said.
Their family walked to the nearest refugee village in Uganda.
The family was first placed by in the Nakivale Camp on the Ugandan border by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR).
As overcrowding and disease spread, they were soon moved to Mbarara and Kyangwali camps in south-western Uganda.
Even now, when I look back at my [Australia citizenship] certificate, it reminds me that I am home, that I don't have to run again.
Rachel Nyiramugisha, former refugee.
Ms Nyiramugisha said diseases such as malaria were as widespread in the camps as common colds are in Western societies.
Most families were unable to afford enclosed accommodation or mosquito nets, leaving themselves exposed to mosquito-borne disease.
In their third camp the family was given a small plot of land to grow crops on and build a home.
It was there that their home was invaded and Ms Nyiramugisha's father injured.
"I don't remember much of the previous camps or the Congo, but this one [memory] has stuck with me through the years," she said.
"It still feels like yesterday that it happened."
Ms Nyiramugisha said she is still amazed by the resilience her parents showed after the event, refusing to succumb to the harsh conditions of the refugee camps or the injuries and illnesses sustained over the eight years they lived "in survival mode".
Learning about their new home through TV
After years on a refugee waiting list, Ms Nyiramugisha and her family arrived in Australia in May 2007, when she was 10-years-old.
She laughed as she recalled their experience leaving the camps and travelling to their new home.
It was the first time in almost a decade the family was exposed to unlimited supplies of readily available food.
Unable to understand English, the family had to play pot-luck with what new foods they were given.
"On one of the flights they fed us something. I don't know if it was fish, but whatever it was it tasted good and was very slippery in my mouth," Ms Nyiramugisha said.
Her father was amazed at the variety of food and was keen to try anything.
"Dad ate and ate on the flight; he was like 'give me this one now'," she said.
Once in Adelaide, the family began to feel isolated by their language and appearance.
Coming from a country where kidnapping and murders were common, the uncertainty of their new home made them so cautious they dared not set foot outside their house for the first few months.
With everything appearing new and foreign, the family found they could learn about their new home by watching television.
The only problem was they had never had a television before and no one knew how to work the remote control.
"We literally watched one channel for half a year," Ms Nyiramugisha said.
Their confidence grew as they began to explore more and more devices.
"We almost burnt the house down using the microwave," she said with a laugh.
It was not long before the nervousness of their move dissolved and the family quickly adjusted.
Becoming an Australian citizen
Ms Nyiramugisha and her family had to wait the compulsory four years before they could apply for citizenship.
It was a moment that redefined her entire life.
I know that someone helped me once, to get me from Africa to here where I am now in university, so [I have] an overwhelming sense or need to help someone else.
Rachel Nyiramugisha
"We always knew we were going to become Australians," she said.
"Even now, when I look back at my certificate, it reminds me that I am home, that I don't have to run again.
"It reminds all of us in our family that we are safe."
Ms Nyiramugisha glowed as she talked about "becoming an Aussie".
The family celebrated at home to the sounds of Peter Allen's I Still Call Australia Home and Waltzing Matilda blaring from the stereo.
"That little symbol of citizenship, or the certificate, means the world to us," she said.
"That was as Australian as we could get."
In the years since arriving, Ms Nyiramugisha has completed her schooling and volunteers as a youth ambassador for the Australian Refugee Association.
She was named winner of the Minister for Education's Award for Excellence in Languages and Culture in the 2015 Australia Day awards.
Ms Nyiramugisha is currently studying for a double-degree in International Studies and Arts at the University of Adelaide.
"Right now I am in a very good place," Ms Nyiramugisha said.
She hopes to be able to use her studies to help vulnerable women and children in war-torn countries.
"I know that someone helped me once, to get me from Africa to here where I am now in university, so [I have] an overwhelming sense or need to help someone else," she said.
Drawing the face behind the story
The opportunity to be drawn in the Faces of the Refugee exhibition by artists Kirsten Treloar, Sue Thompson and Murtaza Hussaini was a chance for Ms Nyiramugisha to share her story with others.
It was also a chance to remind people there are other children in the world right now in the same situation she was once in.
The collection of 15 pencil and charcoal portraits and stories of South Australian former refugees will be on display at the Pilgrim Uniting Church in Flinders Street Adelaide from Monday, February 16 to Friday, March 13.
The display is a collaboration between the Australian Refugee Association and the Pilgrim Circle of Friends, with the ARA planning to launch a second stage of the exhibition during Refugee Week 2015.
Topics: refugees, visual-art, human-interest, adelaide-5000, uganda, congo-the-democratic-republic-of-the
First posted February 13, 2015 12:22:37