Gately - Footprints in the Dust

FOOTPRINTS IN THE DUST

Nursing, Survival, Compassion, and Hope with Refugees Around the World

ROBERTA GATELY

To Sue, Marianne and Jim with love...

R efugeethe latest buzzword, a word guaranteed to spark conversation and fuel emotion. There are more than twenty-two million refugees worldwide, and another sixty-five million who have been forcibly displaced from their homes, their villages, from everything they know. But who are these people, these refugees that seem to slip into our conversations, our country, and even our lives with nary a chance for us to understand what theyre all about? The scant news we have of them filters into our homes via dramatic satellite shots of distant, barely pronounceable villages in countries as foreign to us as any images of Mars might be. We barely have time to focus on the often gut-wrenching photos before the anchor is on to the next story, leaving us less enlightened and perhaps even a little more puzzled by what weve seen. It is in the seeingthe firsthand, close-enough-to-touch encountersthat the real truth can be found. It is my hope that by sharing their stories, their realities, I can provide a little of that truth here.

I am a nurse, a humanitarian aid worker, and a writer, and Ive traveled to some of the most desolate lands on earth to deliver health care to persecuted, desperate people. But lest you think that this is some soul-searching, self-aggrandizing tome, let me assure you that the refugees with whom Ive worked have done far more for me than I ever did for them. It is in this spirit that I share their stories as well as my own.

As a young (at least from my perspective some thirty years on) ER nurse in Boston, Id been acutely aware of the intermittent refugee crises that gripped our world. These international disasters, appearing for brief moments in the media spotlight, invariably featured stark glimpses of big-bellied babies with empty, haunting stares, who invariably caught my eye and stopped me cold. And then, as if Id only imagined them, they simply disappeared from the spotlight and I found myself wondering how this baby or that little girl had fared. Each new story sparked my interest a little more, and finally, in 1986, after a particularly gripping news story about Afghan refugees fleeing to Pakistan, I decided it was time to do something. I called the aid organization featured in the news story, and within two months, I was on my way.

I am by nature neither courageous nor adventurous, and though drama would weave itself throughout my days and nights delivering aid, it was neither a search for adventure nor a dramatic incident that served as the catalyst that finally drew me to aid work. For me it had been the right time and the right set of circumstances, and as an inner-city ER nurse well versed in the treatment of trauma and sad-eyed patients, I was sure I could help.

What happened, Id always wondered, to people already living the hardest of hardscrabble lives when war and misery claim their land? For starters, they dont give up. They manage to go on and sometimes even to smile no matter their own suffering, much like Fatima, a young woman I met in Iraq not long after the US invasion. Wed gone to her small village to test the drinking water, and as expected, it was filled with bacteria and would require boiling before consuming. But Fatima saw possibility in that dirty water. Tucking a stray hair under her hijab, she smiled coyly and spoke to me in perfect English so that the watchful crowd of locals wouldnt understand her words. My husband, she whispered, is an old man and I am his second wife. My life is miserable, filled with sorrow. Her chocolate brown eyes scanned the horizon as if searching for something that was just out of sight. I want to escape this place, and God willing, the dirty water will be the end of him.

And that brings me back to the beginningwho are these people, these refugees? Are they the desperate, doe-eyed children with hungry stares, or are they more like Fatimasearching for opportunity wherever it appears? The answer, I believe, lies somewhere in the middle. They are neither all saints nor all sinners, but perhaps a little bit of each. But without their names or their stories, all we can see of them are footprints in the dust, and even those will fade in time.

It is my hope that once youve read these pages, those footprints will linger in your thoughts and remain theretiny, precious pearls that help to remind us that we are all more alike than we know, that whatever separates us, we are ultimately joined by the common thread of humanity.

A s I opened the door to step into the hallway, I heard a quick hush of voices and rustle of movement, and I hesitated.

Step away from the door, a harsh, unseen voice commanded me. My heart flapped furiously in my chest. This was not what Id expected, not at all. Can I come into the hallway? I asked timidly.

Several rifles appeared, all trained on me. Other than the rifles, which seemed to glisten in the moonlight streaming in, the hallway was black, the men holding the rifles invisible. Bathed in deep shadow, their identities remained obscured, which made the moment all the more sinister. I hesitated, my breath catching in my throat, my lungs seizing up.

Show your hands! a voice demanded, and I put my now trembling hands into the air.

Motioning with their rifles, they directed me into the hallway...

Damn it, I thought. What the hell am I doing here, anyway?

T he loudspeaker crackled to life. The government of Pakistan has just announced that all foreigners must have an official entry visa for Pakistan. The stewardess cleared her throat. I felt my own throat tighten as her voice droned on. Those without visas... Id stopped listening. When Id left Boston, just twenty hours ago, a visa was not required for entry to Pakistan. I glanced through the smudged little window as the plane glided to a stop, the heat from the tarmac rising in spindly waves, almost obscuring the antiaircraft artillery that ringed the airports periphery and the gun-toting soldiers who lined the narrow runway. As my eyes focused on the scene below, the warnings of well-meaning friends and family rang in my ears. Are you crazy? Youll be killed. Youll never make it out of the airport.

My intentions had been pure when Id signed up to help the Afghan refugees fleeing the Soviet invasion for the relative safety of Pakistan. It had seemed a romantic notionthe perfect struggle of good against evil, and Id wanted to be a part of it. Like most Americans, I knew little about Afghanistan or the Soviet invasion there in 1979, but the scenes of stick-thin refugees clad in rags fleeing their homes and their country had moved me to action. Id always wanted to be involved, but until then it hadnt been the right time, but there it wasthe perfect spot for me. Id had no doubt that I could do what was needed, and, with the images of starving children still flickering on my television screen, Id picked up the phone and volunteered.