SITA

The phone call

“What is your greatest wish Sita?”
“To go back and talk to Mum.”

He is not thinking about work. Sita, a tall, young, friendly but melancholy-looking man, was born in Mali 22 years ago. Nor is he thinking about preparing for a peaceful, prosperous future, he who has had to flee the conflict that jihadists have been waging in his country for more than a decade now.

His dream is to talk to his mother.

“Since I left, I haven’t heard from her. I heard from my grandmother that she lives with another man (Sita’s dad died when he was 4 years old) and that she has moved out, but every time I call, she doesn’t answer and they tell me that ‘she’s not there now’ or ‘she’s out, I’ll have her call you.’ But Mum never calls.”

This is the harshest reflection of a migrant’s story: losing contact with one’s family members. It is atrocious when it comes to Mum.

Before this absence, there is the story of a young boy forced to start working at age four, who never went to school and remained totally illiterate into his early twenties. “I learned to hold a pen in my hand, to read and write for the first time in Pomezia.” He flees conflict, first Algeria, the desert, then Libya. “You have no idea how much violence, and they also stole all my money, shoes, T-shirts, they used to hurt me with a knife.”

“What are you aiming for now Sita?” “To find a new job, regain some stability,” he says this while pushing both hands to his temples, “and to hear from Mum.”