World Refugee Day

I guess everyone saw the Angelina Jolie CNN interview (I must admit, I'm a bit of a fan). I just saw the previews but I have been thinking a lot about refugees and their lives as I am supposed to on World Refugee Day.

I never thought about refugees as vulnerable people. Actually, I never thought about them at all until I moved to Denmark. There are so many refugees in Denmark that it's startling for me, an immigrant who had to learn the difference between an immigrant and a refugee.

I interviewed Afghan refugees for my upcoming book The Sound of Language and was stunned at how different their mindset is from regular immigrants. The Afghan I spoke with said to me, "But I want to go home. Everyone wants to go home. Don't you want to move back to India?"

I told him that I didn't. That the world was full of places that I wanted to live in and experience. I didn't ache for India the way he did for Kabul. I miss Indian food but I can just fly to California (or closer to London) and scratch that itch.

It's tough being a refugee even when you're offered asylum. There is a tug of war between wanting to go home, battling indifference and racism in the host country (especially in Europe) and trying to establish a life.

I heard this story about a Bosnian woman whose husband died in the war and she lost a leg. She was pregnant when she moved to Denmark with her daughter. She waited and waited for the war to end because she wanted to go back home. But by the time it was safe to go back home, her kids were Danish and they didn't want to go Bosnia. She had settled in and she didn't want to go home, not really, not after the horrors she'd been through there. And then she realized that she had wasted so many years with one foot in Bosnia and the other, half-heartedly in Denmark. If only she had been wiser, she could have done a better job of establishing herself in Denmark.

But it isn't easy to get established in countries like Denmark. First, refugees sit in asylum centers around the country for years. Their children don't go to school, get no stimulation, they all just sit there waiting for the immigration services to put them out of their misery. I read a news article last year that some asylum-seeking women and their children were moved out of the prison rooms they were staying in and shoved into a big hall in a gym where they had no privacy and were basically living in tents. They had been moved to make room for criminals.

Isn't it bad enough that these refugees had to survive terrible horrors in their country, refugee camps where there is no water, no food, no medicine that we treat them with such lack of dignity when they come to our countries? I was appalled to read that news article.

But just a week ago, a county in Jylland in Denmark announced that all children in the nearby asylum centre must go to school with their Danish peers. The mayor of the town, where the asylum centre is, declared that it was not right to deprive children of education. I commend that mayor and his courage to step out of the system and say, we will help you.

Maybe we can't fly down to Darfur and convince our governments to make changes, maybe we can’t do a quarter of the things Angelina Jolie is able to do because of her position and financial status; but we can help those who are living with us. We can help refugees build their lives so that the hole in their heart that is as big as the home they left behind, closes up just a little bit.

New book by Kavita Daswani!

My friend Kavita Daswani’s book Salaam, Paris is about to come out on 27 June 2006 and I am very excited! I love Kavita’s books. They are fun, they are enjoyable and they are smart and they are so entertaining.

If you haven’t read a book by Kavita, here is a golden opportunity to pick up one. Salaam, Paris is the story of the first Muslim super model. It is Tanaya’s story and how she takes over the catwalks of Paris. I can’t wait to read it.

Here is a short conversation between Kavita and I to whet your appetite.

Amulya: Salaam, Paris is about one of the first Muslim models in Paris. What has your experience with Muslim models been?
Kavita: Actually, none. I'm assuming they exist, of course, but I've certainly never met one. A friend tells me there are some gorgeous Muslim models working in Lahore, although I know little more than that. I guess I was just imagining what her life would be like, living in Paris, in this racy world.

Amulya: You are an industry insider. How much of Salaam, Paris is real?
Kavita: I attended the catwalk shows in Europe as a fashion editor for a few years, and that experience has never left me. I had many opportunities to be backstage before and after the shows, to chat with models, and also to talk to scouts and agents and publicists and all the people that power that world. It wasn't too difficult, as a result, to create Tanaya's world.

Amulya: How is Salaam, Paris different from your other books? And how is it similar?
Kavita: The main difference is the protagonist is Muslim and not Hindu, as the characters in the first two books are. I felt like I needed a little variety. I had originally started out setting much of the book in Karachi and not Mumbai. But I was in Karachi only once, for a few days, many years ago, and really didn't have enough of a connection with the place to create a believable environment. And I suppose it's similar in that it deals with many of the same themes: family, cultural dissonance, emotional conflicts. Also, it's set in a 'glamorous' field like the other two, but the character remains pretty traditional throughout.

Amulya: Why do you recommend Salaam, Paris?
Kavita: I'd like to think that it's a fun summer read that still has a little depth to it.

Amulya: You just sold a YA book to Little Brown. Tell me about it?
Kavita: It's about a teenage girl in Los Angeles named Indira - and who calls herself Indie - who is desperate to one day become a fashion writer. She decides to ask the editor of the most successful fashion/celebrity magazine around to hire her as an intern. Instead, she gets hired as the babysitter. But she's close enough to the editor to learn about the business - and ultimately helps restore the magazine when it falls on hard times. I'm in the middle of revisions now; it comes out in the fall of 2007.

Now that I’m sure you can’t wait to read Salaam, Paris feel free to go to Amazon.com and buy the book! It’s time to get that summer reading started.