ADRIFT AT SEA: A PLEA FOR THE REFUGEE TERESA H . JANSSEN

hen I was a little girl, my mother took us to the beaches of Puget Sound. We went to the sea because it was free, and Wamong the few places a mother of five could afford to bring her brood. My father was never with us, but that seemed natural to me. Each beach was different, depending on the work of current, wind, and tide. On some, we found sand dollars, others were littered with clam shells and flat gray rocks that ground against one another as we walked upon them, and most featured weathered logs of Douglas fir and cedar, clumps of stinky seaweed, and long, skinny kelp we swung above our heads like lassoes. Human debris washed onto certain parts of the beach. Usually we stepped over it or passed it by. I was a child and felt no responsibility for what was lost or discarded. Now, I walk beaches searching for what has been left behind. If I am lucky, I find little wedges of polished glass or a milky agate. In the years since the 2011 Japanese tsunami, caused by a massive earthquake that killed nearly 19,000, I have found increasing amounts of debris on my walks. Pacific beaches from northern California to Alaska have been littered with fragments of plastic, Styrofoam fishing floats, bags, and broken bottles. In Washington State alone on one day in April 2016, Teresa H . Janssen

1,400 volunteers removed more than twenty tons of trash—enough to 183 fill a dozen dumpsters.

I am a high school French and English teacher. When I teach the French –er conjugations, I include the verbs jeter and flotterto help my students remember the verb endings, and because I believe it is important for them to know the difference. It can affect how we act. Jeter means to throw away. Jettaison or jetsam, are objects that have been deliberately discarded into the sea, or perhaps tossed overboard by the crew of a ship to lighten its load. Jetsam becomes the property of whoever finds it. Flotter in French means “to float.” Flotsam, derived from the French noun flottaison, is marine debris that has been unintentionally lost— the result of a shipwreck, accident, catastrophic human event or act of nature. Flotsam, by maritime law, still belongs to its owner. Intact flotsam should be cared for and returned. If it cannot be restored to its place of origin, it merits refuge. Some Pacific beachcombers have gone to great lengths to reunite tsunami debris with its owners. A soccer ball, found on an Alaskan beach, was returned to 16-year-old Misaki Murakami, who had lost everything in the tsunami. A volleyball covered with barnacles but bearing dozens of faded signatures, indicating a farewell gift, was returned to a surprised nineteen-year-old woman, Shiori Sato, whose home had been washed away. A yellow buoy marked with the Japanese character Kei was traced to Sakiki Miura. She is a widow who had used it as a sign for her restaurant, also destroyed. Elated to have her treasured buoy returned, she decided to reopen the restaurant and begin again. I have come to believe that whatever or whoever has been lost or survived a journey at sea is our responsibility. I am drawn to the stories of people dispossessed. I browse thrift shops, picking up photographs of children, young couples and families, arranged like still lifes in long-

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee 184 shut studios. I search the backs of the pictures for names and dates, but usually find none. I study the frozen faces, pondering whether they were inadvertently given away with a box of knickknacks or tossed out when they were no longer recognized. I stare at posters of missing persons and try to memorize their features, in the possibility that I will recognize them in a chance encounter at a gas station or in a grocery line. I wonder whether the adults and teenagers chose to leave home, or whether they were taken by force, now living a nightmare I cannot imagine. I look into the eyes of the littlest children, some in the company of noncustodial parents, others simply disappeared. Do they know they are lost? I cringe at the thought that they may never be found, and I turn away. I remember how it is to feel adrift. I was a year old when my father left. I didn’t miss him at first, because I didn’t know what a father was. But as I watched my childhood friends with their dads, I felt an emptiness grow inside me. Sometimes, when I watched my best friend, Kathy, glide by on her father’s shoulders, a hollow place in my chest began to ache. As my mother struggled to pay for rent and food amid the turbulence of the 1960s, I felt forlorn, even in my crowded home. I longed for a strong, sure anchor—a father to take care of me. As I got older, I began to wonder whether I had been unintentionally lost, the accidental victim of a failed relationship, or whether I had been discarded. I was the fifth child, most likely unplanned, and perhaps one too many for a stressed father on the edge. Perhaps my father had wanted a son, instead of another daughter (his fourth). I feared that if I had been deliberately tossed away, there was little hope of reunification. Jetsam, I seemed to know instinctively, rarely finds its way home. But if I were flotsam, an unintended loss, there was a chance I might be reclaimed by my father, if circumstances changed.

Lately, as I walk the beach, I cannot stop thinking about those lost

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee Teresa H . Janssen

across the sea—the world’s refugees. I agonize over the lack of justice 185 and dignity. Since the advent of the Syrian civil war, eleven million people—over half the country’s prewar population—have been forced to leave their homes. Thousands have braved treacherous journeys across the Mediterranean and Aegean. How do we classify refugees at sea? Are they the world’s debris? What is our responsibility?

In my twenties, I became captivated by the plights of people adrift in the world. My first teaching job in the early ’80s was as an English tutor to Vietnamese refugees in Seattle. After the U.S. withdrawal in 1975, the people of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos suffered continued violence and political persecution. Through the ensuing decade and a half, nearly 850,000 Vietnamese escaped across the South China Sea in overcrowded makeshift boats. A third to a half of the “boat people” perished. Survivors washed up on the shores of Hong Kong, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines, where some were turned away. But most were housed in squalid camps, until their hosts became overwhelmed and refused to accept more. During the Southeast Asian refugee crisis, the United Nations, in a 1979 international conference, recognized that the boat people, displaced as a result of catastrophic human events, could not be safely returned home. In an effort to stem the flood of refugees and deaths at sea, the U.N., including the U.S and France, acknowledged responsibility for decades of destabilizing and destructive interventions in the region. Member nations agreed to fund an orderly system of departure and committed to accept more than a million refugees for resettlement. The UNHCR built the Philippine Refugee Processing Center in Bataan, a safe location to house those cleared for resettlement. In the basement of the Seattle church where I taught, my students told stories in broken English of loss and separation, and drifting at sea. I empathized with their struggle against the overwhelming cultural and

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee 186 language barriers they encountered in the U.S. and realized the need for better preparation before arrival. In 1985, I went to the Philippines to work at the center for refugees.

Perhaps I had a yearning for happy endings. I certainly believed in reunification. When I was ten, my father came back to me. It must have come about gradually, preceded by talks, reconciliation, resolutions, and commitments, but I remember it another way. Suddenly, my dad, nearly a stranger, was living in my home. He went to work in the morning, took showers at night, ate crackers and cheese as he watched TV, and slowly got to know me. It was an awkward, disorienting transition to a new stage of my childhood. He was not the perfect father I had imagined. No piggyback rides, camping trips, or days at the ballpark. He was grumpy in the morning, tired after work, and during my teen years, much too strict. Disappointment aside, as I watched football next to him on the natty brown couch he’d brought from that mysterious place where he’d once lived, and cheered with him when his NFL team scored. I was glad he was there. I would never feel as self-assured as the kids I’d envied, but I had begun to believe that lost people could be found. And if they could not be returned to where they once belonged, they could, at least, begin again. Everyone deserved a second chance.

In the Philippines, I supervised Filipino teachers who taught English to refugees bound for North America and Australia. Many were Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Laotians who, having escaped violence or persecution, had languished in refugee camps since before the end of the war. The processing center operated as a small city with schools, a hospital, a market, power and sewage facilities, a prison, places of worship for four different religions, and housing for up to 18,000. Approved for resettlement before arrival, the refugees were screened for

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee Teresa H . Janssen

illness, treated, if necessary, and after three or more months of language, 187 vocational, and cultural orientation classes, flown to their new homes. I heard stories of pain and loss. I met two teenage brothers who had suffered retaliation in Vietnam due to their family’s former political affiliations. They had been jailed several times for trying to escape, but finally managed to pay passage on a small, open boat packed with more than a dozen people. After its engine broke down, they drifted for days. Several ships passed, but none stopped. After running out of food and nearly capsizing in a storm, they neared an island called Palawan in the western Philippines where they were rescued, eventually assigned refugee status, and relocated to the Bataan camp. They knew they were lucky. During the refugee crisis, more than 50 percent of the Vietnamese boats that made landfall after journeys across the South China Sea had been attacked by Thai and Malay pirates, who robbed, raped, kidnapped, and murdered tens of thousands. The brothers were nervous but excited to be heading to California. I met Noi, a woman from Laos, where 2.5 million tons of U.S. bombs had been dropped in an area the size of Utah, making it the most heavily bombed country in history. She had worked for the Americans during the war in which her husband, a Lao army officer, had been killed. She had escaped with her three children—her youngest, the son of an American officer. They had managed to make it across the Mekong to a refugee camp in Thailand, where they had lived for many years. Noi explained that they couldn’t go back to Laos because she would be persecuted for her ties with the enemy and for her Amerasian child. Her only hope was to begin again. Noi and her children were offered a new start in New York state. Hanh was the woman I got to know best. She told me she had been married to an American G.I. for five years. They had three children together. When the Americans pulled out in 1975, she and the children

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee 188 were left behind. Their lives in Vietnam were misery. Her daughter and two sons were labeled “children of the dust”—nothings, to be swept aside. She had evidence of her children’s paternity from photos and letters, and as part of the Orderly Departure program they were given refugee status. Hanh managed to locate her husband who was unmarried and eager to meet his family. I was happy for her children, soon to be united with a father they had only heard about, though I knew he might not match the dad of their dreams. On the day of their departure from the refugee center, I watched them board the airport bus, equipped with little more than a hodgepodge of belongings in plastic bags and hope for their destiny—a reunion in Florida.

What I learned from talking to refugees in the camp is that none of them wanted to leave home. They were forced to leave because it was no longer safe to stay. Most persevered as long as they could, until the threat from war, human rights abuses, or persecution became intolerable. They held on until friends and family began to disappear or die. Many relocated a short distance from their homes where they were out of harm’s way, but when that refuge became too perilous, they escaped to a neighboring country. Those forced to leave at a moment’s notice left their documents and possessions behind. They became dependent on the mercy of strangers for everything, with few rights, and the understanding that further dangers and uncertainties lay ahead.

That spring in the Philippines, I took a break from the refugee center and flew to Palawan. I walked white sand beaches looking for empty conch shells and bits of dead coral. Near the Palawan asylum center, I came upon a wooden boat, stranded on dry land at an awkward angle, its timbers warped and sun-bleached. I imagined it crowded with refugees. I knelt on the sand, overcome with gratefulness for the

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee Teresa H . Janssen

generosity of nations, international organizations, and individuals 189 that had worked together to alleviate the suffering of the victims of a devastating war across the sea.

In July 2015, on vacation on the west coast of Turkey, I walked the beach near Izmir. Eyes to the sand, I hunted for spiny oyster or pearly snail shells to make into jewelry. I had been following the news of the war in Syria. I had read reports of attacks on neighborhoods, schools, and hospitals. I had heard about refugees setting out in boats for Turkey and the islands of Greece. I looked up, squinted into the sun, and peered across the Aegean toward the Greek islands. The waters were calm and empty that day. Less than three months later, a little boy’s body washed up on a Turkish beach across from the island of Kos. He was a three-year-old who had drowned with his mother, five-year-old brother, and nine others when their small boat, overcrowded with refugees escaping Syria, capsized in the Aegean Sea. By 2016, of the million refugees and migrants that reached Europe by sea, nearly four thousand are believed to have drowned.

The Battle of Aleppo that raged from 2012 to 2016 was one of the longest sieges of modern warfare. Twenty-three thousand civilians were killed—nearly 76 percent of total battle casualties. Nearly five thousand of the dead were children. Almost five million Syrians have fled for safety in neighboring Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey, Iraq, and Egypt, where some are sheltered in refugee camps, while most are living in urban areas, trying to work or get by however they can. Among the Syrian refugees are middle-class teachers, nurses, musicians, janitors, seamstresses, business leaders, farmers, technical workers, poets, and accountants who simply want to live in peace. Sixty-

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee 190 seven percent are women and children under twelve. Solaf is a nine-year-old girl who has been living in a refugee camp in Jordan with her parents and brother for the past three years. She likes playing with friends, doing jigsaw puzzles, and cooking with her mom. Her family fled Syria when a missile destroyed part of their house. Samir was taking finals his freshman year of college when a bomb dropped onto the university and killed more than sixty of his fellow students. He knew that by simply going to classes to learn to be an engineer, he was risking his life. Shortly after, he narrowly avoided being shot by a sniper. He managed to escape to Jordan, but he had no money, no chance to return to school, and was not allowed to work. He is among a small percentage that have been granted asylum in Canada. Nour and Yousef met in college, married shortly after, and are now living in a refugee camp in Greece. They escaped Syria when ISIS soldiers began beheading dissenters in the town where they had taken refuge. Nour gave birth in a Greek hospital, but when her baby was three days old, they returned to their army tent in a warehouse, with no heat or indoor toilets. Her parents are still living in an ISIS- controlled area of Syria, and she worries about them every day. Like every mother, she hopes her baby will be healthy, safe, and can grow up in a peaceful world. Perhaps a million more innocent victims will be displaced from their homes in the continuing Syrian war.

Some countries have been generous—Germany, Sweden, Greece, and Italy, to name a few. The U.S. had originally agreed to resettle 10,000 Syrians in 2017, a small number compared with the late ’70s and early ’80s, when over 150,000 Southeast Asian refugees were accepted each year. Now, it is likely that no Syrian refugees will be welcomed. In the past two years, other countries have closed their doors, too. Hungary,

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee Teresa H . Janssen

Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Austria, and the Balkan nations have 191 shut and militarized their borders. Syrian, Russian, and ISIS indiscriminate bombings are to blame for much of the civilian bloodshed in Syria, and the U.S. is becoming increasingly involved. The U.S. and European countries have, for nearly a century, been partisans in and benefactors of Middle East politics and wars, setting the stage for today’s alliances and conflicts. When will we accept our responsibility?

I recall that some citizens of asylum countries argued in the 1970s that the Southeast Asian refugees should be kept in the camps in Asia, despite dangers and years of stagnation. “No Asylum Here for Saigon Crooks” and “Jobs for Britons, Not Boat people” stated protest signs. Some were hostile to newcomers with darker skin and a different religion. Some politicians asserted that refugees were being “dumped” on taxpayers. Despite these fears, from 1975 through 1997, the U.S. accepted 1,287,000 Southeast Asian refugees, Canada 202,000, Australia 185,000, France 119,000, Britain 25,000, and other nations, smaller numbers. In the 1990s, when persecutions waned and conditions improved in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, the tide of refugees ebbed, the program ended, and the camps and center closed.

The Syrian refugees, who have been bombed, gassed, starved, and targeted by sharpshooters, have been called monsters, criminals, and terrorists. (They are, actually, fleeing from terrorists.) Many assert the refugees will never assimilate and their children will be radicalized. Some are opposed to Muslims as a whole. Others contend that refugees should be kept in the Middle East, despite the perils. Most who are opposed to welcoming refugees are motivated by fear.

After the first difficult year following my father’s return home, I got accustomed to having this man, once a stranger, living with me.

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee 192 When I reached adolescence, my resentment bubbled up, especially when he made me eat my peas or tried to tell me what to do. But as I learned my dad’s story, my anger shifted to compassion. He, too, had been left by his father and grown up poor. He had enrolled in college, but had to work full-time to pay tuition. His second term, he got sick, failed his classes, and dropped out. The next year, at age twenty, he got married, and a year later, had his first child. “I never really got to grow up,” he explained. A year after he left us, he developed an infection of the heart, had surgery, became nearly bankrupt from medical expenses, and spent years recovering. “Even after everything fell apart, I wanted to try again. I was scared. It would have been easier to leave things be, but I wanted to make things right. I was lucky your mom gave me a second chance.”

After my dad came back, I tried to be good because, deep inside, I was afraid he might go away again. But he stuck around. When I was thirteen, he took me to the school basketball court and taught me how to make a layup. When I was fifteen, I took him to my high school father-daughter banquet. When I was seventeen, he took me to the ocean, where we walked for hours at low tide, searching for sea stars and anemones. He found a deer antler, polished smooth by the waves, and gave it to me. His heart finally gave out on him. He died when he was sixty-six, a year after retiring from the factory. He taught me that if you get to know a stranger, you would find something you can share. You might become friends. If you acknowledge your fears, you can be freed of what has held you back. You need to be willing to take a risk to become your best self.

These days, I walk the beach to cope with my despair over who we are. I ponder how the generosity and goodwill of our nation, so manifest

Adrift at Sea: A Plea for the Refugee Teresa H . Janssen forty years ago, could have run out; and how fear has distanced us from 193 our ideals. Have we given up on second chances?

Recently, I came upon a rough gray abalone shell. I flipped it to the other side, and was struck by its iridescence—aqua blue, sea green, and violet in a vessel of shimmering silver. It reminds me of possibility. The planet has shifted. The boat people have landed. Tsunami flotsam has all but ceased, and Syrian refugees plead for our humanity. Hope bobs in a turbulent sea. Ω

Teresa H. Janssen teaches high school in Chimacum, Washington. She was a finalist for the Bellingham Review’s Annie Dillard Award for Creative Nonfiction.