The letter of a worker from the organisation Terre des Hommes who welcomed the 27 minors who disembarked from the ship Diciotti. They were 27 little skeletons, but also 27 resilient children who can still find it in themselves to trust others.
Among those welcoming the minors who disembarked from the coastguard ship Diciotti on 22 August was a worker from Terre des Hommes, an organisation that works every day to protect children around the world fleeing wars, poverty and violence, and which from this year has been providing psychological and psychosocial support to migrant children arriving in Italy. This is the letter she wrote after assisting them.
"I have spent just under a thousand days of my life in reception centres for unaccompanied foreign minors over the past four years. I love my work and I am happy because it allows me to open an exchange, to connect with people, to create a space of care, to discover things about oneself and about others.
Yesterday, however, I was not so happy to attend this disembarkation, authorised on Facebook at around 6 pm. When I saw that video I alerted my colleagues and put on the regulation white T-shirt — the Terre des Hommes one — even before I was officially notified.
We welcomed 27 little skeletons. The thinnest one was slightly shorter than me and must have weighed around thirty kilos, his legs the same width as my wrist. We welcomed 27 little skeletons, one of whom was nothing but ears. We welcomed 27 little skeletons, one of whom could not walk because he was racked with pain. We welcomed 27 little skeletons, three of whom had filthy bandages on a wrist, a foot and a shattered arm. We welcomed 27 little skeletons, including two beautiful young girls.
As I watched them, sitting on the ground enclosed by barriers, I felt like the rich white European lady who goes to the human zoo on a Sunday afternoon, just to see what it feels like.
My work is made of words, as human beings are. Yesterday evening we were in serious difficulty with language — the children were all Eritrean, except for one Somali girl. The interpreter had been unable to be there. Sometimes all we could do was look at each other, asking with our eyes, "So how is it going, how are you feeling?" "And who are you? Why are you looking at me? What is it you want to say to me?"
And as we exchanged those glances, I thought — in spite of the incredible thinness, the scabies, the protruding ears, the hair matted with salt, the filthy bandages, the shattered arm — I thought that they were truly beautiful. I kept telling myself this: "How beautiful you are," and I can only imagine the dazed look on my face in the presence of so much resilience and, above all, of the enduring capacity to trust others. And in those moments I asked myself why so many people are angry and what they are afraid of. Of two eyes smiling at you? Of two enormous protruding ears? Of a few tousled curls? Perhaps of the fact that they themselves have lost the ability to trust others — perhaps because they never had it?
They were all transferred during the night, and as I was out in the street making my way home, big-ears spotted me from the minibus he was on and waved. I waved back.
I think that smiling eyes, greetings, the recognition of one another, are worth another beautiful story. As is not being afraid. That is the most beautiful story of all — it is the story of possibilities. Of moments when what will be does not yet exist, except in your mind, and you are ready to let yourself be moved. Of a time when everything can still happen if you give it the right space. Of days when you do not let fear take hold of you and you remain open to what arrives. Of small moments of happiness."