My Mother Says the Syrian Refugees Look Like Tourists

because she has just finished telling the story of our escapeand needs to draw a comparison, return us safely to the present,

December 2015, we're back at my sister's childproofed house,keeping warm by winter sun, central heating, and our sweatpants;

because some do: "Ghaith joyfully snapped selfies, the Aegeanglimmering in the background. He looked much like a tourist,"

suggests the reporter at large in the New Yorker article I readabout one refugee's epic escape from Syria, and think of again

when my mother can't make room in our story for more people;because my mother never quite has the right words in English,

though to be fair, she said "travelers," and seemed anxious after;because she's not callous, you must understand, just protective…

In the blue porcelain bowl on the granite top kitchen islandwhere we gather faithfully around my mother and the story,

there are three balls of white rice shaped like warm eggs,and a fourth, forming in her hands, being pressed into service

as she recounts making them before, wrapped in banana leavesand secreted inside pockets. These are for my nephew, Aidan,

who loves rice like he loves Cheerios, who will be hungryonce his toy train runs off too many tracks, and who just turned

two, around the age I was when we left, a coincidence my motherpoints to like a storybook illustration… It's December 1981.

We're dressed in nice clothes because Christmas Eve is our cover.The cathedral in Bà Rịa is packed. If anyone asks why we're out,

we can say we were at Mass. Anyone being the police. The localsof course recognize us. We stop at one of the popular stalls

for fresh sugarcane juice, trying to act normal. The nước míatastes unbelievably good. The young woman operating the noisy,

shiny contraption calms us, and when she spots the Công anpatrolling out front, insists we sit down and just relax in the back.

Our boat is parked at the riverbank behind the road that runspast the market, hidden by the lush green flags growing there.

Our third attempt. The last time we waited and waitedat the designated safe house, but no boat ever showed up.

This time we are wiser. My father, thanks to his credentialsas a former Navy officer and ex re-education camp prisoner,

negotiated to be boat captain, which means we travel for free—my mother, my uncle, my cousin, and me—but also means

he can't stay with us because he must collect more passengersat the bus stop. Say you are devising plans to flee. There's a group,

on Facebook, Asylum and Immigration Without Smugglers,you can trust and rely on. Because to be a refugee, you must know

where to go, what routes save time and money, if the sea todayor tomorrow is fatally dangerous, if the storm is practically over,

what island is best to leave for, what to do if you are stuckin the middle of the forest, where to cross the border at night…

We have to wait until nightfall. The moon is our lighthouse.When the time comes, we start walking towards the river

that will lead us to the sea—at this point in my mother's accounta new detail emerges, something small, but not there before:

she loses her sandal like in a fairytale by mistake in the street.Because she thinks she sees police lights up ahead, she panics,

hurries in the dark, heart racing, bare foot sparking the pathto the boat motionless and obscure on the river's black mirror…

In 1981, the rest of the passengers had to pay two to threecây vàng, about two to three thousand US dollars then.

I learned that traffickers, in 2014, raised their prices again,charging at least four thousand dollars to smuggle a Syrian

into Italy. I saw the picture of three-year-old Alan Kurdîand read one...