As a child, I fled Afghanistan with my family. When we arrived in Britain after a harrowing journey, we thought we could start our new life in safety. But the reality was very different
During the summer I turned 15, I fell into a prolonged depression that lasted well into my 20s. My mother, my two brothers and I had just arrived in London, and because we were seeking asylum as refugees, we were moved into a hostel for vulnerable families on Fitzjohn’s Avenue in the affluent north-west of the city. The journey to London had been so difficult that we had separated from my father, one of my brothers and my sister a few months earlier. The hostel was situated on a tree-lined avenue that connects Swiss Cottage to Hampstead village. A pleasant walk north takes you to Hampstead Heath and Keats House, to the south is Regent’s Park, where my family would walk around the park’s ornate rose garden and sit by the fountain, our favourite spot.
Four years earlier, in autumn 1992, my family had left our home in Kabul when the sudden withdrawal of US interests from Afghanistan left militias fighting for power, making ordinary life impossible. Once-frequent family gatherings had been reduced to funerals attended by a few. Food and water were scarce. We rarely left our home – the adults only went out on the most essential errands. My uncle sometimes cycled across the city to bring us drinking water as rockets fell around him. We would be worried sick until his return.
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