Meet A Refugee: Sudanese Civil War Survivor And Melbourne Singer/Songwriter Ajak Kwai
Refugees are very scary until you actually, y'know, talk to one.
With asylum seekers and refugees routinely portrayed as “illegals,” would-be terrorists or “undesirables” by leading politicians and media outlets, many people in the community are suspicious of people who come seeking asylum, especially by boat. One of the main factors preserving that suspicion is the fact that most people have never met a refugee — when most people do, it turns out refugees aren’t nearly as scary as the government makes them out to be, as the small Victorian town of Nhill has found out over the last few years as it steadily embraced its small but prominent population of Karen refugees from Myanmar/Burma.
In that spirit, meet Melbourne singer/songwriter Ajak Kwai, a refugee who came to Australia from Sudan in 1998, and whose music has seen her perform at festivals around Victoria and Australia. Funded by GetUp’s Shipping News project, filmmaker Chris Grose at production company The Story Collective are producing a series of videos about refugees like Ajak to tell the stories the media all too often ignores.
Junkee is hosting an event with GetUp to unpick the media’s portrayal of asylum seekers and refugees, and how reporting on immigration issues might change the national conversation — check it out here. To find out more about Ajak’s story, head to her website.