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Only God Must Know

Temporary place of worship built under a bridge on Sunday morning, outskirts of Paris

Tenzin 

I’m thirty-three. I was born in Leh, Ladakh.

My mother moved there. My father was a farmer, he died in India. He became too much sick. I was twenty-six at that time, or twenty-seven. He was forty-six. I have three brothers and one younger sister. I have two older brothers, one younger sister and one younger brother. Then me. We are five! The older and the younger brother are monks. They practice in Rumtek monastery.

I am married. We married in 2013. We had our first child in 2014. Now he is eight. We had our second child in 2018. My  younger child was one when I left. Now we call each other every time. When I was a migrant I didn’t take photos or videos. Everything had to be delated because police could check my phone.

Passang is my wife’s name. It is three years now I don’t see my wife. It was the sixth of June  2019. I remember my children. I remember my baby girl in her arms. My wife was trying to calm her. That day I took a flight and went to Delhi. My family got in contact with an agent. I stayed there two weeks. The agent gave me a new document with my photo and stamps on it. With that I went from Delhi to Dubai. From there my agent contracted a route for Iraq and I reached it. I don’t know why Iraq. I reached Arbil. My agent contacted a local person and two man took me to a guest house. My group stayed there one week. One day we took a taxi and arrived near the border. We stayed two weeks and waited for another contact to take a stamp to cross the border with Turkey.

At six in the morning we go in the office of immigration to check the passport and everything. There, at that time, they said I had a problem to my passport. They said -this is not original-. So I went to jail one night. After I went to another jail one week. After that I went to Arbil to the biggest Jail. Along this travel I had two friends. They were woman. We got out of jail at the same time. It was 2019. October fifteenth.

In jail I had too many problems. Only two people talked English. Everyone there talked Kurdish. People there were murderers, smugglers, drug dealers. This was jail. Inside there was too much fighting. There were hundreds of people in one space. Sometimes people were fighting each other or doing drugs. I was thinking at my family. I could call my family one time every three weeks. At that point of my travel my younger kid could walk. I was in jail for two months and fifteen days. In third of July I started the Jail, September fifteen I got out.

Now your punishment is finished, they said. Your problem is done with us, they said. I contacted the agent. We have never seen each other, only calls, via phone. The agent made us go around mountains. We reached Turkey after two nights of walking. We were taken to a room, it was full of people. The boss was pakistani. After the daylight we left to start again. It is night time. We are in a truck, one hundred twenty people. Very hot. Everyone is sweating. After three hours we are near the Greece border.

Ten days we were walking. We had no more food. No more clothes. It was September. At six in the evening we start walking till five in the morning. Every forest, in the center of the forest, we were silent. We could see the villages and dogs barking. We were silent and we were going in the other side, away from villages. Forests, mountains and some rivers. When we were in rivers we had all our clothes and everything in bags. We were walking in rivers with the bag on our head. We were so much afraid to be caught using normal streets that we walked through all this. Now I am shocked about how much I walked. After ten days the agent told us You are in Greece. Go now.

Farmers were looking at us and after three hours came police. We got temporary papers for one month. We did one night in jail. That was the time to make the paper. Then we took a bus to Thessaloniki. We arrived in the night. We took a train and reached Athens. We were staying there four days and police came with cameras and guns. -Hands up!, Hands up!- They were saying. So they checked every room. They looked for everything. We had no drugs or guns of course. Police thought we were smugglers. Again, we went to jail two months. After two months a person who could speak Chinese contacted a Chinese man so to have a room in Athens. We stayed there one year because of the pandemic. That was very difficult for everyone and in my life. We stayed home.

One year after my agent contacted a pakistani people in Athens so we can search a new agent. Two agents and my agent talked to each other So we started to walk from Greece to Macedonia. From there eight days walk we are in five in one room, a guest house. One night. After we went to Serbia. In Serbia we stayed one month. Police came, took our fingerprints. One night in jail and another one-month-paper. From there we went to Bosnia. Night time. In forest. Never village. After we stayed in Croatia three months. Then police came and took fingerprints.

This time we had no paper in exchange. Without paper and out. From there Slovenia. There was competition with the dogs of Slovenia. I was running.

The dog was running more than me. The dog caught me. They took me. Took my fingerprints. I had to return to Croatia. We stayed there fifteen days. We found a pakistani agent. He took us from Croatia to Italy by car. We were four people. We reached Milan. After we took a train and then a taxi to Nice. We finally arrived in France. I took a train to Paris.

I search for Tibetan people. My friends and other friends gave me one night of sleep. After, in the morning, we went to Conflans. I stayed in the forest. There were empty tents. We had no money. We cleaned the tent. Food and everything was in the bateau.

After we went in Creteil office. This paper is called Dublin. All people call it Dublin. -Oh, you are Dublin now!- they say. Like this.

My first case is failed. My second, I am waiting now.

I studied five years at art school, at TCV School in Dharmsala. Some people go to wood design. Some others go to painting or tailoring or cooking. We can take one course. Here I am. One year and six months I can learn French language. During this time I can make art and learn French. After this the office can say to you that you’ve stayed one year and six months and have done nothing wrong. Now you can take a new paper. Here there are a lot of formations on painting. After six months I can get one paper for work. Then I can get a job. I like to make fine arts. To mix modern art and my culture. I want to mix them and make paintings. With that paper I can search for work. I can show my six months certificate. At this point I can apply for my family to reach me. I’m better in Conflans. People in the city fight too much. Here I can paint.

Zin

I was born in Tibet, then I went to India when I was five years old. I was with my mom, my dad, my sister and my three brothers. I had no idea what was going on. My brothers are older than me. Since I was the youngest they wanted me to be safe. India is safe, there are many tibetans.

In Tibet you can’t do anything that has to do with politics. My family was not safe there. My dad was a political prisoner, he was a fighter for basic human rights. He was in and out of prison. He was in prison and out of prison. In and out. That’s the way they make you lose energy.

If we were staying in Tibet, I would have started school learning Chinese, not my language. We would not learn anything about our own roots. To behest today I don’t remember even my own house. I feel proud to be Tibetan. I try my best to represent Tibet, to preserve my own culture and language. Everyone of us, everyone you see here at the cafe that has my age shares the same story. When we arrived in Paris we were hosted at the Pierre Blanche, that’s how I met these guys. That’s how we became friends. We lived in the forest in Conflans. Everyone here is working in a restaurant. We learned from basics, from a b c and started to earn some money.

I don’t know why I am like this. I am alone. I am used to be all by myself. I don’t express everything. Of course I feel. I feel completely. But I don’t let myself go. I don’t see the point to be caught by emotions. I don’t see the point to be unhappy. All is impermanent.

My father passed away in prison when I was in school in India. He was arrested. He got sick in prison.

I heard the news, they told me. I didn’t feel anything. There is nothing I can do. I went to sleep and I thought “I don’t have a father anymore. Everyone has his father to call. I don’t.” . I prayed for him that night. And then I went back to school. It is hard for everyone to understand this.

We tried several times to reach Greece. Between Turkey and Greece we walked in the forest and we were caught and sent back I don’t know how many times. There were many people from different nations. Sometimes twenty people. There I met another guy from Tibet.

Here I don’t have any plans. If I’d tell my mom she would freak out. I’m working. I don’t ask money to anyone. I went to school to learn French two months then I started working in a French restaurant. It is four years now I am here. I need to use my confidence because we are shy people.

Tibetans are shy, yes. Humble. Kind. People have become more greedy and started to think only for themselves. In school they teach you to think for others before than yourself. In this society you have to be more selfish. That’s the environment we live these days.

I am back now from work. People work hard and then they become old. I already spent my paycheck today. Here we don’t share bills. One of us pays for everyone. I have been always in the neighborhood. In Stalingrad. At least it is better than living in the forest.

Karma 

Coffee. If you ask me what is the first thing coming to my mind well, I’m thinking about coffee.  That’s what is in front of me.

So I’m twenty-three.  When I was eight I was sent to India by my parents. To Kanzhe. I reached Nepal  and then my uncle sent me from there to India.  I studied twelve years in school.

We arrived through border cross. From Kanzhe I went to Lhasa. It was quite easy. That was quite easy. From Lhasa it was difficult. There were five checkpoints. Three of them you can cross with a special ticket. Like a special ticket. And other two it is very hard to pass. The other two that’s hard. We had to cross illegally walking through a forest.  We were sixteen people. One Six. Sixteen. Most of them were adults, there were few children like me. From there we got to Nepal. There we had to register to a Tibetan refugee camp as Tibetans that came from India. They registered and gave a social security number. With that we could go to Dharmsala, there I went to school.  As language we had English and Tibetan classes, then science, math, these kind of subjects. The lessons were on every subject, you know, school. That’s school. I finished my class when I was twenty. Tibetans have scholarships, they can go to college and university. I decided to go to Europe when I finished school. My classmates now they ar sin college, there. They get scholarships, to support the community there are colleges only for tibetans. Most study in those colleges.

How I moved from Dharmsala is a very long story. From India I had a passport. It is not the same as a passport. Almost like a passport. In India we had a same but for refugee. We call it yellow book. Yellowbook, because the book is yellow. So, from India I went to Bangkok. If you want to go to Europe directly from India, well, that’s very hard to get a visa. I stayed there three months. Then I went to Turkey. Turkey, then Greece.  We don’t have a visa, so we have to transit from a country to another. Turkey is a transit point. You can use it as a transit point and go back to India as an excuse. So when you reach Turkey’s airport we change passport and we use a fake one to get out. With a fake visa, of course.

Agent. I got the fake visa from an agent. Like a passeur, in French that’s the word. Like illegal, transporting people from one place to another. They organize everything for you. It is common, very how to explain, very popular. You pay this person. They organize all. The place you live. How to go from there. They book the tickets. They book the hotel. Everything.

You just need to follow the instructions and voilà: France. Their cost is very low. Usually it is like this. It is common, especially it is very popular because they will take responsibility if you are stuck on the way. For example, for some people might be lucky and get directly to France in one week or one month so their cost is very low and the agent profit is very high. For some people it takes years to reach France and all expenses go in the travel. That’s where there are ups and downs for them. From Turkey to Greece it is easy for us. You have to contact a guy that makes like a sort of tour guide from a border to another.  Turkey to Greece there is an open door, we cross it by night. Once you reach Greece they will throw you on the road. The you have to reach the city by yourself.

My class mate. His parents came here in 2006 in France. He went from India to France in 2010 a long time ago now. He was already in France when I reached Greece. For parents with children to do something like this is impossible. You have to go from border to border, from airport to airport. If you have children, if you go all through Europe like me it is very hard. If you are caught in between and you have to go to jail that’s complicated. Those who are young do not go through this procedure. It is hard. So adults when they reach over here they register in office that they are married and they have children so they can bring the children.

When I landed someone was supposed to collect me. Someone was supposed to pick me up because I don’t know anything! He didn’t came so I was angry. He was very late because my plane was cancelled or delayed so I was stuck at La Chapelle, at the end he didn’t came. He was supposed to pick me up. I was lost, a bit angry. And then my friend came. My relative didn’t come to pick me up. I arrived at La Chapelle. I spent one day at my friend’s house. The day after we went to Decathlon. I bought a tent a pumping bed. I had a blanket, no sleeping bag. Then I reached the forest in Conflans. Tibet is crazy cold, Paris is cold. Not crazy cold. If we were cold, we made a little fire. In Tibet I don’t remember getting cold. We have clothes made of fur. I lived in the forest of Conflans two months. A French woman let me live with her, she was very interested  in Tibetan language. I could stay as much I wanted but I moved with my friend.

I am used that there was China in Tibet.  Since I had to move to India from a young age there is a huge gap about my knowledge of Tibet.

What do I want? First I want an education in French language. I definitely want a formation. On what, that I don’t know. I want to do something I am interested in. I keep thinking what I want to do. I would like to work in crime scenes. Like criminology. Forensic. I watched a lot of series.

I used to watch a lot of movies always in that context. That’s where I started to be interested on it, but that must be very hard. The problem is I’m not good at studying. You know, it enters in one ear it goes out from the other. First French language class is one month. I’m going to take three classes.

It is completely different. Here it is completely different. When I went to work out of the region in Bretagne picking tomatoes in Paimpol something there reminded me of Tibet.  We had very little interaction with the village. You must imagine that there is no emoticon of Tibet flag even on my mobile phone. I can’t use the flag of where I was born. As we are walking two things are coming to my mind. There is a plant that grows here in Paris, in the region. That’s the same that grows in Tibet. I don’t know the name. Another thing, you see the Chinese calligraphy here. Here as we walk. That reminds me of the occupation. What you see in chinese language here around, as we walk.

A Stalingrad, where there is a basketball court, au Jardin d’Eole, there you can find a lot of tibetans.

We are taking you there.

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