The Path To Germany

The Bus

June 8

Dear diary, "There's land!!!!" I said. Everybody cheered. "We can swim to the land! It is not far away from the boat and the children go on the men's back's and the woman and I can swim to the land with some of the stuff. While the children got on the men's back's and the women got all their stuff ready, I got a plastic baggy that had the dried fruit and put this diary in it, then I waited for all the men, the women, and the children (who were on the men's back's) jumped off the boat, then I jumped off after them. We are on land now and everyone is in a circle, thinking of what we can do now that we have gotten on the land, we don't know what to do. I can practically swear that people are glancing at me once in a while since I came up with the idea of coming here. However I had no idea of what to do now. Suddenly, a man jumped up from the ground and everybody's eyes turned to him. "There is a bus! I remember reading in the newspaper that there is a bus that we can catch if we are quick enough." Everybody started to murmur in agreement. I stood up. "Well? What are we waiting for?" Everybody jumped up from their sitting position and everyone started to follow the man. وداعا, Yana 

June 8

Dear diary, we have been walking for about three hours and I have been wondering if that man really knew that a there was a bus that we could ride on or if he just wanted people to think he's a hero. I hope we can all survive. I don't want Mami's sacrifice to be for nothing. وداعا, Yana

June 8

Dear diary, we walked, and walked, and walked, and walked, until we finally found the bus waiting for anyone else to arrive. We ran to the bus, not caring that our feet hurt and got to the door. Everybody rushed onto the bus so that there was no other seat except for next to a girl who looked about my age. She had long brown hair, and brown eyes. Just like me! I slowly walked towards the last seat and quietly sat down on the seat right next to the window. I looked out the window and the bus started to move. Then the girl started talking. "So," she said. "What's your story?" I looked at her. She truly looked like me. "Um, well, Me, my Mami, and my friend Nour were walking to the boat dock to get on a boat to go to Germany and on the way to the dock, Nour got pneumonia." I hesitated, then continued. "When we go to the boat dock, we found out that the boat did not have enough room for everybody. So then some people had to be left behind. One of those people was my mom." The girl's eyes told me that she felt really bad for me. "Then a couple days after we got on the boat, the engine stopped working and I used binoculars to look to see if there was land, and there was. Then we swam to the land and started to walk. Then we found this bus and got on it.". While I was talking I didn't notice that a couple tears had fallen off my cheek. Unfortunately the girl had. She reached over and squeezed my hand. I gave her a weak smile and we both rested on our chairs. وداعا, Yana

Translations: وداعا = bye