Memoar – Mohammad (EN)

Hello. My name is Mohammad. I am 20 years old. I am from Afghanistan and I am a refugee in Indonesia. After a long, dangerous, and hard journey, I finally arrived in Indonesia in July of 2014. It has been more than 6 years since then that I’ve been living here. I was born in Iran as a refugee because my parents were refugees too, so basically, I counted as a refugee too. As a refugee child in Iran, I couldn’t go to public school. After losing my father, it got even harder for me to live in Iran, because I didn’t have any ID, I got deported back to Afghanistan.  I tried to go to my parents’ hometown. But after I went there, it was not really the place that I thought it would be, because of the Taliban in there. I had to leave my own hometown. In thinking of a better place to start a new life, we had to stay in Indonesia, because we didn’t have anywhere to go back to, nowhere to go to, so I had to stay in Indonesia and wait.

In my opinion, everyone can reach their dreams if they work hard enough. It’s really difficult for refugees to achieve their goals, reach their dreams, but it isn’t impossible. The only difficulty here is that refugees are losing their time and time is one of the most precious things in life. In my opinion, if we can use the time that we have here and work hard enough, everyone can reach their dreams, even refugees.

Back in the days when I was in Iran, one day a friend of mine asked me to go and watch the taekwondo club with him and watch them practicing. After watching them, I got interested in taekwondo and thought this is really the coolest sport. I decided to join them and train with them. After training for a few days, I realized that I really liked this sport. This sport motivates me to be happier, maybe I can even have a brighter future by keeping doing this sport and achieving some stuff in my life. I managed to join three competitions there. In two out of three of those competitions, I managed to win two bronze medals. For me it was a big achievement back then.

My biggest dream in life is to become an Olympic champion. Ever since I saw Rohullah Nikpai got the first Olympic medal for Afghanistan, it became my goal in life. It is my dream to get the very first ever Olympic gold medal for Afghanistan. Here, I had to start from white belt. I made a big progress during this time. I also managed to get one gold medal here, which is really amazing. Before I achieved that medal, I participated in two other competitions. In the first one, I lost in the first fight and I couldn’t go further, and in the second competition I got disqualified so I was feeling really sad. But in the last competition, the third competition, with the help of my trainer, I finally could enter and win my first gold medal, which was really amazing. I don’t think I’ll ever forget that moment. I never felt that happy in my life before. It’s really something that I can’t describe at that moment.

Even though I might achieve bigger and better achievements in the future, I have a goal in my life and that goal is what makes me get up everyday and go out and exercise. The goal is what drives me to do this. It is what makes me get up and go out and exercise everyday. Practicing taekwondo is the thing that helps me not to get depressed here and makes living here much easier.

I think I am a totally different person compared to five years ago. How different? I say, a lot. I see a lot of changes in myself. I can’t really say, my friends have to say it. I know I have changed a lot. Back in days, I think I was a really, really annoying kid. After living here for a long time, I decided to think about myself and my behaviors. I try to work on my weaknesses and try to become a more mature person, so I could become a better person in general. I think right now, I am more determined about my goals, dreams, and decisions than I was five years ago. After going through many hardships and difficulties, I am thinking about them as a lesson to be learned, not as punishment to get punished for. I think these things are also helping me to develop a better personality, to become a better person.

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