The promised land

His name is J, and he was born in Liberia. When he was 2, his father died in the Liberian war, and his mother moved to Ghana married to another man. He moved with his grandmother, and they lived together for many years; they used to sell wood for a living. After his grandmother died, he decided to look for a better life and ended up in Italy. It was 2006.

Now, after 3 years, he knows just a bit of Italian and is still unemployed. He makes little money by selling stuff house to house: lighters, socks, carpets, the usual, keeping it all in a sport bag that he carries on his back.

Today he is wearing a pair of gloves that my father gave him some time ago, and is drinking coffee. "When I drink coffee, the cold goes away", he tells me.

Around 6 months ago he managed to get an official document that allows him to stay in Italy, as an official immigrant. It took more than 2 years of clandestinity to get it, and it lasts only 6 months. To apply for this paper, he had to fill in a huge load of forms, that he does not understand for he cannot read. In attached he had to provide details of his previous employers (he never managed to get a job) and money (that he does not have).

He lives in a small flat of 3 rooms in a city around 40 km from here, he tells me. The landlord kicked his Moroccan flatmate out last month because he did not pay the rent, which is less than a hundred euros per month. It is the lowest rent I have ever heard of, but J tells me that, still, it is not easy at all to gather that amount.

"It's been 3 years that I've lived by" he says. I ask him if he would like to go back to Liberia, but he says no. He would go to Ghana, where his mother lives, but how? With what money?

I could not even guess how many people are living in a condition similar to J's, who sought for a better life in this promised land, and too late realized that this place does not have much for them. In many cases their life is even worse than it was back in their homecountries, but it takes money and documents to go back, so they can only stay.

Stuck.