What everyone should know about a Kurdish-Iranian refugee’s time in Manus prison
Imagine a writer forbidden paper and pen.
Wouldn’t this be tortuous enough let alone being held prisoner for more than six years on remote islands?
This was the case to befall author Behrouz Boochani in 2013 but amazingly he discovered a way to write.
Using smuggled mobile phones the Kurdish-Iranian refugee wrote No Friend But the Mountains: Writing from Manus Prison via long text messages and with the assistance of translator Omid Tofighian.
The Pan Macmillan Australia book won Australia’s 2019 National Biography Award plus numerous other prizes.
As life-story writers we can learn much from this unique and historical story…
Behrouz Boochani’s story of survival
Behrouz Boochani grew up in Iran ‘a child of war’ to become a writer, journalist, scholar, cultural advocate and filmmaker.
He escaped from his homeland first by plane to Indonesia (all skinny and with a near-empty backpack) and then by treacherous people-smuggler boats to Australian waters.
The ocean voyages were a near-fatal mix of rotting boats, overcrowding, storms and starvation.
But new waves of hardship and challenges were to come when Boochani was “jailed” by the Australian Government with other refugees on Christmas Island and later at the Manus Island Regional Processing Centre, Papua New Guinea.
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Behrouz Boochani shows us prison life close-up
No Friend But the Mountains by Behrouz Boochani crosses many writing genres and is hard to categorise.
Translator Tofighian suggests ‘horrific surrealism’ but without doubt, for me, this book is a prison survival tale.
It is a disturbing and rare first-hand account of what happened in prison on Manus.
Another interesting theme the book highlights is how the government system works.
Behrouz refers many times to this as the Kyriarchal System, which he says is entrenched in prison life.
He says the system works to grind down the minds and spirits of prisoners who are treated like ‘pieces of meat’.
Examples include being referred to as MEG45 instead of by his name, constant surveillance and body searches.
Then there are endless lines for food, toilets, health care, telephones, razors, cigarettes, and much more.
Another fascinating aspect of the book is that it was written in Persian and translated into English.
Tofighian explains this required much thought, debate and consideration.
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Lessons from Behrouz Boochani
Behrouz Boochani’s No Friend But the Mountains can teach us much as aspiring life writers.
Firstly, despite all odds and difficulties it is possible to be creative.
What stood out most to me was Behrouz’s poetic and lyrical style of writing.
He uses words like colourful brushstrokes to pound home epic imagery of his homeland and of life inside the prison.
“This soul-destroying prison is made with a mix of lime and dirt. Everywhere, fine white sand sticks to one’s feet, particularly to the plastic flip-flops. From one of the camp to the other drainpipes protrude from the kitchen and bathrooms. They create a potion of rotten excrement … the stench of sludge, a multicoloured spread laid out for both microscopic and mammoth mosquitoes which linger regularly around the troposphere above the drains.”
Behrouz is also a master of describing characters in all their physical subtleties, manners, inner fears and desires.
We learn about a heroic warrior-like sailor, walkie-talkie wielding prison guards, placid Papus and myriad of fellow refuges with telling nicknames such as: The Prime Minister, The Man with the Thin Mustache, The Whore, The Giant, The Cow, and many others.
“(The Whore) employs a beautiful form of rebellion that has enormous appeal for the prisoners. … He stands in direct opposition to a system that wants to fatten up lambs for slaughter. With just one word spoken by him, we experience the essence of life.”
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Final say: Behrouz Boochani’s No Friend But the Mountains
This book of resistance is a must read for everyone: Australian and non-Australian, voter and non-voter.
It is a book about humanity and our treatment of each other.
But it is also a work of great creativity, beauty and struggle.
Behrouz, whose refugee status is still unresolved, is clearly driven to write.
I personally would love to hear more about his early life and sincerely hope No Friend But the Mountains is just a taste of more projects to come.
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This article first appeared on the website Forever Young Autobiographies.com.