Kwame and his future

Indra: Look, ...Bram trains hard.

Sarah: What is this with men and muscles?

Kwame: Hey, I just went spinning with you!

Jeroen: And do you see me pumping iron?

Sarah: Anyone want to drink something? I'm thirsty.

Indra (looking at a newspaper): Hey Kwame, do you have to go back to Africa, too?

Kwame: Come on. Africa isn't just one country. I am from Togo.

Indra (bored): Yeah, yeah, but all asylum seekers have to go back, don't they?

Kwame: Indra has heard something new. How do you say it? Something to do with the bell and the clapper.

Jeroen: You hear the bell chime, but you don't know who's ringing it.... That is the Dutch expression used for this. It means having heard of something, without really knowing what's it about.

Kwame: Not all asylum seekers have to go back. But Dutch law is going to be stricter. My mother and I have had asylum here for a long time. I've even had a Dutch passport for two years. My mother learned Dutch and has found a job very quickly. I don't want to go back to Togo.

Indra: And what do you think of the asylum seekers that are on a hunger strike?

Kwame: I think Dutch people don't understand what those people's feelings are like. The fear to have to go back to a country where you can't be safe.

Bram (finished his exercises): The minister opened an orphanage for AMA's (Single Underaged Asylum seekers) in Angola. A lot of AMA's say that they can't go back to Angola because they don't have a home there any more. And what do I read in the newspapers...all of them were picked up by family members. The orphanage is empty now. Again taxes wasted.

Jeroen: To me it seems to be quite complicated. How can you decide in the Netherlands who is allowed to stay and who isn't? There are a lot of asylum seekers that went back and found themselves in an impossible living situation as well.

Bram: Yes, but some are also making the living situation impossible in the Netherlands.

Sarah: I think you forget that refugees are not coming for the fun of it. They come here because they are persecuted in their country because of their political opinion, because they are not safe in their country, because of war or discrimination. From what is written in the newspapers you can get the idea that the Netherlands have to carry the biggest burden in the world. That we take most refugees in. But in Europe we come in 8th. Do you know which country takes most refugees in?

Jeroen: No idea?

Sarah: Great Britain.

Bram: But the Netherlands are a lot smaller.

Sarah: If you compare the number of asylum seekers with the country's surface area the Netherlands come in 3rd. In 2002 the Netherlands had the most expulsions. You might think we have just started doing this but compared to 2002 we expelled more people in 1995.

Bram: But the Netherlands are completely full already. So we have no choice.

Jeroen: That's what I am thinking when I am going to Groningen by train. Oh, the Netherlands are so full. With what??? With cows.

Indra: Kwame, are you afraid to go back to Togo?

Kwame: No that's not the reason. The situation in Togo is quite calm at the moment. But my mother and me we just got used to the Netherlands. We speak Dutch well and my mother has got a nice job. I go to school here and have friends. In Togo I would have to start all over again.

Indra: Then you should have to stay. Who else should walk with me to school?