‘People were afraid to talk to me. They didn’t understand why I wore the scarf’

Rawan Al Masri was in her final year at secondary school when her parents decided it was time to leave Syria. Al Masri's older brother was already studying pharmacy in Jordan, so the family decided to take a short "holiday" from their home in the city of Homs in 2012.

“It was not like we were moving to another country,” she says. “It was just a holiday for a couple of months, and then we would go back to Syria. I didn’t even take all my stuff, no certificates for the house or school.

“My father was worried about us; he knew that people would be taken to prison for saying no to the government. He knew his children would say no because we are the younger generation. We have an open mind about change and creating a better solution.”

The family’s holiday came to an abrupt end upon discovering that they would have to register as Syrian refugees with the United Nations in Jordan.

“They told us, ‘You can’t go back to school until you register’, but my father was refusing because he wanted to go back to Syria. Once you registered, you wouldn’t be going back. But because I was in my Leaving Cert year, they decided to register,” Al Masri says.

Completing her school studies in a foreign country was hugely challenging for Al Masri.

“Jordan is an Arabic country, but it’s totally different from us,” she says. “The education system, the books, the people you know, it totally changes everything. Even in your own country, you get worried about your Leaving Cert. How about moving to another country to do it? It was very hard.”

Al Masri scored 80 per cent in her final exams but missed out on the marks to study medicine, so she opted for a career in pharmacy like her brother. The university in Jordan initially refused to accept her as a student unless she paid international fees. However, she was eventually accepted through a scholarship.

Meanwhile, the family was surviving on her father’s savings from his bakery business back in Homs. The move from Syria was very stressful for Al Masri’s parents and younger sister, and while in Jordan her father suffered a heart attack.

“When you’re watching TV and see your country in conflict, when a few months before you were living there and it was normal, that’s a shock,” Al Masri says. “We were so young, but we had to grow up fast and take care of our parents. I was only 18, but had to act like I was 30.”

Halfway through Al Masri's second year studying pharmacy, her family was informed that the UN had decided to relocate them to Ireland. The Al Masris had been selected to join the first group of Syrian refugees travelling here under the State's refugee resettlement programme and arrived in Dublin in October 2014.

“It’s weird to arrive in a country you’ve never heard about,” Al Masri says. “I’d never heard of Ireland before and we only found out we were coming here a month before we travelled.”

The family spent four months in the Mosney accommodation centre in Co Meath before being moved to a house in Portlaoise. Meanwhile, Al Masri began to investigate how she could continue her pharmacy studies in Ireland. She travelled to Dublin five times to visit the pharmacy department at Trinity College, but was met with confusion.

“We were the first Syrian refugees, so no one knew what was going on,” she says.

Al Masri eventually discovered that she could either pay international fees or wait three years to become eligible for the university fees paid by Irish citizens. She decided to return to Jordan to complete her studies and then rejoin her family in Ireland.

“I had my ‘stamp 4’, so I could travel to Jordan,” she says. “I had my scholarship, all my papers from Jordan. No one ever told me it wouldn’t be possible.”

In late 2014, Al Masri flew to Amman in Jordan, but was refused entry into the country.

“The man in the airport said: ‘You are a Syrian refugee. You accepted to go to Ireland. You can’t come back to Jordan. Either go back to Ireland or go to Syria.’ It was impossible to go back to Syria,” she says.

Al Masri, who was 19 at the time, was locked in a small room for nine hours before being flown back to Ireland via Paris. She wasn’t even given the chance to greet the friends waiting for her outside the airport.

On her return, she applied for a level-five Fetac science course in Tullamore. Not only did she find the material extremely basic, but she also really struggled to fit in with her fellow students.

“I was the only Syrian there and the only one wearing a headscarf,” she says. “People were afraid to talk to me. They didn’t understand why I wore the scarf. They thought I was forced to wear it. I am not. I was shocked when they asked me: ‘Do you put a scarf on at home and wear it all the time?’ They asked: ‘Does your father force you to wear it?’ Of course not!

“The people here are nice, but they only knew the bad side of Arabic countries. They think we only have terrorists and that we’re coming from a poor country. They thought I had no money in Syria, but my family had money. It’s not even because you’re a refugee, it’s because you’re Arabic.”

Al Masri is now studying a level-seven course in pharmaceutical science at the Dublin Institute of Technology. She still finds the materials basic and must travel two hours by train from Portlaoise to Dublin and back each day for her classes. She’s paying for the €3,000 in annual fees through money she saved from welfare payments last year.

She recently discovered that she must spend three years in pharmaceutical science and do one year of level-eight Fetac studies before she can study pharmacy at university. She’s exhausted, infuriated and fed up.

“I don’t want to go back to pharmacy now,” she says. “I’ve spent four years struggling, four years of stress, and I’ve had enough. I’m 21, and everyone in my class is 17. I don’t want to suffer any more. I wanted to do pharmacy, but it was a dream. I know it was a destiny, but I don’t have the energy any more. I’m finished with it.”

We would like to hear from people who have moved to Ireland in the past five years. To get involved, email newtotheparish@irishtimes.com.

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