Escape from Manus Prison by Jaivet Ealom - Book Review

There are few things more rewarding than coming across a book you have never heard of and, from the opening sentence finding yourself well and truly hooked.

If I may quote:

‘I’m going to die tonight. I’m going to die tonight.’

I was sad to realize I’d never feel the sun again. Most likely, none of us would. It was past midnight, and I’d had time to think things through. I accepted the finality. I was at peace.’

See what I mean!  

Yes, the writer lives to see another dawn. After all, this is his story, told by him in clear, compelling prose. He takes you with him on a journey that reads like an adventure but for the gut-wrenching fear and constant deprivation he and his fellow travellers must endure. And which he so poignantly describes. It is a true tale of an asylum seeker, one man’s story of the 90 million men, women and children worldwide fleeing injustice, pestilence, war or famine in search of not just a better life but life itself. 

Author Jaivet Ealom’s escape from the brutal regime in Myanmar (Burma) became a six-month odyssey on foot, by boat (many and mostly unseaworthy), by cars and by planes that transported him across three continents and through seven countries. He is the only man to escape from The Manus Regional Processing Centre, Australia’s notorious offshore migrant detention centre.  

The 29-year-old is a Rohinga Muslim and grew up in Maungdaw, a coastal city near Myanmar’s border with Bangladesh. He had the bad luck of being born after the ruling military junta stripped the Rohingya of their legal existence and placed draconian limits on the movements of this ethnic minority. To all intents and purposes, they are imprisoned in their land.  

But Jaivet would not be contained, and with courage, perseverance and help from family and friends managed to flee his country, eventually boarding a boat of asylum seekers bent on reaching Australia, which he had assumed would prove a promised land. Not so! (Spoiler alert: with astonishing resourcefulness, Jaivet makes his way to Canada, where his asylum claim is granted.  He now lives in Toronto and works for a company that provides software to non-profit organizations.)

Escape from Manus Prison gives a face to the faceless, that vast tide of humanity forcibly displaced; Myanmar is in the top five of the world’s worst offenders of human rights. Never again will this reviewer be able to watch those all-too-frequent television clips of overcrowded, unseaworthy boats filled with desperate people fleeing for their lives without being reminded of the opening paragraph (above) of this book. 

This escape odyssey by a brave and resourceful young man joins a pantheon of books devoted to the asylum experience found in bookstores and libraries everywhere in this country, a nod to our country’s acceptance of those needing a place to live in peace. They are mostly stories of triumph over adversity but certainly not always, yet they invariably add to our understanding of humanity’s basic drive to do our best for our families and ourselves.