Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction 12 | Page 42

Away and Home
St. Paul's Co-educational College Primary School, Chan, Chun Ning Cayden – 8
T
he year is 1938. I am on a boat full of people and there are forty of us. I don’t know exactly how long we
have been travelling for, but it feels like an entire year. I am an eight year old boy and my name is Caleb.
There are eleven families here. My mother, my father, my older sister and I are one of eleven families. We are
travelling to a place called Shanghai. We had to leave our home in Germany because a powerful man called Adolf
Hitler, who wants to kill us because we are Jews.
Daddy said Germany is no longer safe for us to live in and we need to find somewhere more secure. We went
to other countries but we could not stay there. We are going to Shanghai now because we heard that people can get
in without a visa or a passport. I hope we are going to have a new life there in Shanghai because we are all
exhausted and hungry from travelling so much and I d on’t want to run away anymore.
Our boat is getting closer to the city and lots of boats and ships are on the river. It is a very busy place with
different buildings, but some buildings are like those in Europe. As we arrive, I feel fearful because I have never
been here and I don’t know what people here are like. I also feel enthusiastic and excited because it is a new
adventure.
When we get off the boat, we see many people doing different things and moving around very busily. Some
people are pulling, pushing and carrying things around. Most people are Asian, but there are also some European
and American people on the streets. The roads are wide and there are lots of cars, horses and carriages, trams and
even men running around pulling carts. Above the shops and on buildings there are scribbled drawings that look
funny. Daddy said they are Chinese words. I wonder what they mean. I see both English and Chinese words on
magazines and billboards. The streets are extremely noisy and I can hear many different languages spoken as we
walk past people.
This seems like an exciting place to live in. I am optimistic that we can find a new home here and be safe
from Adolf Hitler.