April 5, ____.

Ali was in my room again this afternoon.

He was talking about how he missed Pakistan, about the trouble there and about how he hoped he’d be able to go back one day and carry on from where he had left off.

He says he’d had big dreams and they’d all revolved around Kalusha, the village where he grew up.

“I never imagined I’d spend this long away from home. I never imagined I’d leave Kalusha,” he said.

He’s been in the U.K. for about five years now.

“My cousins helped me flee Pakistan,” he said. “They planned everything, the passports, the exit routes, the people who’d guide me through the routes, and they paid for everything.

“When I got here, they explained about the right of asylum and about why and how I should go about submitting an application for political asylum. They even found a Pakistani solicitor to handle the application for me. The solicitor was confident we‘d win the case.”

But the application was rejected as were the subsequent appeals he made.

“For some reason, the first time I submitted my application, I thought I’d get a decision from the Home Office quickly. I thought the whole process would be over in less than a month. It must have been wishful thinking on my part because from the time I submitted my claim to the time I was told I’d exhausted all my appeal rights, I spent about four years, four years that were filled with anxiety, fear, worry, hair pulling and nail biting.”

A year after his initial claim had been rejected, Ali submitted a fresh claim and it was accepted.

“I’m not sure what’s going to happen next. I keep forgetting to ask my solicitor to explain what’s going to happen next. But what I think it means is that I’m at the beginning of the process again.

“Maybe the Home Office is going to interview me all over again or maybe it will make a decision based solely on the evidence I submitted for my fresh claim, I don’t know.”

I made him another cup of tea.

“You should have stayed with your wife and daughter,” he said. “Life would have been easier for you if you’d stayed with my wife and daughter.”

I’d told Ali a little about my family. He knew that when I came into the country, my wife and daughter were there with me. I’d told him that since arriving in the U.K., things had not worked out between my wife and me and I’d had to leave.

“You should have stayed with your wife and daughter,” he said.

“We have to go,” I told him. “I have an appointment with a solicitor at 2.30 pm. If we leave now, I’ll get there in time for the appointment.”

We walked into town together. Ali said he was going to the mosque and I went to see the solicitor to try and see if he could take up my case.