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• In the Sea There Are Crocodiles is based on the true story of a boy called Enaiatollah Akbari.

• Enaiatollah (Enaiat) left Afghanistan when he was ten years old to escape violence and persecution. He arrived in Italy five years later, where he was granted refugee status. He told his story to the author, Fabio Geda, who then wrote the book.

• Enaiat didn’t remember everything that happened perfectly. He and Geda worked together to recreate his story as truthfully as possible.

• In the Sea There Are Crocodiles describes the dangers that Enaiat faced, but also the kindness he experienced during his search to find a place to call home.

Did you know?

Afghanistan is a country in Asia.

• Its capital city is called Kabul.
• The main religion is Islam.
• Pashto and Dari are its two main languages.

Enaiat lived in Afghanistan with his mother and younger siblings. They are part of a minority ethnic group called Hazaras. The Taliban made their lives dangerous so, when he was ten years old, Enaiat's mother took him to Pakistan. She left him in a boarding house so that he could start a better life.

Enaiat didn’t feel safe in Pakistan so he paid people traffickers to take him to Iran with a group of other asylum seekers.

In Iran, he worked on a building site. Enaiat was found and taken back to Afghanistan by the Iranian police. He returned to Iran and worked with his friend, Sufi, in a stonecutting factory. Again, he was found and taken back to Afghanistan. He returned to Iran a third time.

After four years in Iran, Enaiat arranged for people traffickers to take him and a group of others on a dangerous journey over the mountains into Turkey. Some of the group died along the way.

In Turkey, Enaiat met four boys who were planning to go to Greece. They paid a people trafficker to take them to the sea and provide a dinghy. During the crossing, one of the boys drowned. In Greece, the three boys were picked up by the police but Enaiat managed to hide. A kind Greek woman gave him clothes, food, a bus ticket and money so he could buy a ferry ticket to Athens.

In Athens, Enaiat found work, but when the job was complete he couldn't find more work. He decided to go to Italy to find a boy from his village, called Payam. He hid in a storage container on a boat to get there.

By this time, Enaiat was 15 years old. Payam put Enaiat in touch with a social worker called Danila who offered to foster him. After two years living with Danila and going to school, Enaiat was granted asylum in Italy.

Did you know?

Enaiat travelled from the village of Nava in Afghanistan to the city of Turin in Italy. This journey is over 3,200 miles.

All characters in In the Sea There Are Crocodiles are based on real people.

Enaiatollah (Enaiat) Akbari

Enaiat is resourceful. He is keen to learn, secure work and find a place where he can be safe.

He is also brave and resilient. Although he experienced terrible things on his journey, Enaiat never gave up hope of finding a place to call home.

Fabio Geda

Geda is the author of In the Sea There Are Crocodiles. He writes Enaiat's story as if it is Enaiat telling it.

At some points in the book there are extracts of Geda and Enaiat talking. These sections are in italics and give an idea of the types of questions that Geda asked Enaiat, and how he replied.

Activity

Themes are the big ideas that run through a novel, often indicating what the author wants us to think more deeply about. Three important themes in In the Sea there are Crocodiles are:

• Discrimination
• Migration
• Hope

Enaiat faced a lot of discrimination because of where he came from, his ethnicity and religion.

• In Afghanistan, his school was closed because the Taliban didn’t want the Hazara people to be educated.

• In Pakistan, a shopkeeper refused to serve him and beat him because he was a Hazara.

• During his journey from Pakistan to Iran, he became very ill but couldn’t go to hospital because he was living in the country illegally.

Enaiat's mother told him to always be hospitable and tolerant, but people don’t always treat him the same way in return. His experiences clearly show how unfair this is and suggests that the world would be a better place if everyone were treated equally and kindly.

Migration is the movement of people from one place to another to live or work. People can move long or short distances and might move for a short period of time or might spend the rest of their lives in a new place.

Enaiat is a refugee. He was forced to migrate because it wasn't safe for him to stay in Afghanistan. He has to travel illegally, so is dependent on people traffickers to help him. People traffickers offer an illegal service. They often transport people in dangerous conditions and trap them in jobs if they can't pay.

In the Sea There Are Crocodiles shows how badly refugees and migrants can sometimes be treated. For example, Enaiat experiences police raids and sees police beating other refugees.

Despite the dangers he faces in each new country, Enaiat remains hopeful that there is a better life for him somewhere. He says that:

the hope of a better life is stronger than any other feeling.

Hope is also what led Enaiat's mother to leave him in Pakistan. Even though she put him in a dangerous situation, Enaiat understands that she thought “it was better to know I was in danger far from her; but on the way to a different future”.

Activity

Writers choose words and phrases carefully when they write. Readers can look closely at texts to think about how and why the writer made these choices.

First person

In the Sea There Are Crocodiles is written in a first-person narrative voice, as if Enaiat is telling the story himself.

The author, Geda, said that he tried to be as true to Enaiat's voice as possible and write down the story exactly as he told it.

Dialogue

At some points, the story is interrupted bydialogue between Enaiat and Geda. These sections are in italics.

Often Geda will ask Enaiat to explain something. For example, “How can you just change your life like that Enaiat?” Geda’s questions echo what the reader might be thinking and are a reminder that the story is true.

Dialect

In the Sea There Are Crocodiles includes some words from the Hazaragi dialect that Enaiat spoke in Afghanistan. Some of the words are translated into English. For example:

Other words are used in a way that allows the reader to guess their meaning. For example, kaka is usually used before the name of a man and so the reader can guess that it might mean something like “Mr”.

Not knowing what some words mean could help the reader to understand how Enaiat felt in new countries when he didn’t speak the language well.

Structure refers to how written text is organised – the way the story is ordered and shaped.

Six sections

In the Sea There Are Crocodiles is divided into six sections, one for each country that Enaiat lived in:

1. Afghanistan
2. Pakistan
3. Iran
4. Turkey
5. Greece
6. Italy

Chronological order

The story is told in chronological order, but there are a few flashbacks at the start of the story.

For example, the first section is called "Afghanistan" but begins when Enaiat is with his mother in Pakistan. It includes many flashbacks to his childhood in Nava.

One important flashback is about the day the Taliban closed Enaiat's school. This was the reason his mother decided to take him to Pakistan.

Ending

At the end of the book, Enaiat phones his mother. They don’t speak, but Enaiat says that they listened to each other breathing. This is a bittersweet ending because, although they may never see each other again, Enaiat is finally safe.

Earlier in the novel, Geda says that "the decision to emigrate comes from a need to breathe". Both Enaiat and his mother can now breathe.

The context in which a novel was written can sometimes reveal more about its themes, message and meaning.

The Hazaras

Enaiat was born into the Hazara community who live in Afghanistan, traditionally in the central mountain region. The Hazaras have historically been discriminated against in Afghan society and, until about 100 years ago, many Hazaras were enslaved. Enaiat says that some people still treat Hazaras this way.

While Enaiat still lived in Afghanistan, the Taliban were in control and made life unsafe for the Hazara people. When the Taliban closed Enaiat school, he remembers them saying “school isn’t for the Hazara”.

Hazaras speak a dialect of Dari called Hazaragi. They have distinctive music and literary traditions. Hazarago poetry and music often tells stories from their folklore, which have been passed down through generations.