Theatre to explain immigration in first person: "We have studies and we speak languages"

BarcelonaThis Saturday is the premiere and there will surely be nerves about exposing yourself in front of the general public. The entity La Xixa and the Casal dels Infants once again combine creativity to bring a group of artists on stage. Young migrants without family references in a play that talks about immigration. The script is simple, as will be the few words of the text, because in this story the actors do not need to put themselves in the skin of the character: the character – the person – is them. The first appointment is at 7 pm in the auditorium of the CCCB del Raval and they hope to be able to do it. bowling in schools, civic centres and libraries.

One of the actors is Bilal Knioine, 27. A lawyer with a degree from the University of Fez, the capital of northern Morocco, he arrived in Barcelona 17 months ago speaking four languages and Now he is trying hard in Castilian and Catalan. It is the second time that he participates in the work, which is born from the project Rasif on stage, and he is very clear about his motivation. "We want to make people understand that migrants come here with their life, work experience, with three languages, who have studied or worked in their country, that they don't come from nowhere to do evil," he says. But the laws and "racism" work against them, he admits: "We have been through everything, we have more experience than those of you who are from here."

The work is a portrait of the "difficulties" of crossing Africa and the Mediterranean or the Atlantic, as in the case of Knioine, to reach the Peninsula or the Canary Islands. "You always think that you could be the next dead person, because every day people die by drowning"says the young lawyer, sitting during a break from the rehearsals of the ephemeral company. In another room, his companions are working on body expression and are beginning to present scenes that are familiar enough to them, such as the encounter with the police at the border. who did not want to live in Morocco

Ouissal Malki is one of the few girls who has signed up for this social theatre experience, drawn by the memory of having performed dancing with the Nana association at the Kursaal Melilla Theatre. Her career also breaks with the image that people have of immigration. At 14, Malki decided that she did not want to live in Morocco any longer, dissatisfied with the future that she suspected awaited her, crossing the border one day with her passport and entering a juvenile centre. "I was very young," she says, but satisfied with having taken the step, especially because she is in "a step towards being autonomous". When she came of age, she travelled to Barcelona. She has had to sleep on the streets on occasion due to lack of alternatives, with all the dangers and fears that this situation entails, but for months she has been in supervised housing, which she will have to leave when she starts working. "It scares me, but it also excites me," says this high school student.

He had to wait for Mohammed Berrabah for up to three months before crossing the Mediterranean. The lack of opportunities and a future in Morocco made him follow his older brother to embark on a small boat. He is 19 years old and survives on the streets, but he says he saw no other option, although he would have liked to enroll in law. From his time at the construction site, he admits that he is hurt by "everything" that happened on the way, so he sticks with the "positive" aspect of the trip. "I want to study to be able to improve," he says.

Isaka Maiga's life is that of a refugee child. Originally from Mali, he explains that at the age of five he fled the war to Algeria with his mother and brother, but in all the years they were in the Maghreb country, they never managed to regularize their situation. The lack of papers also cut short a football career that had to be limited to the lower categories. He is motivated to explain the losses and pain he is carrying, while saying that he keeps the "promise" he made to his mother to always stay on "the right path" to study, work and, who knows, maybe one day return to football. For the moment, he is looking for a team.