By Luke Voogt
The tranquil wilderness of Licola Camp is far away from the ground-shaking explosions that shattered Shoghig Araboghlian’s former home city of Aleppo in 2012.
Now living at Norlane, the Syrian refugee began volunteering at the camp for “deserving” children last month, a year after migrating to Australia.
“That was the first time I’d seen a canoe, flying fox or giant swing,” the 36-year-old said.
“I’d never tried anything like that in my life.”
But Shoghig adapted quickly to the new challenges, including canoing.
“At first I was going right – left I couldn’t do it,” she laughed, “but they taught me how.”
A graphic designer in Syria, Shoghig studies child care at TAFE.
“I love children and taking care of them.”
When she heard “the camp was about having fun with children” she had to get involved.
An Armenian Christian, Shoghig had a “great life“ in Syria. But in 2012 war broke, killing thousands and tearing her world apart.
“We had schools collapse and churches, everything we had collapsed,” she said.
Snipers shot from rooftops in her neighbourhood and explosions shock the ground almost hourly.
“Snipers; if you go outside the house you never know if you’ll come back or not,” Shoghig said.
“People were injured in front of my eyes.”
She remembered telling her then nine-year-old son to take shelter in a back room when shells exploded nearby.
“I remember rockets everywhere. If the rockets start they never stop – 20 rockets, 30 rockets.”
But when an explosion killed her six-year-old nephew on a bus in Damascus she knew she had to flee.
“I can’t forget,” she said tearfully.
“He and three children with him on the bus died for no reason.”
“I thought, ‘I can’t live here anymore because I can’t risk my son’s life. I can’t lose somebody else – I can’t’.”
Shoghig fled to Lebanon with most of her family in 2012 before migrating to Australia with her husband and son last February.
“We went to a new country for a new beginning because there was no future for us as Syrians in Lebanon. We all applied together but they refused my brother and my mum.”
A childhood friend helped Shoghig find her house in Norlane.
“Now I don’t think of moving to anywhere else.”
Her 15-year-old son studies at St Joseph’s College and the school had helped him “forget the war and start again,” Shoghig said.
She volunteered at the camp to thank “everybody who is helping and supporting me.”
Shoghig hoped to one day reunite with her extended family.
“I told them you should move as soon as possible, Australia is a great country to start again from zero.”
