This Is Your Country Now, Too

Episodes

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01Gustav and Franziska20191208

Stories seen through the eyes of child refugees as they leave home for the unknown. Starring Damian Lewis.

In the days after the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia in March 1939, a Jewish family is faced with a terrible dilemma - save their two children, nine-year-old Gustav and his elder sister Franziska, but maybe never see them again.

When they hear of a scheme to get children to London on trains, their mother determines it's the only way. This Kindertransport scheme, devised by Nicholas Winton, is left in the hands of two young schoolteachers, Trevor Chadwick and Beatrice Wellington his Canadian assistant.

With more than a little naivety and dogged persistence, amid the chaos of a new Nazi administration, this little-known story of Chadwick's part in the saving of 700 Czechoslovakian children who otherwise would have suffered the fate of their parents, is the first of seven dramas in a series about the experience of child refugees since 1939.

Cast:
Trevor Chadwick

02Mira20191209

Mira Hamermesh's real-life story of her escape at fourteen from Nazi-occupied Poland to Palestine, is dramatised by Claudine Toutoungi from Mira's memoir "The River Of Angry Dogs".

In 1939, when she was fourteen, Mira Hamermesh woke up one day to find that her country had been wiped off the map.

The Nazi-Soviet pact saw the opposing armies invade Poland from West and East. Mira's home city of Lodz was soon occupied by the German army, and her Jewish family were placed under restrictions.

Mira begins to dream of joining her sister Genia, who had left the previous year for Palestine. So like thousands of others, Mira risks her life to cross the Soviet border, with her big brother Mietek for protection.

But her extraordinary journey is only just beginning. Mira soon finds herself alone in a maze of shifting borders, lies and danger.

And as she struggles to find a way to Palestine, how could she begin to guess what's happening to her parents, in the Lodz ghetto?

Mira . . . . Pooky Quesnel
Young Mira . . . . Scarlett Courtney
Mietek . . . . Will Kirk
Genia . . . . Laura Christy
Mary . . . . Jessica Turner
Mother . . . . Heather Craney
Kostia . . . . Neil McCaul
Giora . . . . Sinead MacInnes
Mr Silverstein . . . . Clive Hayward
Interpreter . . . . Lucy Reynolds
Jakov . . . . Adam Courting
Pavel . . . . Ian Conningham
Rafael . . . . Greg Jones
Prisoner . . . . Ikky Elyas

Theme music by Jack Newton.
Series idea by Nick Kent with Jack Bradley.

With grateful thanks to Jeremy Coopman.

Produced and directed by Jonquil Panting.

Mira Hamermesh's real-life story of her escape from Nazi-occupied Poland to Palestine.

Seven stories seen through the eyes of child refugees as they leave home for the unknown.

03Chung-yun and So-ling20191210

Stories seen through the eyes of child refugees as they leave home for the unknown.

Chung-yun and So-ling, two children from a village on the mainland, embark on a treacherous journey to escape the famine in Mao Tse Tung's China by swimming across the South China sea to Hong Kong.

The journey, in their wretched state, is tough and on arrival they find the welcome is not exactly as they had wished. Escaping again from the clutches of a fisherman and his wife, Chung-yun is struck by a lorry and is taken to hospital.

It is at this point their luck begins to change with the support of Officer Wong and his wife, Rita, who make efforts to give the two children the opportunity for another life, rather than being sent back to the mainland.

This is the third of seven dramas in a series about the experience of child refugees fleeing persecution to find a new life in the UK or its dominions since 1939.

Cast:
Chung-yun

04Vijay20191211

Avin Shah's comedy celebrates his East African heritage, for our series of seven dramas about child refugees arriving in the UK since 1939.

Today's story salutes the enterprise and grit of a generation of British Asian citizens, who were forced to remake their lives in the UK in the 1960s.

Fifteen year-old Vijay was born in Kenya, but now the country has won its independence from the British Empire, a new programme of Africanisation means his parents are denied work, and his school has closed down.

But when he arrives at Heathrow with his British passport, he's put on a plane back to Kenya.

Then in Nairobi, Kenyan Immigration say he's not Kenyan either, and put him back on another plane.

So where does Vijay belong? What can he say about who he is, that will get him off a plane and back to school?

Luckily, Vijay's new travelling companion, Mr Ramesh Ramji, is about to help him find the answers.

With grateful thanks to Ramila Shah and Jatinder Verma.

Ramesh . . . . Tony Jayawardena
Vijay . . . . Sid Sagar
Mrs P . . . Chetna Pandya
Mr Singh . . . Amit Shah
Wendy . . . Safiyya Ingar
The Kenyan Official . . . Ivanno Jeremiah
The Tanzanian Official . . . Nahel Tzegai
The Coffee Seller . . . John Kamau
Young Ramesh . . . Nyla Levy
Mohammed . . . Avin Shah
Mr Filmore . . . Neil McCaul
Mr Henry . . . Clive Hayward
The Boy . . . JP Oppong
and thanks to our BBC Africa colleagues Wazir Khamsin, Mariam Omar and Zuhura Yunus.

Theme music by Jack Newton
Series idea by Nicolas Kent with Jack Bradley

Produced and directed by Jonquil Panting

Avin Shah's comedy celebrates his East African heritage.

Seven stories seen through the eyes of child refugees as they leave home for the unknown.

05Eve20191212

Stories seen through the eyes of child refugees as they leave home for the unknown.

In the divisive years of apartheid South Africa, a young girl, Eve, is smuggled out of the country after her mother was killed. The secret plan to get Eve out, with the help of sympathisers of the ANC cause, is arranged by a white South African couple, now living in London where she will join her father, Joseph - played by Danny Sapani.

Although successful in their mission, they meet resistance from Joseph when Eve arrives in London. But her burgeoning friendship with the couple's son, thirteen-year-old Jack, helps to win over Joseph until the Immigration Service call at the house to interview Eve throwing her and her father's future into doubt.

This is the fifth of seven dramas in the series about the experience of child refugees fleeing persecution to find a new life in the UK since 1939.

Cast:
Eve Motsamayi

06Daughter20191213

Actor and writer Yusra Warsama's family fled war in Somalia, and arrived in the UK when she was a baby.

In Daughter, she reflects on the final part of the refugee child's journey: growing up in a new country as a child of refugees, suspended between two cultures, and not fully part of either.

"How can we not lose ourselves in this place that doesn't let us truly sing our hearts' song?

There has to be more than feeling like an alien in the only place you know as home. The only place that has your heart."

The stories in Daughter are from Yusra witnessing and listening to the world around her, and the programme contains some strong discriminatory language.

Written and performed by Yusra Warsama,

with Tanya Moodie as Mother.

Daughter . . . . Yusra Warsama
Mother . . . . Tanya Moodie
Father . . . . Beru Tessema
Jean . . . . Alexander Devrient
Train Manager . . . . Ian Conningham
Employer . . . . Ikky Elias
Student . . . . Will Kirk
Student . . . . Greg Jones
Student . . . . Laura Christy

Theme music by Jack Newton
Series idea by Nicholas Kent with Jack Bradley

Produced and directed by Jonquil Panting

Yusra Warsama reflects on the end of a refugee child's journey: growing up in a new land.

Seven stories seen through the eyes of child refugees as they leave home for the unknown.

07Tarek20191215

Stories seen through the eyes of child refugees as they leave home for the unknown.

The family of 14 year-old Tarek' is bidding him farewell in a restaurant in Idlib, northwestern Syria. Amid the partings and advice from his mother, father and sister and barrel bombs raining down, Tarek is bundled off on a perilous journey across Europe.

But, as if in a Kafkaesque nightmare, following setbacks on the road or at sea, he constantly finds himself back in the restaurant, still to start his journey and receiving more advice.

He can claim asylum once he's in Britain - the problem is getting there.

Set in war torn Syria and across Europe, this is the final drama in a series of seven plays about the experience of child refugees fleeing persecution to find a new life in the UK since 1939.

Cast:
Tarek