Summary

As Chapter 4 begins, the author returns to present-tense narration, describing her time in the two refugee camps in Greece that she is visiting with Paul Hutchings. The first is called LM Village, but Paul’s “store” there has been abandoned. The author is surprised to find when she arrives how intensely she is reminded of her experiences of being a refugee at Barba, but adds that she is fully aware of two reasons why it is important for her to be there. The first is to make sure that true stories of refugees make their way back to the West, which she describes as “a mother who once adopted us, the exiles and outcasts, and now needs us to intervene as calluses harden fast around her heart” (132). The second, she adds, is to have stories to tell Elena, to make sense “of my...