I still whisper the prayer my grandfather used to say to me when I was a child.

I say it a lot.  I say it in the morning.  I say it when I go to bed.  It makes me feel safe.

My family lived in the northern mountains of Ethiopia.  We were farmers.  We worked the land by hand.  I remember running in the fields and thinking that we were the only Jews left in the world.

When I was growing up in the early 70s a communist dictatorship overthrew Emperor Haile Sellasie, and it became dangerous to be a Jew in Ethiopia.  Our quiet lives were changed forever.  Jews were tortured and some were killed– so we kept our faith hidden and prayed in secret.  I remember asking my mother “Is there a place where we wouldn’t be called Falasha, outsider, where we do not have to hide who we are?”

One night, when I was a young boy,  long before dawn my parents woke me up and told me we were leaving Ethiopia that moment. “Where are we going?” I asked.

“Jerusalem” they replied.

My grandfather put his hands on my head and blessed me.

" Thank you GOD You protect me in Peace all night" Protect me in Peace all day"!

Here is the prayer in Amharic:  ተመስገን ጌታዬ በሰላም ያሳደርከኝ በሰላም አውለኝ--

I closed my eyes and the prayer made me feel safe.

We had no time to gather our belongings, and only managed to bring a few things with us.  I took my brightly coloured blanket.  My mother took a buna (coffee maker) and my took father the Torah prayers in Amharic.  Then we had to go.   A group of 100 of us walked together.  It took us one month alone to get out of Ethiopia, hiding during the day, walking silently at night.  We walked 400 miles.  We were helped out of Ethiopia by rebels who took advantage of our vulnerability, stealing from us.  When we finally got to Sudanese border we hid all signs of our Jewish selves and said we were Muslims escaping the war. Whenever I was frightened I closed my eyes and heard the words of my grandfather’s prayers.  They made me feel safe.

When we got to Sudan we were sent to an overcrowded refugee camp jammed with Somalians, Ethiopians and others.  Thousands were dying around us.  One day someone took my blanket and I never saw it again.  I was scared and sad.  It would be another year before we got to Jerusalem.

I closed my eyes and heard my grandfather’s voice.  It helped me to feel better.

My family wanted to escape from the camps so they secretly paid a truck driver to take us to a nearby town called Gedaref.  We wanted to blend in and hoped nobody would notice us.  We never stopped trying to escape.  My parents were always writing lists, sending letters, imagining what a life in Israel might look like.

And then our dreams were shattered.  One day I disappeared.  I vanished from the streets of Gedaref in plain sight – drugged and then kidnapped.  My family kept looking for me.  They searched and searched but began to fear the worst and thought that I might never return.   And then I came back.  After three weeks I’d managed to escape.  I don’t remember how it happened.  I don’t remember that I was admitted to hospital and had to stay there for a month.  All I remember is that whilst I was missing I kept saying my grandfather’s prayer.  I kept believing it would save me.  The words gave me hope.

Almost miraculously, just a few days after I left the hospital we left Sudan on the secret Israeli mission called “Operation Moses” and came to Israel.   It was 1984.  I clearly remember being on the airplane, hearing people singing, not quite being able to comprehend that I was really free. I remember not being able to eat a thing as I was so excited.  In 48 days over 8000 Beta Israel were airlifted from Sudan to our new homes in Israel.  4,000 others died along the way.  The moment we had always dreamed of had arrived.  When the plane landed everyone was singing .   My mom told me not to cry and told me that we were safe now.   I left all trauma and darkness behind me and had hope.

When you ask me what I brought with me from Ethiopia I think about my blanket,  my mother’s coffee pot, my father’s prayer book and I am happy.   The things are linked to memories of my grandfather, of my mother making the best food, of the smell of coffee.

My grandfather’s prayer takes me to the place I used to run when I was a child and the place where I knew I would be ok – it helped me to survive and escape from the kidnappers and it has helped me ever since.  It gives me hope.

I whisper the prayer when I go to bed.  It makes me feel safe.  I say it a lot.  It will stay with me for the rest of my life.

" Thank you GOD You protect me in Peace all night" Protect me in Peace all day"!

Here is the prayer in Amharic:  ተመስገን ጌታዬ በሰላም ያሳደርከኝ በሰላም አውለኝ--

From illustrator Sophie Herxheimer

Firstly, what a privilege to hear the stories of Avishai and Violet. I found each story immensely touching in different ways. Thanks to both of you, and to Juliet and Reboot for inviting me to listen and respond. 

I am interested in objects as holders of history and memory, also objects as metaphors for ourselves. My priority was to get to the essence of the objects the narrators spoke of and try to put them in the context of the place from which they came, and explore the real meaning of the object. In terms of my approach, I have used the emotional power of paint, with colour and brushwork, to convey love, energy and movement. 

With Avishai, the fact that his blanket was stolen was so sad. Yet in his strength he has woven a new blanket. It’s just as warm and protective as the original one he had as a child, but it is invisible, being woven from Amharic words, the words of his beloved grandfather’s prayer.  For this reason, I put the relationship of Avishai and his grandfather in the middle of the painting, like a meditation, and surrounded their figures with a rich golden yellow, and added the other objects that were mentioned, the buna his mother brought, for traditional Ethiopian coffee, the delicious food she cooked: wafting those smells of home, as well as the worn out book his father brought, and a modest Ethiopian synagogue. I hoped to catch the spiritual and emotional richness that glowed from Avishai in golden light even now, even from an early life of difficult journeys, terrible loss and material poverty.