Sophie Skips Town

We see the familiar face of Roshida’s husband smiling into the phone. He’s lying in bed with Roshida’s two grandchildren. Just as his face comes on the screen, Roshida holds up a piece of the “doi fida” that she was eating. “Doi fida” is one of the many traditional Rohingya snacks I’ve tried in Roshida’s home. She and her daughters were making the doi fida all day — all the while, keeping her family in the loop the whole time. 

When I say she keeps her family in the loop all the time, I mean all the time. They do everything together over the phone. Cooking, cleaning, eating meals, taking care of the children, everything. 

Her family is in 5 countries on 3 continents. It’s been years since they’ve seen each other in person. They are one of the most scattered families I know, yet they are with each other almost every second of the day. All because of a phone.

But it wasn’t always like that.

When I first met Roshida in Thailand, she had no access to a phone. Living in limbo at a temporary shelter, she could only contact her family maybe once a month. But the phone calls were limited to just a few minutes. All the other women also needed to contact their families on the shared phone that was available to them.

When I first saw Roshida in America, she was a different person. She had a phone. That means she had her family back. There were very few minutes in the day when she wasn’t talking on the phone. Sometimes she would call on multiple phones, pull up the Facetime, then give me all the phones so I could speak to multiple family members at once.