It wasn’t too long ago Yahye Fitaax was being carried to safety in his mother’s arms, whilst under heavy gunfire.
Born into the Somali Civil War, Yahye now resides in Melbourne and says if it wasn’t for the courage of his parents to move home, he’d probably be dead.
“Mum and dad would carry us kids and just run while someone was shooting over their heads at something or someone else. Bullets everywhere,” he recalls.
Living four hours out of a major city called Gaalkacyo, Yahye’s family, which also includes his two brothers and two sisters, was young and in desperate need of protection. But it was unattainable.
“Civilians versus civilians, rebels versus rebels, anyone vee anyone back in those days. It’s all about land, money and tribalism…that stuff goes to their head and they go overboard and start using guns and violence.”
Now, it’s all a distant memory, but those terrifying experiences have defined the 20-year old and allow him to cherish and appreciate the life he now lives.
“We were relieved to leave the country…like our land behind…not happy about it, but relieved that we left all the trauma and agonising pain,” he explained.
“It’s a war-torn country and back then when I was born, that’s when all the riots and all the wars had started. We had moved a lot and gone to different places just trying to get out and find a better life somewhere else.”
Aged six, Yahye was left in the care of his aunties and uncles in Somalia, while his parents fled to Australia to seek a better world to bring up their five children in.
“When we came here, it was a new start, but there was so much fear because we didn’t know what to expect from something completely different. To come from a country where I’d never even seen a white person, to a country where you hardly see any black people, it’s really tough.”
His father passed away when he was two, but his mother was always there for him. After remarrying, she made a brave decision to seek refuge overseas and it was a move that would change their lives forever.
“We went from Somalia to Kenya, because my Grandma was in Kenya. We were there with her for six months and then made the trip to Australia alone. Mum had organised the flights and stuff, we just needed someone to put us on the plane.”
Yahye can still remember the first time he actually saw a ‘white person’; it was on the plane during his one-way journey to Australia to reunite with his mother and step-father in 1998.
Surprisingly, the long trek went relatively smoothly - well almost.
“We lost my little brother in Singapore on the way over and found him two hours later asleep under a chair.
“The trip was fun, but also when you don’t know a word of English and you have never, ever seen a white face in your whole life, all you’ve seen is black people, and you go on a plane and see white people and they’re speaking a foreign language…you get, like…you get nervous and you are a bit intimidated and scared really.
“On the plane I was hiding under my older sister from the white people because I didn’t know who they were or what they were on about. I thought they were crazy. I thought they were not human.”
It was the same in Primary School at Brunswick North West where fear was Yahye’s first emotional response to most situations, followed by anger.
“School was a headache for me, because my older brother Abdikhane was a nutcase and loved to fight. Not knowing a word of English, he thought every word the other kids said to him was a swear word or something unpleasant, an insult…so every day, he would be in a fight.
“I have to jump in because my brother’s in a fight and I’m not gonna stand there and just watch my brother have a fight with three or four guys when I could jump in and do something to help him.”
But the tactic far from ostracised the pair and remarkably, became a way for them to integrate and ultimately be accepted.
“We’d start a fight, that’s how you make friends. You start a fight and then go to the Principal’s office and we would be made to shake hands and make peace. That was the only way we thought we could make friends.”
“That was the hardest bit, to feel accepted. To come out at recess, we were the only African kids until about Grade Six, and to see all the white boys playing footy or soccer…we wanted to play, but we didn’t know how to even ask. The first few years, me and my brother would just play by ourselves. But once we broke that barrier, that’s when all the fun started and we began to feel welcome.”
Some extra work on their English at a special language school made the transition even more bearable for Yahye and his brother, but there were still many other issues to overcome later in life.
“I didn’t really have any skills but just wanted to play sports. I always wanted to have a career in sport and a job in the AFL would do. If I couldn’t make it as a player, just to work there would be unreal.”
The second youngest of the Fitaax children, Yahye has found his feet through Australian Rules Football and the North Melbourne Football Club.
“I came to Australia and the first thing I picked up was a footy… I never put it down. Some kids at school introduced it to me and I was like, ‘what the hell is footy? How do you kick it and bounce it?’ I bounced the ball and it goes over there and then here…then I thought, ‘this is way more interesting than soccer’."
In 1999, Yahye watched his first game of AFL - it just happened to be the Grand Final between North and Carlton. The Kangaroos won the game, and won Yahye over.
“I was like, ‘that’s my team! I’m going for them from now on!’ But I think I cursed them,” he joked.
“They haven’t won a Grand Final since then!”
Now, he not only plays the game he loves, but has managed to land a dream job with the team he loves in The Huddle - a modern and innovative educational and community facility embedded within the North Melbourne Football Club.
“My mate’s dad was associated with the Huddle and my mate started working there first. I asked him to get me in there. I told him to see if I could come and work there too. I would have done anything to work there, I would have cleaned the North Melbourne Footy Club, just to be in there.”
A peer facilitator, Yahye’s role is to link in with the African community and help the children become more active and encourage them to participate in sport and education.
“It’s getting the kids to come down to the club and get involved in Aus Kick, the sessions in The Huddle, play sport like ‘Drop in Basketball’ after six o’clock.”
But it’s not a full-time position. During most days, he works as a casual for Linfox ‘picking and packing’ products to be sent out to various supermarkets and grocery chains.
Yahye was also studying Youth Work and Sports Recreation at Victoria University but says now that his foot is in the door at The Huddle, he wants to try and keep it there, permanently.
The thrill of working closely with his idols still hasn’t worn off.
“I go over the moon when I see Boomer (Brent Harvey)…a bit star struck.
"They’re really cool guys. Drew Petrie, you see him on the footy field and he’s so aggressive but then you meet him out here, and he’s the nicest bloke you’ll ever meet…he’s just a genuine guy.
“You see them out of footy, like out beyond that white line and see how they go about their daily routine…it just amazes me.”
Looking at the young man today and he’s a far cry from the timid six year-old who couldn’t communicate, integrate or even understand the world he was living in.
Perhaps his large, bold, eye catching afro hairstyle says it all. No longer is Yahye Fitaax someone who needs to hide behind his sister or swing for the fences in a school yard fight. He is proud of his heritage, well aware of his background and as hopeful as ever about seizing the opportunity to make good on the second chance gifted to him by his parents and step-father.
“I always think about how I can use this opportunity to my advantage, because there are people back in Somalia that would be craving to be in my position right now and for me just to waste it, would be idiotic.
“It was a great decision that my parents made to flee. I don’t know what I’d be doing if I wasn’t here today…if I was in Somalia, worst case scenario…I’d be dead.”
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