According to the Global Missing Children's Network, an estimated 96,000 children go missing in India every year. Many are never found, getting carried away like chaff in the wind. Therefore, when one of them found his way home 25 years later with the aid of Google Earth, the story made headlines around the world. A Long Way Home gives a true-life account of this inspirational journey. It is not only a long and convoluted quest across continents and cultures, but also a road winding through poignant memories, painful losses and profound kindness.
This extraordinary story begins in the most non-descript of places—a one-room shack in a dusty village in central India. Sitting on the cowpat-and-mud floor is a five-year-old boy who will soon be lost. His name is Sheru, the Hindu word for lion, but he will later mispronounce his own name as Saroo and keep it to this day. While his mother and brothers are away working or foraging for food, Saroo is the protector and provider of his baby sister. As much as he loves her, he longs to be out in the world with his brothers. At the moment, he is begging his 14-year-old brother, Guddu, to take him along to the railway station where Guddu does odd jobs. His brother finally gives in. As Guddu's bicycle speeds through the night, Saroo is laughing happily, unaware that his life is going to take a fateful turn.
By the time they get to the station, Saroo is exhausted. “Just sit down and don't move. I'll come back in a little while and we can find somewhere to sleep the night.” These are the last words Saroo has ever heard from his brother.
When Saroo wakes up from a nap, he discovers that he is alone. In a blind panic, he hops on an empty train to search for his brother. Many hours later, Saroo is spat out in Calcutta (now Kolkata)—one of the most populated and unforgiving cities on earth—alone, penniless, terrified and unable to speak the local language. For weeks he lives on the streets, surviving on his instincts and whatever scraps of food he can find. Begging and scavenging is the easy part, which, after all, is not very different from the way he has lived back home. It is the homesickness that is the hardest to bear. At night he will cry to himself, “Where are you, Guddu? Please help me. Take me away from this place. I want to be with you and everyone else.” He sneaks aboard several trains departing from Calcutta, hoping one might take him back to his family. He has no luck. Eventually, he lands in a benevolent orphanage where he is adopted by Sue and John Brierley, an Australian couple in Tasmania; thus ending the first chapter of his remarkable odyssey.
Saroo is lovingly brought up by the Brierleys, and he flourishes, growing from the scared little boy into a robust and confident Aussie. But the astounding narrative does not end there, for Saroo never gives up hope of returning to his Indian family. He clings to his childhood memories, rehashing them in his mind in case he ever gets the chance to trace his footsteps. With the advent of Google Earth, Saroo embarks on a virtual journey of his hometown. For five long years, he examines every route out of Calcutta closely, poring over satellite images of the country for landmarks he recognises. At last, fate smiles on him. One day, he miraculously finds what he has been looking for.
The book culminates as Saroo reunites with his siblings, who are now married with children, and most of all, his mother. However, Guddu, the eldest brother whom he looked up to the most as a child, was found dead on railway tracks the very same day that he got lost. Though some questions remain unanswered, Saroo can finally lay the spectre of his painful memory to rest. At the end of his quest, he is able to make peace with his past and re-establish his self-identity. “I am not conflicted about who I am or where to call home,” he says. “I now have two families, not two identities. I am Saroo Brierley.”
Inspiring as the perseverance of Saroo is, equally admirable are the two mothers. Kamala, the mother who has given him birth, never moves from the neighbourhood where she lives, on the off chance that her son would find his way home one day. And Sue, the mother who has given him the second chance of life, has a special spirit. Her experience of growing up with a volatile father has led her to believe that “there was nothing sacrosanct about families formed only by birth parents”. She could have had her own children but she has chosen to adopt children in need from developing countries. Saroo says, “She and Dad thought the world had enough children born into it already, with many millions of them in dire need.”
Saroo's memoir prompts readers to ponder an intriguing question: What makes a family? Saroo's biological father deserted his pregnant wife and children for another woman and left them in hardship. Sue, Saroo's adoptive mother, endured a rough and bitter upbringing because of her father. Whereas the Brierleys, despite not having a blood relation with Saroo, have been nothing but supportive and caring, the best parents a child could hope for. It seems that blood might be thicker than water, but love is thicker than blood.
