Name: Go Back to Where You Came From
Genre: Documentary

Go Back To Where You Came From is a Logie Award-winning Australian TV documentary series, produced by Cordell Jigsaw Productions and broadcast in 2011 and 2012 on SBS.

The series followed two parties, each of six Australians, all members having differing opinions on Australia's asylum seeker debate, being taken on a journey in reverse to that which refugees have taken to reach Australia.

Go Back to Where You Came From

Go Back To Where You Came From Live - Trailer

Six ordinary Australians agree to challenge their preconceived notions about asylum seekers and refugees by living like refugees for 25 days. They move in with real refugees building a new life in Australia, before taking a perilous journey to unknown shores on a leaky boat.

Episode 1

Six ordinary Australians move in with Burmese refugees in Malaysia and are confronted by the harsh realities of their daily struggle to survive. As they forge emotional bonds, the Australians are shocked to learn the Burmese are in constant fear of arrest. During a midnight immigration raid it becomes clear why.

Episode 2

Continuing their reverse refugee journey, six ordinary Australians travel to Kenya and Jordan to live as refugees. In Kenya, they discover the daily struggle to survive in one of the world’s biggest refugee camps, while in Jordan, they navigate life in its dire slums. Unexpectedly, the Australians are offered a chance to travel all the way to two of the world’s most dangerous cities: Goma in the Congo and Baghdad, Iraq. Will they take on the challenge?

Episode 3

Host Anton Enus will join the participants Adam, Gleny, Raye, Raquel, Darren, Roderick and their family and friends for a forum event that will continue the important conversation around refugees.

The Response

In the second instalment of this award-winning series, six prominent Australians risk their lives to experience the reality of refugee life as they embark on an extraordinary and confronting three-week journey. Tempers flare as the Australians - Peter Reith, Catherine Deveny, Angry Anderson, Michael Smith, Imogen Bailey, and Allan Asher - move in with resettled refugees and asylum seekers. But nothing can prepare them for the twists and turns in store. They face mortal danger in the world's deadliest cities - from the sweltering, war-torn capital of Somalia, Mogadishu to the riotous streets of Kabul, freezing amid the mountains of Afghanistan.

In this episode, the refugee experiment gets bolder still. The Australians experience two countries torn apart by war. With ever-present danger, their differences become more pronounced. In Afghanistan, Reith, Deveny, and Anderson arrive as riots break out across the country. Tension is high as the Australians are confronted with a stark reminder of why so many Afghanis desperately want to escape their country. They meet victims of violence and visit makeshift camps for displaced Afghanis. Meanwhile, in Mogadishu, Smith, Bailey, and Asher meet a group of mothers desperately trying to keep their starving children alive. They then join the greatest human exodus of modern times, heading for a refugee camp on the Ethiopian border.

In the final episode, the Australians head for Indonesia. They live with a refugee family in Jakarta, desperate to get on a boat no matter what the risk. Reith, Deveny and Anderson travel to the island of Roti, a recruiting ground for people smugglers. But the young men they meet are not the villains they expected. The six Australians then become boat people themselves, aboard an Indonesian fishing vessel headed for Christmas Island and directly into the eye of a storm. Finally, with unprecedented access to detainees, the journey reaches an emotion-charged conclusion within the walls of the notorious Christmas Island Detention Centre.

Tempers flare when six Australians move in with refugees who were once "boat people" and nerves are tested as they retrace their hosts' journeys back to some of the most dangerous places on earth.

Join Jenny Brockie for a special live Insight featuring all six participants from the Go Back to Where You Came From series.

Peter Reith, Angry Anderson, Catherine Deveny, Michael Smith, Imogen Bailey and Allan Asher will be reunited, and joined by family members and a studio audience.

Have their views changed? What reaction have they had from their family, friends and the public since the show aired? And what’s the backstory to some of the key moments in the series?

Go Back to Where You Came From

Genre

Release Date

User Reviews

Available On (US)