On September 8, 2008, a boat carrying about 28 illegal immigrants from Africa capsized in the vicinity of an Armed Forces of Malta patrol boat on a Frontex mission.
Among those on board was a woman caring for two children, a toddler and a baby who was a few months old. The children were found floating face down, unconscious, the baby almost dead. The woman did not survive the ordeal.
Today, the children, named Destiny and Victoria after that fateful day, are living happily with their adoptive parents, Ewan and Susanna Nicholson, in the heart of Sliema. Recently, the Nicholsons decided to invite over the person who had first given the girls medical attention, saving them from certain death.
Sergeant Silvio Xerri, a member of the AFM Maritime Squadron for the past 18 years, is an engineer trained as a combat medic. The Nicholsons came to know about him through an article that appeared on The Sunday Times last year.
On entering the Nicholsons’ apartment, Sgt Xerri was greeted by two smiling, playful girls, the embodiment of health. The parents introduced him simply as “someone who had met you a long time ago”.
At the couple’s request, Sgt Xerri recounted the rescue operation in detail. He told them how a colleague brought the lifeless body of the baby, Victoria, on board the patrol boat. “She had no pulse, no breath... she was like a rag doll,” he recalled. After removing the water filling her lungs and applying CPR, Victoria started coughing and her heart beat returned.
“I became very emotional at that moment. But it was God who saved her, not me,” said Sgt Xerri humbly. It was the first time he had rescued a baby.
Destiny was also unconscious but was in a better state than her sister: “She was full of water too but her heart was beating.”
A helicopter arrived within minutes and whisked the children to Mater Dei Hospital.
The mother, Susanna, told him that when Destiny, the elder child who is now four, sees newspaper cuttings of the incident, which they kept for posterity, “it triggers something in her as if she remembers the event even though she was very young”.
The Nicholsons want to gather as much information on the children as possible because they have almost none. In order to determine their age and be able to establish an approximate birth date, they carried out a bone density test. They are also clueless as to their nationality.
“When they get to a certain age, they need to have more information… they would need, for example, a birth certificate,” Ms Nicholson said. “At one point, we would also have to face the race issue... Now they just say they are from Spain, like mummy...”
Ms Nicholson and her Australian husband would also like to know where the woman who was caring for them – who could possibly be their mother – is buried, so they could take the children to the cemetery and put flowers on her grave.
It’s been little over a year since the children were adopted but they have grown very attached to their guardians. “They get pampering from mummy and play with dad,” Ms Nicholson said as the girls stormed into the sitting room, jumping onto her lap, vying for attention.
Mr Nicholson pointed out that this bond grew gradually. “They first saw us a threat... It was traumatic for them to be ripped off from their environment,” he explained. The children were very attached to the nuns at the Ursuline Creche who Ms Nicholson described as “very affectionate and tactile”. So they would cry hard whenever the couple went to pick them up – at first, for the day and, subsequently, for the whole weekend – until, a couple of months later, they would cry not to leave their new home.
Another problem was the communication barrier. The children only understood Maltese while the couple, who met in Malta seven years ago, could only speak English. But within a month of living with the Nicholsons, Destiny started speaking English. Ms Nicholson said people were questioning how the children came to be adopted by a foreign couple. Besides going through the whole adoption process, like everyone else, she and her husband were the only couple who wanted two girls of any skin colour and accepted physical disability.
Victoria, now three, has one leg that is 10 to 12 centimetres shorter than the other, which, however, does not keep her from running and jumping all over the place.
“They are very energetic and physically strong. They keep me fit from early in the morning,” said Ms Nicholson. “But they are good girls, obedient and very happy kids.” The two children, seemingly oblivious to their recent past, lead a normal life, doing all the things other children their age love doing. Destiny, especially, enjoys dancing and singing. “She’s gonna be the Maltese Beyonce,” Ms Nicholson said proudly.
The Nicholsons used to tell the girls a story of how they were saved from the sea by a mighty dragon. Before Sgt Xerri left, Mr Nicholson decided to reveal to them the identity of the “dragon”. The two were incredulous and started giggling.
“Will you come to visit us again,” the girls asked Sgt Xerri as he walked out the front door.
He certainly intends to.