Brothers Pacharo and Gideon Mzembe were five and six when they arrived in Australia fleeing Malawi with their family.
Gideon, a former NRL player and Pacharo are venturing back closer to home co-starring in a play "Prize Fighter".
In it, Pacharo plays Isa, a young Congolese boxer, overcoming his past as a child soldier as he faces the biggest fight of his career.
But the Mzembes are no stranger to conflict.
A war broke out while we were in Africa and we were misfortunate enough to experience what it was like to be under gunfire...
Up until 1994, the Republic of Malawi had been governed by a one-party state for more than 30 years, known for jailing and killing its opponents.
We were born in Zimbabwe in exile and then you'd go country hopping. But we did go back to Malawi but it was very unsafe because once they find out who your relatives with, it was yeah, not so good.
Their father, opposing the regime, fled first and gained political asylum in Australia.
The boys then followed with their mother, arriving in Adelaide before settling in Queensland.
"Our first memories, um, just the kind of welcoming that we got. It threw me back a little bit, because you just don't know what's was going on. But in hindsight now it was phenomenal. I mean the big feeds and the meeting relatives of other people's relatives and not our own, and being invited to weddings and things like that, you just asked yourself and you're just waiting for that next gun shot and it never came. And then after that it was, you start to quickly adapt and comprehend, "OK, we actually in a safe place."
Gideon, recalls a strong sense of loneliness.
You just left your country speaking your native tongue and coming here and you can barely put words together like hello, my name is Gideon and conversations would start to deteriorate from there on ...There's kids running around and you want to interact with them but the best you can give them is a smile and reintroduction of your name.
But they both gained scholarships that catapaulted them to successful, but different, careers in football and acting.
A visit back to Malawi nearly two decades later instilled in them a stronger drive.
When you did come back you had a sense of duty. Because our father pulled us aside and said, "just because you're over there doesn't mean everyone over here is not thinking about you. Just remember that this person here, this other Mzembe member, your family member who doesn't have anything, that the fact that you share the last name is humbling to them, but they have a sense of honour to know that there's someone else over there making it big." And obviously it's about sendingh elp or giving back.
Today, they are still trying to comprehend just how their lives unfolded.
Pacharo: "Back then I had no idea I'd share a stage with my athletic brother when we split and he went to sport and I went to the arts. And now we're back here. What about you?"
Gideon: "No, not at all. Couldn't have written this if I tried. Yeah."
