Iraq-born refugee Saad Tlaa used to spend hours sketching the buildings of Villawood when he was a detainee there. Because art materials were scarce, he would make his own ink from grains of instant coffee.
He doesn't have time to draw or paint much anymore. In 2011, just a month after being interviewed for the SBS online documentary Detention Centre, Tlaa's life took a turn for the better when his wife and four children arrived in Australia.
"It was almost three years to see them again," he recalls. "When I went to the airport to welcome them, I don't know if I'm happy or to cry. It was a really amazing mixture of feelings."
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Tlaa left his first home in Iraq during the Gulf War in the early 1990s.
He spent the next 20 years in the Philippines before becoming a UNHCR-certified refugee.
Click on the image above to explore Australia's detention data.
"I cannot stay there in the Philippines," he says. "For a time I was also in jail there because of my nationality. It was a really big headache for me and for my family."
"You don't really feel safe because of the problem of human rights there as well."
Despite the threat of persecution in Iraq and his experiences in the Philippines, he says being placed in detention in Australia was still a shock.
"I'm aware that it will be something like they'll restrict your movements or you'll be questioned, or [the immigration authorities] will investigate you, but I wasn't really expecting a jail."
"Detention, they just make it a beautiful word for jail."
Tlaa and his family have established a new home in Adelaide, the "quiet place" his family have settled in to start their new life.
"The first year was really hard for their adjustment, but it is good now, everybody going to school," he says.
He still hopes to one day achieve his goal of earning a living in Australia as an architect.
"It seems it will take more time than I was expecting," he says.
"Now I'm doing an interpreting course, hopefully I can finish it by next year and I will apply for a job."
"The architect course is my next step after I get a job."
Tlaa doesn't think much about Villawood these days, but says there are parts of the experience he'll never forget.
"Your friend committing suicide in front of you. That is the really hard one," he says.
"How the government can do something to stop that, I don't know, really. It depends about the government and their policy."
