The British teenager who reappeared in France after being missing for six years has spoken out about his escape, revealing he ran away after an argument with his “anti-vax” mother because he was fed up with her hippie “pain in the arse.” Lifestyle.
“We had a stupid argument over nothing,” Alex Batty, now 17, said in an interview with The Sun, just days after returning to the UK and reuniting with his grandmother.
“My mom can argue about anything, so it doesn’t take much. She is very clear about her views.”
The boy said he had been living a “nomadic” lifestyle across Europe with his mother, Melanie Batty, and grandfather as part of a “spiritual community.” In September 2017, when Alex was 11 years old, his mother and grandfather took him on vacation to Spain and never returned home.
He finally decided to leave and join his relatives in the UK earlier this month, after his mother decided she was going to uproot them again to Finland.
Alex Batty was living with his mother, Melanie, and grandfather David in France in 2017 when he ran away at the age of 11. ITV
Alex said he feared what his future would be like if he stayed with his mother, whom he candidly described as “a great person… but not a great mother” because she was “set in her ways.”
“From the last few years I was able to get an idea of what life would have been like,” the teenager said. “Moving. No friends, no social life. Work, work, work and not study. “That’s the life I imagined I would lead if I stayed with my mother.”
He described the radical and unconventional lifestyle his mother led and had imposed on him as a “pain in the butt.”
Batty wrote a note to his mother before running out, telling her not to worry about him because he knew how to take care of himself. AP
And so he hatched a plan to leave, something he had considered doing for at least two years and even argued with his mother and grandfather, David Batty, 67, who helped raise him since he was a toddler.
On the night of December 11, while his mother was lying in bed at the farm where they had stayed in the Aude region of France, Alex laid out four T-shirts, three pairs of pants, a skateboard, a flashlight, 100 euros and a Swiss army. He put the knife in a backpack and left.
Before leaving, the 17-year-old left a farewell note to his mother, explaining his decision.
“Hello mom, I want you to know that I love you very much,” reads the note, to which The Sun had access. “I am very grateful for the life you have given me over the past few years.
“Don’t worry about yourself, I’m sure they won’t find you. Don’t worry about me either, you know I can take care of myself. I love you very much, don’t be too angry with me. “I love Alex.”
Alex said his mother had been strongly opposed to him returning home to the UK.
Batty sent a Facebook message to his grandmother, Susan Caruana, when a truck driver picked him up in France earlier this month. CHRIS NEILL / MEGA
“She was very anti-government and anti-vaccine,” he said. “She was worried that if she returned to a country and got my ID they would put me in care. Her slogan was to become a ‘slave of the system.’”
But he explained that he was tired of working instead of going to school and not having friends his age or a social life.
The teenager was discovered by a delivery driver crossing a bridge near the southern French city of Toulouse in the middle of the night in a downpour on December 13.
“I was a little worried,” Batty told The Sun while talking about being picked up by a stranger in the middle of the road.
Although he says he loves his mother, Batty felt that she did not do her job raising him as the two always had a difficult relationship, especially since his parents separated when he was only 2 years old. family brochure
“I thought, ‘What kind of lunatic would pick up another lunatic in the middle of the night in the pouring rain?’”
He lied to the driver that he had left a remote mountain community in the Pyrenees and asked him to use his Facebook account to send a message to his grandmother in the UK.
Batty said he was trying to protect his mother and grandfather from legal repercussions when he lied about crossing the Pyrenees on foot and offered additional false information intended to confuse police.
“I’ve been lying to try to protect my mother and grandfather, but I realize they’ll probably get caught anyway,” he told the outlet. “I pretended I’d been on such a long trip for that reason.”
French authorities said last week that they thought Melanie Batty might be in Finland and that David Batty appeared to have died.
On Friday, British authorities announced they had launched a criminal investigation into Alex’s alleged kidnapping, which they said would involve his mother.
The teenager returned to Oldham, near Manchester, on Saturday and stayed with his grandmother Susan Caruana, who is his legal guardian. She said he was happy to be home.
“The house is different now, but it still feels the same,” he said. “The biggest difference is that when I left I was a boy, but now I’m 6ft, so I’m too big for the bed. It feels great to be back.”
The 17-year-old said he wants to go to university to study computer science, cybersecurity or blockchain development, while continuing to study the French language.
“I’m going to be very busy studying and catching up,” he told the newspaper.
With post cables
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Source: vtt.edu.vn