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For me, like many, the Syrian civil war is a world away.
It is something I see on television, read in the paper or hear on the radio.
It is why I have been so moved by a piece, Gardens Speak, featured at this year's Adelaide Festival.
Hearing someone's story from beyond the grave is not new.
Hearing someone's story while lying on their 'grave', I imagine, is.
Let me explain.
I am one in a group of just 10 audience members who are about to embark on a very personal journey with someone we are yet to meet.
After being given a plastic raincoat to wear and a card, with a name in Arabic to keep safe, we are ushered into a dimly lit room, where a long-rectangular garden bed, sits in the centre.
It is there we see 10 timber boards representing gravestones, each with a name matching those on the cards.
After a few moments, we hear chanting.
It is our cue, to find the 'grave' we have been assigned.
When I find mine, I kneel down in the dirt and can faintly hear a voice underneath.
Voice shares story from beyond the grave
As I scoop away some of the soil, the voice becomes clearer, and so I lie down, ear to the ground.
I can smell the damp soil which is sticking to my face and covering my feet. But I am immersed.
It is like someone is whispering in my ear.
In my case, his name is Mustafa.
He tells me about his work, about being a non-violent activist, about how he met his wife and their plans for the future.
He then tells me about the day the pair attend a demonstration during the Syrian uprising.
The day he is killed.
He tells me how his death affected his family, how his wife helps those around her, but is sad, and how he wishes he could tell her that she is not alone.
As I lie there, dirt now under my fingernails and in my hair, I finally get the tiniest insight into this world, so far away.
Families bury dead in gardens as funerals targeted
It is just what artist and Gardens Speak creator Tania El Khoury hoped for.
"I wanted the audience to place themselves in the place of those victims, to build an intimate relationship with them, to think how would they have lived through that," she said.
"But I wanted it to be more than that, what was their lives, their hopes, their dreams. I wanted them to bear witness to their lives."
In 2011, Ms El Khoury began collecting stories of people who had been killed during the early stages of the revolt against the Assad regime and who were buried in private gardens.
She later spoke with family and friends to create the first person narrated oral histories which feature in the sound installation.
"There were various reasons for garden burials, one because people couldn't get to cemeteries because of shelling and snipers," El Khoury said.
"But the more poignant reasons were the fact that the regime was targeting funerals and denying people any celebration of the first victims of the uprising, or turning them into heroes or icons.
"So people wanted to protect the community who was coming to celebrate them by making these home funerals."
After about 30 minutes, we emerge, give back the raincoats and cards, wash our hands and feet and return to our world.
Chatting afterwards to fellow audience member Ruth, we both agreed that while Gardens Speak is like nothing we have experienced before, it is one we are richer for having done so.
"I found it a really immersive experience," she said.
"I found it an interesting way of looking at what's going on, and I think looking at individual stories makes it come home, what an atrocious thing that's happening there."
Topics: arts-and-entertainment, unrest-conflict-and-war, performance-art, adelaide-5000, sa, syrian-arab-republic