NAURU – There are 755 refugees on Nauru and 128 of them are children.

Both the Nauruan and Australian governments say they want the refugees moved on from Nauru, but they have been unable to reach agreements on where else they could be sent.

While that stalemate continues, many of these children are struggling to hang on to hope.

Here are some of the children still trapped in limbo.

Shamim is 17.

She’s from Myanmar and came to Nauru with her mother and grandmother. When she heard that she was going to Nauru, she thought it was Norway.

“When they told us you are going to Nauru. I was like ‘Oh we are going to Norway it’s so good. Norway is so beautiful. Mum why are you crying? We are going to Norway’,” she said.

“And they were like ‘No we’re not going to Norway, we’re going to Nauru and we don’t know what that place is like’.”

She wants to be an obstetrician.

“She was very talkative, she was always asking for more work, more work. She was very ambitious, very focussed on the future and very, very happy, bubbly,” her former teacher Tracey said.

Shamim has spent 1092 days on Nauru.

Misbah is 13.

She’s from Myanmar.

“We ran away from Burma because of the raping, and things happening to the girls, and burning houses,” she said.

It’s now four years since Misbah arrived on Christmas Island with her mother and three sisters. She says there wasn’t enough money for her father to come with them, so he planned to follow later.

“On the boat it was so dangerous and even my little sister was crying, ‘Oh I’m so scared of this swimming pool’,” Misbah said.

“She thought that it was a swimming pool and my mum was crying too but when we get to Christmas Island we are so happy that we are safe, we are here, and I was thinking that I would get to meet my father again.”

Misbah wants to go home, but her mother says they can’t.

“I asked my mum but she said ‘No it’s not possible, if we go back we will get killed’.”

Misbah has spent 1181 days on Nauru and Christmas Island.

Batol is 10. She’s from Iran and came to Nauru with her father and sister.

Batol wants to be a vet.

She’s a keen student and is having long distance lessons with her teacher from the detention centre, who is now back in Australia.

Batol has spent 978 days on Nauru, nearly a third of her lifetime.

Hossein is 19.

He’s from Iran where he planned to study medicine.

“You know like everyone else my age, we’ve got a dream and my dream is to study medicine and be a surgeon,” he said.

Hossein has spent 1134 days on Nauru.

- ABC/