Anna, 40 years old

beneficiary of the psychological counselling and

psychotherapy service at the Athens Solidarity Center

She speaks softly; however, the most are expressed through her eyes –her pretty, brown, wet eyes, part of a white face that is composed of elegant female features. What Anna does not say with her voice or eyes, she does it unconsciously with her rich, brown, long hair – she touched it when she was feeling shy; when she didn’t want to answer a question; when she took a while to think.

One year ago, she faced an emotional and professional impasse. She didn’t have a job and she didn’t have someone to turn to for support – “I needed to talk and know that I would not be judged, but at the same time I needed guidance and advice to see the future clearly; a future that only frightened me in those moments.”

A series of random however fortunate events led Anna to the Athens Solidarity Center operating by SolidarityNow and in her first meeting with the head of the psychologists’ team. At first, she was reluctant and cautious, but quickly as she says, “I felt intimate with my psychologist, who encouraged me and made me trust myself as to move on relying on my own strength.”

Anna is not her real name. However, she chose this name to introduce herself to the readers of her story. The 40-year-old woman narrates unpleasant family memories; these memories led her to abandon her home when she was 16 years-old. Since then, Anna has lived a life of good and bad moments, many difficulties and always hard work and great effort. At some point in the past, a man, later her husband, appeared in her life. Although there are no longer a couple, she has kept good memories of this marriage.

Anna didn’t finish school because after she left her home she was forced to work for a living. She has changed a lot of occupations, some of them more some less interesting, whereas she has spent two years working in Britain. Last year, in addition to unemployment, she faced a temporary, but serious health problem. Her health was restored, as opposed to employment, resulting in a huge emotional gap.

It was that moment when Anna felt she needed help and looked for it. In the last year, she visits the Athens Solidarity Center once a week, receiving free support through psychological counselling and psychotherapy service. “My psychologist ‘builts’ me from scratch; he helps me to believe there is a share of hope for me too. He helps me to think positively and remain composed apart from rational.”

The outcome; Direct!

Anna is now a student at her neighbourhood’s night high school and in June she will graduate. Her next goal is to improve her English and get a relevant certification which will help her find a full-time job. In the meantime, she works as a private part-time employee.

But Anna’s most important achievement is that she gradually gains confidence both in herself and in others. She still needs to win the fear that other people will not respond to her expectations. Thus, Anna tries to be more lenient towards herself as well as the others.

And she seems to be doing really well.

*Anna is one of the beneficiaries receiving pro bono services provided to vulnerable population groups (Greeks, refugees and migrants) in the SolidarityNow Athens Solidarity Center. Find more about the Athens Solidarity Center: https://www.solidaritynow.org/en/kentro-allileggiis-athinas/.

This solidarity home hosts the Nour family – the father is called Nour, after his mother’s name. Mother and son are now in Athens together, but it’s not just the two of them. Nour has made his own family with Gofran and they have two children; the 3-year-old Mira and Elias, 7 months old, who was born in Greece.

In the middle of 2016, they all made the known trip from Syria’s Duma to Turkey, and then arrived at Greece with first stop at the island of Lesvos. Greece, and Europe in general, represented for them their rescue from war; the living hope for a safe life again.

“Today, I will cook mandi and tabbouleh”. We will eat with them. Grandmother Nour invites us while the young couple of Nour and Gofran reassure us that we shouldn’t miss the opportunity to taste her cooking! Until lunch time comes, a table full of fruit has already been set in front of us. Grandma doesn’t stop bringing in dishes, peeling apples, bananas, pomegranates and pears. “We always eat a lot of fruit. My mother has taught us that it is better than food“, says Nour.

They are great hosts and feel lucky being in Athens living in one of the six solidarity homes under the same name program implemented by SolidarityNow, in collaboration and with the support of the organization Help Refugees.

While the fruits are being peeled, Gofran tries to talk with us in Greek. She’s learning the language, like all “the Nours”, by attending Greek courses offered to the program’s beneficiaries by SolidarityNow educational teams. “The National Bank is between the pharmacy and the post office“. In today’s lesson, this is the sentence Gofran must learn to write, and has already learned to say. “I walk straight and on my right-hand is the supermarket and on the left, the pharmacy“.

Gofran wants to learn Greek, find a job and stay in Greece. At the same time, she confesses that she wants to learn piano and that she is a painter! She loves painting! Her father played the accordion and thinks she looks just like him and therefore, loves arts. But the discouraged Gofran, who is only 20 years old and mother of two, is still afraid to dream. She is now trying to change the belief that she doesn’t have the right to dream – “let things come, I don’t need to dream” – now she feels safe again.

And Grandma Nour wants to stay in Greece. She likes it very much, she thinks that Greeks and Syrians are very much alike and will do everything she can to find a job and offer her support to the family. She believes that she will also manage to bring her daughter to Greece; her beloved daughter who is still in Syria with her family.

Recently, grandma Nour and Gofran attended a photo seminar organized in collaboration with the Hellenic Center for Photography for the beneficiaries of SolidarityNow hosting programs. With the use of her own photos, Grandma Nour created a collage and wrote a short text related to her daughter, their unique relationship and expressed her feelings caused to their separation.

In the meantime, Nour continues to fix things in the house – he is very young and eager to start a new life in Greece. In Syria he was a baker; he believes he can be a baker in Greece as well.

Mandi and tabbouleh are almost ready, and the table looks wonderful. Gofran has Elias in her arms; she shows us our seats and we all enjoy homemade Syrian food. Life flows the same as it does in every home where there is a warm, welcoming and loving family, wherever its members come from.

Help us support more Families to find a safe Home – A Solidarity Home. Click here: https://www.solidaritynow.org/solidarity-homes/ 

*Solidarity Homes is a program implemented by SolidarityNow in collaboration and with the support of the organization Help Refugees. Through the program, which was initiated in June 2017, accommodation is offered to the most vulnerable population groups – Greeks and refugees – on the sole criterion of their urgent need.

The 19-year-old Aya from Syria is white like snow. She has a beautiful pure white face and great eyes. Wafaa, resembles her mother; she is Aya’s three-year-old daughter who has two lovely dark brown eyes. While we were eyeing Aya warily, she was chasing Omar, her two-year-old son.

Therefore, we started our conversation with Aya’s spouse, Abdul. The first question was his! He asks about our profession and when its his turn to answer the same, he gets up from his chair with excitement saying: “What do you want? I can make it!”. He is a carpenter and willing to make everything! Abdul has been to Greece before; he was afraid that war would break out in his country and that he would lose his job. As it happened.

He still remembers that during his initial stay in Greece, a woman had told him that whoever “drinks the ‘Greek water’ never forgets Greece and returns”. “I will never forget that”, he says. Besides, this is what happened to him as well. He liked Greece that much and when he decided to flee his country due to war, the only country he wanted to go was Greece.

Today, Abdul has created a beautiful, bright home for his family in Athens, which is one out of the six solidarity homes. Abdul and Aya attend the Greek language courses provided under the framework of the “Solidarity Homes” program, which is implemented by SolidarityNow with the support of the organization Help Refugees.

This is also only the start for Aya who lost the opportunity to finish school in her country and now dreams of doing so in Greece. She has an even greater dream; to become a paediatrician! Abdul, Aya, Wafaa and Omar participate in all the activities implemented for the members of the six families in the solidarity homes and they especially love     long walks like those to the sea. Aya dreams of having a car of her own one day as to drive far and get to know new places.

Aya talks about her homeland with nostalgia; she is missing it. But she is willing to start a new life in Greece, a life that surely, as she says, will be better for her children.

Later in the afternoon, Aya will meet Gofran and Ariz -neighbors- to take their tea together. Their relationship was developed through the “Solidarity Homes” program and all family members enjoy the company of each other. They have something in common; a hard past they want to leave behind, a safe present they are now sharing through the program and a future full of positive prospects for which they are willing to try.

Help us support more Families to find a safe Home – A Solidarity Home. Click here: https://www.solidaritynow.org/solidarity-homes/ 

*Solidarity Homes is a program implemented by SolidarityNow in collaboration and with the support of the organization Help Refugees. Through the program, which was initiated in June 2017, accommodation is offered to the most vulnerable population groups – Greeks and refugees – on the sole criterion of their urgent need.

It is just seven months old, yet is a hyperactive creature with restless eyes!

Our entrance into this solidarity home causes anxiety to this creature that feels uncomfortable and suddenly moves behind the door, just a breath away from the 3-year-old Josephine who knows she will offer protection, if necessary. She changes places at least ten times until she ends up under the left corner of Josephine’s bed; there she will be able to have everything under supervision; meaning our feet!

Her name?

Kitty.

Her identity?

Persian cat.

If we described her in one word, what would that be?

Bushy!

So, Kitty is the seventh member of the family in this solidarity home, that, as they say, is an equal member with its rights and obligations. These are truly the “magnificent seven”!

The family is in Greece since 1995, where they came as migrant workers. Today they are not considered migrants anymore, but they remain people who need to try hard to live in dignity, as the economic crisis in Greece has “brought them upside down”, as Daniela, 34, mother of three children, says and smiles bitterly. The same does her husband, Sergio, who shakes his head, applauding Daniela’s words. Our discussion for their family history that brings them today in one of the solidarity homes is often interrupted by their children’s crying and requests; but the solution is coming from the grandmother, the sixth but main member of the family who is there and solves everything.

The grandmother Anna who is only 65 years old has many stories to narrate. Anna her spouse sought a better future for their children in Greece in the mid-1990s. They worked hard and at some point, their efforts paid off, some of the dreams come true, their children grew up and they were living altogether happily. Thereafter, Anna’s daughter, Daniela, met Sergio and the couple started its life; today they are the parents of three children. However, the next years were not so good as the first ones of their common life – discharges, frustrations, increased needs, reduced revenues.

They first asked support by the competent services of the Municipality of Athens and later they were introduced to SolildarityNow; this is how they are nowadays residents of one of the six solidarity homes. They are so happy and grateful! “I laugh again! I’m not afraid now, I’ve gotten low and now I feel like I’m reclaiming life“, Daniela says. Sergio does not talk so much, but his eyes shine excited.

Now they have a home they can start from the beginning. They know, and they are not afraid of working hard. Now, Daniela works for a few hours in a retail store and is very happy about it; Sergio tries to find any job – they do not give up.

In one of the house’s rooms there is a table full of open books and notebooks; this is the office of the 8-year-old Natalia who goes to school. Her two younger siblings run around her and mix her things; a classic family moment in a home with children – a moment of a solidarity home.

Anna, the grandmother, Daniela and Sergio will make it; Greece is their country, they feel very close to the Greeks and do not change it. Together with Kitty, who is moving from her position, the family accompanies us to the door while we reschedule our appointment for a next meeting. Kitty looks at us until we leave the corridor – probably wanting to make sure we leave – this solidarity home is all hers again.

Help us support more Families to find a safe Home – A Solidarity Home. Click here: https://www.solidaritynow.org/solidarity-homes/ 

*Solidarity Homes is a program implemented by SolidarityNow in collaboration and with the support of the organization Help Refugees. Through the program, which was initiated in June 2017, accommodation is offered to the most vulnerable population groups – Greeks and refugees – on the sole criterion of their urgent need.

Firas counts his children and presents them one by one.

One, two, three, four daughters. The one more beautiful than the other!

“I am proud and lucky to have them”.

The 40-year-old Firas and his spouse arrived at Greece, having as their first stop the small island of Farmakonisi in Dodecanese. They have suffered a lot in their country. Firas was persecuted by the regime, lost his job, and his family faced threats. He had no other choice but to look for safety in another country. Thus, they all made the painful journey towards Europe.

Life in Syria was beautiful the old days, prior the war. Firas, as a civil engineer, was employed in the construction sector and managed to live with dignity in a safe environment. However today Firas and his family have found safety far away from their country in a country which they feel as if their own.

The four girls and their parents live in one of the six solidarity homes, in the context of the homonymous program which is implemented by SolidarityNow, with the support of the organization Help Refugees. They are happy for this progress in their lives. The four girls attend school and learn the Greek language. At the same time, their parents join the Greek language courses provided to all beneficiaries of the Solidarity Homes program -and not only.

Despite his health problems, Firas hopes that he will succeed finding a job after learning Greek. His aim is to gain back financial independence for his family.

Firas and his wife keep repeating that their four daughters are the ones supporting them emotionally. These wonderful girls who smile politely and embrace their parents throughout our conversation. The two older girls are also very good students. When the family was initially hosted in the organization’s structure in Peania, the two girls were the first to participate in the educational activities. They impressed everyone when they recited the poem ‘Eirini’ by Giannis Ritsos in fluent Greek!

“Peace is a glass of warm milk and a book in front of the child waking up”.

Help us support more Families to find a safe Home – A Solidarity Home. Click here: https://www.solidaritynow.org/solidarity-homes/ 

*Solidarity Homes is a program implemented by SolidarityNow in collaboration and with the support of the organization Help Refugees. Through the program, which was initiated in June 2017, accommodation is offered to the most vulnerable population groups – Greeks and refugees – on the sole criterion of their urgent need.

“I have the most beautiful woman; I know it“, says Rimon.

Ariz blushes and looks down. “He loves me“, she says.

And so it seems; Rimon and Ariz from Syria – parents of two children, the 7-year-old Lana and the 3-year-old Elias.

Their family is hosted in one for the six solidarity homes, in the context of the “Solidarity Homes” program, implemented by SolidarityNow in collaboration and with the support of the organization Help Refugees.

They live in Athens; they have gained back a normal daily life. As we were talking, Ariz cooked the family lunch, then she would read Greek and later she would take Lana from school. Before their night dreams, Lana and Elias will listen to mom’s stories; Ariz will do the same as she did in Syria; telling bed time stories either that she comes up with or some she knows from her mother. Any questions about the stories are answered in the morning!

Most of the neighbors think that Rimon and Ariz are from Greece and they talk to them in Greek. Ariz and Rimon smile politely at them because they are now learning the language by attending lessons provided in the context of the “Solidarity Homes” program. More specifically, the members of the six families hosted in the solidarity homes attend Greek and English courses at the organization’s Blue Dots Center and at the premises of the new SolidarityNow education and training center, in Athens. The same applies to little Lana, who attends Greek public school.

Ariz, at her 37 and Rimon at his 42, are a modern couple – they want to build a new life in Europe without memories from the past. They don’t want to talk about the past and the painful trip of their displacement. They lay all their hopes for a better future on themselves and their efforts to integrate into a European society and be able to work again. In Syria, both worked as nurses. Rimon and Ariz worked in the same city where they met and fell in love.

Ariz’s dream is her children “to become citizens of the world. Not to get through so tough times. In our 40 years, we were displaced. I want my children to live where there is safety“.

*Mate, originally an Argentinian drink, is very popular in Syria. The drink, which contains mateine (an analog of caffeine), is made by an infusion of dried leaves of yerba mate.

**Rimon, Ariz, Lana and Elias are now in Germany, hosted in a refugee camp and they are about to begin a new life. We wish them all the best!

Help us support more Families to find a safe Home – A Solidarity Home. Click here: https://www.solidaritynow.org/solidarity-homes/ 

*Solidarity Homes is a program implemented by SolidarityNow in collaboration and with the support of the organization Help Refugees. Through the program, which was initiated in June 2017, accommodation is offered to the most vulnerable population groups – Greeks and refugees – on the sole criterion of their urgent need.

Ahmad is a 50-year-old, lawyer, painter and poet.

In his country Syria and in the Arab world, is among the well-known contemporary authors. Even today, despite persecutions, imprisonment, health problems, family separation and the experience of becoming a refugee, he continues to write poems and prose that he sends for publication in Arabic newspapers and magazines.

He is married to the 44-year-old Nadjah, a former teacher, and a father of three; Yozan, 20, Haya, 18 and Abdalah, 13 years old. His financial situation was very good during the years he lived with his family in Raqqa, Syria. “For 20 years, a competent lawyer and active citizen“, he says.

Ahmad is hosted today in a SolidarityNow apartment in Athens, along with his eldest son Yozan, in the framework of ESTIA*, the Emergency Support to Integration and Accommodation program. In an apartment full of colors, paintbrushes and paintings, while in the center of this small house is the painter’s easel; the painter who does not stop to surprise. When he paints, he confesses, he needs to listen to music. Suddenly something intimate was heard – music by ‘Odes’, the album of Greek folk songs by Irene Papas and Vangelis Papathanasiou! At the same time, he says that one of his favorite painters is the Greek painter, Panayiotis Tetsis.

But Ahmad’s story begins earlier; a story in which he is the hero and tries hard to save his life. He left with his family and reached Turkey to get away from ISIS. They stayed there for a long time. The famous writer, Ahmad, although a refugee in Turkey, was almost every month a guest in a Turkish University to present his work, but also to speak about the life as a persecuted in Syria. Not even there, he stopped fighting for freedom of speech and human rights.

Shortly after, his wife with the two younger children returned to Syria when Ahmad’s mother-in-law died, with a view to returning to Turkey a few weeks later. But they didn’t manage to reunite. The borders were gradually closed. It was difficult for them to even move within Syria.

Ahmad and Yazan fled to Greece. From Farmakonisi to Leros, then to Athens and the SolidarityNow apartment. They are currently in anticipation of bringing the rest of the family to Greece. Ahmad, however, tries not to face life passively. He supports and relies on his son, a talented amateur footballer, as he sees him, he reads about ancient Greek culture and dreams of becoming a professional painter.  

*ESTIA, the Emergency Support to Integration and Accommodation program, is implemented by SolidarityNow, supported by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and funded by European Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid Operations (ECHO).

“We came here to the woods because we were told that there is no place for us in the camp. We kept waiting out in the cold. For what? For nothing. My wife was nine months pregnant. The first few days, we were offered help by friends, but also by people who didn’t know us at all. Then, someone left and gave us their tent. A few days ago, my wife gave birth to our third child, a girl. Her name, Rafif. My wife was admitted to the hospital and three days later the birth they told me we could leave. But we didn’t have anywhere to go, so we came back to the tent.

I left my country’s hell, a place without houses, people, life; a destroyed place. If I knew this would be the case, I don’t know if I had come. Maybe, I would have stayed to die in my homeland. The only difference here is that they don’t bombard us.

I cannot see any future here, life, prospects. We live in the woods, in the cold. Every morning we wake up frozen. I help my wife get up because her body hurts. We are sleeping down. I asked to transfer my wife to Kara Tepe until she gives birth. Nothing happened. And from day to day she will have our child.

All I ask for is safety and dignity for me and my family. If there was a life for us here in Greece, a job, I would like to stay here.”

Bashar, 29, comes from Syria where he worked as an electrical engineer. He arrived at Lesvos on November 16^th, 2017 with his wife Bara, 23, nine months pregnant, and their two children, Rima, 4 and Muhammad, 2 years old.

Note

Little Rafif and her family are now living in a warm home in Lesvos thanks to the kindness of a resident who helped them. The five members of Bashar’s family will sleep in a real bed, under a real roof, after such a long time!

“My wife is six-month pregnant; yet, she has not been either treated or examined by any doctor since we have come here. She is about to give birth to our fourth child. In Syria, we don’t have doctors anymore, they have all left the country because of the war. I didn’t expect that things here would be even harder for us. We live in a tent, into the mud. I must wait in a queue for at least two to three hours to get some food. Sometimes, if there are conflicts in the queue while waiting we go away empty-handed and hungry.

What is my wish? All I want is my children to go to school and live in safety. I want my pregnant wife who is in pain not to live under these nasty conditions. In the tent, it’s as if we live in a plastic bag. If we leave the tent open, it really grows cold; when we close it, it is cold again. Every so often I wonder; could anyone of the decision-makers bear his family to live in a tent?

What does festivity mean to me? Home. Safety. Dignity. Here, someone loses their dignity as humans. We have forgotten what celebration means. Any kind of feast is meaningless if you cannot offer your children the least of what they ask; a sweet.”

The 37-year-old Ahmed comes from Deir ez-Zor in Syria where he worked as a

shoemaker. He has been in Lesvos for a month with his wife Rasinta, 34, six

months pregnant, and their three children:

Basar, 11, Usar, 9 and Asma, 2 years old.