Salma’s Story, Greece
Under different circumstances, Salma* would now probably dance traditional Kurdish dances and study beauty and make-up artistry. Instead, at just 19, she has already spent four years in exile after fleeing Aleppo. Living in a small apartment in Athens with her husband and their 3-year-old son, Salma longs for the day she will see her mother and beloved brother Omar again.
“I was just 11 when they came to arrest Omar, 15 then, for demonstrating against the regime. I still can’t forget how he was screaming to stop the beating of our father for ‘raising him wrong’, as they said. Omar was sentenced to ten years in prison while our father spent five years in the opposite cell so that he could hear his son being tortured…
Things got worse in 2009 when they arrested and tortured my youngest brother Nizar, 13, also for demonstrating. After his release, he resumed his activity and was wanted again. We had to move every 2-3 months to hide. The world still had no idea of what was really going on inside Syria. By 2010 most of my friends were arrested. Nizar and I had to get out of Syria the soonest possible.
At the beginning of 2010, Nizar arrived as unaccompanied minor to Greece. Ten months later I followed in his footsteps.
I was lucky. I had an uncle at the border control who managed to stamp my passport without anyone checking. My mother accompanied me to the border. In our last moments together we couldn’t utter a word. We just held each other and cried. Before turning to leave, I grabbed her headscarf. This scarf, along with a bracelet and a key-ring Omar made for me in jail, are my most precious possessions.
The most important things Salma took when she fled Syria: her mother’s headscarf and a bracelet and key-ring Omar made for her in prison. Photo by UNHCR/ E. Nazil/ 2014
In Athens I found Nizar and my fiancé, whom I married a year later. I applied for asylum two months after my arrival. Recently I got notified that my case was interrupted and I am currently trying to re-open it so that my application is examined.
I can’t even think of the future unless my family’s situation changes**. The hardest thing is that I can’t be by my mother’s side. I feel she’s left all alone. I want to get my documents to be able to meet her in Turkey. Omar is also always in my mind.
Would I do anything differently given another chance? But we did nothing wrong.The first to join demonstrations was our mother, then the ‘message’ was handed over to all my brothers, one by one, then to me. There was no choice but to fight for what was right to us.
If I could turn back time, I would treasure the moments we were all together. What I miss the most are those times when our parents, mad for something we had done, gathered us around the kitchen table to tell us off. How I would love to be back at that table right now…”
Salma’s testimony has been recorded by: Elisavet Nazli UNHCR/2014.
*Names changed for protection reasons
** Omar, now 23, has been in prison for the last eight years. He has come very close to dying from torture and famine. Nizar, almost 18 today, managed to go to Germany a year ago where he has already been granted asylum and has applied for family reunification. Salma’s parents have moved to Damascus to be closer to Omar. No matter the risk, they have decided to remain in Syria until his release in 2016, hoping then to be able to reunify with Nizar in Germany.
