Video

At home in Nigeria, Caroline worked as house help. She had grown up an orphan, but after a fight in the village, she fled what little family remained to her. In town, she met a man who told her his sister had a supermarket in Europe and could arrange a good job for her there.

Three Nigerian men in a centre for migrants in Italy share their stories with each other. From different backgrounds and circumstances, they all travelled to Europe along the same route: through the Sahara desert to the Libyan coast, then across the Mediterranean.

Kiros and his wife Adiam met in a refugee camp for Eritreans in Ethiopia, got married and started a family. Because of the lack of job opportunities in the camp, they moved to Sudan, where they hoped to be able to earn a living. That proved to be very difficult, and Kiros decided to go to South Sudan, where he stayed working for a year. When he returned to Khartoum, his family had left to go to Europe via Libya. Their situation in Sudan had become unbearable and Adiam had not been able to contact her husband. He now had no idea where they were but decided to follow them to Europe.

Sagal is a young Somali woman who fled her homeland because her family demanded her daughter should be circumcised. She refused. She says she is an educated woman and does not want her children to go through what she had been forced to endure as a child.

Awet was traveling through the Libyan desert when they heard that fellow Eritreans had been caught by ISIS (Daesh) and killed. It was a dreadful situation because he had taken a group of Eritrean teenagers under his protection.

Foosiyo is a single Somali mother sharing the same fate with so many other Somali mothers: her son was captured by traffickers in Libya who demanded a huge amount of money for his release. But Foosiyo is not just any common Somali woman, she is a famous poet and social activist and is fighting back. She established a group of parents whose children were kidnapped on the way to Europe.

“Some friends of mine had travelled with smugglers. They told us they had a nice life over there. That’s what made me forget my sweet life, forget my beloved mother, also forget my beloved family, that’s why I left.”

Abdirahman thought he would easily get to Europe through Libya but his dreams were brutally crushed.

Abdirahman was living in Hargeisa, Somalia when he started getting jealous of his friends who had gone to Europe. They were telling him that life there was wonderful, and he wanted to join them. With some other youths, he contacted a smuggler who arranged for their trip through Ethiopia, Sudan, and Libya. In the beginning, the journey was easy and the smugglers friendly and helpful.

Liban Mohamed thought the journey would be short and easy. Instead he ended up in a torture chamber in the desert. Watch his story!

“People were drowning as the boat was sinking. People were dragging each other down. Some were stuck on the boat, others were clinging to each other.” Mohamed was one of only 50 who survived when an overloaded boat with 600 onboard sank on the way from Libya to Europe. Watch his story!

“I was told that in Europe you find money everywhere, even in the streets. A place where you can find money easily and can build your future.” Mustafa was seduced by all the fantastic stories and decided to take the smuggling route to Europe through Libya.

“The journey had a huge impact on my life. It’s not something you can easily forget. I faced a lot of things that I didn’t expect, beating, robbery and pain. I saw a lot of suffering that I hadn’t even imagined before. Things I had heard about but thought were lies.”