‘I Won’t Lie, I Can’t Lie To You And Say I Am Happy Here.' --

[bemildred]

What It's Like To Be A 20-Something Syrian Female Refugee Living In Germany



‘I will not lie and say I am happy here’ 23 year-old Zahraa Daoud says. ‘We have been here for six months and we are not happy, we didn’t know the language and, if you don’t, you cannot go to school, to university or to work.’

She is currently in Germany, safer than she was in Syria, but in a state of limbo. ‘I was studying English literature at university in Syria but I stopped because of the war. I’m 23, for the last three-and-a-half years this has been my life’, she says. ‘I’m 23. For people my age it’s very difficult. Many of my friends are still in Syria, not all people can leave, some can but it’s difficult because they need the money to come here. It’s not just money for the journey but in the first two months after arriving we used all of our money.’

It’s hard to miss the reporting about the refugee crisis. It’s hard not to encounter a wide ranging mixed bag of views on the subject: whether that’s a slightly xenophobic relative, another News at 10 report, a friend who’s gone to volunteer over in Calais, someone you know currently living in Germany, Donald Trump or a taxi driver with tiny boxing gloves hanging on his mirror, which read ‘Afghanistan’ in small but bold red letters, who tells you that he has lived in Britain for 8 years and he, like Zahraa, can not go back home.

Zahraa and her mother made the journey from Syria to Stralsund, in Germany (where she is now) last September. She is one of more than a million migrants and refugees who crossed into Europe in 2015. Theirs is not the narrative that many headlines would have you believe is the norm; they are not male for one and Zahraa was a student before the civil war put paid to her education, while her mother was a teacher. They had no choice but to leave their home, friends and family, but the decision was not one the took lightly.

http://www.thedebrief.co.uk/news/real-life/what-its-like-to-be-a-20-something-syrian-female-refugee-living-in-germany-20160262281

[Jefferson23]

1. Too sad but I am glad to know her voice is being heard..somewhat at least. K&R

[bemildred]

2. We try.

There were some posts today about the "White Hollywood" controversy, which I don't really want to get into (you can look at it as much better than when I was a kid, or the same old "Orientalism" Edward Said was talking about back then).

So anyway, yeah, let them be heard. Let everybody have a turn at the Mic.