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Like many young Eritrean men, Yohannes first sought asylum in Ethiopia and lived in a refugee camp there. Nine months later he was granted the opportunity to study at Mekelle University in Ethiopia, majoring in a three year Business Management Program. Upon graduation, unable to secure a job as a refugee, he was forced to go back to the refugee camp where he stayed for a year. Frustrated over waiting, he decided to embark on the journey to Europe.

While living in Somalia, Abdisalan found himself having to choose between two fires. War had broken out in his home area that resulted in his his father being killed by Al Shabaab militants right before his eyes. Having nowhere else to go, he decided to flee Somalia. He embarked on the journey despite knowledge that it would certainly present its own problems.

“Before I got abducted, I had no intention of going to Europe or America,” Filmon says. “Since my training was mainly within electronics repair and IT, my hope was to work in Uganda or Angola.”

It’s a warm September afternoon and we’re sitting at a refugee center in Munich. With us are Osman and Mohamed, two Somali asylum seekers who have been living in Germany for three and eleven months, respectively. As they remember the journey they endured to get here, Mohamed is much more talkative while Osman is more reserved.

Akberet’s journey from Eritrea to Europe started in 2012 when she left Eritrea to find work in Sudan, where she ended up living for nine months. Originally she had no plans to leave, but life there proved to be too difficult. After watching many others depart for Europe, she decided to take her chances and join them.

Baylon, in his early 20s, was born in Sudan to Eritrean refugees. While in Sudan, he got into a conflict with the law authorities who threatened to deport him to Eritrea. He escaped prison, and within two days he had started on the perilous journey to Libya.

Faisal was living in Saudi Arabia with his family when he found himself on the wrong side of the law and was sent back to Eritrea. No more than six months after his arrival, and at the age of 17, he decided to take the journey to Europe.

Zeregabir is a man who’s been to hell and back and lived to tell the story. Over the course of his journey through the Libyan Desert, he visited the brink of death repeatedly, returning each time barely alive.

Ahmed left Eritrea in 2014, crossing the border into Sudan where he spent no more than ten days before embarking on the infamously dangerous journey through Libya. No sooner had his journey begun, did he find himself face to face with death.

Andemariam is an Eritrean refugee in his early 40s, although he appears to be much older. He is frail and walks in small paces with a distinct tremor. He is not well, and hasn’t been ever since his arrival in Europe nearly a year ago. Europe, a destination he had not intended. A journey he had not planned for. At the time of this interview he was living at a refugee center in Munich, Germany.