Video

“They think that as soon as they arrive here, they will get a well-paid job and be able to support their families. But it’s difficult to get a job and there’s a long process to go through before you can stand on your own feet.”Daniel speaks about the cultural shock asylum seekers experience when they arrive in the country of asylum and realize that nothing is what they had expected. 

Originally from Mogadishu, Halima has been through a great deal during her journey to Europe. And despite her eventual arrival there, the last seven years have seen her traveling between different countries seeking asylum without any success.

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.

“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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

“I almost decided to jump off the big ship, but my friends held me back. They supported me and stood by me. Then when we arrived in Lampedusa, we learned that she was alive and that there were many who had remained in Libya.” Ibrahim thought his wife had perished crossing the sea to Italy. Watch his story!

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!