Mohadese

full interview

Now, please introduce yourself.
My first name and last name, you mean?

Yes, the ones you told me already.
My name is Mohadeseh, and my surname is [redact]. I’m from Afghanistan. I’m 19 years old. I have immigrated, and I’m currently in Greece.

What kind of house are you living in now?
We’d been in Victoria park for a certain amount of time, and after that, some beneficiaries affiliated with church took us to a hotel, and it’s been three months we are in this hotel.

Are you pregnant?
Yes.

How long have you been pregnant?
Nine months.

Can you explain your living conditions?
In the early days, we’d been through difficult situations, but thank those who brought us here, in this hotel. We’re comfortable living here.

Are the hotel’s amenities good?
Yes, it’s good.

Who do you live with?
My husband and I.

How do you spend your time during the day?
By cooking, doing dishes, washing clothes, going out if I have anything to do, sending emails. Do the things I have to do for approval.

Have you received your approval?
Yes, the first one.

What makes you enjoy your life or be happy?
Having peace of mind, being with your loved ones, family.

How has your life been since you got to Greece? What are the pros and cons of being here?
We’d been through so much trouble in Greece, we had difficult times in both Athene and the island. We’d been on the island for one year and two months. They kept marking me red, once they put me as underage because I was a month short of being 18 years old, and they separated my case from my husband’s. And then he interviewed us, and after 10 days, the result was declared, and we were rejected. I miscarried twice back then and I had all the medical documents, but wherever I went, nobody cared about me, I’d show them the documents and nobody bothered to look at them. At last I had no choice but to come to Athene. If they had done something regarding the progress of my case, why would I have come here? I came to Athene, and here I experienced more difficulties than the island. I was pregnant as well. They blocked my bank card account. And now I am here until someone helps me and I get to my second result.

What does it feel like to live here?
I couldn’t have imagined I could live through all these difficulties. I always thought the conditions must be good for one to live. From the day we got to Europe, I realized that it is possible to live in a harsh condition.

Have you ever thought you have the ability to be in this situation and handle it?
No, I have never thought it could be possible to live like this.

Do you think that all these hardships have made you stronger?
Yes, it’s helped me to do my work, to be independent, to plan for your life, and so on. From these perspectives, it helped me a lot.

How has COVID-19 influenced your life and emotions?
People cannot socialize like before, it’s like the world is coming to its end. And it’s been more than a year since this pandemic started, and the virus taking toll daily is increasing. Most of the shops are down due to COVID. All the work is on hold.

I want to ask you about the past, what was the reason that you left your country? Can you explain what happened?
Country … I haven’t lived in Afghanistan. I have been born and raised in Iran. Iran does not give proper documents to the Afghan migrants. For example you could work on land but it didn’t have any value because you couldn’t get that far and they would arrest you. Or If you wanted to have a shop or something similar you would become bankrupt, like my husband who started his own shop and he got bankrupt, and so we had to leave Iran because of that.

How did you feel when you faced that problem?
When you face a problem, you have to come all the way, don’t you? You pass all the hardships, seas, mountains to get to Greece, and when you do, nobody attends to you and you are completely ignored. You explain to them I’ve been through a lot of hardship, but no one is going to pay attention to you. When you have no choice, you embark on this journey.

How did you get to Europe? What happened to you along the way? What difficulties did you encounter?
It wasn’t easy at all, it was all hardships. When we left Iran … we failed three times and the Iranian guard captured us. The third time and with a lot of hardship, we passed through the mountains, walked for four to five hours. We had nothing, we had run out of water. We got to Turkey, and we’d been there for two months. There we were stopped three times. The first time we were on the water for seven to eight hours, we wanted to go to Thessaloniki, but our boat broke down. After that, we said since our boat is broken down, let’s go back where we were, to the shore. For the second time, we had been on our way for two hours. The coast guard of Turkey hit our boat and punctured it, so that we couldn’t go forward further. For the third time, we started off from Canakkale and were on the water for four hours. We were 70–80 people in the inflatable boat until we got to Greece. 

How did you feel back then? When you were on your way.
I was thinking about death and life. Can we make it? Or we would die when we got there?

Do you still think about the things that happened to you? 
Yes, it’s been about one and a half or two years since we got here. It’s all that we think about. We don’t enjoy our life anymore. What happened to our documents? What happens if they reject us? What happens if they block our credit card? It is all about these problems. There is nothing else.

How do you feel when you remember all these things?
The journey that I took was very hard, and I don’t want it to be ever repeated. It wasn’t an easy journey.

How has the situation that you have faced, the journey and the hardships, influenced you and your life?
A lot, I think I’ve become depressed, I cry all the time. Some days, I sit and cry for several hours. And I tell myself “What should I do? Now that I’ve come from the island? And my documents are marked red.” Here, wherever I go to ask organizations for help, they tell me to go and come back again. I tell them I have been in Moria for one year and two months and you did nothing for me, for my documents and all. Why do I go there? I don’t feel good at all.

Have you ever thought you could make it through all these difficulties?
No, I didn’t even imagine such things. It was very difficult.

How could you handle the difficulties? What did you do?
I still haven’t been able to make peace with my problems.

Haven’t you been able to forget them yet?
Still I break down during the day and cry about them.

Didn’t you find anyone who could help you, like a psychologist?
No, I haven’t.

Before your husband went bankrupt and all those incidents, when you were in Iran, what was your dream? You can answer like: “My dream was …”
My dream was to go to a good country.

No, I mean before this bankruptcy had happened.
To have a decent job. To be a good mother for my children, to have a peaceful life. 

When you decided to leave your home and house and you began the journey, what was your dream at that time?
Since police were caughting asylum seekers, I told myself, I have to go, if we come back to Iran, we have nothing there. We have to go to a place where we could flourish. And to be a role model for other people by reminding them that they can continue their lives and to be stronger.

Before you left Iran, what were your strengths and abilities in comparison with others?
I was happier back then, I enjoyed every little happiness, but from the day I got here, since I have come here and got busy with the administrative work, I don’t have time to be happy at all. When I was back home, I took care of myself, dressed well, but here there is no such thing. I think I am messed up mentally.

Do you think that these difficulties have helped you to grow personally? Did it have any positive outcome for you?
If you mean to grow, yes. But this situation is very hard, I don’t know what to do.

You mean, you don’t feel good compared to the past?
No, I don’t know what to do.

Now that you are here, what are your dreams? Start with: “My dream is …”
My dream is that, God willing, my migration process to move forward. Whatever that is best for us, if it is best for us to be approved, they approve us; if not, then something would happen. Because I am very tired of this situation. I want to reach a place where I could provide facilities for my child.

Thanks a lot, my questions are finished. If you have something to say to people in Europe to better understand the condition of immigrants in Greece, please do so.
I want them to attend to the immigrants, to listen to them, and to not reject a case without a reason, and to really study the cases. When they deliver a case result within 10 days, what does that mean? it means they didn’t put time into analyzing the cases. When they cut the payments, they should put themselves in immigrants’ shoes. I fled my country, have nothing and have taken refuge here, and then, you block my card? If you seize all the things from us. Well, what does a human need? House, money, safety. If you take all of those from them, then what is the difference between you and her own country? They should pay attention to these issues, to the families, to the pregnant women. Now that I am in this situation, I can understand better. Maybe at first, I wasn’t aware of these problems like them. They should carefully investigate the cases and not reject them without valid reason. The person who came here had been forced to immigrate, nobody takes that difficult journey without reason. Would they take it? Is there anyone who is not deprived of choice and would take that journey?

Obviously not.
They definitely won’t come.

Thank you. It’s finished.