Osama, 12, was spotted at Athens International Airport just before boarding a flight to Belgium, where he was reunited with his older brother. Six months earlier, the young Palestinian had entered Egypt. He flew to Turkey, took a boat to the island of Leros, and finally arrived at The Home Project hostel in Athens. He made new friends and they presented him with a large card with his photo and his wishes written on it. It was the most important thing in his red suitcase.
On the night of January 16, 12-year-old Osama from Palestine couldn’t sleep. Early the next morning, he was to leave Athens for Belgium to meet his brother. He was excited to be reunited after four years, but also nervous – about this trip, a new beginning there, and of course the war in his homeland.
When he left Palestine alone six months ago, Israel’s war in Gaza had not yet begun. Perhaps with childish naivety, he felt that a great adventure was about to begin. He thought nothing and felt no fear. In early September, he took his first flight from Egypt to Turkey, where he took a boat to the Greek islands. In the middle of the sea, when someone yelled at him to throw his belongings overboard to lighten the ship, he did not object. He threw away his school bag with a change of clothes in it. He only kept his documents and cell phone. He took it with him and sent a message to his father that he had arrived safely on the small island of Leros in the Dodecanese archipelago.
“Our priority is not for a 12-year-old who doesn’t speak a word of Greek to learn the language or history, but to feel comfortable in the school environment.”
At a local migrant camp, he waited patiently for days until his case was processed. On September 24th, they put him on the coach. He didn’t know exactly what was going on. He was told he was going to a hostel in Athens and he just dutifully followed the instructions. The excitement I felt a few weeks ago was gone. I felt sick on board. It was dark and the weather was bad. He was vomiting and had a fever. The journey seemed endless to him. When he arrived in the middle of the night at the hostel of The Home Project, an NGO that helps unaccompanied refugee children, he was exhausted. One of his NGO staff hugged him and he started crying. The next morning he ate breakfast, but he was quiet and timid. The hardships he had endured made him look younger – something he himself felt. He suddenly wanted to meet his family and sought their care in a hostel.
Osama’s energy perked up when he met Yanis, the translator, and other Arabic-speaking children. I also felt energized when I looked out the window at the school courtyard. He knew that the process of reunification with his brother had begun and that it was only a matter of time before he left Greece, but he wanted to attend school in Athens. Back in Palestine, he told his caregivers that he loved school. His life had always been difficult – he lost his mother at an early age and there were frequent conflicts in the area he lived in – but he preferred to talk about the good things in the hostel. Or maybe he was really good at rollerblading. His father was a doctor’s driver who commuted daily between Egypt and Gaza. In the summer, his father, who had raised money for the trip, decided to send Osama to his brother in Europe, hoping for a better future for Osama.
He started attending Greek school in early October. The teacher asked him to sit next to Melek and Violetta, who spoke Arabic. He studied theater and a teacher who also spoke Arabic began teaching him improvisational theater. “Our priority is not for 12-year-olds who don’t speak a word of Greek to learn the language or history, but to feel comfortable in the school environment,” said school principal Konstantina Bosonerou. explain. At the school in Cato Patissia, where she started in September, and at her previous school nearby where she worked as a teacher, 70% of the students are recent or second-generation children in the country. – generations of immigrants, most of whom do not speak Greek properly.
The process of integrating them into schools is not easy. “At our school, we are committed to our teacher education because we too are uncomfortable with this new profile of our school,” she explains. All teachers now participate in an inclusion program to work with children from different cultural backgrounds.
A few days after Osama started school, the NGO faced another administrative challenge. War in his homeland. They saw him communicating with his father and waited for him to start talking about the matter. After a few days, he opened up. His village is on the border with Egypt, he told them. Although it was not the focus of Israel’s bombing campaign, it was a danger. “But my father is very careful, so it’s okay,” he told them.
those left behind
At the school, Osama’s arrival provided an opportunity for an important discussion. How he left his homeland and what those left behind experienced. In the weeks that followed, he became increasingly restless, anxious and desperate for communication with his father, who always had his cell phone in hand and had little access to the internet. “We are seeing the devastating effects on children from war-torn countries. Children fainting from the trauma. We are seeing how it can destroy lives,” says Sofia Kouberaki, CEO of The Home Project.
The hostel staff tried to support Osama in every way they could and saw how he too found refuge in school, new friends and various programs at Home Project. He chose to spend the weekends at his ACS and the University of Athens, where he attended classes and participated in sports activities with other children in the hostel.
When he was given the green light to reunite with his brother in Belgium, the school wanted to hold a farewell celebration. However, Osama suddenly refused to go to school. They understood that the reason was that it was difficult for him to break up again. They explained to him that the beautiful circle was about to close and that he would also have to say goodbye to his friends and teachers. He returned to school and was excited when his classmates revealed that they were going to have a party. That day, he wore his favorite clothes, borrowed cologne from an older boy at the hostel, and styled his hair with gel.
Everyone worked together to plant an olive tree, Osama’s olive tree, in the schoolyard. “We’ll let it take root and your little tree will grow and bloom and bear fruit. We’ll send you pictures and we’ll keep you posted to see your growth and progress.” We would also like you to send us a photo,” the principal told him. “It gives you a little connection to where you lived, so you can stop by when you come back. I purposely planted it in this corner so you can see it through the iron barred door.”
His classmates hugged him and shouted his name in unison. Osama, looking happy and moved, said that he had another olive tree in his garden in Palestine that was at least 100 years old and had a large trunk. He pasted pictures of all the children and staff on cards, filled them with everyone’s wishes, and took the souvenir to Belgium.
It was the first thing he took out of his suitcase when he arrived at his new home. He wanted to display it in his new room.