I hear yelling in Arabic. I see signs and flags wavering in the wind. There is a crowd of people in an area where usually just a few are seen walking. "What's going on?" I wonder. We get closer and I see this:
It was a protest demanding the borders be opened. Currently, about 2,000 refugees are stuck in Thessaloniki, Greece and are living in refugee camps. The borders are closed and they have nowhere to go. The group of students I'm with decided to venture into the protest.
We walk over and run into a fellow student on our trip that speaks Arabic. She introduces us to a refugee, who wishes to remain anonymous. I ask him a few questions because he is the only one who can speak a bit of English.
I asked "how did you get here?" and he told me how he and his brother paid 600 euros each to be guided (the word trafficker was also used) out of Syria to Greece. He told me that he left after the school within his mosque was bombed and how he sold his home for money to leave the country. He hopes to end up in France one day and has been living in the camp for 13 days so far.
Refugees weren't the only attendees at the protest. Many Greek citizens were there in solidarity.
But there was also hostility. Two fights broke out while I was there. Some people were against government groups being there. Anarchists were present. Apparently, even some Neo-Nazis showed up. It was hard to understand what the fights were about because I speak neither Greek nor Arabic. However, this is what I heard from the people I talked to.
They were giving out this piece of paper. It defines what a refugee is and outlines their rights as refugees. Useful things to know as a refugee, right? Because truly, how do you know what rights you have in other countries?
Later, I saw posters all around the city for the protest. I really liked the graphic because it's so telling of the situation. It was unfortunate to see so many young refugees protesting instead of being in school or having the chance to make something of themselves. I had gone to a "refugee hangout" and food kitchen the night before for an interview with a lawyer that helps refugees get asylum and realized that the refugees live in the present in order to survive. You don't really realize how widespread the refugee crisis is until you are in a country deeply affected by it. I learned that protests were held all over the European Union on March 19th, the day I was at this protest in Greece. The lives of many are impacted by this global issue. What I learned from this protest is that refugees are looking to the world to stand in solidarity with them and not to forget that they are people trying to survive, too.
