We met Edgard at Belgrade Station - “are you volunteers?” he asked emerging from the many refugees wearily filing off the overnight train.
He is a Brazilian human rights lawyer who has given up his life in Sao Paulo to travel alongside the refugees from Turkey to Germany. “I want to understand this crisis from their perspective, to feel what it is like, so that I can help to find a solution” he explained. “Everybody I touch is a human - travelling through Europe is like a marathon for refugees, you can’t complete it without supporters along the way.”
Edgard has some extraordinary stories from his trip. He relies on a cuddly Dumbo toy, which he carries with him everywhere, to help him look innocent and disappear from authorities and traffickers alike amongst a refugee crowd. In Serbia he was saved by a photo on his phone of him with Novak Djokovic, after his passport and a strip search failed to get him released from detention by the police.
By walking across borders, taking long and unpredictable bus and train journeys, and often sleeping in minus temperatures, Edgard helps articulate the exhaustion and bewilderment felt by people following this route. “The most difficult thing of all”, he remarks, “is having all choice taken away from you. You feel like nothing. And it’s hard not to shout or get angry.”
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