Our Friend Omar

We met Omar at the Pikpa camp yesterday. Having arrived by boat from Turkey on Saturday he was already a central member of the volunteer team by the time we arrived. 

Omar was 16 and returning from high school when he was hit in the shoulder by a bullet shot from a government soldier, and then in the leg by a ricochet. His grandmother convinced him to leave in order to keep him safe, and he spent a year in Malaysia before visa issues forced him to move onto Turkey alone, working manual jobs so he could learn Turkish and get a job behind a bar. Tensions have increased recently in Turkey for Syrian refugees though, so he decided it was time to leave, even though he was convinced he wouldn't survive the boat journey across to Lesvos, so didn't buy the $50 life jacket.

Leaving at 3am from a Turkish beach, his small inflatable boat was filled with more and more refugee families. At 35 adults, he and another refugee insisted they stop adding more people. It was lucky he spoke Turkish. The captain was terrified, so Omar had work hard to calm him down and give him the confidence to navigate the choppy waves. Near the island the boat hit a rock and they had to swim
ashore and be rescued by volunteer lifeguards.

Omar registered with the Greek government on arrival and handed over his Syrian passport in return for asylum papers. We said goodbye to him tonight as he boarded the overnight ferry from Lesvos to Athens where his application will be processed and he'll be told which country he'll be sent to. "I'd like to go to France" he said "as I speak some French and there are opportunities there. I know there's no hope of getting to the UK". He doesn't think the war in Syria will ever end, especially now that Russia and the US have become involved.

Omar is an extraordinary and inspiring young man. At just twenty and with fluent English he is not just independent and courageous but also highly intelligent and deeply generous and compassionate to everyone else he meets on his travels. It will be Britain's loss of he never makes it to our shores as he has a lot to teach us. For now though, we just feel honoured to have him as our friend.