“It will not be easy. We will need a safe place, especially for the nights.” Saleem knew some of the boys in Attiki slept only a few hours a day, afraid to close their eyes after sunset when a new world of dangers emerged.
“YOU LOOK LIKE YOU COULD USE SOME WATER. HERE,” SHE SAID IN what sounded like perfect English. Roksana, a volunteer with the aid group, held out a plastic bottle. Saleem followed the hand up to a slim wrist, a graceful arm. It only got better from there.
She wore a purple T-shirt tucked loosely into a slim pair of jeans. Her dramatically straight, black hair, fell loosely to the side as she tilted her head. She looked about his age, maybe sixteen. Her eyes, rimmed in black pencil, caught his attention with a flutter of lashes. She did not smile nor did she look at him with sympathy.
“Thank you.” Saleem took the bottle from her.
“Of course. What is your name?” she asked. Though she had a face that would inspire an overly romantic Dari love ballad, her tone was all business. She was the kind of girl so striking that she’d hardened her demeanor out of necessity, especially in a place like Attiki.
“Saleem,” he answered. And that’s all you’ll tell her, he reminded himself. But Saleem felt his defenses coming down as he looked into her eyes.
“Okay, Saleem. I haven’t seen you here before. How long have you been here?” He wished her to say his name once more.
“A few weeks. . but I am not staying here,” he said, suddenly feeling embarrassed that she might think he slept in the park. He took a casual swig of water.
“Oh? Where do you stay then?”
Another swig as his mind raced. Good question, he thought, and turned the conversation around.
“What is your name?” he asked gently. She paused and looked at her clipboard before responding. It was clear she was not happy with his question.
“Roksana.”
“Rokshaana?”
“No. It’s Rok-sa-na,” she repeated, emphasizing the pronunciation.
“But this is an Afghan name. . Rokshaana!” he repeated with a smile.
“It is my name, my Greek name,” she said, her lips pulled together tightly.
“But you know Iskandar, er. . Alexander. He married an Afghan woman. She was Rokshaana. It is the same name,” Saleem explained. It felt good to show her he knew a bit of history. She looked like she might have regretted approaching him but exercised patience.
“I am not her. My name is Roksana. And that is enough about my name,” she said. “Tell me, Saleem. Do you want to stay in Greece or do you want to leave?”
“Nobody wants to stay in Greece,” Saleem said quietly.
Roksana, less naïve than most girls her age, was not surprised to hear Saleem say this.
“Where are you trying to go?”
“England.” Saleem sighed. Saying it out loud, it seemed like an impossibly far destination. “My aunt is there.”
“Ah, England,” Roksana nodded as she looked out at the other refugees. “Yes, England is very popular.”
“Greece is beautiful, but Greece does not want us here.”
“It is a small country. The government does not have the money to help everyone.”
“But you. . you give food and help.”
“We are just people, not the government.” Roksana did not go into ideology or motives. She was not here to sing about the cause. It was her quiet presence that spoke to her beliefs. Saleem felt ineloquent around her.
“You do not agree with the government?” Saleem felt a little apprehensive for her. Where he came from, it was more than dangerous to blatantly oppose the thinking of those in power. Roksana was young and bold. His father would have liked her.
“We believe that people should be treated decently. We know what happens when people come to Greece, and we don’t think it should be this way.”
“People cannot apply for asylum here. Why is it so different?” Saleem had initially been frightened by the stories he’d heard about Greece from the boys in Attiki. He worried that the rest of Europe would be similar, a dead zone where his family would be adrift forever and in fear of being sent back to Afghanistan. The life of transience was exhausting both physically and mentally. But the Afghans he’d met also told him tales about the better worlds. Places deeper into Europe, countries like Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden, did not turn up their noses the way Greece or Turkey did. Afghans there had been given second chances at having a normal life.
“Most people do not understand our system. How did you get here?”
Saleem did not want to answer. He twisted the cap back on the bottle of water and shrugged his shoulders cheerfully. His playful elusiveness made Roksana laugh.
“Tell me what happens here,” Saleem said instead.
“Yes, yes. Okay, forget the question. This is what happens to most people who come here. They are arrested and the police take them to detention centers. They should be clean and safe places for people to stay, but there are too many people. There is no room. People say it is like a prison, even for children. They say it is worse than the place they came from. Sometimes they stay there for months.
“One day, the doors open and they get some papers. The papers say you have one month to leave Greece. Some people even get a ticket to Athens so they can leave from there.”
“But asylum? There is no asylum?” Saleem was once again grateful for the false passports and the good fortune they’d had not to be stopped in Piraeus. They’d breezed through checkpoints without a second glance. According to what Roksana was telling him, their story was an exception.
“There is no real asylum. You must have work to get asylum. How can people find work?” She waved in the direction of the park. “First, you need a work permit. And for a work permit, you must apply for asylum. You see the problem?”
“Why are your friends here talking to refugees and writing these papers?”
“We volunteer. We want to be here. No one is giving us money to come. We come because we want to help.”
Saleem looked at Roksana and wondered what kind of person he would be if he were in her shoes. He tried to picture himself as a high school student in a peaceful Kabul, coming home to his mother and father. Would he take up the cause of strangers? Would he care enough about how people were being treated that he would spend his time handing out food and filling out applications on their behalf?
He hoped he would. But it was very possible he wouldn’t.
Just picturing himself in that utopian snapshot was painful, though. It was possible he would never be restored to the person he once was, the person who’d been able to laugh and dream and call a place home. It was possible that person, like his father, lay in an unmarked grave somewhere in Afghanistan.
ON THEIR SECOND ENCOUNTER, A DAY AFTER SALEEM’S FAMILY left their room in the Attica Dream, Roksana was more direct.
“Ela, you want to apply for asylum or no?” Roksana was in no mood to mince words today. They sat on the concrete steps leading to the park. He wanted to ask her if she knew of a place his family could stay. Tonight would be their first night on the streets.