Day 21, 17 December, 2016
7 and 4 years old. They were born in Irak in the plain of Niniveh next to the city of Karakosh where the majority of people are Christians. Together with their parents they fled their home in the summer of 2014 when the ISIS troops were approaching. They found refuge in an overcrowded refugee camp in the town of Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. They stayed there for a whole year. With the help of a French NGO and the Taizé brothers they were able to acquire visas to come to France and to take a plane directly to Paris. For a few hundred euros the family of 4 could enter Europe and reach safety after a 3 hour long flight. They did not have to cross the Turkish border illegaly, risk their lives on inflatable boats on the Mediterranean Sea, they did not have to endure the ordeal of the Balkan Route and they did not have to pay 15 000 euros like all the other families we have spoken to in Budapest during the summer of 2015.
When they arrived in Taizé Manuel was easily irritable, he was getting angry easily and would hit people for no reason. We knew that he had seen and experienced things too difficult even for adults. Yet, after a year spent in a safe environment and a lot of personal attention we are convinced that Manuel is overcoming his difficulties. He learned french incredibly fast, he is interested by everything that surrounds him and he asks a lot of questions.
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