FLOAT

Author

Frida Sterenberg, Craig Newmark Graduate School of JournalismFollow

Graduation Date

Fall 12-13-2019

Grading Professor

Alia Malek

Subject Concentration

International

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Abstract

A family of Afghan asylum seekers on the Greek island of Lesvos had found a trace of stability in their lives. They lived in a house, found jobs, were developing new skills and were even nurturing some creative vein while they waited for their asylum interview scheduled for early 2020. But all that was taken away, abruptly, when they were transferred to Athens in mid-September.

The illusive feeling of stability is something the family knows all too well.

Raziye, the mother, has been a refugee for four decades and her children their entire life. Raziye and her late husband fled Afghanistan to Iran in 1979 during the Soviet invasion. They received asylum in Qom where, eventually, their children were born and raised.

After their father passed away, in 2013, the family had difficulty to subsist and repay money they had borrowed for their father’s medical expenses. Raziye was being pressured to marry her daughters to their first cousins.

The family left Iran in 2017. They crossed the border with Turkey on foot. A few months later, they attempted twice to cross the Aegean Sea on a raft. On November 2018, they finally landed on a beach on Lesvos. The family spent their first Greek winter in the notorious Moria refugee camp. They were able to move to a house in the spring. The relative tranquility lasted six months. From September 2019 on they have been embroiled on a bureaucratic rollercoaster.

The family is among the more than 6 million people estimated to have left Afghanistan since 1979. Four decades marked by endless conflicts and occupations, from the Soviet invasion, to a civil war, to the Taliban regime, and the US-led invasion have put the Afghan population in constant flux. Afghans are the second largest population of refugees in the UNHCR system. On the Greek islands, by the end of 2019, Afghans made up 47% of the total number of migrants and asylum seekers.

Link to capstone: http://www.fridasterenbergprojects.com

Recommended Citation

Sterenberg, Frida, "FLOAT" (2019). CUNY Academic Works.
https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gj_etds/393