I got to the border between Syria and Turkey shortly after I took the decision to leave. I had to stay there for two days, waiting for my turn to cross legally. I didn't know anyone in Turkey, and I had no idea where to go.
So I started talking to people. One thing led to another, and I found myself travelling from city to city, from one contact to another, until I found a way to cross the sea to Europe that seemed "safe enough" One night, I got to the seaside with a group of migrants. There was an inflatable boat waiting for us, but it took a long time before it was filled with air and we could leave. At midnight, the boat was on the water, and the Greek coastguards picked us up around in the morning.
But this time it was through friends from Syria who knew people that had gone through a journey similar to mine, and who agreed to let me stay at their place for a few days.
I stayed in Greece for 4 months and found some work in construction, so I could save money to continue my journey. Right as I left the train, I asked people where I could go to ask for asylum. Thankfully, the immigration office is not far away from the North Station. So, on the 1st of June , I asked for asylum and I received a piece of paper with an address on it, a train ticket and a bus ticket. I was lost, I did not know Belgium and I did not know where my destination was, so I used Google maps to arrive there.
I was sent to a closed center, near a village called Florennes in the South of Belgium. The center was an old military base from WWII, that was renovated in order to welcome asylum seekers. It was a real nightmare. It was on the edge of an operating airbase, we had fled a war zone, and now we had F flying above our heads. We were put there to be away from people. The daily life was dull, static and boring.
