Patras

Moroccans hold court over the mobile charging station outside an abandoned factory building housing around two hundred illegal immigrants from Afghanistan, Sudan, Algeria, Morocco and the Middle East. 

Athens: Lost Boys

Chaman Ghiyami, Athens Greece.

Patras: Refugee Graffitti

Graffitti in a squat in Patras, Greece, occupied by refugees from Afghanistan depicting a visual poem, an homage to the artist's mother, how he misses her and thanks her for giving him life. 

Patras: Lost Boys

Patras, Greece. Hussein Mohammad, 22, an Aghan refugee from Karachi during his prayer in a safe house for undocumented migrants. 

Athens: Lost Boys

Athens, Greece. Chaman Ghiyami, 22 left his home in Daykundi, Afghanistan when he was seven years old. His father, threatened with death from the local Taliban commander after their succession to power in Afghanistan fled with his family as refugees to Iran.

Chaman enjoyed a relatively peaceful life in Iran until he was 16 when a car crash almost killed him.

He was in a coma for nineteen days and awoke to find his leg smashed to pieces...and that he was blind.

During his miraculous recovery he began to question his faith in Islam and along with some friends formed an organization he called 'Searching for Truth' to ask local religious leaders why Sunni persecuted Shia and why Muslims could not live in harmony together. Their line of inquiry, visiting with powerful Iranian clerics such as Sheik Abbas, Sheik Khatimi and the Afghan Mullah Sheik Islami and questioning them on the very foundations of Islamic faith raised questions in the Iranian secret service and Chaman, aged 19, was imprisoned for forty five days in the Damian jail north of Tehran, accused of being a terrorist.

On his release Chaman decided that he wanted to seek a better life in Europe and left Iran over the mountainous smuggling routes with other Afghan migrants through Turkey and onwards to Greece. Many of his friends died on the three month trek.

Chaman has been lucky in Greece, people have befriended him and begun to help him out of the perilous spiral of illegality and poverty that many Afghan refugees face on their arrival to Europe. He has been able to begin getting the medical advice that he needs. Doctors tell him that with new surgical methods there is a chance he could see again.

A brave young man with the most positive attitude, his story is as heart-wrenching as it is inspiring.

“There is no past and no present” he told me, “only the future”.

Patras: Lost Boys

Patras, Greece. Khasim Latifi, 16, an unaccompanied minor from Paghman near Kabul in Afghanistan busts an impromptu breakdance move in an abandoned industrial facitlity that is home to approximately two hundred illegal refugees from Afghanistan, Sudan and the Middle East. One of thousands of so-called Afghan 'Lost Boys', he has been squatting here for 5 months trying to make the journey by sea to Italy and onward to mainland Europe.

He wants to live in Brussels, Belgium where his family members have settled.

Patras: Lost Boys

Patras, Greece. Jawid Mohammadi, 16, an Afghan refugee from Ghazni province lives under a road bridge in the Greek port city. The so called 'Afghan Lost Boys' are mainly Hazara youths disillusioned with persecution from the Taliban in Afghanistan and in their adopted home of Quetta in Pakistan, where target killings against the Hazara are becomming increasingly common. Many have been refugees all their lives and getting to Europe represents a 'chance for a better life' for all of them. It is also their toughest challenge, many have been trapped in Patras for months and some for years trying to cross the sea to mainland Europe.

Patras: Refugee Graffitti

Graffitti in a safe house in Patras, Greece occupied by refugees from Afghanistan waiting to cross to Italy illicitly by sea depicting their journey to a better life and their frustrations of being trapped in Greece.

Patras: Refugee Graffitti

Graffitti in a safe house in Patras, Greece, occupied by underage refugees from Afghanistan waiting to cross to Italy illicitly by sea, depicts a caricature of the Afghan president Hamid Karzai among various other tags of their hopes and dreams.

Domingo. D.F.