Switzerland has done so much for me

Earlier this week it was reported how Eritrean refugee Okbaab Tesfamariam had arrived in Switzerland nine years ago and had since successfully completed an apprenticeship in logistics. While doing so, being so much older than others on his course, he said he felt he was very much the grandfather of them all, even though he was in his late twenties.
 
Last Sunday, the Zuger Zeitung published another article about a refugee, this time from Syria, who equally embarked on an apprenticeship three years ago, and recently qualified to be able to work in his dream job, that of hairdressing.
 
Mohammed Habach fled his homeland with his family in 2014. The journalist who wrote this article was struck by the fact that the refugee could easily be taken for someone a few years older than his eighteen years, and, with his physical build, he could well be taken for a competing sportsman.
 
Like many Syrians, Habach had to endure the effects of the ongoing civil war in his homeland, resulting in tens of thousands of people losing their lives and being injured, and causing millions to leave their home.
Habach recalled what it was like for him as a 15-year-old in Aleppo (main photograph), Syria’s second largest city. “Just crossing the street meant you could get shot,” he said. “It was never clear who was fighting against whom. Bombs used to go off not just during the day but at night, too. I still have nightmares about it now.”  He went on to explain how, for those injured, there was only basic medical care, hospitals not able to function properly. Alas, some members of Habach’s family, too, succumbed to their injuries.
 
With war raging on the streets and the situation of the Habach family made worse because they had Kurdish roots, it was at this time his parents decided they would flee, taking their three children with them. They set off north-east, towards the border with Turkey, to the town of Afrin. However, there were lots of checkpoints en route. It was at one of these that some of the military tried to persuade Mohammed’s father to join up to fight for Bashar al-Assad. When it was clear he was not up to it for health reasons, they then tried to recruit 15-year-old Mohammed himself to their cause. Fortunately, this was able to be avoided and the family was able to cross into Turkey. It was in Istanbul that contact was then made with a people-trafficker, who was paid to take the mother and three children to western Europe, as father returned to Syria, though he followed a few months later.
 
A few days later young Mohammed arrived in Zurich with his mother and brothers not knowing anyone and not speaking a word of German, adding to the number of 16,100 refugees who have fled Syria and sought refuge in Switzerland since the troubles started in 2011. The family was escorted by policemen to a reception centre in Kreuzlingen, in the canton of Thurgovia, bordering Lake Constance and Germany. Fingerprints were taken and many questions asked but eventually they were given permission to stay in Switzerland and allocated to accommodation in the canton of Obwalden.
 
It was here where Mohammed was able to attend primary school enabling him to pick up the language, before moving on to secondary school. Even as a young boy he had wanted to become hairdresser, and, after gaining some work-experience, thanks to Philipp Giger, the co-proprietor of the hairdressing business of the same name, Mohammed was able to work in one of his salons.
 
Talking of his time here, Mohammed said, “Switzerland has done so much for me, unlike my homeland. Not that is has always been easy, but I have learned to fight. After all, we are architects of our own fortune, aren’t we?”