“My dreams were more important than my parents’ abuse”

Anna is 20 years old, lives in Thessaloniki, has a cat and is studying fashion design. Her dream is to travel to Cuba and the Netherlands and be able to attend fashion classes through her school in Milan next year. Knowing Anna, no one can imagine that this young woman was a victim of domestic violence, that she attempted suicide six times and lived in a shelter of abused women. “The violence in my home started very early, before I was 10. At first I was watching my father, who was an alcoholic beating my mother. My mother never wanted me, she never treated me as her child. My father was physically abusive to me and psychologically to my mother,” Anna tells us.

Twice her father attempted to kill her, once he doused her in petrol and another time he stabbed her. Her mother didn’t do anything. Depression, bulimia, bullying by her classmates, suicide attempts, this was Anna’s life. The psychologist who was following up with her tried to give her antidepressant and antipsychotic drugs. “It was very difficult for me, I didn’t have a person to talk to. Although I had experienced all this rejection, I’ve decided to help myself,” she tells us. At the age of 16, Anna reported her parents for domestic violence at the NGO “To Chamogelo tou Paidiou” and with the support of a woman living in the apartment next door – who reported Anna’s parents to the police – managed to escape from hell.

A police car outside her home, one night at a police station, one night in a hospital with an exclusive nurse watching over her in order not to attempt a suicide, and a women’s shelter in Thessaloniki, where she will be staying until her 18^th birthday. “Within three days my life changed. I felt free, I had escaped from hell,” she states. What kept her alive were her dreams. “I thought, I don’t want to end up like my parents. I want to study, to travel the world, to have my own home, to adopt 10 cats. These were bigger than my parents’ abuse. All these made me pursuit them,” Anna confesses.

She came to *SolidarityNow’s Thessaloniki Solidarity Center seeking psychological support because she was not feeling well. “I’ve never had good chemistry with any psychologist, but with Vicky there is chemistry! I feel that I can open up my heart to her,” she says and adds “I have been supported not only by the psychologist, but as well by all the people who work at the Center; by the accountant and the social service. Beyond the basics they are telling me that ‘I’ll be here for whatever you need’; something that is important for me to hear”.

Today she can openly speak about all the things she has gone through. In the past, talking about all these would have caused her uncomfortable feelings. Today, she does not speak to us as a victim, but as a woman who survived, she tells us. Like Anna there are hundreds of other women who are making the first steps to survival. “From the age of 16 I realized how much inner strength one can have. You must reach an extreme point to realize it. I want to tell the women, the girls who are experiencing what I have experienced, that there will always be people out there who will listen and help them,” she stresses.

* Thessaloniki Solidarity Center is supported by the Open Society Foundations.

“I love myself and my daughters; when I felt that ‘I saved them’, I knew we would make it”

The beautiful 34-year-old woman who welcomes us to her home in Athens is a refugee from Iran, a divorced mother of two and she chooses to introduce herself to us as ‘Maria’.

Maria speaks farsi and some greek. Talking with her is very pleasant; her hands are as lively as her eyes when she narrates her life so far. Eyes and hands grow even more vibrant when her two daughters, 4 and 10, enter the room.

When Maria and her children came to Athens, after living for a while in Moria camp in Lesvos island and in Malakasa camp, they joined SolidarityNow’s accommodation program*. They lived again in a “normal home”, as Maria says, one she wouldn’t leave from the first three months – “I guess I needed to feel safe first“. But after she got out of it, Maria didn’t give up. Leaving her country, she decided she would never live again in a state of fear, relying on no one else but herself; being free to choose her own future. This is how it is – and still is today.

While Maria was a beneficiary of the organization’s accommodation program, she took Greek lessons, received psychological support and her children began school. “For the first time in my life I felt someone was listening to me“, Maria says, thanking SolidarityNow’s social worker. At the same time, she attended classes and received her diploma as a nail technician. Today, she works in an Afghan store downtown Athens.

The future belongs to the three women. They have been granted asylum in Greece and have moved on to the next step from SolidarityNow’s accommodation program, the integration program and are now beneficiaries of Helios**. This means that for the next six months, the duration of the program, Maria has time to be more empowered and financially independent.

What about the past? “I cannot delete what has happened, but I have managed to keep only the positives, which of course are my children. Still, it is also the power I discovered within. A power that enabled me to do all the things necessary to get away from the abuse, the insecurity and the humiliation that my children’s father presented as if it was affection. I love myself and my daughters; when I felt that ‘I saved them’, I knew we would make it. I’ll be their best example”.

* ESTIA, the Emergency Support to Integration and Accommodation program, is implemented by UNHCR and funded by the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund of the European Union.

** Hellenic Integration Support for Beneficiaries of International Protection by IOM (International Organization for Migration)

Mariam, 27-year old, comes from Afghanistan and along with her daughter, who is 9 years old, have been living in Greece for the last four years. Mariam was a victim of domestic violence. The problems with her husband began when both of them were living in Afghanistan. She tried to break up from him but she couldn’t. Couple’s relatives intervened to stay together, promising that he would “change”. But he never changed. In Afghanistan, women are considered to be inferior to men. Indeed, in the event of a divorce, custody of the child is given directly to the father. In order not to lose her daughter, Mariam stayed with him.

The problems got worse when the family came to Greece. Her husband continued to be aggressive and violent towards her. One day he beat her so badly and she had been admitted to the hospital. “I was used to all this. I could get away with it, but my daughter was scared. It was this time, that I said, enough is enough,” she confesses. With the help of the lawyers of the Greek Council for Refugees, she moved with her child, for a while, to a women’s shelter and later they came to Thessaloniki. She came to SolidarityNow’s Thessaloniki Solidarity Center looking for legal and psychosocial support. The organization’s lawyers represent her in her child custody.

The day of her daughter’s custody trial is approaching. But Mariam no longer feels the fear she felt before. In her country as she tells us, they believe that women have no power and that they cannot raise a child alone. “But the future has shown that a woman can do everything alone, without a man standing next to her,” she says and adds, “I want to become a symbol for all women in my country”. The only thing that she wants is to take her divorce and win full custody of her daughter. “I’m not looking for anything special, I just want a simple life and a job so I can support my daughter”, she states.

“A woman who is a victim of domestic violence in addition to psychosocial support she also needs legal support. Our goal is to facilitate the access of these women to justice, thereby enhancing their struggle for emancipation,” stressed Thessaloniki Solidarity Center’s Legal Service.

*Thessaloniki Solidarity Center was established and is supported by Open Society Foundations.

Olga was born and raised in Greece. She has lived in the Patisia area for more than 30 years of her life, living in the same house. Olga is proud to say she has always been punctual in her financial obligations towards third parties, ensuring a decent standard of living for herself.

Things have changed for her in the last years. She has been unemployed, and her age has not allowed her to re-enter the labor market. Her financial situation worsened as a result of policies imposed due to country’s poor financial situation. Olga had to adapt to the new conditions, change her lifestyle and worry about whether she would be able to meet her basic needs, even her housing needs. And indeed, she was not always consistent in the payment of her rent. Due to this, she was sued by her landlord for the unpaid rent and, with short deadlines, in less than a month, she risked being left homeless, and losing all her belongings.

She visited the organization’s Solidarity Center in Athens seeking the support of the legal service. With the support and mediation of a lawyer, Olga solved her immediate problem, which was none other than securing her housing. Following the legal procedures, she finally signed a debt settlement agreement with her landlord and remained at her home, getting the time needed to adjust her life to her new financial condition.

At the same time, she was empowered by the legal team to become more active in her new reality, that of shrinking income. She was also informed of all the social services provided by the civil society organizations supporting and helping to cover the deficits of the welfare state, which ultimately leads to a deficit in social justice. Unemployment, in combination with austerity policies, lead to an expansion of economic and social inequality for this population, threatened by the consequences of income loss, and challenges even the most basic goods and services of a welfare state.

*The Athens Solidarity Center is financed by EEA and Norway Grants, with HumanRights360 and CROWE Greece as the fund operator. The Center is also supported by the Municipality of Athens.

Stefka was born and raised in Bulgaria. In the mid-1990s, she, like many of her compatriots, arrived at Greece in search of a better life, a life that would allow her access to basic rights, such as work and financial independence.  26 years later, Stefka has acquired the Greek citizenship and since 2007 she is a pensioner. Stefka was unaware of the reasons why her pension was being reduced each year. It was reduced without a sufficient explanation by authorities. She didn’t know the pension amount she was entitled to, and whether her insurance had paid her retirement pensions which, she was later informed, had the right to receive it retrospectively.

She visited the Athens Solidarity Center seeking legal support regarding her pension issue. Prior to that, she had visited her social insurer several times as well as private lawyers. All in vain. The Center’s legal team responded to Stefka’s request and took a careful look at her pension profile and data. According to the data, the social insurer owed Stefka the amount of 5,500 euros which she would no longer be entitled to if she did not request it by the end of 2019, as there is a limitation period for the application of such request. Stefka had been deprived of other monies owed by the social insurer in the past due to deadlines she was not aware of and unable to meet.

Stefka is now fully aware of her pension profile, her rights, and will immediately receive the above-mentioned amount owed to her by her social insurer.

Unfortunately, the nature and the way public services function is slow and dissuades people belonging to vulnerable social groups, such as Stefka- a foreigner, working in Greece for many years who has acquired the Greek citizenship- to have equal access and rights to social services and benefits which constitute the structure of a Welfare State. The Solidarity Center’s Legal Service responded to a twofold need: to provide information but also legal representation and mediation in claiming rights, thus restoring the unequal treatment of a citizen.

*The Athens Solidarity Center is financed by EEA and Norway Grants, with HumanRights360 and CROWE Greece as the fund operator. The Center is also supported by the Municipality of Athens.

Mohammed is from Pakistan. He is 36 years old. He requested international protection and asylum and his request was rejected in both first and second degree. Mohammed has been diagnosed with a chronic kidney disease (CKD) at a terminal stage by Greek Public hospitals and since May 2019 he has joined a dialysis treatment program, three times per week, at the artificial kidney unit of a public hospital in the Attica region. The treatment will be necessary for the rest of his life.

Mohammed has been referred to the legal team of the organization’s Solidarity Center in Athens by the NGO responsible for his accommodation in order to get legal support for his second asylum request at the Greek Asylum Service. The case of Mohammed was directly classified as one of “high priority”, since the beneficiary would be deprived of his medical treatment and accommodation, if he was no longer deemed as an international protection applicant and thus with no legal residence status in the country.

The practical difficulty of this kind of claim is the long waiting periods both in booking an appointment with the asylum service for the claim to be registered and in having the claim examined for admissibility. This is the case even for vulnerable applicants. The above facts call into question the access of an extremely vulnerable person to medical care and housing, two basic social welfare benefits, which must be provided to everyone, and especially to those who, for health reasons, are unable to provide for themselves.

The Solidarity Center’s legal team immediately began the process of submitting the required legal and medical supporting documents, requested an appointment with the relevant department for vulnerable cases and succeeded in highlighting the urgency of the case. The positive outcome at every step of the process has generated optimism for both the legal team and Mohammed himself. The request was examined in the form of urgency, and Mohammed received the international protection certificate. He now gets his treatment in the public hospital without any problems, as every citizen is entitled to.

*The Athens Solidarity Center is financed by EEA and Norway Grants, with HumanRights360 and CROWE Greece as the fund operator. The Center is also supported by the Municipality of Athens.

Eleni K. 40-year old is a professional makeup artist. She decided to seek legal support at SolidarityNow’s Thessaloniki Solidarity Center, as she did not have the money to pay a lawyer to represent her in the change of her gender in the government-issued identity document.

From the age of 4 she felt that she was different. It’s not easy to be different in a world that wants you to be someone else. She faced many difficulties at school; her classmates were cursing and abusing her verbally. At the age of 18 she left her small town and went to Thessaloniki. She sought for “help” at the red light district. Then the only way to get a legal gender correction of your identity document was through prostitution, as the surgery was expensive. She was scared and feeling ashamed. She didn’t want to force herself to follow this path, as most of the people were doing back then. Her next step was to move to Athens, where she found a job as a makeup artist and cosmetics saleswoman. “There I felt more free,” she tells us. Family reasons forced her, five years ago, to return back to Thessaloniki. She continued to work for the same company, but for no apparent reason, after some time, she was fired. She thinks this was because she was wearing makeup, but they never admitted it.

At the age of 37, she decided to start hormone therapy. Legislation had now changed and the procedure to correct her/his gender on the identity card was easier than in the past. She talked to her family about her decision; her mother was very supportive, but her sister had some difficulties to understand her. “Suddenly there was a strong man next to her, a man who was a role model for her, and now she has ‘lost’ him,” says Eleni and adds, “fortunately now our relationship is good”.

Correcting her gender on her identity card was something very important to her, since she could no longer live as two different people. She wanted this situation to end as they questioned her identity everywhere, in public services and banks. When the court’s ruling came out, she had to go to her home town at the population registration office and the court of first instance to complete the process and take her identity. The whole process was frightening her but she met employees who helped her and did not make her feel bad. “I’m glad, because I can now do my job without any fear,” she says. “Life is too short; everything goes away and we must stop spending so much time sweating the small stuff,” concludes.

“The establishment of the right of the person to change his/her gender in the government-issued identity document is an important achievement for the LGBTQI + community. The imprinting of the gender on an administrative documents is an important step in defending the rights of transgender people,”  said the Legal Service of the Thessaloniki Solidarity Center.

*Thessaloniki Solidarity Center was established and is supported by Open Society Foundations.