During the summers of my schooling years, my father trained me to work from a young age. At the age of fifteen and during one of these working days, I realized what it means to be persecuted. As I stood around a fire with my coworkers, one of my peers threw a nearby tank of petrol on me and I caught on fire.

 

After twenty days of hospitalization, I was transferred at home unable to move as my skin was burnt. A couple of weeks later, I had lost my vision due to the lack of blood. They kept bringing "plasma" from France, but I was blind for three months and on bedrest for six. Despite this situation costing 3 years of my life, I praise the Lord that the only scarves reminding me of this event are on my legs.

 

By a miracle, I regained my life back and was trained as electrician while establishing my own music band. After years passed and my parents died, I decided to leave Syria and immigrate to Europe. But, the day before I left, I had decided to take revenge on my attacker. When I went to his house, pretending to be his friend, his sister informed me that he was imprisoned the week before for killing a girl in a car accident. I believe that God spared my life once more.

 

So, I arrived in Greece in 1989, believing that I would never go back to Syria. I wanted to have nothing with my country and my nation as I was terribly traumatized. A few years later, I met Voula and after we were married we visited my country many times.

The beginning of the war in Syria in 2011 brought a big change to my heart and mind. In 2013, I made the decision to give up my job and be dedicated to helping the men, women, and children fleeing my home country. These persons were landing in Europe hopeless, distressed, depressed, and victimized. I felt the call to offer them hope, guidance, re-orientation, genuine and practical love, strength, and inspiration to start from the beginning.