(4/5)“When I arrived from Syria to Turkey my friends and I started to look for a smuggler who could get us to Greece. Getting in touch with a smuggler was very strange. None of us had ever spoken to a criminal. Finally, we found someone and each of us paid 1200 Euro to get on a rubber boat. We were 41 people and the smugglers put us into a small van. Each of us had to stand on one foot in order to fit in. It was so scary. After two hours we arrived at a forest. We spent the night there. The next day the sea was smooth so we were really lucky. We could see Greece right in front of us. A few kilometers before we entered Greek waters, we got pulled aside by the Turkish Coast guard. They told us to return. We negotiated with them for thirty minutes. Then they let us go but they took all our fuel so we couldn’t get forward. I took my phone and called Greek coastguard. They told us that as long as we were still in Turkish waters there was nothing they could do for us. I looked on Google Maps and saw that we had about one kilometer to go. I told the whole group that there were only 300 meters left so they would not get discouraged. We tried to peddle forward but we barely advanced. We had no water left and everyone started to lose hope. Then all of a sudden my friend came up with the idea to fill the fuel tank with a big bottle of aftershave that he carried in his backpack. I thought he was crazy but we tried it and it worked. It felt like a miracle had happened. We reached the Greek border and the coast guard came and helped us out.”
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