Special envoy to GreeceIt is a wish. May she never forget, please, the photo Esra took of me, who will sleep tonight at a gas station on the E-75 in northern Greece. Nor the kiss so sweet - a sigh on my ear - that Mahmud gave me while his father, younger than me although he doesn't look it, smiled at me. May she never forget the boy who preferred to play football with me more than with the little ones because I kick better.
The violin music of the Irish boy from Lesbos. The smile of the girl from Kobane washing her head on the tracks in Idomeni. The child from Aleppo who sang for us on a rainy night. The warmth on my face, sitting around the fire with Ola and her whole family, listening to her tell us about her life in English. The strange smell of the mountain of life jackets north of Lesbos.
I never want to forget Sana, the Afghan girl who is on the front page of the newspaper today. The pride of Aimal's father - from Kabul - when I tell him that his son is a very good boy, and he answers me that his brothers are too, that all his children are good and he hugs them with the long arms of a father. The deep gaze of Emilia Kamuisi, the grandmother from Lesbos, when she wished us kaló taxidi [good trip] when leaving her home. How dark the Aegean was at night, and the security that the people from Proactiva made me feel during their night watch. And the photos of dead friends stored on the mobile of a girl too young to have a phone.
We have traveled, with Cristina Mas, more than two thousand kilometers through Greece, a land that I love. We have met good people who are suffering a very difficult situation and also many others who are doing more than they can to help them. We have tried to tell their stories. And my wish is that we never forget them. And that Emma does not forget them, who wants me to take Mahmud home with me.