Hungary closes down border crossing from Serbia, September 15. Demotix/Beata Zawrzei. All rights reserved.In these times of turmoil over the massive arrival in Europe of war refugees from Syria and Iraq, and of massive interrogations among receiving European countries, and people, torn between welcome, fear and, for most, uncertainty about what the future might look like, I would like to put in the balance my family experience.
Born French, of Flemish ancestry from my father's side – he being born a few miles from the Belgian border – my maternal grand-father was an Hungarian Jew from Transylvania (now part of Romania) who had emigrated to France looking for a better life; then he married a French woman.
His brother followed his journey to the States where he started a fruitful glass business. So my grandfather was what we would now call an ‘economic refugee’, like millions of other immigrants whose families are now part and parcel of today's France.
