Months after the body of Aylan Kurdi was found washed up on a Turkish beach in September 2015, the attention of key international players has turned towards the Levantine region of the Middle East, and peace talks are beginning to take place within Europe to determine the fate of Syria. Despite attempts at both peace building and easing the current humanitarian crisis within the Middle East and Europe, there remains a lack of migrant voices within the arena of public debate. No matter how many bodies are violently thrown onto Europe's collective consciousness, the stories of those embarking on these journeys are almost never heard. It is imperative that we try to help give those fleeing war both a voice and a platform.
I travelled to Macedonia on the 15th of November 2015 to listen to the stories of those rendered voiceless, and with the hopes of alleviating some of the hardships of both the refugees and NGOs in the country. My hopes were idealistic and I quickly reevaluated my stance when faced with the grossly asymmetrical power relations within which the refugees found themselves. As someone of South Asian decent I was repeatedly and systematically mistaken for a refugee, placing me and my travel companions in an uncomfortable middle ground, identifying with the constructed ‘other’ whilst simultaneously being viewed with suspicion by our European ‘own’.
16 November 2015: My first day in the Tabanovce camp and I have been told about a man who has just disembarked from the train with his travelling companions. He seems unwell, and his companions urge him to get medical assistance from the Red Cross. The temperature in Macedonia, as of lately, drops rapidly at night but he would still like to continue on to Serbia. Unfortunately, a medical exam reveals the he has incurred damage to his foot during the journey, resulting in broken bones, something he did not notice…
