It has been over a year since I visited Gaziantep together with Dr. Susanne Schmitz and Dr. Andreas Gammel to have a look at our joint project.
All the greater was the joy to meet Abu Ziad and his warm and hospitable family again, with whom I could live again this time. So it did not surprise me to find a table overloaded with food despite the late hour. A picture that actually came to me at every meal together. Together, since Ramadan, but only in the evening. During the day I often find it difficult to accept all the food offered, on the one hand because of the sheer unmanageable quantities to others because the others were only allowed to watch. The following day I had the opportunity to meet the new members of the team personally and was reassured by the positive impression Abu had already made of them.
The three and a half days were used well and intensively and Abu really tried to spend every free minute with me and to read literally every wish from my lips.
Should he ever visit us in Germany I will start to sweat a lot to do justice to his host qualities.
In the evening we sat on the balcony until late into the night and he told me with pictures, hands, feet and Google Translate (speech input) about Raqqa before and after the war, his life before the escape and also had many questions for me.
The time passed much too fast and I flew home with the even bigger conviction how important this project is for the people there and with the freshly strengthened motivation to collect the money again this year what is necessary to keep it alive. Not least for Abu, his family and the other members of the team.
