I woke up excited. Today was the last day of the Rasoul´s at the Diakonie shelter. It was thanks to the generous offer of Eva and Stephan that the Rasoul´s didn´t have to move to a camp as the lovely couple was happy to invite them to their own home for a full month.
I scheduled the move together with Mo who luckily had the car of his brother at his disposal. After work, I rushed to the shelter. The Rasoul´s were ready to go. Petra from the Diakonie shelter was kind enough to take me to the storage room and offered me to take some food with me. I packed everything I could.
We put the few bags the Rasoul´s had into Mo´s car. Helz and Mohamad, the two teens, were out with the acquaintance of their parents and would meet us at the apartment. Eva and Stephan were excited and Eva was already planning their first dinner for the night.
The couple´s apartment was beautiful, a truly warm and welcoming home reflecting the couple´s spirits. The room was already prepared with the mattresses that had arrived the night before. We dropped off all the bags in the room and I took the extra food upstairs to the kitchen.
Eva and Stephan showed the Rasoul´s around and mentioned that they could use anything in the apartment and that they should help themselves in the kitchen. My heart melted seeing that their intention was for the Rasoul´s to feel at home.
We went upstairs, sat down, had tea and coffee and were able to chat thanks to Mo was translating patiently. Mohamad and Helz arrived too.
I could see that the Rasoul´s really didn´t want to be a burden to anyone but I mentioned that Eva and Stephan would have never agreed to this if they were not certain that they could pull it off. In Austrian mentality a "yes" can be taken as a "yes" and the same rule applies to a "no".
I decided to leave with Mo before dinner as I wanted to give Eva, Stephan and the family some time by themselves to get a feeling for each other. We exchanged phone numbers, email addresses and some more information about the next steps I would take. I was planning on coming back the next day to visit and to pick the Rasoul´s up to go to the museum. I also contacted the Iraqi family who was living at the shelter with Rasoul´s and invited them to join us. Culture to me is a crucial part of positive integration, just as much as a social network. It was my goal to not only find the Rasoul´s a permanent home but to also make Vienna their hometown by showing them all the beautiful things that make it one of a kind so that they could learn to love it even though I knew that nothing could ever replace their original hometown in Syria. It was a new beginning and it was difficult on many levels but I was confident that I could provide them with everything they needed for a good, steady start. Hope and Love were on my side.
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