90 »I was crossing the river Evros together with my wife and our six-year-old boy on the October 26. There was still some light. We were 15 persons in the boat. Suddenly our boat got stuck in some branches. Some people jumped off the boat. I was among them. Then the boat turned around. Our boy got caught in the branches. In the last second I could grab 13. Lost and dead at the borders him. He was about to drown. As I started looking for my wife, the others told me that she had been carried away by the stream. There were Greek officers standing at the coast and watching. They didn’t react. They didn’t help. I don’t know how many got lost. I don’t know if my wife is still alive.«255 »Last time I saw my husband, the water was carrying him away with his eyes closed and the bag with our children’s clothes still on his shoulders.« Tahera, from Afghanistan256 knew how to swim save two African women. Then I lost sight of him. Last time I saw my husband, the water was carrying him away with his eyes closed and the bag with our children’s clothes still on his shoulders«. ■ Tahera has three children (10, 8 and 6 years old). Her husband got lost on the border between Turkey and Greece, at the river Evros. Until today she does not know whether he is alive or dead. The rest of the family managed to reach Germany, but her heart remains on the wet border, still looking for her husband. »We were around 60 people, but had only a small dinghy for some women and the kids. The others had to walk through the river. Some of them were not tall enough, soon their heads slowly disappeared under the water, which carried them away in the dark, along with their cries for help«. It was two o’ clock in the morning when they started their journey to Europe from Turkey. Eight people managed to save themselves on the riverbank. The Turkish police arrested them. »We talked on the phone, but they also don’t know anything about my husband and the other missing persons!«. Close to the river, there were some rail lines. Though exhausted and under shock, they tried to search for the others but did not find anyone. There were also some other Afghan and African families – around 60 – who moved in two separated groups. »For one hour we walked through the forest. We reached the water, but they told us it’s not good to cross the river now. We left and then came back again to the river-side at 4 o’ clock in the morning. There was only a small boat. Four women and all the children got on the boat. Eleven persons, among them a girl with disabilities. The others had to cross the river by holding hands. The water was very high and those who couldn’t swim suddenly disappeared into the water. When we reached the shore, we got out of the dinghy. I saw a friend of my husband’s who 255 H.N. from Afghanistan; November 2, 2010 – Athens Then they sat there, waiting for the police to come and arrest them. They immediately told them about the missing people. Tahera and her three children were transferred to Neo Chimonio’s police station. She stayed for two days. The police released them in order to ease the re-unification procedure, in case her husband was found. The police searched the river for a couple of hours. When they returned, they sent some photos taken with their mobile phones to Tahera, but she did not recognize her husband among them. None of the fourteen corpses retrieved by the Greek authorities fitted Tahera’s description. The lost were not in Tychero, Soufli, Alexandroupoli, Didimoticho, Orestiada, Dikea, Sidiro, Feres, Neo Chimonio… Four more bodies were found on the Turkish side. It is her last hope. The anticipated DNA-test procedure Tahera wants to make with the found corpses of that period has not yet been started by the German authorities. She is waiting since more than one year. 256 Tahera from Afghanistan; Interviews by Infomobile August 2010 – Athens; March 2011 – Hamburg