The survivors next door

There was no time to grieve the loss of her boys—she immediately had to rush her surviving daughter, and comatose husband, to medical attention and safety. She had another baby on the way, and needed to stay alive.

Reema trudged through dark underground sewer tunnels with her young children to get to safety in Syria. Now, with their second home in ruins, Reema called smugglers to help to get to safety. Later, the family traveled a harrowing eight hours in the night to Jordan.

“I felt like going mad, but I had to come back to my faith. I saw other people’s problems were worse than mine, and I felt like nothing.”

Reema used to be an upper-class housewife who lived comfortably in Homs before the war forced them out of their home. As Homs was being bombed into oblivion, the family tried to resettle in the tiny city of Yabroud (population 25,891), only to be forced out. She recalls her year as a refugee in Jordan as “hell,” a fate she wouldn’t wish on any enemy.

Her husband Adham lay in a coma for 21 days. His consciousness returned, but he was paralyzed from the waist down. The family had an enormous bill on their hands upon his discharge. Reema was still reeling with grief but scraped out an income cleaning homes, selling vegetables to pay the bill and feed the two children who remained — Islam, now four, and Tabarak, three years old.

“We were so hungry all that time," she recalls. "When we walked past a house, we could smell the food, and we just wished we could have a bit. People would insult us, saying we took their jobs.”

When the mood grows heavy, four-year-old Islam waves her saffron-haired My Little Pony toy in front of the adults and interjects in English:

“This one, orange!”

Islam and Tabarak bounce and spin on the couch, a whirlwind of pink. The girls seem determined to distract their mother's attention whenever the atmosphere turns dark.

“This yours!” Three-year-old Tabarak squeals, gripping a pink beaded bracelet in her stubby fingers.

“What’s this one? This one?” Both girls are inquisitive about technology, and attempt to take photos with my camera.

The family's first few weeks in Surrey were marked by isolation and confusion, aggravated by Adham's struggles with mobility.

"We didn't even realize there was a Superstore just behind our apartment complex for two weeks," she recalls.

When a group of strangers found out about their difficult situation, the cloud of despair began to lift.

Bassam's wife, Yousra, sits on the couch to talk. Last year, she had often seemed busy and preoccupied, caring for young children including a newborn who almost died during his first month in Canada. Today, she looks visibly more relaxed.

“I’m going to school,” Yousra said in English, with a touch of pride. She said her daughters Mariana, Fatima and Yusra are enjoying summer break.

When Bassam goes outside for a cigarette, Adham hoists himself off the couch with his arms and drags his body to the balcony to chat. His wheelchair is somewhere, but there’s no room with all the guests and furniture, so he climbs on the chair using just his arms. Yousef, Bassam’s bright 7-year-old son, waits attentively to translate as Adham starts to talk about memories of the war.

“Her - they were really scared. She saw her brother die,” Yousef says, pointing to Islam walking through the room.

“They were … sleeping, and the airplane, come and... ‘boom!’” Yousef uses his hands to depict an explosion.

Shrapnel parts are still stuck in Adham’s back. If he tries to move these parts, a botched operation could render him "blind" or “sleeping all day,” explains Yousef.

Adham woke up weeks later in a hospital in Jordan. He learned all three of his sons were dead, and that his wife and daughters were in a refugee camp. His girls, who were sleeping in another room when the bomb landed, had escaped without long-term injuries.

"Thank God!" Bassam says in English, comforting his friend.

Haroon Khan ruffels Yousef’s hair, calling him a smart boy.

“When I first met Yousef, he didn’t know any English,” he tells me, glowing with admiration. “Now, he’s translating for adults in English.”

It's not easy for them to travel around to explore Surrey since Adham is in a wheelchair. So the people they've met are often the ones coming over to visit their home.

Adham, who was once supporting a much larger household, now lives in an unfamiliar landscape and struggles to communicate due to language barriers. Even though his arrival to Canada was supposed to be a positive change, his initial weeks were traumatizing as he struggled to get support from settlement services.

“It made me hate myself, and where I am,” he murmured. He said he felt like “a burden" on his wife.

The two girls go silent, looking down and fidgeting with their toys.

There is pain and suffering written on Adham's face as his eyes stare off in the distance.

Suddenly, there’s a flurry of talk among Bassam, Yousra, Reema, Adham and Fatima, each shouting their views about what to do about the future.

"We've left everything back in Syria. When the war ends and the country rebuilds, we will go back."

"Be realistic! How long do you think it will take to rebuild? Look at Iraq! Has it rebuilt itself after the war yet?...How many years will it take?"

"But look at what we've gone through here since coming to Canada..."

"OK, but many refugees have it worse.”

Fatima reassures that they’re not arguing; this is just a normal exchange of opinions.

Although the family is tight-knit, they’re still affected by the conflict. The parents say the girls are still terrified of ambulance sirens.

Reema says she accepts all the losses of war. She came to terms with the loss of three children, the death of her sisters, and her husband’s injuries. But she bursts into tears when mentioning the one memory that still troubles her.

“My mom died of starvation. During Ramadan. This is too much,” she says, tears streaming down her face. “This, I cannot digest.”

In front of her, Islam murmurs in English, “I love this one,” holding a plastic doll, and Tabarak wails, “Mommy! Mom!”

“Humanity died during the war in Syria,” Reema said. But she doesn’t have long to linger on the past. Islam will be starting school in September, and she has to focus on her daughters' future.

“It’s God who gives, and God who takes—and I believe we’ll get through this,” she comments, on her struggles. “We didn’t come to Canada for money. We came for peace, and to stop living in fear.”

Adham has turned back into his former gregarious self, and profusely thanks visitors for coming.

“Please come again,” he smiles. “We want to see you again.”