Syrian refugees use war resilience to confront virus
While the pandemic bears no resemblance to Syria’s civil war, some refugees believe their experience of violence and exile helps them deal with the anxiety sparked by the novel coronavirus.
Several Syrians in France, who said past ordeals such as prison and exile, had primed them for coping with the lockdown.
The minute France’s stay-athome orders began, Mohammad Hijazi said he thought back to what he had learnt from living through war and the dark days of his three-month detention by the Syrian regime.
Keeping a strict routine helps, said the 31-year-old filmmaker from Damascus, who was held because of his political views in 2012 and 2013.
His experience has taught him the importance of community, eating healthy and expressing yourself “through singing, drawing, praying... everyone has their way, but they all work just as well”.
“I suppose that people who have lived through these types of experiences have more training on how to keep a sense of perspective,” Hijazi said, speaking via a video conference app here, his home since 2017.
“We immediately go back to the mechanisms we used before to manage in times of crisis.”
Seeing war does not make living through a pandemic any easier, as Yazan al-Homsy knows.
He survived more than a year under siege and bombing in the city of Homs and said the first week of the lockdown took him back to that terrifying time.
Before planes were grounded by the virus, the sound of them taking off and landing at Lyon airport near his new home began to trigger memories of jet fighters that pounded his native city.
“I’d wake up thinking, where am I? I was lost and didn’t go out for a week,” said Homsy.
After everything he has been through, he says the best advice he can give anxious friends is to remember that “their government is working for their safety” and that “they have rights”.
In these troubled times, living in a democracy is also reassuring for Dunia Al Dahan from Damascus.
“There is a system, there is a state, and there are people who are expressing their views,” the mother of two said.
Having lived in Paris since 2014, she values the freedom to be able to speak out, citing the example of a televised interview with a French doctor, who lambasted the authorities over a lack of preparedness for a pandemic.
But she acknowledged that the death toll from Covid-19 had “frightened” her.
“What really frightened me was the news of the deaths, the number of deaths,” said Dahan, 40, who co-founded the Portes Ouvertes Sur L’Art (Open Doors to Art) association and is studying for a doctorate.
“It shocked me because it made me wonder: how could we bear it when we hear how many people were killed in Syria?”
Having started from scratch once, Emad Shoshara, a Damascene chef, is not letting the string of cancelled catering contracts get him down.
He owned a transport company, but he had to find a new trade when war forced him to flee.
He set up shop in Paris in 2015 offering Syrian cuisine. But the coronavirus has wreaked havoc on businesses, big and small.
And now Shoshara spends his days making time-lapse video recipes to share on Instagram such as his bright purple, beettinted version of hummus, the star of the Levantine kitchen.
“In Syrian slang, we say: every time you fall, you stand up again,” he said while preparing grilled octopus.
The 36-year-old hopes his virtual cooking will help lift spirits.
“(Problems) are not a reason to give up. Remember, you are on a path in life and there are obstacles. Maybe you’ll overcome this obstacle, maybe you’ll trip over the next one. But whatever happens, just keep going.”