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This 9-Year-Old Syrian Boy Got Lost Along the Refugee Trail in Greece

5 minute read

Abdelhay Eydy, a 9-year-old boy from the Syrian city of Idlib, isn’t quite sure how he got separated from his parents as they were making their way to Europe last month. Though hardly shy, Abdelhay is a taciturn kid, and answers most questions about his story with a shrug or a suspicious smile. The truth is that Abdelhay’s experiences aren’t all that rare — and seem in some ways inevitable — among the hundreds of thousands of migrants now making their way from Syria to the European Union.

Around noon on Sept. 6, when a TIME photographer first met Abdelhay, he was swimming and playing beside a pier full of small fishing boats on the tiny Greek island of Leros. Asked how he had gotten there, he looked up at the Syrian asylum seeker he’d been traveling with for the past three weeks, Ahmed Abu Kashef, who said he found the boy stranded and alone in Izmir, a city on the western coast of Turkey.

Abu Kashef then filled in the details of their story as Abdelhay went back to jumping off the pier into the clear blue water. On Sept. 2, he says he met Abdelhay at the edge of a teeming crowd of travelers at Izmir airport, a common transit point for migrants heading through Turkey to Europe. The boy said his family had escaped from Syria to Lebanon and was planning from there to join the exodus of refugees heading to Europe. But somewhere along the road they seem to have lost each other, and after failing in the course of that day to find any sign of Abdelhay’s parents in Izmir, Abu Kashef decided to take the boy with him rather than leave him marooned in the airport.

“We’ve been traveling together ever since,” he says. A few days after they met, Abdelhay and Abu Kashef made the short but perilous crossing from the Turkish coast to Greece, where their tiny boat, packed with about 15 other migrants, landed on the island of Leros. Roughly a thousand asylum seekers have been arriving on that island alone every day since late August, when Europe’s refugee crisis peaked, and Abu Kashef, who is 43 years old and also hails from the city of Idlib, has been asking everyone he meets along the way whether they know the boy or his parents.

He hasn’t had much luck so far. The Leros branch of the Greek maritime police, who are responsible for registering migrants and providing them with the documents they need to travel on toward mainland Greece, have no record of a child named Abdelhay Eydy arriving on the island, according to social workers from the Smile of the Child, a Greek charity that helps reunite migrant families separated along their journey. The group tells TIME it has taken up Abdelhay’s case, and will make every effort to find him and his parents.

But staying in touch with asylum seekers along their road through Europe can be difficult. Abu Kashef has neither a mobile phone nor an email address, he said, and since meeting with TIME there has been no answer at the Turkish number he provided as the only way to contact him. On Sept. 6, after reaching out to several international rights groups about Abdelhay’s case and posting his photo with a call for help on Twitter, a TIME reporter returned to the place where Abdelhay and Abu Kashef had slept the previous night. It was a covered archway outside a disused building in Leros, right near the port where they had been swimming with a group of other migrants. But all of them were already gone.

For migrants on the island, it usually takes no more than a day or two to receive their registration papers and move on toward northern Greece on ferries. So Abdelhay may already be traveling the migrant trail that leads from there through Macedonia, Serbia and back into the European Union via Hungary. Given how badly the migration crisis has overwhelmed local and national authorities along that route, it’s not surprising that police in Leros seemed to have failed to take note of Abdelhay’s arrival. The courtyard of the local police station, a whitewashed building eroded by the island’s salty air, has become a de facto refugee camp in recent days, as migrants sleep or sit in every available spot, waiting for their documents.

That afternoon on the pier, Abdelhay was at ease and glad at the chance to play in the water, and Abu Kashef seemed to treat the boy like a surrogate son. Abu Kashef says his own children are back in Turkey — two teenage boys, one of whom is deaf and mute — and he hopes to secure asylum for them in Germany as well. Unless he can find Abdelhay’s parents along the way, Abu Kashef says he will take the boy with him and continue the search once he arrives. But anyone who has information that could help reunite Abdelhay with his parents should reach out to the Smile of the Child at the contacts provided here: http://www.hamogelo.gr/1.2/home.

These Photos Show the Massive Scale of Europe’s Migrant Crisis

Greece Migrants
Syrian and Afghan refugees warm themselves and dry their clothes around a fire after arriving on a dinghy from the Turkish coast to the northeastern Greek island of Lesbos, early on Oct. 7, 2015. Muhammed Muheisen—AP
migrant refugee greece
A migrant who recently arrived across the Mediterranean Sea from Turkey, watching a ferry in the port of Mytilene, Lesbos island, Greece, on Oct. 5, 2015.Zoltan Balogh—EPA
refugees migrants Lesbos Greek islands
An Afghan wades to the shore after arriving in an overloaded rubber dinghy on the coast near Skala Sikaminias, Lesbos island, Greece, Oct. 1, 2015. Filip Singer—EPA
Syrian refugees Lesbos Greece
Syrian refugees are covered with life blankets upon arriving to the Greek island of Lesbos, after crossing the Aegean sea from Turkey, on Sept. 28, 2015. Aris Messinis—AFP/Getty Images
migrants refugees Lesbos
Migrants and refugees arrive on Sykamia beach, west of the port of Mytilene, on the Greek island of Lesbos after crossing the Aegean sea from Turkey, on Sept. 22, 2015. Iakovos Hatzistavrou—AFP/Getty Images
Croatia Migrants
Migrants and refugees board a train by climbing through the windows as they try to avoid a police barrier at the station in Tovarnik, Croatia, on Sept. 20, 2015. Manu Brabo—AP
Croatia Migrants
A Syrian refugee boy cries while he and his family try to board a train at the station in Tovarnik, Croatia, on Sept. 20, 2015.Manu Brabo—AP
migrants hungary serbia border clash
A migrant holds his child during a clash with Hungarian riot police at the Horgos border crossing in Serbia, on Sept. 16, 2015.Sergey Ponomarev—The New York Times/Redux
migrants serbia
Migrants sleep on a highway in front of a barrier at the border with Hungary near the village of Horgos, Serbia, on Sept. 16, 2015. Marko Djurica—Reuters
Hungary Serbia border
A wagon equipped with razor wire is placed at the border between Hungary and Serbia in Roszke, some 10 miles southeast from Budapest, Hungary, Sept. 14, 2015, to close the gap of the temporary border fence at the Horgos-Szeged railway line. Balazs Mohai—EPA
refugees migrants Lesbos
A refugee reacts from exhaustion while swimming towards the shore after a dinghy carrying Syrian and Afghan refugees before reaching the Greek island of Lesbos, on Sept. 13, 2015. Alkis Konstantinidis—Reuters
refugees migrants Hungary
Syrian people sleep inside a greenhouse at a makeshift camp for asylum seekers near Roszke, southern Hungary, on Sept. 13, 2015. Muhammed Muheisen—AP
Hungary Migrants refugees children
Syrian refugee Raed Alabdou, 24, holds his one-month old daughter Roa'a, while he and his wife hide in a field not to be seen by Hungarian policemen, after they crossed the Serbian-Hungarian border near Roszke, southern Hungary, on Sept. 11, 2015. Muhammed Muheisen—AP
refugees migrants macedonia
Migrants and refugees beg Macedonian police to allow passage to cross the border from Greece into Macedonia during a rainstorm, near the Greek village of Idomeni, on Sept. 10, 2015. Yannis Behrakis—Reuters
refugees migrants Morahalom Hungary
Migrants run over a motorway from a collection point that had been set up to transport people to camps in Morahalom, Hungary, on Sept. 9, 2015.Dan Kitwood—Getty Images
syrian refugee migrant hungary
A young Syrian man from Damascus tries to evade the Hungarian police by sneaking through a forest close to the Serbian border in Morahalom, Hungary, on Sept. 8, 2015. Dan Kitwood—Getty Images
refugees migrants Serbia
Migrants cross into Hungary as they walk over railroad tracks at the Serbian border with Hungary in Horgas, Serbia, on Sept. 7, 2015.Dan Kitwood— Getty Images
refugee migrant Lesbos
A refugee from Syria prays after arriving on the shores of the Greek island of Lesbos aboard an inflatable dinghy across the Aegean Sea from Turkey, on Sept. 7, 2015. Angelos Tzortzinis—AFP/Getty Images
syrian refugees migrants greek coast guard
A migrant scrambles to climb back aboard a rubber dinghy full of his fellow Syrians as they try to cross from Turkey to the Greek islands on their way to claim asylum in the European Union, late on Sept. 6, 2015.Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME
syrian refugees migrants greek coast guard
A Syrian migrant aboard a flimsy rubber motorboat hands his one-month-old baby to Greek coast guards, who have arrived to rescue the boat full of migrants from dangerous waters near the border between Greece and Turkey, early on Sept. 7, 2015.Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME
Greece Migrants
A young Syrian boy is wrapped with a thermal blanket as he arrives with others at the coast on a dinghy after crossing from Turkey, at the island of Lesbos, Greece, on Sept. 7, 2015.Petros Giannakouris—AP
Greece Migrants
Refugees and migrants wait to cross the border from the northern Greek village of Idomeni to southern Macedonia, on Sept. 7, 2015. Giannis Papanikos—AP
Migrants walk along rail tracks as they arrive to a collection point in the village of Roszke, Hungary
Migrants walk along rail tracks as they arrive to a collection point in the village of Roszke, Hungary, on Sept. 6, 2015.Marko Djurica—Reuters
migrant refugees train macedonia
Migrant families ride a train from Gevgelija to the Serbian border in Macedonia, on Sept. 4, 2015.Dan Kitwood—Getty Images
Italy Migrants refugees
Migrants crowd the bridge of the Norwegian Siem Pilot ship sailing along the Mediterranean sea, on Sept. 2, 2015. Gregorio Borgia—AP
Aylan Kurdi boy drowned
A Turkish gendarme carries the body of Alan Kurdi, 3, who drowned along with his brother Galip, 5, and their mother, in a failed attempt to sail to the Greek island of Kos, in the coastal town of Bodrum, Turkey, on Sept. 2, 2015.Reuters
Migrant crisis
Dozens of refugee families, mostly from Syria, camped near the Keleti train station in Budapest, Hungary on Sept. 2, 2015.Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME
Migrant crisis
A Syrian migrant bids farewell to the Hungarian volunteers who welcomed him upon his arrival in the European Union in Szeged, Hungary on Aug. 30, 2015.Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME
refugees migrants Hungarian-Serbian border
A father of a migrants family is arrested by the local police near the village of Roszke on the Hungarian-Serbian border on Aug. 28, 2015.Attila Kisbender—AFP/Getty Images
Syrian migrants cross under a fence as they enter Hungary at the border with Serbia, near Roszke
Syrian migrants cross under a fence as they enter Hungary at the border with Serbia, near Roszke, on Aug. 27, 2015. Bernadett Szabo—Reuters
Hungary border fence migrants refugees
Hungarian soldiers install a wire fence at the border between Hungary and Serbia near Hercegszanto, 115 miles southeast from Budapest, on Aug. 25, 2015. Tamas Soki—EPA
syrian migrant refugee girl greece
A little girl from Syria looks out of a bus as the ferry she arrived in is reflected in the bus window at the port of Piraeus, Greece, on Aug. 25, 2015. Petros Giannakouris—AP
Macedonian police clash with refugees at blocked border
Children cry as migrants waiting on the Greek side of the border break through a cordon of Macedonian special police forces to cross into Macedonia, near the southern city of Gevgelija, The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia on Aug. 21, 2015.Georgi Licovski—EPA
Calais migrants
Gendarmerie attempt to prevent people from entering the Eurotunnel terminal in Coquelles, Calais, France on July 30, 2015.Rob Stothard—Getty Images
Kos Migrants Greece
Life vests and a deflated dinghy are seen on a beach on the Greek island of Kos, following the arrival of Afghan immigrants, on May 30, 2015.Yannis Behrakis—Reuters
9 year old lost migrant refugee boy Greece
Abdelhay Eydy, 9, from Idlib, Syria, who got separated from his parents on refugee trail, photographed in Leros, Greece, on Sept. 5, 2015. Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME
9 year old lost migrant refugee boy Greece
Abdelhay Eydy, 9, from Idlib, Syria, who got separated from his parents on refugee trail, photographed in Leros, Greece, on Sept. 5, 2015. Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME
9 year old lost migrant refugee boy Greece
Abdelhay Eydy, 9, from Idlib, Syria, who got separated from his parents on refugee trail, photographed in Leros, Greece, on Sept. 5, 2015. Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME
9 year old lost migrant refugee boy Greece
Ahmed abu Kashef, a migrant from the Syrian city of Idlib, stands at a pier on the island of Leros, Greece, with a fellow migrant, 9-year-old Abdelhay Eydy, who was separated from his parents during their escape from Syria to Europe. After finding Eydy stranded at a Turkish airport in the middle of August, Kashef decided to take the boy with him on the migrant trail to Europe in search of the boy's parents. Yuri Kozyrev—NOOR for TIME

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