After fleeing constant aerial bombardments and a harrowing six-day journey on foot across the desert, the Qwasem Rahhal family now calls Amman home.
- Harrowing journey for refugees
- Fleeing the bombs
- Acid poured on handcuff wounds
- Shelter offers relative comfort
- Winter journey to safety
- 'Please, photos and write . . . anything'
- Purpose-built, orderly and secure
- 2000 asylum seekers interviewed daily
- Night-time crawl under fire to escape
- 85,000 souls spread across camp
- Young scholar pleads for help
- Travel diary
We accompany UNHCR staff on a home visit to the family.
They are there to assess them for additional financial support.
Samer meets us on the street and directs us through a narrow alleyway.
We park the conspicuous white UN Pajero four-wheel-drive before following on foot up a steep set of stairs through a high-sided, rubbish-laden, maze of alleys to his home.
I am taken aback, when following his invitation, going inside.
The ''apartment'' is a spartan series of small concrete cell-like rooms and the only furniture is squabs on the floor.
In the corner sits a small colour television.
Our UN media guide tells me the apartment is ''average for refugees''.
''It was upsetting,'' she says.
In Syria, Samer was an agricultural engineer. His home was 200sq m on a small olive grove.
They had fled from Homs to Jordan, crossing the border illegally after traversing the rocky desert on foot, a dangerous six-day journey with little food or water.
They arrived with the clothes they were wearing and $JD30, about $NZ50.
They fled to escape the aerial bombardment.
''Many friends and my wife's parents had been killed in the fighting. If they want to kill one person, they don't care if they kill 1000 to get that one person.''
After first abandoning their home, they moved quickly from town to town trying to keep ahead of the military onslaught.
Finally they found themselves close enough to the border to make the six-day dash on foot.
''I thought we would just stay in Jordan for 10 days, until things settled down. We have now been here more than a year,'' Sammer says.
I ask how much the flat costs.
''$JD110 per month,'' he says.
It used to be $JD22 a month, but is now a lot more because of all the refugees.
''It is nicer than the first one we have had. Our first night in Amman was spent under a bridge.
''Our first house was just zinc roofing with a toilet [a hole in the floor] in the kitchen.''
On first arriving in Jordan, the family spent a month in Zaatari.
''I prefer living in Amman. We like it better than the camp,'' he says.
Samer hopes one day to return to Syria.
''It is very bad now. Worse than when we came here. But it can't continue. In two years it must be settled. We want to return home.''
He despairs of the situation at home.
''Every day it is getting worse. Now local people are starting to fight each other. It is worse than ever.
''When a breadwinner loses his wife and his children, he has nothing to do but to get engaged with those groups and to start fighting. If it was me, I would do the same.''
Urban refugees need a permit to work in Jordan.
They are forced to work under the table and this exposes them to exploitation.
''When I arrived here, I worked in a clothes shop. Then they became scared of the Labour Ministry and told me not to come back. They did not pay me my last month's pay ($JD200)."
Samer's wife sits quietly at his side throughout the interview, before disappearing to bring us a small Turkish coffee each.
The coffee is strong, bitter, and it is humbling to be their guests.
The children are excited to see us.
Aysha (5) has been burnt in an accident in the kitchen and the scars are visible and appear painful.
In Jordan they have access to education and health care.
''We feel secure here,'' Samer says.
- Steve Addison
