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Hara Hotel:A Tale of Syrian Refugees in Greece
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A first-hand account of a Greek refugee camp – and the stories of the refugees staying there
Hara Hotel chronicles everyday life in a makeshift refugee camp on the forecourt of a petrol station in northern Greece. In the first two months of 2016, more than 100,000 refugees arrived in Greece. Half of them were fleeing war-torn Syria, seeking a safe haven in Europe. As the numbers seeking refuge soared, many were stranded in temporary camps, staffed by volunteers. Hara Hotel tells some of their stories.
Teresa Thornhill arrived in Greece in April 2016 as a volunteer. She met one refugee, a young Syrian Kurd called Juwan, who left his home and family in November 2011 to avoid being summoned for military service by the Assad regime. Interweaving memoir with Juwan’s story, and with the recent history of the failed revolution in Syria, and the horror of the ensuing civil war, Hara Hotel paints a vivid picture of the lives of the people trapped between civil war and Europe’s borders.
Reviews
The intimate, deeply felt account of a volunteer who worked with Syrians during the years they were stranded in Greece, which, unlike so many stories of the refugee crisis, does not shy away from speaking about the forces that tore those refugees from their homes.
Hara Hotel is a vivid first-hand account of Europe's failure to protect the refugees at its borders, and a tale of solidarity that points to how things could be different in future.
Hara Hotel is an eminently readable first-hand account of a British volunteer who travelled to support Syrian refugees in Greece and then Austria in 2016-17. The author's humanity jumps out on every page. She tells both the very human stories of individual refugees, and through them, the story of the disintegration of Syria that has led them to flee. Strongly recommended!
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Thornhill overlays the wrenching refugee sagas with her personal quest to understand why Syria began its alarming unraveling in 2011. What she learned ... will certainly enlighten casual followers of that nation's bloodshed. A brave, affecting book about a continuing humanitarian crisis.
Kirkus Reviews