Two Syrian brides dreamed of Germany and were swallowed by the sea off Lebanon
Hiam Saadoun holds a picture of her daughter, Inas Abdel Salam, not believing what happened to her.
AFP
Shawafa did not know how her daughter Janda would travel to her fiancé in Germany.
AFP
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In a remote village in northeastern Syria, Shawafa Khader refuses, while crying, to believe that the sea swallowed her daughter (Janda), who was among dozens who chose to reach Europe via a boat they sailed from northern Lebanon.
"My child, my spoiled daughter, will remain, and I will wait for her every night, and I pray to the Lord of the worlds that she is in peace and in a safe place," the woman told AFP, while sitting in her home in the village of Patarzan, in Kurdish.
Although her daughter is missing, Shawafa, 60, refuses to hold a funeral, and even expelled her son from the house when he suggested surrendering to the fait accompli and accepting the death of his sister by drowning.
"She may have been lost on a beach," adds the woman, whose sad face was overwhelmed with wrinkles.
Several weeks ago, Janda Saeed (27 years old) and Inas Abdel Salam (23 years) left Syria for Lebanon, where they boarded a boat they hoped would bring them to Europe, to meet their fiancés in Germany, and to complete their marriage transactions with the two brothers.
But the trip, which took off on the night of April 23, soon ended with the boat sinking while trying to arrest it by the Lebanese army off the coast of Tripoli in the north.
According to the United Nations, 84 people were on the boat, 45 of whom were rescued, 11 of them Syrians, while only eight bodies were found.
About 40 people are still missing, eight of them are Syrians, including (Janda) and (Enas).
Every time she looks at a picture of her daughter showing her braids in a white and red sweater, Shawafa starts crying.
The grieving mother recalls the last hours with Ganda, repeating, "Oh, mom, ah, mom."
She says that her daughter "carried in her bag and my scarf so that my scent and protection would accompany her."
Shawafa bid farewell to her daughter on the eve of her travels by holding a henna party for her, which is an inherited tradition for the bride who wears a red dress, in the presence of her friends, during which her hands are decorated with henna.
She says: "I put henna on her hands and a golden lira in her palm and put a ring on her finger (..) I was feeling happy.. Today, not a day passes without crying over her."
Shawafa did not know how Janda would travel to her fiancé in Germany.
"If I had known that she was going to travel this way, I would have prevented her," she says.
Unlike (Shawafa), Hiyam Saadoun, 42, was satisfied with fate and agreed, after a long wait, to hold a funeral for her daughter (Enas), and all her hope today is to find her body.
Inside the mourning tent in the city of Qamishli (northeast), (Hiyam) holds a picture of her daughter, the bride, and tells "AFP": "My daughter was happy with her engagement (...), I was hoping to see her wearing her wedding dress."
She added, "I used to imagine her at home with her children and her family, but today I hope that her wedding will be in heaven."
Longing squeezes Hiyam's heart, especially since her daughter has always told her that she will not return to Syria, which is mired in a bloody conflict that has weighed the lives of her family since 2011.
But the grieving mother never expected her daughter to meet this fate.
• Longing squeezes Hiam's heart, especially since her daughter has always told her that she will not return to Syria, which has been engulfed in a bloody conflict that has weighed the lives of her family since 2011.
• Several weeks ago, Janda Saeed (27 years) and Enas Abdel Salam (23 years) left Syria for Lebanon, where they boarded a boat they hoped would take them to Europe, to meet their fiancés in Germany, and to complete their marriage transactions with the two brothers.
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