Wooden Pointers

By Arash Etemad Moghaddam

"A true story on the crisis of immigration into Europe and the facts behind

that; it also discusses of other issues such corruption, discrimination,

crimes and also paranormal activity."

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ukiyoto Publishing
• Release date: Mar 16, 2024
• ISBN: 9789361728181

Book preview

Wooden Pointers

Pointing at Time

Arash Etemad Moghaddam

Ukiyoto Publishing

All global publishing rights are held by

Ukiyoto Publishing

Published in 2024

Content Copyright ©Arash Etemad Moghaddam

ISBN

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.

The moral rights of the author have been asserted.

This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise circulated, without the publisher’s prior consent, in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published.

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This book is dedicated to those suffering from injustice.

WOODEN POINTERS

Arash begins his first journey to reach to Britain in 2015 and, after passing from several countries, he finds himself in Vienna in Austria, where he stays in a camp. He finally goes home, but embarks on another journey to Europe in 2018.

He encounters many obstacles on his way and learns more about immigrants and laws.

This book is dedicated to those suffering from injustice.

Contents

A Journey to Europe

Crossing borders

Stop in Austria

Life in the camp

More adventures in Vienna

Leaving Austria

A travel to Serbia

Crossing from Serbia into Bosnia

Bihac city

More trouble

Life in Sarajevo

Return to home

About the Author

A Journey to Europe

I

am from Iran and studied there. I was not a good student in school but a good ping pong player. When I left school I stayed at home. But I always wanted to visit my favourite people and countries. One day I found an English self-teaching book from my father’s library under the sofa in our living room; my mother gave it to me while she was cleaning. I opened it and decided to learn English without being taught.

Several months later, I happened to meet a middle-aged English man at a sport complex. I tried to speak to him, and one day he told me that I looked English. I gradually became more interested in learning and continued studying for years, then decided to take an exam on English from the Cambridge representative in Tehran, Iran; but on the day of the examination, I was given the wrong paper by the girl in charge of the examination and missed the listening section, which they denied.

Years passed and I still wanted to visit Britain. I did whatever I could but failed; At last, after years, one day news came that some European borders had been opened! It was without a doubt my best chance of reaching to my destination. I packed my clothes and other possessions and started out my journey on September, 2015.

In Turkey, there were many immigrants around the squares of Istanbul, and the numbers were increasing rapidly. Most of them were hanging out and had fun in the streets; I visited some Iranians there and asked to join them, but they rejected me. At night I found another group of Iranians who were looking for somewhere to sleep; we went to an apartment and paid to stay there for a night.

The landlord was also an Iranian; he rented his apartment to others and found smugglers for them. There were many people in a small apartment, and the landlord did not treat us well. We had to sleep close beside each other and most of those people were so noisy I couldn’t get any sleep at all, and in the early morning I left there. I was looking for someone to take me to Europe, and I met an Iranian who asked me to come to a square at 6 pm. I went there but he was not there, and I spent that night on the street. The next morning I met another Iranian; he also wanted me to meet him in the evening at a square. I went there but he was not there either.

At last, I met some other Iranians around a square. They knew a smuggler and wanted me to pay him to take me, but I did not trust them. While I was talking to them, I noticed an Afghan person standing few meters away from us – I had already seen him around there several times. I was frustrated and after about a week staying in Turkey, I had decided to go back to my country.

One night, when I was on my way to a restaurant, I accidently met the same Afghan man in an alley. He came up to me and said, You’re still here! and then asked me why I hadn’t asked him for help. He called someone, and a few minutes later another Afghan person appeared and took me to the boss, as that Afghan man slept in a square. I gave him my blanket to thank him, we talked to the boss, and he arranged to take me in a group. Then he asked me to stay in a house with other immigrants.

We stayed at a big house for a while, and at last the day came: he asked us to pay him and we paid, then he bought us life belts and transferred us from that house to another house. In that house, there were a lot of families and also several smugglers who were working together. They took us in a taxi to a park in several groups. We waited at that park for hours until they caught a mini bus and took us to a far city, Izmir.

Crossing borders

T

here were many people in that mini bus and we could not even move our bodies, curtains were closed and we were going a very long way. I fell asleep several times as it took us many hours to get there. We were stopped by police at a checkpoint; one of the smugglers got off the bus and talked with the officer in charge for a long time, then a gate was opened and we went along a dark and dusty road. After a while we all got out and crept through a forest, the smugglers with small torches in their hands. They took us over some hills amongst the trees; it was getting light, and it was a beautiful place, birds singing beautifully – I heard a canary there. Then they brought us a plastic boat and asked us to blow it up.

We did it in turns, and there were also some other groups of immigrants metres away from us. Any time we wanted to put it in to water, a police boat came and we picked up the boat and hid amongst the trees. We waited, and when the police boat got farther from that place, we and the other groups rushed toward the sea with our boats. We quickly jumped into the boat and planted an Afghan guy as the driver, turned on the engine and left carefully.

There were many people on the small plastic boat, mostly from Afghanistan; a young Afghan woman fell on my legs and could not move even a little, while her companions had gotten caught on the other side of the boat and could not move either. In fact, nobody could move even a little because of the overcrowding.  Around us, people from Arabic countries were going to Europe quickly and secretly.

We were almost in the middle of the sea and, while I was taking some photos with my cell phone, suddenly a barbaric Afghan creature which was apparently against my work attacked my cell phone in my hand and hit it too hard; it slid through my fingers, its cover came off and flew into the air. Fortunately, my phone landed on the boat, but its cover fell into the sea. I did not see the attacker but as I was too angry, I chased him. A young Iranian guy got into an argument with me, but none of us could move. At last some people separated and calmed us.

As we were in the middle of the sea, water started coming into the boat and some people tried to drain and empty it, women were shouting and crying in fear and the boat was going from a side to side. The driver tried to get the boat under control, and we could see the lights of the buildings at the beach more clearly.

After 2 hours at sea, we saw some people waving at us from the beach. The driver was trying to drive toward them but the waves diverted us from our course from time to time. We were getting closer and closer to them and people were calming down. At last we came so close to the beach we could see those people at the beach more clearly and some people jumped into the water with joy, but I waited until everyone left the boat. We were all wet and after I jumped out of the boat on the beach, an Afghan stabbed the boat with a knife and burst it. It made a very loud noise.

Some doctors and reporters came to see us; there were many life belts on the beach, and we left ours among them too. I was very excited – I never thought one day I would pass from Turkey to Europe, and here I was looking at Turkey from Greece.

After talking to