This lady, Hayat. Her name means "life" in Arabic. She joked. Life is full of problems. And I ever the optimist said life means life. It's a wonderful thing. She is from Damascus and traveling alone with her three children to Germany. I asked her what made her decide it was time to go. She gestured to her head. A bullet she said went by her forehead. And she started to take off her hijab which in itself had an elegance to it. The unpinning and the unwrapping.  

I wasn't sure what I was going to see nor that I had understood correctly. I thought maybe the bullet had whizzed by her and it was too close for comfort. But no. When she removed her hijab the scars were very clear. She had been hit by a bullet when a bomb went off and people started shooting. It entered through one side of her forehead and out the other. 10 days in a coma. This happened five months ago. You see what I mean she said. Life is problems.  

She and her children are heading for Germany. Inshallah she said. In the current political climate she knows it's going to be hard. But she sees it as the only option.  

"Five years now," she said, "we are feeling like we are living in another world. We need to stand up again."  

And, she added, with a sweet smile, "I am life."  

March 2016