{"id":3880,"date":"2022-11-15T08:21:06","date_gmt":"2022-11-15T08:21:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/?p=3880"},"modified":"2022-11-15T08:24:06","modified_gmt":"2022-11-15T08:24:06","slug":"gender-based-violence-after-years-of-abuse-naomi-seeks-a-future-in-greece","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/gender-based-violence-after-years-of-abuse-naomi-seeks-a-future-in-greece\/","title":{"rendered":"Gender-based violence: after years of abuse, Naomi seeks a future in Greece"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>She fled Nigeria and terrible suffering<\/h2>\n<h2>Our staff met her in Athens, where they help her with food distribution and psychosocial support<\/h2>\n<p>Naomi is sitting on a mattress in her room in Athens. A closet, an armchair, an old mattress on the floor, and her things in some plastic bags. She sprinkles with oil her one-year-old son Lord, who never stands still. She tickles him and smiling says,\u00a0<em>\u201cIn Nigeria, there was no money to go to school. When I was six years old, my mother, a \u201cbusinesswoman,\u201d sold me to a woman who took me to Ghana. Even there I\u00a0<strong>could not go to school<\/strong>, I had to take care of her children and work in the house until the evening.\u00a0<strong>This woman used to beat me<\/strong>; I was very afraid of her.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Naomi is 33 years old and she\u2019s Nigerian. We met her in Athens, during the\u00a0<strong>food distribution<\/strong>\u00a0we do as part of the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.intersos.org\/en\/greece-with-food-for-all-we-give-food-to-refugee-families-and-asylum-seekers\/\">\u201cFood for All\u201d<\/a>\u00a0project together with the Migrant Forum. After years of violence and suffering,\u00a0<strong>she arrived in Greece<\/strong>, where she is struggling to have a better life for herself and her son. Vulnerable and alone, she recounted how she managed to escape the woman who exploited her when she was about 30 years old.<em>\u00a0\u201cI ran away alone, without a penny in my pocket: I went to different countries, but everywhere there were problems with men.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0In Iraq, a couple locked her in a room and\u00a0<strong>forced her into prostitution<\/strong>.\u00a0<em>\u201cI needed sex to survive.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0On her body, Naomi has signs of abuse and an ugly scar on her chest,<em>\u00a0\u201cA man bit me until I bled.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0Then\u00a0<strong>she became pregnant<\/strong>\u00a0due to a man who would not use a condom. But fortunately, a friend helped her escape. Naomi hoped to arrive in Greece and build a better life, but it didn\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n<p>She lived in the Moria refugee camp in\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.intersos.org\/en\/world-refugee-day-lesbos-an-emblem-of-the-failure-of-eu-policies\/\">Lesvos<\/a>, where\u00a0<strong>she gave birth to Lord.\u00a0<\/strong>When\u00a0<strong>the camp was closed<\/strong>, they moved to\u00a0<strong>Eleanos camp<\/strong>\u00a0in Athens:\u00a0<em>\u201cIt was terribly hot in the metal cabins and cockroaches were everywhere.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0After three months in the Eleanos camp, Naomi\u00a0<strong>received a residency permit<\/strong>. However, this meant she had to leave the camp and take care of herself.\u00a0<em>\u00a0\u201cAt the end of June, the police suddenly showed up at the door and threw me and my baby out. I was desperate, I didn\u2019t know anyone here, I had no money, what was I supposed to do?\u201d<\/em>\u00a0She slept in parks and\u00a0<strong>searched for food<\/strong>\u00a0in bins until a Ghanaian woman who saw her crying offered her a room to rent.\u00a0<em>\u201cI worked hard because I had to put together the rent of 150 euros a month.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>A fluorescent yellow jacket hangs on the windowsill to dry. Now\u00a0<strong>Naomi works at a bus cleaning company<\/strong>: six days a week, from 9 p.m. to 4 a.m., for 600 euros a month.\u00a0<em>\u201cLord stays at the babysitter\u2019s house who costs 150 euros a month,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0she says.\u00a0<em>\u201cWhen I come home, I sleep for a few hours and then I fetch Lord. I hate leaving him with someone else.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0Sometimes, if food isn\u2019t enough, Naomi grabs something to eat from her roommate or looks through the garbage to find something edible.\u00a0<em>\u00a0\u201c<strong>Lord wants milk<\/strong>, he pulls down my blouse and grabs my breast. But unfortunately, considering the poor diet, I don\u2019t have any milk left.\u201d\u00a0<\/em>Suddenly, she received a phone call from a refugee in the camp she knows. Then she starts shouting:\u00a0<em>\u201cLeave me alone, don\u2019t call me anymore! He thinks he can still take advantage of me,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0she explains,\u00a0<em>\u201cbut I really want a better life for me and for Lord! Sometimes I pretend to be asleep, and he comes and gives me kisses.\u00a0<strong>I am fighting for a better future for him<\/strong>.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>She fled Nigeria and terrible suffering<br \/>\nOur staff met her in Athens, where they help her with food distribution and psychosocial support<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":3881,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":""},"categories":[30,31,10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3880"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3880"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3880\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3884,"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3880\/revisions\/3884"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3881"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intersos.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}