By Dritare.net, adapted in English by Oculus News
Many young people leave Albania every year. They head towards Europe or anywhere they can find a better life than in their home country. However, what they find is not always better. In some cases, they witness horrors, struggle to make it, face many obstacles, and only a lucky few manage to smile freely. Dritare.net will bring you a different story, about two young people who sought paradise but found purgatory.
Eriola and her fiancé had just completed their studies in mathematics at the Faculty of Sciences. Working at a call center had drained their spirits, and life in Tirana was almost unbearable. So, they thought of leaving for England, where they had relatives.
"We were renting. We needed a home for our family. Our income was meager. A relative of ours in England promised to help us with jobs and a place to stay if we secured the documents. So, we started looking into how to find a way with fewer expenses. They told us that one possible way was obtaining the identity of another country, something many Albanians had done. So, we decided to try our luck. A friend at the call center found us someone who could create false documents. We paid 500 euros per person and waited to get our new identities and Italian citizenship."
"We traveled for two hours by plane to Gothenburg, a city in Sweden. We stayed at a hotel, and then we looked for an agency to buy tickets. We found an agency that accepted cash because most agencies only accepted credit cards. After a few simple questions about why Italians like us wanted to go to England, we secured our tickets, and we were eagerly waiting to leave."
But this was not easy at all. Sweden turned out to be anything but merciful, shattering thousands of illusions, thoughts, moments of happiness. Eriola and her fiancé, Altini, were revealed at the airport. After routine questions about their names, the purpose of their visit, the city they would be visiting, the airport officer conducted a thorough check, even of their Italian passports. And that's when the green light turned white and brought the truth to light.
"He discovered in the system that my identity was stolen. It seems someone had reported it to the police. In those moments, when he left for an office, I was trembling with fear. Then they discovered our Albanian passports, even though we had concealed them in our bags. They took us to a separate building with police officers. They placed us in different rooms. From there, they sent us to the police station."
Facing a cell for the first time
For the 25-year-old from Albania, this was the most challenging moment of her life. A person who had never dared to say a bad word was now heading towards bars for deception.
"When they told me we would go to the police station, I broke down. I cried, feeling like a criminal. All the movies I had ever watched came to my mind. I wondered what would happen to me in pretrial detention, where many people were, where they would harm or kill you."
Upon arrival at the police station, the photographing and other procedures, they underwent a psychological test to understand their condition. "In addition to routine questions like whether I had been to jail before, there were questions like: 'Do you contemplate suicide?' or 'Do you think why this happened to me?' And this was not a routine question; it was an important question to understand each person's limits."
"Security was absolute, with heavy and fortified doors. No door opened without a code. They put me in a solitary cell. The windows had two sets of bars and very thick, unbreakable glass. The furniture was made of soft material. It was very warm inside, even though it was December and very cold outside. They brought every meal for me to eat, but I couldn't. I just cried a lot. I cried so much that I had to ring the bell and ask for medication. While I was awake, I paced around the room and read the writings on the walls. There had been other Albanians before me, and many foreign words, evidence of those who had the same fate as me."
For someone entering prison, it's like a death in a way. It's a kind of death because you lose your freedom. Eriola says she had no concept of time for anything, didn't know where her fiancé was, and no one answered her, while her only thought was about her mother. How would she feel now, with her daughter in jail?
"In there, you often think about your family, the pain you can cause them. You don't think so much about yourself. Even more so, I didn't know what would happen to me. When they asked me if I wanted to walk, I almost felt like I was flying. The feeling of freedom gave me wings. With their instructions alone, I ended up in an air-conditioned room and returned to my cage."
Eriola explains that besides the high security, the use of technology, and good conditions, there was also human care. For her, the prisoners were like a study case. Every time they brought food, several people came, all taking notes, each for their own field: behavior, reaction, food consumption. After two days, Eriola says they were questioned by a lawyer about their act, whether they knew it was illegal or not, whether they admitted to their mistake, whether they regretted it, etc.
"He asked me why all Albanians leave their country. I replied that it's due to economic conditions. Then he continued, 'I have friends who come on vacation to Albania and say it's a beautiful country. I've heard that Albanians are good people, but they have bad and corrupt politicians.' I tried to explain what was really happening in our country."
The Last Stop at the Immigration Office
In the face of such an act, no one could turn a blind eye, especially not a Swede, whose laws were dearer to them than life. Eriola explains that Swedes were very communicative and polite, supportive people, but when it came to residence, they said they couldn't go above the law.
So the two young people were sent to the Immigration Office, fined 200 euros each, and banned from free movement within the EU for 2 years.
"At the immigration office, there were all the undocumented immigrants. There were people from different countries, Albanians, Indians. They placed us in a large one-story building with shared facilities for dining, a gym, an internet room. We also had a personal room, but we could never lock it with a key. It was forbidden. Even the staff members would check the rooms every hour to see what was happening. We could only go out to the courtyard surrounded by a wall for ventilation for two hours, and then we had to stay inside the whole time."
Despite their attempts to try their luck again by applying for economic asylum, the young couple failed.
"They didn't accept it, saying that Albania is a safe country, that the number of police had increased. According to them, there were data that our country was experiencing economic growth, and we could do well here. So, they sent us back home."
You might think that someone who has failed wouldn't try again, or that they have come to appreciate the values of their country. Despite this, the desire to leave doesn't fade easily. For Eriola, nothing is the same as before. She's not in a relationship, and she doesn't have the same job. However, she still has the same desire: to leave.
"I wouldn't make the same choice again, because I don't want to end up in prison. I want to find a way to leave in accordance with the rules. But, I do want to leave this place. An hour ago."