Austria. Marianne Grasl, Rolf Nagel and Leo Grasl (18) host Somali refugee Leyla Mahamud and her baby boy Zacharia who was born April 29, 2016, a few weeks after she moved in, in Vienna. Photo: Aubrey Wade / UNHCR
Somali woman gives birth to son in safety
“At first I wasn’t sure I could live with a crying baby but it worked out. He rarely cries and when he does it’s so quietly, Laila calms him down immediately,” Marianne says. “Now, if he cries I take him. I love having them here.”
Marianne’s partner, Rolf, is an electrical engineer who volunteers by teaching German language classes to refugees a couple of times a week.
“I supported Marianne from the beginning with this decision. Take in a refugee into your home to verify if it’s true or not what is written in the media. I want to have direct contact with them and see and discover their world. I want to find out how they are on my own. I believe that why they came here, whatever they fled from, must have been really bad,” said Rolf.
Laila left Mogadishu in 2009 after she got entangled in a complicated web of honour killings. When she refused to marry a man her family arranged for her, she ran away and married someone else. Her family killed her new husband and then his family sought to kill her in revenge. They kidnapped her daughter and locked Laila up, but she escaped. She arrived in Vienna in March 2015.
“I was so scared when I first came here,” Laila says, “but they are so good to me.” She is trying to learn the language so she can start working.
Portrait by Aubrey Wade
Assisted by Stjepan Sedlar
Text by Nadine Alfa
This story is part of the No Stranger Place series, which tells stories of refugees and locals living together in Europe. The project was initiated by Aubrey Wade, Sarah Böttcher and Stjepan Sedlar, and developed in partnership with UNHCR and Nadine Alfa.
