Not once, but twice

Hassan was only a year old when his family fled from Syria to Ukraine, which was not home for too long. Now eleven, he embarked on another dangerous three-day journey across hundreds of miles, this time all by himself and with only a phone number written on his hand to lead him to his destiny. His widowed mother made the most difficult choice to let him go, hoping for a better chance of his survival, away from the looming threat of their neighboring nuclear plant and from the devastating war. She stayed back to take care of her ailing mother. Hassan reached Slovakia safely and was reunited with his brother. “My hope carried me on my way”, says the hero, one among 4.3 million children that have been forced out of their homes since the war began in March in Ukraine. – Nikhil