“Has Ambition Died In My Country”, A Story Of A Syrian Girl Dreaming Of A Work Opportunity

With tears that was streaming on her cheeks and a heart beating with pain and grieve, Ruba got out the album of her photos with her colleagues in collage; here her memories were crossing her mind remembering every event whether the sweet or the bitter ones. She told herself:” how much our laughs were innocent and coming from all our hearts”, she forgot her pain for a while and laughed to find a spontaneous photo while they were having breakfast in the apartment of a friend.
Ruba is a Syrian girl from Idlib city, her ambition pushed her to go to Mechanical Engineering collage in Aleppo University. After she earned her certification as she graduated with an excellent GPA, she applied for higher studies gaining magisterial degree. However, and despite what she has earned, yet her ambition is bigger than this; she was designated in a governmental facility in Idlib city before the city becomes out of regime held on 28th December 2015.
As rebellion factions become in full control of Idlib city, regime has issued a law that its employees have to work in the same facilities and institutions in regime areas, where who will not commit to this are to be considered fired so that their names will be on the list of wanted in the military checkpoints of regime forces in the roads, to be arrested and investigated with a charge of aiding terrorists and betraying the homeland.
Ruba was struck between two hard bitter options; she is concerned about her family (her parents) since she is who supports them with her salary, the other option is moving to regime controlled areas to go to her work leaving her parents, her city and the dreams she has always planned for them where they started to fade away.
She continues her story with a sad tone that seemed so clear in her voice, she said:” In the beginning I decided to go to my work in Aleppo city just like the rest of my colleagues only for a while and then to come back to Idlib so that I get my salary every two consecutive months. However, my manager in the facility forces us to come to work every day without accepting any excuses or taking into consideration my difficult circumstances what so ever. I did not know what to do; staying in Aleppo requires to hire an apartment and extra spending that are not taken into consideration, this doubles my suffering where my family refused to come with me to Aleppo city; the thing burdened me forcing new difficulties”.
“I hired a room in a house of a lady in a neighborhood of Aleppo city with 8 thousand Syrian pounds; which is a cheap rent in comparison with other high rents. Yet, I had big debts. I could not tolerate being apart from my family. I was deeply depressed, that is why I made up my mind to leave the job and go back to my city to search for another work hoping to have my ambition making advantage of my experience which I have worked hard to gain during the years of study and work”, she added.
Ruba did not know that the life of war will put an end to her dreams and ambitions for which she had always planned and looked forward to through studying to have her first step on the road to reach them. What she found in Idlib city is a shocking reply to her call; the city lacks organizations and work opportunities for being recently liberated and the lack of funders and supporters of the organizations to employment, where organizations are mainly interested in the field of relief.
“I spent 7 years in studying, is it possible to through them away and stay in home waiting for an opportunity that might not come so that a part of my ambition comes true, or are we become living in country in which ambition and hope died with fire and rubbles?
By Samah Allkaled
Translated by Sabah Najem
Syrian Press Center