Welcome to Canada tell us the story of Mohammed Alsaleh, who survived the violence of the

war in Syria and nowadays works as Syrian refugees’ counselor in Canada. As a counselor, he
welcome the Syrian people who arrive to Canada and help them with the resettlement process.
Before the Syrian war started, Mohammed was a medicine student, who dreamed to treat
cancer, but when social protests started and the government violently censored them,
Mohammed, as well as thousands of people, was imprisoned and tortured. After four months
of tortures, Mohammed was released and left Syria to move to Beirut, Lebanon. His situation,
as well as the most of the Syrian refugees in that country, was extremely hard due to the
restrictions; they aren´t allowed to work or even to go to school. The unique available option for
Mohammed was working as a car washer to earn just 20 dollars per day, however this was better
than living in his country. His life changed in 2015 when Canada granted him asylum, then he
moved to Vancouver and started a new life with new aims: helping Syrians in a similar situation.
Mohammed hadn´t seen his family since he left Syria, tree years ago; obviously he is homesick
and also his family misses him, but now they are relatively safe in Turkey and hope to be together
in Canada as soon as possible.

This touching short film is a testimony of resilience and the gritty of one of the millions of
refugees all over the world, it shows us how families or individuals can have a new start in a
place they didn´t chose to be, but have to be. Mohammed´s drama, unfortunately is not the
unique human drama, his complains and reflections are shared by all humans who saw the
country, city or village where grow up destroyed by the war, the famine and the disease. You
can imagine all the Venezuelans that are coming in these days to Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and
other countries, thinking in their beloved ones who were left behind. You can imagine all the
Rohingyas arriving to Bangladesh and living in overcrowded refugee camps without their basics
needs satisfied but preferring that than face the abuse and violence in their homeland. You can
imagine a Yemeni watching the death of a relative or a friend on social media. The refugee`s
drama, their suffering, death, hunger, incomprehension is naturalized, it`s seems like if they
were just numbers: according to UNHCR (2018), 6,3 million of Syrians; 5,4 Palestinians; 2,3
million of Venezuelans; almost 1 million of Rohingyas are refugees, and the numbers continue
growing day by day in all over the world. Every refugee has a story to tell, as Mohammed has,
each of them just need our empathy and the sincere effort of the global community to have a
new start, even in a place where didn´t chose to be.