Sarah is like any other young adult. She likes talking about her family and friends and is a big fan of Hollywood movies." 'The Fault in our Stars' is my favourite," she says of the romantic film that tells the story of a 16-year-old cancer patient. As she feasts on a big piece of chocolate cake, the 17-year-old talks of a scene in the movie when the protagonist, Hazel Lancaster, goes on a date with Augustus Waters, a former basketball player who is an amputee. If she could, Sarah would go on and on about it, but she suddenly remembers that she has lent her copy of the novel by John Green that the movie is based on, to a friend of hers. Sarah takes a break from the conversation and tucks into her dessert. She sips her coffee and talks about life in her home country. Life in Syria Back home in Damascus, Sarah lived a relatively normal life with her parents. Her father is a biology teacher and school principal. Her mother looked after the children at home, the  two sisters and their brother. Sarah went to school and in the evenings she often met friends or went to Zumba classes. It all changed when the war began in 2011. The family house was destroyed and Sarah moved with her parents and siblings to another part of the city. The situation got tougher as they could not leave home. It was even more difficult for the Sunni family's women, because they wore headscarves and were easily distinguishable from Alawites - who belong to President Bashar al-Assad's religious community and who did not cover their heads. Sarah's brother was arrested and sent to prison, "for no reason," she remembers. As the war worsened, Sarah and her 29-year-old sister Fatima left for Europe. They took a flight to Turkey and took a boat to Greece. "We were made to sit on a rubber dinghy and there were 65 people on the boat," Sarah's sister Fatima says. "20 minutes after we left Turkey's shores, our boat got stuck and stopped moving. Then the Greek coast guards came and helped us. The other boats that set sail with us sank. Everybody died." she explains. Coming to Europe After a brief halt in Greece, they left towards Western Europe by foot. "The worst was Slovenia," Sarah remembers. "We were all taken into custody and shut in a small room. We had to sit on the floor. It was very cold and there was no way to get out. The police beat the men. We spent one night there." Sarah fell sick, but luckily, activists of the Red Cross got there on time. The two women did not have to go back to the shelter. They were taken to a bus and could travel further into Europe from there. "We were very lucky," Fatima remembers. "We travelled with a family with three daughters and there were two other boys who helped us," she says, adding that the boys made sure the women were safe. "Other than a man who tried to steal our bag, we didn’t face any harassment," she adds.  Once in Austria, Fatima and Sarah bought a ticket for 300 euros that would get them to Germany. The refugees were first sent to a shelter in the Western German city of Duisburg. The former hospital had separate rooms with attached toilets. "The worst was the container," says Sarah about the shelter in Bornheim, a suburb of Bonn. "The condition was very bad and we had to stay there for 25 days. There was only one toilet for 100 people and it was very dirty. Many people got infections," she reveals. The women also felt unsafe in the container. There were hardly any security officials and the next container housed Romanian workers who came down to Germany for seasonal work and to help out in the fields. "These men wanted to be friends, but we ran away. We left the place at 8 in the morning and returned only by 10," Fatima told InfoMigrants. They usually spent the day with a woman who had been kind enough to let them use her home during the day. The gesture however did little to improve Sarah's mood, and she spent most of the day crying, her sister says. Missing friends and family "One day, Sarah was sitting in front of the town hall in Bonn and burst into tears. A man - I think he was from Iraq - walked up to her and tried to console her. He said he would try and find a place for us to stay and within the next three days, he had arranged an apartment for us," Fatima reveals. From then on, life became easier for the two sisters. Sarah, whose German is now almost as good as her classmates', is busy studying hard to become a doctor. Fatima is a pharmacist and is getting her degrees from Syria recognized. They both regularly keep in touch with their families in Syria. "They often don’t have any electricity so talking over Skype becomes difficult," they say. There is little expression on their faces to suggest they might be worried about their families. While 29-year-old Fatima seems to have reconciled with her fate, her younger sister is still coming to terms with her school, the new language, culture and the people."I miss my friends back home," she says as she focuses on finishing the last bits of her chocolate cake. Author: Manasi Gopalakrishnan