Why did you decide to leave Morocco? Because I wanted to study, work, help my family and meet people. I've come to look for a
better life. Morocco is very nice, but the government is very bad. They don't let go. Here it is different. Here young people have a chance to do good things. There is nothing there.

Who did you live with? With my family. I was fine with my mother, my father and my brothers. Now his older brother is in Belgium, another one is here in Pamplona, on a floor for minors, and his sister and his younger brother are
still with his mother. Your brother has to learn a little and then we'll see how we can do it to bring him.

How about your other brother in Pamplona? OK. It's on one floor with two other young people. They give them food all week long and take care of them. Soon he'll be 18
and leave. He is now taking a mechanical course and preparing the papers to collect guaranteed income. I want you to come and live with me. Since I don't have another family here, it's very important to be with her. Being alone is very difficult. I talk to my mother through the Whatsapp video call, but hopefully she's next to her.

Isn't your sister coming?
No. Our sister is 15 years old and will soon get married. In Morocco, the girls get married very soon, at the age of 18-19.

Do you think it's possible to bring father and
mother? Not now. To do this, you need a good job, a house, money -- not now, but hopefully in the future.

Have you had the opportunity to study in Morocco? Yeah, I've studied to high school. Then I started working as a
fruit and vegetable seller. I had a little three-wheel motor that would take me to the big market to buy fruits and vegetables to sell on the street, but I didn't feel good at that job. I preferred to travel and learn something to have a better future. In Morocco sellers have no future and life is very hard. They work from 9:00 in the morning until 22:00 in the evening.

Do your parents work? His father
is a peasant. Grandpa has a land and works on it. Plant vegetables, onions, carrots, potatoes -- but just for home. No delivery for sale. Just enough for families to eat.

How did you decide to come here? I know many friends from Morocco who came to Spain and they told me to come. I talked to my mother and she worried. You know, mothers' hearts suffer a
lot, but I told her I had to look for my life. After much talk, he finally accepted it.

How much money did the trip cost?
I paid 5,000 euros to come here. A little money was mine, another one was family.

Is it easy to find a skate to make such a
trip? Yes, but you must be careful not to be robbed of the money. Now traveling is harder than before. Prices have risen a lot. It now costs EUR 8,000.

What was the journey like? I first went to Algeria. There I spent a
month waiting for the good sea. After five attempts, the day finally arrived. It only took me five hours to arrive, but many of my friends have come to spend four or five days at sea without food. It's very dangerous. We left the city of Oran and arrived at a tourist city called San José, Andalusia. We were fifteen people, all young men, and we got well.

Many people stay at sea, unfortunately -- many. Others are
walking from Turkey on a seven- or eight-month trip. Many of them die down the road. A friend of mine, now in Pamplona, spent eight months and saw many people killed by the cold, but he couldn't help them because he was too bad.

Did you have a lot of fear in the skate? Yeah,
a bit. Fortunately, my journey was short. I was also afraid before, because you never know what's going to happen at sea. Furthermore, the Algerian Government does not want people to cross the sea and if Moroccans are caught at sea and sent to jail. Take precautions. I was almost caught
on several occasions. If you are Moroccan, Algerian prisons are very harsh. You have to wait until you send papers from Morocco, then send them back and in the meantime life is very hard...

Do you
know how to swim? Yes, but swimming on the high seas is of no use to you. Where are you going? To Spain? Return to Algeria? If something goes wrong, all you can do is wait for Red Cross or someone to come to you. If you're lucky someone will come, if not, you'll die.

What did you do when you reach the
peninsula? I arrived with nothing. I went to Almeria and then a friend from Morocco in Madrid paid me the bus ticket to Madrid. There I stayed for five days and then came to Pamplona.

Why Pamplona? Because I
was told in Madrid that there were many aids and opportunities here. More than in most of Spain.

And what did he find here? I spent two
months and ten days sleeping on the street and on some basses. I arrived on 9 September and it was very cold. During the day we were looking for food and some acquaintances told me that they were going to the social dining room of Paris 365, where they were eating for free. There, in addition to food, I was given other help. There's a girl named Marta and another named Jone. They are social workers and very nice. They talked to the Red Cross to enter a program and gradually everything has been coming: an accommodation, the possibility of studying, the classes in Spanish and, six months later, the possibility of collecting a guaranteed income. You have to be very patient, but it comes. In Paris 365 I was given great help and that is why I will never forget what they do with immigrants like me.

How do you live now? Now I'm fine. I live on a floor with a
friend who came with me to the kick, another young man and a Spanish man. I need half the guaranteed rent to pay the floor and the other half pay everything else. Everything is very expensive. I'm studying plumbing. I've spent five
months at the school of the Virgen del Camino and now I'm going to do internships at a company. Then, the next course, in September, I will continue studying Vocational Training to specialize in refrigerators, cold facilities, etc. What I'm learning I really like.

Did you choose?
Yes, I chose what to study.

Do you have
a residence permit? Not yet. I have to wait three years since I came to get the residence permit. Furthermore, an employment contract is needed, but it is very difficult. There are people selling employment contracts in the black market. They ask you for 5, 6 or 7 thousand euros. I know a lot of people who have bought the contract. What has recently changed here in Navarra is that you can get training even if you don't have paper and that's very good.

And how do you live without papers? That is all I need. I have a passport, a doctor, a transport card… That's enough until I get a residence, if you don't get into these problems. If you do a normal life, nobody's going to talk to you, but there are
guys who do bad things and have a lot of problems.

Recently a Moroccan boy was arrested at Plaza del Castillo for raping
a girl. Does this kind of news seriously harm the image of immigrants? Of course. The Spanish Government has to make one thing clear: when someone does something wrong he has to return to his homeland, not to mention anything else. Today they are back in the street after being arrested, so there are guys doing bad things. The government must act rigorously against bad people.

It develops very well
in Spanish. I'm doing it. I have spent a year and three months studying at José María Iribarren College.

And the Basque? I'd
like to learn. I already know a few words: lady, pretty girl, thank you... [laughs]

How are you on the Paris
365 football team? Very satisfied. At first, when we didn't have anything, we trained with Johan and Mikel at Castillo Liver,next to the bus station. We have gradually improved and have now allowed us to train at the Larrabide stadium. We come twice a week and besides the field we can use the changing rooms and showers here. On Saturdays and Sundays we have matches. Now we're better classified.

What has made you work on this team? Since I was young, I really liked football. In this group, moreover, as I am with the children of my country, I feel like in the family. We speak the same language and they, like me, continue to live as they can. We help each other. We feel that we are in a group and not as before, each
on its own. Mikel and Johan, besides knowing a lot about football, help us manage well with each other.

Is there a lot of racism here? Racism is all over the world, including in Morocco. Good and bad people are everywhere. There are
also racist behaviors in the police. When the gangs of the boys gather at night, the police always come to us to ask for papers, to the Moroccans, even though they do nothing. When you see a Moroccan boy, they seem to see a bomb exploding. But we must understand that they do their work and that it is clear that there are Moroccan boys who do bad things. I have never had any problems. I have not got into trouble and have not been taken to police station. I think there is not much racism here in general. People don't look at me badly.

Are you a
Muslim? Yes. It's a true religion. However, it's very difficult: you can't drink alcohol or smoke, you can't go to nightclubs, you can't have sex before you get married... but if you don't do it, you get sick with God and that's really bad.

Do you pray five times a day? Yeah, looking at Mecca. Let's read some Quran phrases. There are

114 sentences to pray. We are known and repeated. The Ramadana also follows it rigorously, because it is very important. The situation here is very different. Muslim women, for example, do not drink alcohol, do not smoke, are covered, do not go out of party... and the women here drink, pray, leave...

And does that seem wrong to you? I
respect everything. I am not saying anything, but I think it is good that women are at home.

But they also want to take it out… Yes, and
they go out, but not to nightclubs to drink alcohol. They go out for coffee with mom, sister or friends. They also go to the wedding very elegant dresses.

But the guys do. Yes,
but without smoking or drinking. My religion is very difficult. However, I am pleased.

Does this sacrifice deserve? In my religion you can't do some things if you want to have a
good relationship with God. If not, after death, what do you have to say to God? “Was I there from party to party, drinking and now you have to give me the opportunity to enter paradise?” That's not worth it.

OF THE RECORD

Pamplona, 21st century

“A member of the Paris 365 team has been inactive for a long time because he had been infected with the bite a rat gave him on a foot while he slept in the street. It's still wrong."