Fabien Toulmé's Hakim's Odyssey, Book 2: A Review

Fabien Toulmé, Hakim's Oddyssey: Book 2: From Turkey to Greece (University Park, PA: Graphic Mundi, 2022). 254 pages. Translated from the French by Hannah Chute. 

Book 1 of Hakim’s Odyssey ended with Hakim in Turkey, wandering the streets of Istanbul where he had been trying to make a living while working out how to obtain a visa to France (eventually refused to him and his son). In Book 2, Hakim, frustrated with the many obstacles and administrative barriers imposed by all governments, decides to make the (officially deemed to be illegal) trip to Greece, the European Union, by boat. It’s not a unique story: Hakim has to find his way among the dodgy opportunists who exploit human desperation and make a huge profit from the tragedy of forced migration. There are overpriced, taxi services by grumpy and menacing-looking drivers; there are the crammed hotels where receptionists charge extra as soon as they recognise a desperate Syrian refugee; then there are the store owners prepared to sell you anything you may need when you board an overcrowded boat in the Mediterranean Sea.

How important can it be to learn to prepare a milk bottle?

And then there is the night of the voyage: the mafias who arrange transport to the beach where they force a hundred human beings on to a shonky inflatable boat that should normally hold 25 people maximum. Toulmé’s craft unambiguously conveys the terror of these people as they cross the sea and the engine fails in the darkness, as water starts leaking into the boat and the certainty it will sink assails their minds.

No room at the inn... Unless you're prepared to pay more than others.

When disaster seems imminent, all the men on the boat jump into the water and hold on to the side to delay what seems inevitable: it will sink. In Hakim’s case, this lot were lucky. A Greek border patrol ship finds them. They are rescued and taken to a refugee camp where they will be held for 48 hours. Then they will be free to wander in Athens or attempt to move on. Carrying his very young son with him, Hakim will choose the latter. Hence the Book 3 in this series.

Words are always inadequate to explain this kind of situation.

The unpalatable reality is that boats sink all too frequently. The victims of this unstoppable migration can be as young as eight months old. In the meantime, heartless neofascist politicians continue to spit their xenophobic hatred against people whose only crime is to seek a better life.

And a daytime scene of Victoria Square...

Victoria Square, Athens, photograph by Badseed.