Big brother Aram is busy maintaining the website of the church and learning more about it. His father repairs broken devices. By doing this type of volunteer, they can make themselves useful. “We remain positive. We are now here a hundred days here, but it seems shorter. It is flying by, especially thanks to all the support we receive.”
Yet Aram also has his difficult moments. “We are on each other’s lip all day, that is difficult. The girls sometimes argue. You just want their own room, your own house. Doing your thing, continuing your life. You are waiting and hoping for the best.”
And the family now hopes for a hundred days. And the family is also waiting for a residence permit exactly 4000 days this Saturday. General secretary of the Protestant Church René de Reuver will visit the family again on Saturday afternoon. In December last year he also visited the family. He calls the milestone of one hundred days “not something to celebrate, but a marking of a sad low point”.
The church shelter continues as long as it is necessary, but no one knows how long that is. “I certainly hope, I believe that people and also politics will realize that they have something right here after all these years,” says pastor Kasper Jager of the church in Kampen. “The church lives with hope. Faith, hope and love, they are the most important words. And if that applies somewhere, then that’s here. So yes, we certainly have hope.”
Asylum minister Marjolein Faber recently said she is waiting for the family to come out. Herman Stomphorst, coordinator of the Kerkasiel, calls that “hopeful, we will also wait for that. This will be possible as soon as Minister Faber comes up with a just solution. That is why we heartily invite her to come and have a look here. Who knows, she will be inspired by the hospitality of the church.”