Refugees sleep on the street at the Hungarian border with Serbia near the town of Horgos. (Armend Nimani/AFP/Getty Images)

By Robert Samuels

HORGOS, SERBIA — It had taken a year for the young Somali couple to get this far. So when they saw the fence and the Hungarian flag before them, they began to run.

“Let’s not miss the chance,” Abdi Hassan, 22, who said he studied electrical engineering, said to his wife, Hani. “They say the border closes at midnight, so we have to hurry.”

It was about 10 p.m. Monday. Hani, 20, wearing a leopard print hijab, grabbed Abdi’s hand and they ran together. A stranger stopped them and his eyes fixed on the baby clutched in her arms. Apudi was six months old and wore a onesie that matched Hani’s hijab.

“Is your baby okay?” asked the man, who said he was from Doctors Without Borders.

“There’s no time,” the mother said.

“They don’t close the border in two hours, don’t worry,” he said. “The baby is sick. And it’s beginning to rain.”

Across from them, a crowd of 300 gathered on this desolate stretch in the countryside. Chatter in Arabic could be heard on a dark road littered with discarded water bottles and used blankets. Before, refugees had walked through Serbian-Hungarian checkpoint with little to fear. When midnight came, no one was fully sure what would happen.

What they feared most was that the Hungarian government would shut them out, cutting off their route to more welcoming countries in Western Europe. The night might not have been the last chance to receive asylum, but it would be the easiest one.

And it had already been hard. On the Serbian side of the fence, a 90-year-old woman in a black hijab grabbed the chain links and looked ahead. On this night, doctors said they were seeing more migrants with heart palpitations. One passed out. Another woman had a miscarriage.

Apudi was a “little sick” and doctors gave Abdi and Hani a bottle of children’s medicine. The medicine was a much-needed salve for a family that had little luck. Abdi said they applied for asylum in Turkey, only to be rejected after six months.

When they heard that Hungary was stiffening border controls, they began to walk, when Apudi was 16 or 17 days old. The small boat they used to travel along the Aegaen Sea fell apart, Abdi said, and they had to be saved by police. Now, at last, they were here.

In front of them was a 26-year-old Syrian hotel receptionist named Qais Jaafar. When news traveled that the border was going to close on Sept. 15, his family told him to leave the city of Suwayda. He was young, able bodied and charming; surely he’d be able to send for them later. So he slipped on the bracelet that his mother gave him long ago for inspiration, and promised his fiancee that he would not lose the engagement ring. He made a 12-day journey in 10 days.

“I am now a great athlete,” Jaafar joked. “Running is key. Usain Bolt? Now he has nothing on me.”

Behind them was a group of about 50 families and friends that came from Syria and Iraq. As they approached, a television journalist stopped to let them know the border would be closing at midnight. It was about 10:45 p.m. Bilal Rahmani, a lanky 18-year-old, went numb.

“I didn’t know we wouldn’t make it,” he said. “If I cannot make it, there is no hope. The dream is off.”

“All I want to do is get to Germany,” Rahmani continued.

“I’m tired,” Hani said, as she sat down in the street with her baby.

“I’m bored,” said Jaafar, who hadn’t rested in a few days.

Hungarian police officers stood on the other side of the fence. They gave instructions to Arabic interpreters, who began to shout to the crowd a little bit after 11 p.m. All day long, volunteers said, police had let people through a little gate in groups of about 500.

They’d walk through the border in groups of 10, every 90 minutes. But there were only 50 minutes before midnight. And there were more than 600 refugees. Would some not make the cut-off? some wondered. They tried to push toward the front, yelling in indistinct chatter.

“Move back!” the volunteers yelled and Abdi and Hani obeyed.

Jaafar yelled “Move back” to help pass the message along, his bracelet moving back and forth as he waved his hands. Rahmani and his family stayed in place.

Midnight approached. A group of people ran to the front to explain they should go first because they are Syrians, who comprise the majority of migrants. A group of people pushed them out of the way and shouted “Afghanistan!”

“Stop! Stop!” yelled Ahmed Twaij, who volunteered to keep the line in order. “The police told me everyone will go through. Syria. Afghanistan. Everyone, please. Go slow. Don’t push. Keep the kids safe.”

The pushing began to subside as volunteers kept repeating, “Everyone will go through.” Soon, peacefully, they began to walk. The 90-year-old woman walked across followed by small children holding their mother’s hands. So did a middle-aged with braces around his leg. As he crossed, Rahmani smiled and said, “Wish me all good things!”

Jaafar made it too, one step farther away from his life in Syria.

From 11:50 until 12:06, migrants streamed through. They would board a bus, then take a train, then walk to get to Austria. At 12:07, a Hungarian police officer locked the gate.

“No more,” he said.

But there were more. More kept walking toward the border. About 50 more migrants were there in minutes, the last being a man walking on crutches. The volunteers asked for compassion. Once again, police opened the border. Ten minutes later, it was closed.

But people kept coming, including a family from Iraq who said their fastest run wasn’t fast enough. A dozen or so young Afghans showed up, too. Volunteers pleaded with the police to take even more into the border, but a police officer just shook his head.

“The rules have changed,” he said.

As the volunteers continued their efforts to persuade the border police officer, from the dark, came a young tanned woman in a leopard printed hijab. The baby she held was drinking a bottle of milk.

“I was tired,” Hani Hassan said as Abdi stayed behind. She stopped when she saw the locked gate.

“Closed?” she said. “No! No.”

A volunteer touched her arm and looked into her eyes. She tried to explain that volunteers would bring tents. She could try again the next day.

Her eyes began to bulge.

“Why?! she screamed, and as it echoed, she softened to a whisper. She asked again, “Why?

Source: The Washington Post