' "I was not afraid of dying, because if anything happened I could swim to arrive at the island. But the problem was that I had 20 persons with me," said Sarah. "In Syria I worked in a swimming pool to watch people not drowning, so if I let anyone drown or die I would not forgive myself." '
Syria is dying every day in the Mediterranean, but humanity endures. Everyone who can leave is leaving.
'After the conflict began, the Mardini family moved around to avoid the fighting and tried to ensure their daughters could keep on swimming. Ysra, now 17, even represented Syria at the short-course world championships in Turkey in 2012. But as the war intensified fellow swimmers drifted away.
"We were 40 or 50 swimmers, and now we are maybe 10 or 7 swimmers in Syria," said Sarah. "We want to have a future. I want to be in college, I want to be an international swimmer and my sister too. But if we stay there we will not reach that because the situation is not OK in Syria." '
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