Five months ago, in a hospital in Nis, baby girl Dunja came into the world. Tiny yet spirited, with dark, bright eyes, she is the daughter of a migrant couple Saliha and Fido, who have been   in the Reception Center in Vranje for two years.

„We are from Kabul, Аvghanistan. Life became unbearable over there, we could not make it any longer. My husband worked as an interpreter for an international organization in Kabul, which created additional problems for our entire family“, Saliha Amiri (28) tells the story as she holds baby Dunja in her arms. 

Several years ago, when their lives became endangered, her husband Fida Muhamed Madzizada (42) decided to take the whole family onto a long and uncertain journey. Besides Dunja, the couple has three more children Farzad (12), Farshad (10) and Farid (7). The boys have been regularly attending classes at a local school in Vranje.

„Boys are doing well at school and we are generally happy here in the Reception Center in Vranje. Dunja came as a blessing while we were waiting to continue our journey to Germany and later on hopefully to the United States“, explains Saliha.

At first sight, one may think that the parents decided to give Dunja a Serbian name, however, the story has an interesting and unusual twist.

„Actually, we’ve had several reasons to name Dunja the way we did. One of them is that on our long journey that temporarily ended in Serbia, we have travelled through many countries, namely Iran, Turkey, Bulgaria. In a sense, we have „travelled the world” and there is a beautiful symbolism behind the name, since „Dunja“ means “the world” in Arabic, Farsi and Pashtu. The other reason certainly has to do with a fact that Dunja was born in Serbia and it is such a beautiful Serbian name. Therefore, it was a perfect match.“

Saliha is hopeful that other cicumstances in life will also become a perfct match for her family. The family is hoping that Dunja’s birth and her symbolic name will take them further into a better and more beautiful world, much different from the one they left behind.