Yusra Mardini: Refugee swimmer off to flying start after Pope Francis sends letter

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Ahead of competing at the Olympic Games in Rio de Janiero, Yusra Mardini, along with the nine other athletes that make up the Olympic Refugee Team were sent a letter by Pope Francis.

“I extend my greetings and wish you success at the Olympic Games in Rio – that your courage and strength find expression through the Olympic Games and serve as a cry for peace and solidarity,” wrote the Pope.

“Your experience serves as testimony and benefits us all. I pray for you and ask that you, please, do the same for me.”

Soon after details of the Pope’s letter were published, the 18-year-old Mardini jumped in the Olympic pool and won her heat in the 100 meter butterfly – though she didn’t swim fast enough to progress any further.

Aged 14, Mardini swam for Syria at swimming’s short-course world championships in 2012. But with her home destroyed in the ongoing conflict, she and her sister decided to flee the country in August last year.

Every competitor at the 2016 Olympics will have undergone a personal journey to reach Rio. But for some athletes, notably a number of refugee competitors, the path has been truly life changing ...

Paul Amotun Lokoro: South Sudan, 100m —

Paul Amotun Lokoro fled war in his home country of South Sudan. Years later, the 24-year-old is aiming to not just compete, but thrive at the Olympic Games."I want to win a gold," he says. "If I win the race, I will be famous!"

Rose Nathike Lokonyen: South Sudan, 800m —

Fourteen years after leaving South Sudan for the Kakuma refugee camp in Kenya, Rose Nathike Lokonyen is set to line up alongside some of the world's finest middle distance runners at Rio 2016.

Yiech Pur Biel: South Sudan, 800m —

Pur Biel also fled the Sudanese civil war, arriving at the Kakuma camp in 2005. The 21-year-old cites the prospect of Rio 2016 as "a great moment in my life and a story to my children and grandchildren."

Rami Anis: Syria, Swimming —

Six years ago, Rami Anis was swimming for Syria at the Asian Games in China. But in 2011, he fled his home of Aleppo to escape bombing.

Leaving Syria, reaching Rio —

His new coach in Belgium believes Anis' place in the Rio 2016 Olympic refugee team is a form of "justice".

Yusra Mardini: Swimming, Syria —

Joining Rami on the team is 18-year-old Yusra Mardini, another refugee from Syria who now trains in Germany.

Youngest refugee athlete —

Mardini's coach, Sven Spannekrebs (pictured left here), will be one of the backroom staff joining the refugee team for Rio.

Popole Misenga: Democratic Republic of Congo, Judo —

Congolese judo athlete Popole Misenga sought asylum in Brazil after the 2013 world championships in Rio. He will be on the official Olympic Refugee Team for the 2016 Games in the same city.

New life in Rio —

Misenga, 24, has married a Brazilian and has a young son since being granted asylum. He says Rio is a "magical place" to live.

Anjelina Nadai Lohalith: South Sudan, 1500m —

Anjelina Lohalith, 21, left her home country when she was just eight years old. While her family remain in South Sudan, she will now compete in Rio in the 1500m for the Refugee Olympic Team.

Yonas Kinde: Ethiopia, Marathon —

36-year-old Yonas Kinde left Ethiopia for Luxembourg in 2012 and immediately pursued his love for running. He soon becoming the best long distance runner in the tiny European country.

James Nyang Chiengjiek: South Sudan, 400m —

Just 13-years-old when he left his home, Chiengjiek managed to avoid the fate of South Sudan's child soldiers. He reached Kenya's Kakuma camp in 2002, quickly capitalizing on his athletic talents despite a lack of top class facilities.

Beyond the team —

Raheleh Asemani, formerly a taekwondo athlete for Iran, was on the shortlist for the Olympic Refugee Team -- but will now compete for Belgium in Rio having been granted citizenship.

Woman behind the team —

For many years, Kenyan marathon runner Tegla Loroupe has been using athletics to work toward peace in Africa. Five of the Olympic Refugee Team are South Sudanese refugees from her foundation's training center, and she will be the team's chef de mission.

Rio 2016 Olympics: Meet the first ever refugee team

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From Lebanon they reached Turkey and then took a boat to Greece – but the boat began to slowly sink as it took on water during the journey.

Mardini had to jump into the water and, summoning all of her swimming and survival know-how, help push the boat and its occupants until it safely reached Greek shores.

“I thought it would be a real shame if I drowned in the sea, because I am a swimmer,” is how she summed up the nightmare to reporters earlier this year. She is now living and training in Germany.

Leaving everything behind

“These refugees have no home, no team, no flag, no national anthem,” International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach said when he announced the selected athletes last month.

The IOC came up with the plan in March, creating a $2 million training fund and shortlisting dozens of refugee athletes for potential selection.

“We will offer them a home in the Olympic Village together with all the athletes of the world,” Bach said.

The final team for Rio includes 10 athletes competing in three sports. Half are refugees from South Sudan, two fled Syria, two left the Democratic Republic of the Congo and one is originally from Ethiopia.

Bach added: “These refugee athletes will show the world that despite the unimaginable tragedies that they have faced, anyone can contribute to society through their talent, skills and strength of the human spirit.”

From Kakuma to Rio

Five of the 10 athletes grew up in Kenya’s vast Kakuma refugee camp before joining a special track and field project.

Tegla Loroupe used to be one of Kenya’s top marathon runners. The 43-year-old now runs a foundation in her name, partly dedicated to helping refugee athletes train. She will be the refugee team’s leader in Rio.

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL - AUGUST 04: The official logo for the Rio 2016 Olympics games displays during a press conference of Two Years to Go to the Rio 2016 Olympics Opening Ceremony on August 4, 2014 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. (Photo by Buda Mendes/Getty Images)

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Last year, Loroupe’s foundation came to the Kakuma camp and began to hold tryouts for residents.

The camp, in Kenya’s northwestern corner near the border with Uganda and South Sudan, holds more than 180,000 people – roughly the size of Swindon in the UK or Salt Lake City in Utah.

Returning from a trip to Kakuma in January, top International Olympic Committee official Pere Miro said sport appeared to be one of few things keeping refugees going in such a harsh environment. Kakuma has more than 100 football teams, for example, and dozens of basketball teams.

Now, it has five Olympians too.

Yiech Pur Biel had been at the camp for a decade when Tegla Loroupe’s foundation showed up to hold trials. The 21-year-old, a refugee from South Sudan, was a good enough runner to be chosen for Loroupe’s training center – despite having no shoes at the camp – and will now race in the 800 meters for the refugee team in Rio.

Joining him is James Chiengjiek, who fled South Sudan to avoid becoming a child soldier in a decades-long civil war that claimed millions of lives. He arrived at Kakuma in 2002.

Now in his late 20s, he had been one of Loroupe’s athletes since 2013 and will run the 400m in Rio. Paulo Lokoro, who left South Sudan to join his mother at Kakuma in 2004, runs the 1,500m.

Loroupe’s foundation is sending two female South Sudanese refugees to Rio. Anjelina Nadai Lohalith, 21, is one of them: She came to Kakuma at the age of six and began running at one of the refugee camp’s schools.

In an interview with Rio 2016 organizers earlier this year, Lohalith described her surprise at being chosen to train for the Olympics.

“During the selection it was just like a trial,” she said, “but suddenly they say: ‘You will be going for training here.’”

Lohalith, entered in the women’s 1,500m, will be joined by 800m runner Rose Lokonyen on the team. Lokonyen, 23, was a resident at Kakuma from 2002 until joining Loroupe’s team in 2015, despite her parents returning to South Sudan in 2008.

Strangely, the place these refugees called their new home for many years may soon be wiped off the map itself. Kenya says it will soon close Kakuma due to national security concerns, although it has not specified a date and it’s not clear what will happen to the residents.

For now, there will be time to gather and follow the fortunes of their five former neighbors in August.

‘It would be a shame if I drowned’

Like Mardini, Rami Anis is another accomplished swimmer.

The 25-year-old Anis had been expected to make Syria’s team for London 2012 in the men’s 100m butterfly event. But in 2011, faced with bombing in his hometown of Aleppo and the prospect of an army call-up, he decided to follow his brother to Turkey.

However, four years later, Anis remained barred from competing with his teammates as he was a refugee. With help from smugglers he chanced a terrifying dinghy trip to Greece then made his way to Belgium, where he was finally granted asylum in December last year.

“This is a dream for any athlete,” Anis told a press conference ahead of the 2016 Games. “When I was a child I would dream about participating in the Olympics and our dream about participating in the Olympics under my country’s flag.

“However, I am proud that I am participating today even though I am participating as a refugee Olympic athlete. Obviously, I think about my homeland, Syria, and I do hope that by Tokyo 2020 there will be no refugees, nothing is nearer and dearer to my heart than the homeland.”

Now he trains at the Royal Ghent Swimming Club under former Belgian star Carine Verbauwen. When Anis was selected, Verbauwen said: “If he stayed in Syria – if there was no war – he would have been in the Olympic Games. I think this is justice.”

Anis, meanwhile, has tried to keep a low profile in the buildup to his Olympic debut. He has complained, Verbauwen said, that after months of trying to forget what has happened to him, he is now being asked to relive his journey time and again. His motto is simple: now, “the swimming pool is my home.”

‘Impossible’

Yonas Kinde, at the age of 36, is by some distance the oldest member of the Olympic Refugee Team. Kinde lived in Ethiopia until, he says, political and economic difficulties made it “impossible” to continue in his country as an athlete.

Kinde left Ethiopia in 2012 and reached Luxembourg, where he has since been earning a living as a taxi driver while continuing to train as a distance runner. He will be on the Rio men’s marathon start line.

“This chance is special for me,” said Kinde on being chosen for the team in June. “I’ve won many races but I don’t have a nationality to participate.”

Breaking free in Brazil

The final two members of the refugee team won’t have to travel far for their first Olympic appearances.

Yolande Mabika and Popole Misenga were members of the Congolese judo team at the 2013 world championships – in Rio – when they decided to escape.

Misenga, 24, had seen his mother murdered when he was six years old before fleeing into the rainforest to avoid fighting in his hometown of Kisangani. Rescued a week later, he went on to learn judo at a home in the capital, Kinshasa – which is exactly how 28-year-old Mabika had taken up the sport when she, too, was evacuated to the same city.

But life on the DR Congo judo team offered little respite from hardships at home. Both athletes say their coaches would assault them and hold them in cage-like cells if they lost. Sometimes, there would be no food.

As the 2013 world championships closed, Mabika and Misenga made a break for a northern Rio neighborhood and sought political asylum. They have remained ever since and are likely to be warmly received by their adopted home crowd when the Games begin.

“Their previous treatment seemed to be subhuman,” the duo’s new coach, Geraldo Bernardes, told the Guardian newspaper this year. “Here, everyone supports them.”

Misenga is now married to a Brazilian and has a one-year-old son. He will compete in the men’s 90 kg category with Mabika in the women’s 70 kg event.

“I want to win a medal and inspire refugees from all over the world,” Misenga told Rio’s organizers as he prepared for the Games.

“Afterwards, I want to stay in Rio. God has made this a magical place.”

Beyond the refugee team

The official Olympic Refugee Team won’t be the only place you can find refugees competing at the Rio Games.

Iran-born taekwondo fighter Raheleh Asemani, for example, was shortlisted for selection to the refugee team but has since been awarded citizenship and picked for Rio by her new home country of Belgium. She already has a European bronze medal with her new team.

Another example is Tsegai Tewelde, who will run in the men’s marathon for Team GB. The 26-year-old sought political asylum in Britain eight years ago, having grown up in Eritrea. At the age of eight, Tewelde was injured in a land-mine explosion that killed a friend – and he still bears a scar from the incident on his forehead.

Nor is this the first time a form of refugee team has been planned, although it’s the first time the IOC has agreed to it.

Back in the early 1950s, a group called the Union of Free Eastern European Sportsmen – started in Hungary and secretly backed by the United States – tried to set up a team of exiled eastern European athletes for the Olympics as the Cold War intensified.

Read more: Full Olympics coverage

The IOC rejected that bid. On hearing that the athletes’ application had been denied, Hungarian official Anthony Szapary – who backed the plan – said in a letter to the New York Times: “For ‘choosing freedom’ they are now banned from the greatest sports event of the world.”

In Rio, that will no longer be the case.