Last September, 22-year-old Ibrahim Lashin left his home in Lebanon and boarded a small

boat for Cyprus, where he and other migrants hoped to find better jobs and a whole new

life.

Lashin told MPR's Ruth Shurlock that he had sold his mother's couches to pay for this boat

trip.

And that before they boarded, the smugglers who arranged the trip took all of the migrants

possessions, including their phones and even baby formula.

Lashin says they were promised it would only be a seven-hour journey.

But then two days later, they were stranded at sea without fuel and without food.

A two-year-old died in his mother's arms.

That's when another passenger decided to swim.

He said he was going to find help, he asked us all for forgiveness if he didn't succeed.

That was the last they saw of him.

Others swam for help too.

And then seven days into this journey, after three more passengers had died, Lashin decided

it was his turn.

I decided to go because there wasn't anyone left but me on the boat who knew how to swim.

Lashin swam through the night and was saved by a rescue boat that happened to be passing

by.

Eight days after they left Shur, six of his fellow passengers were now dead.

The international organization for migration estimates that last year, more than a thousand

people died trying to make similar crossings in the Mediterranean Sea.

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