I met my first Syrian refugees The force was strong with the tiny one.

I was sat on the Bus going to town for some shopping and a lady with her two kids a girl and boy got on and sat in the part where buggies go and the little girl was sat on her mothers knee, she had a small lightsaber toy no bigger than 12 inch and was waving it in my direction...It was a green one btw.
Now being a Sith I knew I could defeat this small weak girl with even my tiny keychain saber (red) so I got it out and had a lengthy battle doing all the sounds and such much to the delight of the girl and lad and her Mother who kept on apologising for the petulance of the child (yes by this time she had defeated me Noooo!) and we got talking she came over last year and being lucky she had money and got in the UK on a visitors visa and has now claimed asylum I asked her about her Husband and he is still over in Syria with the rest of her family.
She said her kids are now happy and can be children again her stop came and she said goodbye and with a wave from the kids I wished them good luck and told the Mum "The force is strong with the little one" she laughed and that was it.
Anyhow It just gave me a human touch to the plight of the people all over the world ravaged by war and just wanting the same things we all want a safe environment to bring up our kids.
I hope she and her children will be welcomed into the UK and given the help they need.
Crap situation all around though it isn't black or white but we have the moral responsibility to help those in need.

a reply to: Monkeyguns

Are you saying that she is stronger than even young Anakin was?

How could a Sith like yourself be defeated by such a young Jedi?

Or did you let her win as not to draw attention to your powers being that you where in a public space??

So many questions… Disturbing the sound of this is...

a reply to: EmmanuelGoldstein

I lured her in by making her think the light side will win thus making her downfall so much more tragic! Mahahaha Mahahahaha Mahahaha...but also her lighsaber was bigger than mine

The Jedi cant be trusted.

That's a cool story though!

Am sure they're nice people and I'm quite liberal when it comes to asylum, refugees and immigrants in general but she scammed the system. Visitor visas are temporary and granted on the condition that you return home at the end of the stay, she clearly entered with no intention of doing that.

Maybe I'm just anal about it because I work in this industry and I see genuine people everyday that have worked hard to get here, paid the huge fees and have jumped through all the hoops but still get shafted trying to do it the legit way.

At the same time, if your country is at war and you have kids I suppose you're going to do whatever it takes to get out of there.

originally posted by: Monkeyguns
a reply to: EmmanuelGoldstein

I lured her in by making her think the light side will win thus making her downfall so much more tragic! Mahahaha Mahahahaha Mahahaha...but also her lighsaber was bigger than mine

Yoda never complained about his lightsaber size.

Kids are the same the whole world over, even the big ones like you

originally posted by: Monkeyguns
Crap situation all around though it isn't black or white but we have the moral responsibility to help those in need.

I fully agree.

But that moral responsibility doesn't trump the moral responsibility to keep those already living in the areas set up to help those in need safe and relatively secure in their way of life.

You're right, it's not black and white, but at some point you must ask if the risk of hurting those who are paying to help those in need is a risk you're willing to accept. Of course some, if not even most, of the refugees are kind-hearted people trying to better their plight in life, but it's the ones who are of an unkind heart and are motivated to alter the places that are accepting them as refugees in one way or another who ruin my willingness to accept the lot of them with wide open arms.

If we had better, more thorough means to vet the refugees, my opinion might be a little different, but it's impossible to vet what is in one's heart, only what is in one's past. And when they are coming from a country who keeps very little records on people's pasts, that makes the moral responsibility of keeping one's own citizenry safe while helping others very, very difficult.

ETA (and I should have said this first): Very good job interacting with them in a friendly way--I would have done the same thing, as would many, if not most, others on here. You appear to have been a good ambassador to the kindness of "western culture" and the people who comprise it, regardless of what all the naysayers might think about the western world.

a reply to: Monkeyguns

A nice, light-hearted experience for you, and one that will resonate with a child for a long time. It's always fun to light up a child's imagination (much more so for me now than before I had kids - I used to do my best to keep my distance from kids lol.)

a reply to: LostThePlot

Seriously??

Day 5 of your participation and you spout this??

Go Away. Now. Please.


Great actions on your part OP!! Great to hear not all folks experiencing the influx are judgmental creeps.

S&F for your, friend!!

a reply to: fenian8

Yeah, pics or it didn't happen lol
I'm usually kind to a fellow human stranger most days but I don't start new threads about it, maybe I should.
Or maybe it doesn't count because I live in an overwhelmingly white area of the UK and being kind to asylum seekers is perhaps 'more' nice or something?

The OP is basically a story about a bloke playing light sabre's with a kid on a bus, I don't see the asylum seeker from Syria relevance or angle that is trying to be conveyed.
I actually pretended to spray a web at a 4/5 year old in a spiderman costume who passed and pretended to shoot me as I was loading a trailer in the street today. Both he and his mother chuckled.
The little boy wasn't an asylum seeker though so I guess it didn't deserve a thread on ATS.

*Edit*
The OP is more like a facebook post to me, unless that is what we think ATS is now, just sharing stories of playing light sabre games with stranger kids on the bus?
Maybe I should start a new thread for every similar action I find myself involved in each day...I think y'all would get sick of that though as I certainly would.
Leave that for facebook I say, and remember the difference between that and ATS.

a reply to: grainofsand

General chit in Off topic is a break from the the hardcore ATS stuff, the OP can post what they want here.

originally posted by: zazzafrazz
a reply to: grainofsand

General chit in Off topic is a break from the the hardcore ATS stuff, the OP can post what they want here.

Not once did I state that the OP could not post whatever they wish to, so thanks but I didn't need the reminder on ATS rules.
I am free to post my own opinions on the thread myself, unlucky if that bothers you, but you are free to respond however you wish as well, T's&C's considered of course lol.

You may wish for General Chit Chat to be a mutual appreciation love in, but it is not, so I will share my thoughts and expect replies, as you, the OP, and everyone else does.

originally posted by: PaTommyJ
a reply to: LostThePlot

Seriously??

Day 5 of your participation and you spout this??

Go Away. Now. Please.

Great actions on your part OP!! Great to hear not all folks experiencing the influx are judgmental creeps.

S&F for your, friend!!

Been here a lot longer than you.New account.Lost my login details and email due to a change of isp.Now you do one, please.

It was a well written story. I could see the events play out in my minds eye, and it brought a smile to my face. The first real smile of the day.


Then I get to the bottom of the page. Apparently the OP is an ISIS sympathizer with an overwhelming desire to bring Sharia law to the UK. And the mother in the story is a Jihadist who was casing the bus so she could come back later to set off a suicide bomb. [/sarcasm]

The story may be fiction, I don't know for sure. But all of the criticism, innuendo, and conspiracy theories are speculation. So, for now, I'm sticking with the smile I got from reading the story.

The rest of you do what the heck you want.

-dex

originally posted by: DexterRiley
It was a well written story. I could see the events play out in my minds eye, and it brought a smile to my face. The first real smile of the day.

So, for now, I'm sticking with the smile I got from reading the story.



-dex

This was my take on it as well. Apologies to any who think my response was off base. I guess I'm forever the optimist and would like to believe in my heart and mind that this is a true story. call it gullible, softhearted, wuss, whatever. My response was based not only on the lack of evident experience of the poster, but the incredibly sh$%^&ty attitude. I was raised by the if you don't have anything nice to say keep your mouth shut principal. Attitudes and responses like that just flat out piss me off and my temper gets the better of me. This is why my post count is low - nothing nice to respond with when the posts are awful like that, and smart enough to realize most of these minds on ATS are sharper and better informed than I. The poster I responded to is not one of them.

I withdraw from the fray. Utmost respect to those who can tolerate and rebut in a meaningful way.

BTW Losttheplot - lost my IP and credentials too, been here since the internet was invented...

funny how that works, isn't it??

a reply to: PaTommyJ

I guess I'm forever the optimist and would like to believe in my heart and mind that this is a true story.

It was a good story. You know, it was some nice news for a change. Like you, I'm going to take the optimistic point of view as well. Even if it was fiction, for me it helped to remind me that these are real people. I admit that I've been caught up in the "Radical Islam Terrorist" meme for the last few weeks. And while I believe there is an overall danger in what is transpiring in Europe, the vast majority of these people are at the mercy of something that is so much bigger than they are.

I really thought this would be a more uplifting thread. I was totally bummed out when I got to the bottom of the page. In light of some of the comments, I had to take a minute to reaffirm to myself that this was a plausible story. I came to the conclusion that it didn't matter. It served its purpose.

Your comment to the poster who made the disparaging comment actually jumped out at me. Most of the time I just ignore such tripe. But I'll give you props for doing what more of us should do. Keep being positive, and keep up the good fight!

-dex

a reply to: PaTommyJ

And this is why so many are leaving ATS....
I can't even tell folk about an interaction I had with my fellow human beings....
Thats it again.