The Boat
In August 2015, Yusra Mardini and her older sister Sarah boarded a dinghy on the Turkish coast, aiming for the Greek island of Lesbos. Twenty people were crammed into a boat designed for six. Halfway across the Aegean Sea, the motor failed.
Yusra, seventeen years old and a competitive swimmer from Damascus, slid into the water alongside Sarah and one other passenger. For three and a half hours, they pushed and pulled the sinking dinghy through open sea. Everyone on board survived. Yusra had been training since age three — she never imagined the pool would prepare her for this.
The Journey
From Lesbos, the Mardini sisters made the refugee trail north through Macedonia, Serbia, Hungary, and Austria, arriving in Berlin in September 2015. Yusra spoke no German. She had no home, no coach, and no pool. Within weeks, she had found a swimming club in Berlin-Spandau and resumed training.
Her times were good. Remarkably good for someone who had just crossed a continent on foot. The International Olympic Committee, preparing for the 2016 Rio Games, was forming the first-ever Refugee Olympic Team. Yusra qualified.
The Platform
At the Rio Olympics, Yusra competed in the 100-metre butterfly. She did not medal, but that was never the point. She became the most visible symbol of the refugee crisis on the global stage — a reminder that the 80 million displaced people worldwide were not statistics but swimmers, doctors, teachers, and engineers.
She competed again at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. She was appointed UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador. And Sarah was later put on trial in Greece for her rescue work helping other refugees — a case that drew international condemnation and highlighted the criminalisation of humanitarian aid.
The Mardini sisters' story exposed a broken system: the same act that made Sarah a hero to refugees made her a criminal in the eyes of European law.
What This Means for You
Yusra Mardini trained her entire life for something she never expected — and when the moment came, she was ready. If you are building skills, resilience, or faith that seem disconnected from your circumstances, do not dismiss them. You may be training for a moment you cannot yet see. And like Yusra, you may find that the very thing that saved your life becomes the thing that gives you a voice.