On the east coast of the Greek island of Lesbos, in the shadow of an abandoned hangar and not far from the crystalline Aegean Sea, 30 people in swimming suits stand in a circle.

To the east, the small cove is bordered by a white cliff – beyond is the strait that separates Lesbos from Turkiye. To the west, a few kilometres in the distance, lies the island’s capital Mytilene and its castle. The beach is blindingly bright, drenched in the white sunshine of the July afternoon.

The group comprises trainers and students of a swimming class organised by Yoga and Sport with Refugees (YSR), an NGO that works to foster physical and mental health through sports. Many of the participants have had traumatic experiences with water, having crossed the Mediterranean in dangerous and harrowing conditions as refugees seeking asylum in Europe.

Several class participants wear swimming shoes, two wear fins and one person has a pair of goggles. One by one, they introduce themselves.

“I’m Salah*,” an athletic young man proclaims proudly. “I come from Syria and I can swim!”

“I’m Hossein*. I come from Iran and I cannot swim,” says a tall and thin man with his arms clenched.

“I’m Hasan*,” says another swimmer with a smile and a wave. “I’m from Afghanistan and I can swim so-so.”

The instructors guide the swimmers to the water and divide them into groups based on experience – from beginners to those who want to perfect their swimming skills. Most enter the sea but some are hesitant, remaining on the shore.

“Let’s enter slowly, no hurry,” says Salah, who is already up to his waist.

YSR has its roots in swimming, explains Estelle Jean, the organisation’s founder and executive director. “In 2016, thousands of people were coming by the sea, especially in the northern part of the island, where the Turkish shore is only 12 km (7.5 miles) away. Rescue teams had formed spontaneously.”

The situation led to the birth of the swimming programme in Lesbos in 2017, she explains. The aim was to teach swimming but also provide an opportunity to both rescuers and those who crossed the sea to reconnect with it, especially after a traumatic experience.

YSR officially started in 2018 and now operates in four locations, with the other three in Ioannina, Athens and Paris, France. In Lesbos, they hold daily swimming classes from May until October, weather permitting, which are open to men and women (including women-only classes). Each group has at least one instructor who carefully monitors the students.

“Day by day, they are improving,” says Sara Balamurugan, a volunteer instructor from France. Three younger students practise leg movements on the shore, while two first-timers practise floating in the water. Meanwhile, two advanced students go further out into the sea with another instructor.

Salah comes back to the shore doing the butterfly stroke, raising his head and arms with every two leg kicks. Luiza Lena Benz, a swimming coach, tells him he needs to correct his hand positioning and demonstrates the correct method. Salah listens attentively, then sits on the shore for a rest.

“I love swimming,” Salah says smiling. “I’m quite good, you know. I can swim there,” he says, pointing to the blue mountains beyond the sea. “I came from Turkiye swimming,” he continues, his tone becoming more serious. “It took six hours. It has been hard, but I had a float helping me.”

On June 29, YSR hosted an international event called “Swim for Good 2024”, held simultaneously in Lesbos and several cities – from Paris to Singapore and from Kampala to Copenhagen. Each event involved a 12km (7.5-mile) swim designed to raise awareness of the dangerous journey many people are forced to confront when they leave their place of origin to seek safety.

Along the shores of Lesbos, 54 people swam together. One was Yusra Mardini, a Syrian swimmer who competed in the Refugee Olympic Athletes Team in 2016. Her participation has a deep meaning. She arrived on the island for the first time in 2015 as an asylum seeker and returned to the same sea where her swimming ability helped her save herself and others from drowning.

Yusra also runs a foundation in her own name which provides refugees with swimming lessons and helps them to overcome their fear of water. This year, the organisation has partnered with YSR’s swimming programme in Lesbos and provided financial support.

‘I have always loved swimming’

The water is becoming more turbid close to the shore. The swimming class has stirred up the muddy seabed and dead Posidonia (seagrass).

Hasan, wearing a cap and goggles, is practising freestyle. “I have always loved swimming,” he says. “In Afghanistan, there is no sea. We have wonderful rivers but rivers are dangerous. I lost one of my friends, taken away by the current in a river.”

Hossein and another swimmer glide with kickboards towards the instructor, their bodies half out of the water. They both shiver, despite the summer heat.

Beside the frame of an old pier, Jullian Lacey Lang, a volunteer swimming instructor from the United States, teaches the front crawl to two students from Syria. After six or seven outstretched strokes, Abdel* raises his head to breathe in deeply. “Bravo!” exclaims Jullian. “The movement of the arms is perfect. You are strong, but don’t forget to breathe.”

Sitting on the shore, Emilie Bottini, a mental health coordinator at Terra Psy – Psychologues Sans Frontières, which offers psychological support for displaced, exiled and refugee populations, observes the training sessions. “Swimming is a key activity in this context,” she says. “Water can mean many things to people: the sea they have crossed to get here, the sea surrounding the centre where they are enclosed. Water is often linked to traumatic experiences, but at the same time, it is at the sea that people find moments of sociability, fun and freedom on the island.”

Terra Psy operates in the nearby community of Paréa. “We hold workshops where we ask people to close their eyes and imagine they are in the water,” Bottini says. “We try to re-establish a relationship with this fundamental element.

She came to the class to help, she says, but also to learn and find new ideas for Terra Psy workshops. “At this time, after all, our work is less intense. There are just over 800 people locked up in the Mavrovouni centre, and we can think about how to improve activities.”

The European Union-funded Mavrovouni Closed Controlled Access Centre (Mavrovouni CCAC), is a centre for asylum seekers in Greece, about 5km (3.1 miles) from the centre of Mytilene. Encircled by fences and walls, it is referred to as a “prison-like model” by NGOs. The grounds are surveilled and living areas patrolled by police. However, people living there can leave during the day – like for activities with YSR.

Last December, Mavrovouni CCAC was overcrowded, with approximately 6,000 people living in the centre. However, numbers have decreased significantly over the summer.

With this reduction in the population, YSR also sees lower participation in sport activities, explains Renia Vogiatzi, a YSR volunteer coordinator. She adds that it is good that the camp is no longer overcrowded and that asylum procedures have sped up, “but if there are fewer people, it is also because push-backs from the Greek coastguard continue. Never before has the island been so full of tourists, especially from Turkiye, which is also why they decided to empty Lesbos of asylum seekers”.

Agnese Ottaviani, a legal expert at a large insurance company in Italy, spends her holidays in Lesbos and teaches swimming to children as a YSR volunteer. She watches over two brothers from Palestine. The younger one is seven and cannot swim. The elder sibling, who is 17, follows his little brother’s first steps in the water with apprehension, watching him closely.

Gradually the younger one gains confidence and starts to dive for a few seconds. “He is very good,” Ottaviani says. She has seen many fearful children, she explains, but she is confident that he will soon learn to swim. The older brother eventually relaxes and joins an advanced group.

A few hours pass and the air becomes cooler. Shadows from the old buildings, where fig trees grow in the ruins, stretch across the beach. Some of the swimmers have come out of the water early to pick the sweet fruit, while others continue to practise or hang around, laughing and splashing. Near the old pier, a large group plays with a ball.

In the water close to the shore, Salah swims in long strokes with his eyes closed, as if in a dance that slows in rhythm until it stops. He then stretches out like a star on the surface, looking at the sky, and becomes part of the sea.