“I feel bad about it and I see that I'm just here but I don't have any voice and I don't have any right about my dignity. So, at that point, I determine that I am just a slave which has been taken from Africa to here and they now are going to decide anything about my situation. Because, as I told them my story and my situation, if they don't agree with it, they can say to me, ‘Okay, we will just forward it to another level.’ But they should not have the right to decide my age there — which they don't know. How can they just see a person and tell, ‘This is your age,’ which you never see — this is the first time they saw the person. It's all about racism, I can say.”

Q: “Why do you think some parts of the public and the law are so obsessed when it comes to finding out the age of migrants?” A: “Good question. I think this is different. It has different reasons. There is one historical reason: there is a long history of measuring and defining non-white or non-German persons in like, not to accept that they — not to accept what they say but to say, like, the state is allowed to decide about everything. Like what you have to eat, where you have to stay, where you have to live and even what age you have. To define a person until 100 percent and not let the person by himself or herself do it.”

“I really think this connection to the colonial practice has to be put more in focus. Like the fact that people are sent — like even in these results, for example, there is written — like after every medical test, the doctor writes the result. There it is written, like, they cannot measure the private part of a person, because this is not allowed anymore. This is written there, before they even measured sometimes the private part, to look if it is like adult or what ever. This is like — you cannot find words for this — but that people have to take of their clothes and being photographed and whatever. I think it is also important to bring this — to point on this continuity.”

“In general, I am totally against any form of migration law. Because any form of migration law is an extra law that is treating people different to others. And any form of migration law will affect human rights and age determination is part of this so I reject this. (...)”

Q: “I think I have exhausted my questions for you and then, is there anything that you would like to add or anything that you would like to say or anything that you would like people out there to know? It can be anything but just feel free to say whatever you want people to really know.” A: “Yeah of course. Like us, this thing is all about the age there so I wanna talk about age. Because, you know, it is very very stupid for you to come and even though ‘I'm a hundred years old,’ or if I come and say, ‘I'm 10 years.’ What is your business there? What is your business with my age? What's wrong with my age? if I said, ‘I'm 10 years,’ and even if I'm 100 years, I say, ‘I'm 10 years.’ That's not your business to check my age — whether my age is correct or not. The most stupid and heartbreaking thing is they say, ‘We don't believe you we will go to check your bones — bones checking — to know whether you are this age.’ That is the first part of discrimination, the first kind of racism and the first kind of everything which is very disgusting and heartbreaking. Like, to say they will check you to find out whether your age is this or not — what the hell is that? How can a human being even be like that? How can you think about that? So someone come and tell you ‘This is my age,’ and you're telling that person that you don't believe it, you don't believe their age. And also, when the Europeans went to Africa, we didn't ask them about their age. Even when we ask them and they say that they are 100 years or they are 12 years. We don't care, we say, ‘Yeah, we'll go with that.’ That's the human, a human has to believe like that. Whether you trust the person or you don't trust the person — I don't think that should be a problem. I come to you, ‘That's my age,’ and you said you don't believe it so, ‘You have to give me your own age’. So what — which is which? Will I believe the age you've given to me—” Q: “Even after providing your passport?” A: “Yeah...If I give you the age, what is the age you'll wanna believe? My age or the age you've given to me yourself? You don't even know where I was born. You are not my father, you are not my mother. How can you know my age? When you are telling me, ‘This is your age. So you have to take this.’ That is the most stupid thing they did. I just want them to stop whatever they are doing. Because if they don't stop what they are doing, they are going to face the consequences. So that's the only thing I have for them. What they are doing is not right. Black people and African people — no one is living here comfortably. Everyone is facing their own demons. So whatever they are doing, let them stop it If they don't stop it, they are going to face the consequences. So that's what I have for them.”

“My plans are not to be here for very long in Europe. I have said it in other interviews that I do not come here to stay and to say that I had a war in my country, that I had problems. I come here like any other person who wants to travel to other countries and look for better work to make money. This is what other people do from other European countries. They go to any country they want and want to better their life. I did the same thing. So, I believe we are all the same, we could all do this, regardless of being a black person from Africa or any other country.”

“Sure, I feel violated. Every other person will feel the same way. Because, if a white man goes to my country without any document, then he would be asked, he would be given a chance to explain himself and then what he explained would be written down for the records. But the same treatment has not been applied to us because they ask you questions and then you give them honest answers. Then at the end of the day, they reject it.”

“I think everybody is in this situation. Like, I think every African, every black person feels that we have been discriminated. If white people — Europeans — went to Africa, if they go there, we treat them good. You know, they have everything. We didn't tell them, ‘You are illegal here,’ or so. But Africans, when we came here, even if one person is suffering, I think that should be a suffering for every African, not only that one person. I think every African should feel the same that, ‘Why are we in this?’”