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After losing his lower leg with a 2012 bomb in Syria, Ibrahim al-Hussein never imagined he would one day swim in a pool when his Olympic statues shattered history.
In 2016, he was the flag bearer of a group of refugees who started at the Rio Paralympics. Now he is looking forward to returning to the competition in Tokyo.
“Nothing is impossible,” said the 32-year-old at the start of a training day at the Athens Olympic pool.
“You have to fight, with your body, with your heart … you can do whatever you want with your life,” al-Hussein said.
As a child, he swam along the Euphrates River with his father, who had an Olympic dream.
At the age of 15, al-Hussein follows in the footsteps of Ian Thorpe and Michael Phelps in 2004 at the Athens Olympics from his hometown of Deir Az Zor in Syria.
His hopes were dashed when Syria entered the civil war in 2011 and his family was forced to flee.
Al-Hussein was initially left behind, but when his right leg was injured when a bomb exploded and had to be cut off, he had to leave for Greece via Turkey in February 2014.
Like thousands of other refugees, they traversed the dangerous Aegean Sea and reached the Greek island of Samos.
After living on the streets of Athens for two weeks, al-Hussein was led by a fellow Assyrian to the Angelos Chronopoulos, a Greek physician who gave him an artificial limb.
Finding an escape route in 2015, he was able to find a job and start packing the pieces.
After seeing victory in the Greek Paralympic Games, he attracted the attention of the Hellenic Olympic Committee, which commissioned him to carry the 2016 Rio Games lantern through the Athens camp in Eleonas.
Later, the International Paralympic Committee gave him the opportunity to join the first flight team from Rio Games, hoisting his flag at Maracana Stadium.
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