"With a spoon and spatula in hand, Zaid, a
23-year-old Iraqi refugee, lifts the lid on a large pot filled with
goulash and potatoes as he begins his shift.
From 6:30 to 8 pm, he is employed by the city of
Berlin to dish out dinner to 152 other Syrian, Iraqi, Afghan and
Moldovan refugees in a sports hall, which had been turned into an
emergency shelter for the newcomers.
Zaid is one of thousands of refugees who have taken
on tasks ranging from repairing bicycles to pruning plants to cleaning
sidewalks for pay of just over one euro ($1.1) an hour.
The so-called "one-euro jobs" have been touted as a
springboard for the newcomers into Germany's job market, but experts
remain skeptical about their effectiveness.
At the sports gym, Zaid tries to explain to the
sceptical faces crowded in front of him what went into the beef stew
that he described as "so German."
For the work that includes setting the table, cutting bread, serving food and then cleaning up, he is paid 1.05 euros an hour.
Restricted to working no more than 20 hours a week,
Zaid gets a monthly income of 84 euros at best, a small extra on top of
the 143 euros he receives as pocket money while he waits for the
official decision on his asylum application."
Read more from source at GlobalPost here.
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