Belgian Woman Stranded in Morocco for Two Months as COVID-19 Lockdown Continues

"We are the forgotten ones. I’m afraid I won’t be able to return home soon," laments the woman from Arlon. She is having a hard time with the experience in Morocco. "I got stuck at the home of friends who were hosting me before my flight, which was supposed to leave on March 15. It was postponed from hour to hour before being definitively canceled and Morocco closing its borders on the 16th," Géraldine Michel told La Nouvelle Gazette.

Yet she owns an apartment. Her parents do too. But she has been forbidden to settle there. "The cities are locked down, we can’t move from one to the other," she says. "From start to finish, the embassies told us nothing. We were led on while it is an enormous deprivation of liberty," the young woman despairs.

The woman from Arlon is not enjoying the lockdown. "I thought I would be going home, I don’t have any belongings while it’s 40°C. My clothes are all worn out. I was locked up in the property for a month without seeing anyone. In addition, I am recognized as disabled by the mutual insurance company and I can no longer find my medications as I want because they are imported. I thought we would be deconfined on May 20 but no, they extended it until June 10!" Géraldine Michel confides.

The woman from Arlon is full of uncertainty about her return to Belgium. TUI Fly is organizing repatriation operations for people stranded in Morocco, including Géraldine Michel. However, the company has not yet confirmed this to her. It will have to wait until July 1 for TUI Fly to resume its flights to Morocco.