The carcass of an abandoned hotel on the Greek island of Kos has become a grim shelter for scores of migrants fleeing war and poverty as Europe faces its worst refugee crisis in decades. Dozens of people sit around the empty swimming pool, others lie on mattresses cramming the reception area of the Captain Elias hotel, while tents and huts cobbled together from cardboard and branches fill the garden.
The fields beyond serve as toilets, the fence as a washing line to dry clothes.
"No one has come to give us food in four days. And even when someone comes, it's never enough. We are too many people here," said Ersha, a 25-year-old engineer from Herat, Afghanistan, who has run out of money after paying smugglers $5,000 (4,500 euros) to reach Kos.
The Greek island has come to symbolise Europe's shambolic response to the refugee crisis which EU Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos described on Friday as "the worst since the Second World War".
Last week their were chaotic scenes when overwhelmed police beat migrants with truncheons and sprayed them with fire extinguishers at a sports stadium on the island, where 2,000 refugees had been gathered for processing.
Many, like the residents of the hotel, had been sleeping rough on the island for weeks. "I have been here 17 days. I want to go to Athens, and then to Germany or Sweden," said Ersha, who travelled from Afghanistan to Greece via Pakistan, Iran and Turkey to flee "kidnapping and bombings".
"In Afghanistan, each man has a militia and you must obey somebody. I wanted another life," he said.
But he and many others at the Captain Elias feel abandoned. The hotel is not an official shelter, and therefore offers its inhabitants practically nothing.
Behna, who came to Kos from Iran, said, "The situation here is very bad. In the night there is no electricity, so we all sleep at 7:00 or 8:00 pm. It is very sad."
A couple from the United States drive up to the hotel, and dozens of people rush outside to greet them.
They are volunteers who have come and hand out much-needed food, water and nappies for the babies.
At first, laughter rings out from the crowd as people grab at oranges, tomatoes and water bottles. But sheer desperation triggers a fist fight between two of the migrants, and it takes their friends to separate them.
Women and children look on, some of the younger ones crying in confusion.
Sirus, one of the volunteers, is a sailor who lives and works on boats all year round with his wife.
"We're ordinary citizens who are trying to give a hand. I don't know where the governments are," said Sirus, who is in his 40s and did not give his last name.
"They're just normal people just like you and I, trying to make their way in the world," he told AFP.
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