An example of the living conditions at Baobab camp in Rome. Migrants live under plastic sheeting even in extremely hot summer conditions. There is no electricity to speak of and water sources are located a distance from the camp, which sits in an industrial area near train tracks. Many migrants here describe feelings of hopelessness and despair after being unable to secure work.

Robert, a 23-year-old Nigerian man sits in front of a tent that he shares with friends at Rome’s Baobab camp. Camp residents have to go to a water spigot several hundred meters from the settlement in order to get water to wash with. Robert arrived to Italy several years ago seeking work but has had no luck. “I can be a mechanic,” he said. “But I will take any job. Anything. This is no life.”

Dawit, 24-years-old, arrived to Italy a little less than a year ago. Prior to arriving to Rome, he lived in Sicily. “I thought I would come to Rome for work,” he said. “But here there is no work. And there is a lot of people afraid. Now, I go back to Sicily to work on the farms.”

Godsea, 29-years-old, came to Rome from Nigeria about two years ago. After several months trying to find work, he simply gave up and now makes his living begging next to the old Piazza Indipendencia squatter camp. "I love Italy," he told me. "But I am afraid. I am afraid that they will take me away.”

Khalil Ahmed (right) fled Syria three years ago with his 5-year-old son. While he worked as a mathematician in Syria he is still trying to find work in Berlin. Wisam Muhamad, was a singer in Iraq before he left for Berlin three years ago. “We are still learning German,” he said. “And we need to improve our skills. Here it is impossible to get work without a very high level of education.”

Juan Mendoza Rohloff, aged 24, arrived to Berlin in mid August after fleeing the political and economic turmoil in his native Venezuela. “People who used to be middle class are now eating out of the garbage,” he said. “There is no future where I come from.” Living in Berlin’s Templehoff airport, Mendoza is hoping to claim his grandmother’s German heritage as a means to citizenship. If he is unsuccessful, he will file for political asylum.

Templehoff’s Hangar 1 has been housing refugees and migrants since the crisis began in 2015. The designation of Templehoff as a refugee site created deep suspicions by local residents who were concerned that developers would use the crisis in order to secure the legal authority to build on the airport, which was closed in 2008 and is currently the site of one of the largest urban park spaces in Europe.

Nastaran Fekri, 38-years-old, arrived to Germany 5 years ago from Tehran, Iran. For several years she worked starting different NGOs dealing with women’s rights issues. Now she is studying cybersecurity and hopes to land a job soon. Still she worries about the competitive job market in Germany. “I am not a homemaker,” she said. “I want to use my skills.”

Batoul Ahmad, 30-years-old, taught Syrian and French literature at the University of Damascus before she arrived to Germany in 2015. She was granted asylum the following year and engaged in intensive study of German and computer literacy. Two years later and she has found a job working for the German government as an office manager. Germany's Federal Employment Agency predicts the economy is on course to create 650,000 new jobs this year, 100,000 of which will be taken up by people who came to the country as refugees. “We have this fear, the work here is so much harder than the work in our country,” says Ahmad “it is something that you have to face with confidence.”