[0:03]Watching eight-year-old Aya play, you'd never guess she's become the embodiment of a tragedy.
[0:11]One of 1 million Syrian children who are now refugees. She's happy her family was able to flee the devastation of Homs. But I'm curious what her life is like now. One dismissive expression says it all.
[0:31]I press on, asking how life here is so difficult. It's just not good, she tells me. It's just not good. Aya doesn't say much today, but she does make it clear she wishes she were back in school. She went briefly after arriving here in neighboring Lebanon, but after a while, her family could no longer afford the transportation fees and she had to stop. Nowadays, she must stay at what has become her home and help care for her disabled sister, Labiba. The UNHCR selected Aya as their poster child to raise awareness of what they call a shameful milestone. We chose Aya because she she's a symbol of the the resilience that we see in many children here. Kids so young they should never know this many hardships. Struggling to overcome the numerous horrors they've already witnessed. You can see that she has she still has the spark. She wants to learn. She wants to go to school. She she's still hoping that one day she will be able to go back to Syria. Here in Lebanon's Beqaa Valley, it's makeshift refugee camps like this one that dot the landscape. Syrian families having fled the violence back home, trying to set up whatever remnant of a life they can here. It's a very harsh existence. There are at least 200,000 registered Syrian refugees in this part of Lebanon alone. Over 100,000 of them are children. In all, more than 750,000 Syrian child refugees are under the age of 11. A shocking statistic and a chilling reminder of what a humanitarian disaster Syria's brutal conflict has become. These children may have escaped a civil war, but it's clear the trauma remains. Raising fears they'll become a lost generation. No child should have to play next to barbed wire. These kids barely notice it. Mohammed Jamjoom, CNN in the Beqaa Valley, Lebanon.
