Welcome to Germany with Catrin Nye Our World

This is the east of Germany. The former GDR, Gera, around an hour

from Dresden. It has a population of 95,000, a declining population.

Young people off and head for the west. It feels like a very white

town. East Germany experienced very little immigration. Only 2000 people

are foreign. 2%. Hello. This is Muhammad, his wife and three

children. Muhamed, eight, Seba, four, and of their 18 -month-old. He

came ahead of his family, overland from Germany from Syria a year ago.

He was imprisoned by the Syrian regime and fled. In theory he worked

in IT. His wife is from a family of farmers. -- in Syria. He has been

granted a silent in Germany and so his wife and children were allowed

to join him a month ago, flown from a Turkish refugee camp. Then his

15-year-old brother arrived, braving the journey overland in the hope of

joining them alongside thousands of others. His boat almost sank on the

crossing to Greece. Because he has been in Germany for a year his

family are ahead of many refugees still arriving. They have an

apartment and state benefits. While he learns German and tries to get a

job. This is Dirk. His daughter is to back -- two. His other daughter,

six. His wife, Daniela, and their youngest, Pierre, ten months old.

Dirk has lived his life in Gera and works in care for the elderly. They

know that refugees are coming to their town.

And this is the new refugee centre, capacity 2000, which opened a week

ago in an old hospital to cope with the growing numbers arriving here.

This is where the new refugees in Germany and up before they apply for

asylum. There have been lots of attacks on refugee centres of this

year and someone tried to even fly this place before it opened. The men

are doing security and they said don't show the figures on TV because

if neo-Nazis see them on the street they will beat them up. One security

guard agrees to be on camera and shows us around. There are single

men here but many families have also been resettled in Gera. And venue

were moved? Your fifth camp? I am seven. You are just being moved

around Germany? . No space to do anything. Only sleep. The whole

place feels like hospital. It is all very temporary. It is from a

doctor. His legs, during the war, from a plane, a shot, and he lost

them. In Idlib? And what do you want from Germany? I want to walk. You

want to walk? So, this man is relaying an attack by a Nazi. I want

to find out more what happened. Outside, I asked... I found out the

facts later. Three refugees were attacked by two men with five dogs.

There is some hostility here. But it is piece can head with what this

family fled in Syria. Over the next few months, they will

try to create a new life in Germany. Some people in Gera don't think

there should be so many refugees coming.

Why do you think people would be protesting about the refugees?

The family know that Germany is taking huge numbers of refugees

compared to the rest of Europe. Saturday afternoon in Gera. In town

today are two stalls, one representing each side of the

refugee debate. Both had advertised they would be in the local paper.

Dirk and family are here to see both. So, Dirk has told me that the

political party here are the former Socialist party when this was east

Germany. These guys are pro- refugees.

Syria? And you live in the hospital? Yeah.

The other side is the AFD, alternative for Deutschland. It is a

right-wing party opposing the arrival of so many refugees. Young

guys are being told, when you come to Germany, then you will get your

own house, you will get a lot of money and so on. When in Germany you

say something harsh about asylum seekers, it can very easily happen

that you are going to be reported by your next door neighbour. Do you

mind if people call you guys racist? They can tell me whatever they want

as long as they listen to me and think about what I am trying to say.

Will your party grow because of the refugee situation? Naturally, it

will. The majority of refugees here are Muslim. And Dirk gets involved

in a debate because of the negative things he has heard about the

religion. The man tells him is money is not aggressive and that ISIS does

not represent the religion -- Islam. These muslins handout Korans

Antell locals they don't have to worry if their numbers increase. --

and tell. As weeks passed and leaves for all

from the trees -- fall from the trees come and you people have

arrived at the refugees enter, men's, women and children from other

places as well as Syria. But others have also left, some have been moved

to another part of Germany and others are choosing to go,

particularly those who don't want to be in the east of Germany. Have you

heard that the West is better? All the people say that. There is also

confusion. Lots of confusion. The rules on which we refugees can stay

in Germany and what they are entitled to are constantly being

debated and changing all the time -- which refugees. For this family, it

is the third month they have all been together in Germany.

In Syria, eight-year-old Mohammad used to hide under his father's

clothes from bombs. Here it is the climbing frame he is scared of. Do

you worry that people don't understand just how bad it is in

Syria? Over tea back in their living room, they show me their life back

in Syria. They come from a town first bombed by the government and

now controlled by ISIS. At the moment, there is no purpose

built a mosque in this town to visit. This man's room over a shop

provides for most of the Muslim visitors here but the congregation

is growing daily. Are you building more space to accommodate? Over at

the family home, this baby's walking has come under nicely since my last

visit. Dirk is following news about the refugee arrival closely and says

politicians keep changing their minds over how welcome the refugees

actually are. On the other side of the town, there is a gathering.

Students from a nearby University are studying the arrival of

refugees. There is a buffet and later a disco where students can get

to know the new arrivals. A teacher tells me why this is an interesting

place to study. Being a former federal state, there was not really

any experience of being an ethnic state before 2012. It is much

different in West German cities. They don't have any knowledge about

them so it is quite easy to be manipulated by the right-leaning

parties. Is there a problem with racism? Yes, all over Germany and it

is increasing. It never went away and it grew and grew. Racism is not

what is on show here. The night ends with another sharing of culture as

the Syrian refugees teach the Germans some dance moves. These

students represent the ultimate in a German welcome of refugees,

something about to be challenged by events in Europe. On the 30th of

November, terrorists killed 130 people in Paris. At least two of the

attackers entered Europe posing as refugees. The family is growing.

Mohammed has just arrived from another town in Germany but Paris is

on the mind of this family. I meet this family at a restaurant. The

Paris attacks have had a real impact here happy they are scared and it

has hardened their view on the refugees arriving. Has that changed

the way people feel about the refugees? Dirk and Daniela

Hantuchova concerns that the there is currently a big debate about

whether the minimum wage should be lowered for refugees. Daniella tells

me she is seeing more refugees now than she used to. Today, Mohammed

has started at this cool, a short walk from there and new home --

their new home. And he is also in school himself. He goes to

integration classes daily, paid for by the German government happy they

teach German history and culture as well as language. The government

lessons only get refugees up to basic German, which worries some of

the teachers here. These refugees who come from Syria are very

ambitious. They don't have enough language though. Here in Germany, we

have so many free workplaces because we don't have many young people. The

city and the government can do more for the refugees and for the German

people, they can work together and live together. This man bumps into

an Iraqi he has just come to know. My daughter is in the same class as

Mohammed. I am from Mosul. You know it. We escaped and managed to

survive. The city centrefield very far from a war zone today and it is

this family's first German Christmas market.