Migrants from Iraq, Syria and other Middle Eastern nations are fleeing to Europe, a continent whose migrant camps are struggling to keep up with the growing numbers. PHOTO: SBS

Greece has agreed a deal in principle with its lenders about a third bailout, worth around €85bn and allowing some €10bn to be disbursed to the country’s struggling banks almost immediately. There is a long list of reforms the country has to carry out in return for the cash. While governments do the talking in terms of numbers, there is a group of people doing the talking – in deeds of compassion and kindness towards multitudes of refugees who wash up on the country’s already struggling shores. They come for travel, they stay back for humanity.

While the words responsible travel have been rallied about for years now, the situation in Greece lends it a new dimension. Much thought has been dispensed into lessening the environmental impacts of travel, with the humanitarian aspect only seldom discussed. But the unfolding scenes in the lanes of Greece put the focus right back on where it should be – people.

The vacation had been everything that Angelique and Onno Bos dreamed it would be.

With their four children, the Dutch couple had taken full advantage of the first-class amenities on the picture-perfect Greek island of Lesbos: They power-boated through aqua-green waves, scootered along breathtaking mountain passes and whiled away the days on secluded sandy beaches.

At 10 p.m. the night before their flight back to Holland, they did something impulsive and uncharacteristic: They canceled their trip home – not to extend their idyll, but to provide aid to some of the thousands of refugees who, like the tourists, have been drawn to Lesbos this summer.

“We’d seen refugees all over the island, walking along the roads. And we kept saying to each other: What can we do to help?” said Angelique Bos, a tanned, fit and blonde 47-year-old. For Angelique Bos, help meant doling out cookies, water and hugs one recent day to dozens of migrants minutes after their flimsy rubber raft was picked up by the Greek Coast Guard and towed into shore. The migrants – a cross-section from the world’s conflict zones – thanked her repeatedly. Bos said she was the one feeling grateful.

“It’s been the best vacation ever,” she said. “We’ve been helping for 12 days now, and we’ll stay five more. Then we’ll have to stop.”

Read on about how more and more people are putting humanity first in the time of crisis.