Félix Williams and María Comfort Arthuer paid 1.000 dollars to a mafia to cross from Ghana to Europe. They were abandoned in the middle of the Sahara Desert, without water, without food, under a merciless sun. María was already carrying her first child, Iñaki.
They managed to jump the Melilla fence, but the Civil Guard detained them and they were about to deport them. A Cáritas lawyer gave them advice that saved their lives: say they came from a country at war. That is how they arrived in Bilbao, where a missionary named Iñaki Mardones gave them shelter — and, grateful, they gave their first son his name.
Today, Iñaki is 32 years old and played in this World Cup representing Ghana, while 22-year-old Nico Williams wears the Spanish national team shirt and Real Madrid is fighting to sign him. But whenever Iñaki, his older brother, remembers the desert, he says it turns his stomach. Neither of them forgets where their parents came from so that they could get so far.
