Dreams died with them

Aylan Kurdi was born into a country eaten up by war. His parents, Abdullah and Rehen, only wanted a better life for Aylan and his four-year-old elder brother, Galip, than they had in Kobani, Syria.

They wanted what anyone does -- what hundreds of thousands of people fleeing violence, who have flooded Europe, want -- a safe home.

Trying to make that simple but treacherous dream a reality, Aylan, his brother and mother drowned.

Abdullah, the only Kurdi family member to survive the trip, says he has nothing left to live for.

"I don't want anything else from this world," he told CNN yesterday. "Everything I was dreaming of is gone. I want to bury my children and sit beside them until I die."

Abdullah says he boarded a small fibreglass boat in Turkey with 12 people on board. The vessel was manned by two smugglers, a Turk and a Syrian, he said. It was very crowded.

"I told him, 'Should we empty the boat? Should I get off with my wife and child?'"

One of the smugglers replied, "'No, no, it is good,'" Abdullah recounted.

Large waves began crashing against the boat soon after the refugees set out.

He again raised his concern but the smuggler insisted, "It is guaranteed. Guaranteed."

Shortly afterwards, the smuggler jumped overboard and swam toward shore as the waves pounded harder and higher.

Abdullah tried to take control of the boat but it capsized in the rough waters.

"I tried to reach for my wife and children," he said. "I was in the water for 20 minutes. One after another was dying."

Originally from Syria's capital, Damascus, Abdullah said he was trying to get to Sweden by way of Greece.

"I don't want anything from anyone anymore," he said. "I will sit by my wife and children and read them Quran until I die, God willing."

TRYING TO GET TO CANADA

Canadian Member of Parliament Fin Donnelly told CNN partner CTV that Abdullah's sister Tima Kurdi, who lives in Vancouver, had filed refugee paperwork to obtain permission for the family to live in Canada, but the application had been rejected in June.

But Tima Kurdi, in an interview later on Thursday with CTV, said she had actually filed paperwork for her other brother, Mohammed, and that was rejected.

She said she was hoping to personally put up the money to sponsor Mohammed and his four children to come to Canada. They are now in Germany.

Meanwhile, she had been sending money to Abdullah. She presumes that Abdullah used those funds to try to get his family to Canada.

The world learned of Aylan's death when a photo of the drowned boy was shared widely on social media, many using the hashtag #KıyıyaVuranİnsanlık or "Flotsam of Humanity" in Turkish.

It shows the toddler on his stomach, face down on a beach in Turkey. He looks like he's sleeping the way so many children his age do, with their bottoms raised and heads gently to the side.

Nilufer Demir of Turkey's Dogan News Agency who shot the photo said, "There was nothing to do except taking his photograph. And that is exactly what I did. I thought this is the only way I can express the scream of his silent body."