A dad is living out a real life nightmare like Tom Hanks' character in the film The Terminal after getting stuck inside an airport indefinitely.
Abdoulie Jobe, 48, has been unable to leave Paris Charles de Gaulle in France since losing his UK residence card two weeks ago.
His situation is reminiscent of the Steven Spielberg blockbuster where Hanks plays a stateless refugee who gets trapped at JFK airport while war rages in his country.
The supermarket worker said he has been hardly eating, drinking water from toilet taps and sleeping on uncomfortable seats in the airport lounge, echoing scenes of the US comedy.
Mr Jobe, from the Black Country, eventually ran out of money and was forced to go without food for three days.
"It was a hell, like living in a prison camp, he told Birmingham Live.
"I didn't get a shower and I had not brushed my teeth in 14 days. I just got the paste and put it in my mouth.
"I didn't want to go close to anybody because I was smelling so bad. Everybody was looking at me, starting at me – 'why is he here?'
"I felt helpless, nowhere to turn. It felt like I wasn't part of anything."
He had been visiting his family in The Gambia before touching down in Paris on a connecting flight back to the UK.
But his journey home turned into a nightmare when he was barred from entering the UK after losing his biometric residence card, which confirms his right to live there.
Without it, he was told he could not prove that he was a British resident and was blocked from leaving the airport.
Mr Jobe could not leave the airport to book a hotel in Paris as he did not have a visa allowing him to be in France which meant he was trapped at Charles de Gaulle airport indefinitely.
The UK would not accept him and France would not welcome him meaning for those two weeks, he was 'a citizen of nowhere.'
Although he had lost his residence card, Mr Jobe said he had various other documents outlining his British citizenship.
He said: "I got to check-in and they said without the card I wouldn't be able to fly.
"I showed them all the documents, which had the card's unique reference number on - it shows what's on the biometric card.
"They said immigration in the UK would not allow me to fly. I was just left at the airport to sort it out myself."
What followed was a two-week ordeal and a bureaucratic nightmare as the dad-of-three tried to seek help to get back home to his family in Walsall.
Mr Jobe, who moved to the UK from The Gambia in 1994 and works at Sainsbury's in Birmingham, had run out of money meaning he couldn't buy food or drinks from the airport shops.
The dad claims his received mixed reactions from airport staff with some telling him it "wasn't a hotel" when he pleaded for food and another kind worker offering him a meal to tide him over.
He would walk aimlessly round the airport and missed his son's 12th birthday while stuck at the airport.
And it was difficult to get much sleep in a busy airport on uncomfortable seats.
Mr Jobe said: "It's a 24-hour place. It's busy until about one or two in the morning and then busy from about 4am.
"There's always someone cleaning the airport. I didn't get much sleep at all. I would put my head down then the next minute someone comes to clean."
And his condition soon took a turn for the worse.
"The first week I stayed there I collapsed because I had hardly had any food and was taken to hospital," he said.
"I was taken to the police station, they said 'we cannot deport you because you have got the legal documents to return to go back to the UK. Because of UK law we cannot interfere'.
"They were laughing at the UK about this immigration system, I felt so ashamed. I used all the money I had.
"I tried the embassy and Gambian embassy, I couldn't get hold of anybody. My 12-year-old son didn't want to go to school. I was very worried."
Eventually, his ex-partner sent him some money to help him survive while trapped at the airport.
Then, in an act of desperation, he got in touch with a British law firm Richard Nelson LLP who said they would fight his case.
After two weeks there was finally a breakthrough when the Home Office agreed to provide Mr Jobe with a waiver allowing him to return to the UK.
It was an emotional moment when the dad-of-three touched down back at Birmingham Airport on June 26.
He said: "It was one of the best things I have ever felt. Seeing my family, and to be back in the country.
"It was the greatest feeling ever."
Mr Jobe, however, is still furious about his two-week ordeal when he was effectively made stateless.
"The UK immigration system, it's shambles," he stated bluntly.
The Home Office, however, blamed Mr Jobe for his situation, saying they had advised him to apply for a visa before leaving Africa.
A spokesman said: “Mr Jobe told the Home Office that he had left his biometric resident permit in the UK, we advised him to apply for a visa before travelling however he went against this advice.
"We have since granted him a visa waiver, even though he acted against our advice, which he used to come back to the UK. We provided advice to Mr Jobe, but he decided against following it.”
Sajib Hosen, consultant immigration solicitor at Richard Nelson LLP, said: "We took on Abdoulie's case after he'd been held in the airport for a number of days and were very concerned for him.
"He should have been allowed to enter the UK earlier, however, due to a lack of co-operation between the internal departments at the Home Office, Abdoulie's return was delayed causing him severe distress."
