Abdelbashir, 20, said he had recently arrived from Sudan. He described escaping violence in Darfur through the Sahara, traversing the Mediterranean on a rickety fishing boat, and crossing into France from Italy on foot, wearing the same flip-flops he left home in.

Like many migrants, he was waiting for an asylum appointment and longer-term housing. But even those who get a place risk losing it over minor infractions. Information in migrants’ native languages is scarce, and the rules at asylum hostels — like curfews and visiting policies — change constantly.

I found Ismail, a 25-year-old Somalian, asleep under a shower curtain in a urine-soaked enclave beneath a highway. As he pulled his asylum papers from his backpack, he began to cry.

He said that he had been living on the streets for more than a year, and that he had not contacted his wife or children — who were living in a refugee camp in Kenya — out of shame.

“I respect France, but France does not respect me,” he said.

A decision on migrants’ asylum claims can take as little as two weeks. Some are granted asylum and stay in France, while others are sent back to the first European Union country they landed in or deported to their home nation.