"your gifts feel like life vests"
Donation protected
Dear Friends,
You have asked what you can do to help refugees from Syria.....here is one small way. We are buying and distributing diapers to mothers on the street.
There is a saying in Turkish: “The butcher cares about the meat but the lamb cares about its life.” Three weeks ago we arrived in Izmir Turkey, bright-eyed, naive, and bushy-tailed. We were starting a new research project on migration—to generate original data from interviews with migrants, e.g. to get the “meat”-- of academic research. On an unbearably hot, sweaty day we set out for the section of town in which the Syrian refugees were staying. Emerging from the train station, we were stunned with the sight of a crowd of refugees who had fled from their bombed out cities, carrying large plastic bags with their only belongings, wearing shorts and t-shirts, actually looking much like us. It was like being slapped across the face with the true reality of the refugee crisis. Some were sleeping there. Across the street were rows and rows of shops selling life jackets, inner tubes, and children’s flotation wings. Life vests in all sizes were everywhere, even in barber shops, drug stores, and markets, grim and hopeful symbols of a perilous journey ahead. Flyers with pictures of lost relatives were scattered on lamp posts. On the street we encountered women with babies, sitting on cardboard “carpets,” and thin, listless people sleeping on a “bed” of life jackets. Others were huddled together, waiting, waiting, to find a smuggler willing to provide them with a boat which would ferry them to Greece, to the EU, where they could apply for asylum. Many could not afford to pay for the smuggler and would stay on the street.
What we have discovered is this: We cannot be the "butchers," that is, we cannot take the “meat,” the fruits of an academic research project, without caring for the lives of these people we interview. One of the simplest and most oft-stated needs of the women on the streets is Diapers. Also milk, baby food, childrens’ clothes. Those most in need are the ones who stay behind in Turkey, the ones who cannot afford the smugglers’ fees or the price of a hotel room.
Many of you have asked how you can help. This is one way: we will contribute our own money and gather funds from those who wish to help, and we will buy and distribute diapers and other necessities to these most desperate mothers. We will do this ourselves, directly. It is a drop in the bucket, but it is a drop of relief for the many others sitting, sleeping, caring for their children on the street.
I posted this on Facebook: On "hotels street" in Izmir, 500 years ago during the Ottoman empire, Jews who fled the Spanish inquisition found safety there, but the street is now home to new refugees waiting for a smuggler to take them across the Agean Sea to Greece. Rooms on Hotels Street cost $2-3 per night and the hoteliers tell us that many of the same people check in over and over again....those who fail to make the crossing to Greece and come back to stay a night or two before they try again...they live on the streets during the day, and the streets are full of those who cannot afford a room at night
There are almost 2 million Syrian refugees in Turkey, half of all the refugees who have left their bombed out country. Turkey welcomes them but does not give them the benefits of asylum, since it has not signed the UN Refugee Convention that would give them refugee status. And refugees do not receive work permits here. Therefore…. many have no choice but to leave for the EU, whose members have signed the Refugee Convention and are obligated to grant them the opportunity to apply for asylum, once they arrive. They will even be able to find work in Europe. But there is a Catch 22: those who want to go to Europe to work are not permitted by EU members to apply for asylum when they are outside the EU, in the countries neighboring Syria. They are not permitted a visa to take a bus, train, or plane from Turkey, Jordan, or Lebanon to any EU country. So their only recourse is to try to enter by sea and land routes and apply for asylum when they enter an EU country. There is no such thing as an illegal asylum seeker; these people have the legal right to seek asylum in a country which has agreed to grant asylum to those fleeing persecution and violence. Thus the terrifying journey by dingy from Turkey to Greece for most, who do not know the perils of the sea, and do not know how to swim. A plane ticket would cost 300-400 euros. The dangerous journey costs 1000-5000 euros. Irrational. Ridiculous. But true. While Turkey is overwhelmed with refugees, EU politicians smugly build walls around their countries again, and debate in air conditioned conference rooms what is to be done. We want to do something for our brothers and sisters now. This is something small, but it is what we can do now. We are grateful and greatly strengthened in solidarity if you can join with us to help.
You have asked what you can do to help refugees from Syria.....here is one small way. We are buying and distributing diapers to mothers on the street.
There is a saying in Turkish: “The butcher cares about the meat but the lamb cares about its life.” Three weeks ago we arrived in Izmir Turkey, bright-eyed, naive, and bushy-tailed. We were starting a new research project on migration—to generate original data from interviews with migrants, e.g. to get the “meat”-- of academic research. On an unbearably hot, sweaty day we set out for the section of town in which the Syrian refugees were staying. Emerging from the train station, we were stunned with the sight of a crowd of refugees who had fled from their bombed out cities, carrying large plastic bags with their only belongings, wearing shorts and t-shirts, actually looking much like us. It was like being slapped across the face with the true reality of the refugee crisis. Some were sleeping there. Across the street were rows and rows of shops selling life jackets, inner tubes, and children’s flotation wings. Life vests in all sizes were everywhere, even in barber shops, drug stores, and markets, grim and hopeful symbols of a perilous journey ahead. Flyers with pictures of lost relatives were scattered on lamp posts. On the street we encountered women with babies, sitting on cardboard “carpets,” and thin, listless people sleeping on a “bed” of life jackets. Others were huddled together, waiting, waiting, to find a smuggler willing to provide them with a boat which would ferry them to Greece, to the EU, where they could apply for asylum. Many could not afford to pay for the smuggler and would stay on the street.
What we have discovered is this: We cannot be the "butchers," that is, we cannot take the “meat,” the fruits of an academic research project, without caring for the lives of these people we interview. One of the simplest and most oft-stated needs of the women on the streets is Diapers. Also milk, baby food, childrens’ clothes. Those most in need are the ones who stay behind in Turkey, the ones who cannot afford the smugglers’ fees or the price of a hotel room.
Many of you have asked how you can help. This is one way: we will contribute our own money and gather funds from those who wish to help, and we will buy and distribute diapers and other necessities to these most desperate mothers. We will do this ourselves, directly. It is a drop in the bucket, but it is a drop of relief for the many others sitting, sleeping, caring for their children on the street.
I posted this on Facebook: On "hotels street" in Izmir, 500 years ago during the Ottoman empire, Jews who fled the Spanish inquisition found safety there, but the street is now home to new refugees waiting for a smuggler to take them across the Agean Sea to Greece. Rooms on Hotels Street cost $2-3 per night and the hoteliers tell us that many of the same people check in over and over again....those who fail to make the crossing to Greece and come back to stay a night or two before they try again...they live on the streets during the day, and the streets are full of those who cannot afford a room at night
There are almost 2 million Syrian refugees in Turkey, half of all the refugees who have left their bombed out country. Turkey welcomes them but does not give them the benefits of asylum, since it has not signed the UN Refugee Convention that would give them refugee status. And refugees do not receive work permits here. Therefore…. many have no choice but to leave for the EU, whose members have signed the Refugee Convention and are obligated to grant them the opportunity to apply for asylum, once they arrive. They will even be able to find work in Europe. But there is a Catch 22: those who want to go to Europe to work are not permitted by EU members to apply for asylum when they are outside the EU, in the countries neighboring Syria. They are not permitted a visa to take a bus, train, or plane from Turkey, Jordan, or Lebanon to any EU country. So their only recourse is to try to enter by sea and land routes and apply for asylum when they enter an EU country. There is no such thing as an illegal asylum seeker; these people have the legal right to seek asylum in a country which has agreed to grant asylum to those fleeing persecution and violence. Thus the terrifying journey by dingy from Turkey to Greece for most, who do not know the perils of the sea, and do not know how to swim. A plane ticket would cost 300-400 euros. The dangerous journey costs 1000-5000 euros. Irrational. Ridiculous. But true. While Turkey is overwhelmed with refugees, EU politicians smugly build walls around their countries again, and debate in air conditioned conference rooms what is to be done. We want to do something for our brothers and sisters now. This is something small, but it is what we can do now. We are grateful and greatly strengthened in solidarity if you can join with us to help.
Organizer
Beverly Crawford
Organizer
Berkeley, CA