{"id":1197,"date":"2019-03-27T03:52:52","date_gmt":"2019-03-27T03:52:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sportsnewsforyou.com\/?p=1197"},"modified":"2019-03-27T03:52:52","modified_gmt":"2019-03-27T03:52:52","slug":"no-birthdays-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/?p=1197","title":{"rendered":"\u201cNo birthdays here\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n

A secondary school English class \u2013 lessons are as
\nmuch about academic education as about sharing culture and creating a safe space to learn.Refugee Education Chios. All rights reserved.
\nAmid freezing temperatures in Europe\u2019s hotspots,
\nrefugees fleeing from some of the most dangerous places on earth still
\nencounter political stagnation and the threat of forcible returns after
\nharrowing journeys across land and sea. Young people have been forced into
\nadulthood, leaving their education in a state of limbo. But one NGO has set out
\nto restore the childhood of these forgotten victims so they have some relief
\nfrom the horrors at home.<\/i><\/p>\n

The human reality<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The small Greek island of Chios, once famous for
\nits production of mastic resin, is now notable instead for hosting refugees.
\n2,300 men and women, including 700 children live on the island, in dire conditions
\nin the camps, ring fenced with barbed wire. The demographic is overwhelmingly
\nmale and mainly comprised of Syrians, Afghans and Kurds. Statistics such as
\nthese often give bystanders a snapshot of a crisis, but essentially reduce
\nadults and children to abstract images and data, dismissing the human reality
\nof these young people. <\/p>\n

Be Aware and Share (BAAS) is a volunteer NGO
\nworking in Chios to break down this depersonalisation by presenting and
\ntreating child refugees as an average school kid; in doing so they uphold some
\nfundamental rights for these minors. With a profound grassroots effort, it has
\nestablished a primary and secondary school, and a youth centre. During school
\nhours, these children can shed the stigmatised identity of being a refugee, and
\nhave the opportunity instead to simply explore childhood.<\/p>\n

21-year-old Moh, a volunteer teacher, himself a
\nrefugee from Syria, helps translate for and assist classes.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is great to be getting out of Vial,\u201d he says,
\nreferring to the detention facility that accommodates over 1,000 refugees on
\nthe island.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is definitely dangerous to sit around all day
\nand do nothing. You can see the effect of school on children\u2019s behaviour \u2013 they
\nnow cry if they cannot go one day, even though many of them have not been in
\nschool before now. It is important most of all because it is their first point
\nof contact with Europe \u2013 especially the Vial kids, they never meet Europeans.
\nBy going to school they meet European people who make them feel happy and
\nloved. I think this first impression is very important.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sensitising learning<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Teaching English at the schools with BAAS requires
\na high level of sensitivity to the children\u2019s trauma. Simple educational
\nmethods and everyday activities with them can trigger difficult memories. The
\nstudents left Turkey in boats to reach Chios across the freezing Aegean Sea \u2013
\nsome as unaccompanied minors. Many of them have lost family members, and
\nchildren as young as six speak with an astonishing detachment of the deaths of
\nclose relatives. <\/p>\n

Some of the teenagers have escaped torture and
\nforced labour as child soldiers by ISIS or others from the conflicts that throng
\nthe Asian and African continents.<\/p>\n

Establishing a learning environment which
\nfacilitates their comfort is evidently difficult and BAAS have had to cherry
\npick the curriculum with the utmost care. Typical educational activities
\ninvolving food or daily routines are inappropriate in these complex
\ncircumstances. In Souda, an informal refugee camp based within Chios city, a
\npatchwork of NGOs are struggling to support refugees with even basic food and
\nsupplies, where an already strained Greek government has failed to do so.
\nWorksheets must therefore be sense-checked so classrooms can focus on human
\nuniversals and creativity instead.<\/p>\n

This is not without its difficulties, however. In a
\nprimary school lesson, a reading of \u201cThe Owl and the Pussycat\u201d provokes a
\ndisturbed response to the \u201cpea green boat\u201d; some children shake their heads,
\nwhilst another mimes the puncturing of a boat and imitates drowning, blowing
\nair through pursed lips, then gasping for breath. Out of context, the
\nchildren\u2019s disquiet would seem abnormal, but the trauma they have experienced
\nat sea and at home has left their childhoods in fragile fragments, which BAAS
\nis putting back together with Pritt stick, playtime, and human affection.<\/p>\n

Continuing reality<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The backdrop to such hopeful progress at the
\nschools is bleak however. There is growing unrest both in the camps and across
\nthe island because of the expanding population. Although numbers are dwindling,
\nrubber dinghies still reach Chios at night from Turkey, and the new arrivals
\nare forcing Souda\u2019s makeshift camp to spill out onto the adjoining beach. UNHCR
\ntarpaulin is their only insulation from the blighting cold. The boredom of
\ndaily life in the camps builds frustration, which often turns violent,
\nexacerbated by toxic living conditions and the stagnation of the asylum
\nprocess.<\/p>\n

It is not only life within the camps that threatens
\ntheir safety. The camp has faced vicious attacks from gangs of fascists. For
\nBAAS volunteers, walking the children back to this environment after a day
\nsinging \u201cthe wheels on the bus\u201d in a warm and colourful classroom can be the
\nhardest part of the experience.<\/p>\n

A boy from Key Stage 1 (ages 6-9), walks to school
\nfrom Souda.<\/i><\/p>\n

Political deadlock<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The children on Chios deserve to be on school
\nregisters, not waiting for months to join the expanding numbers on asylum
\nregisters. But the chaos of western politics casts a long shadow and dominates
\nthe media. The refugee crisis has become hidden, out of mind and out of print.
\nWhile BAAS\u2019 work is impressive, it should not only be their responsibility to
\nrehumanise the situation. Politicians, reporters and Europeans must all stand
\nup against the \u201cothering\u201d of refugees, occurring at the behest of toxic
\npolicies.<\/p>\n

The fragment of normal life BAAS students
\nexperience is all too fleeting. Volunteers wave goodbye to children regularly
\nas they board the ferry to Athens for the next step of the asylum process,
\nknowing too well that Athens won\u2019t necessarily hold a better future.
\nAccommodation is even more informal in the Greek capital, and progress even
\nslower.<\/p>\n

Having escaped the terrors of war, it thus seems
\nthese minors cannot escape the loss of their childhoods. When playing with LEGO,
\nthe youngest choose to build guns rather than houses. One boy, Khalid, during a
\nlesson on celebrations, admits that he can\u2019t even
\nremember his own birthday. \u201cNo birthdays here\u201d, he explains. Ever since he
\narrived in Chios seven months ago, it\u2019s a luxury his family cannot afford,
\nanother normality left behind.<\/p>\n

This makes the work of BAAS so crucial, however
\ntransient. It brings structure to children of a generation who some feared
\nwould be lost. But they are not lost. Not lost to drone strikes or Assad forces
\nin Syria. They did not lose their lives in a car bomb in Baghdad. And they
\nsurvived the freezing temperatures of Europe\u2019s seas and harsh winter.
\nNow, they need not be forfeited to self-harm or violence in the loveless
\natmosphere of the camps. The work in Chios is a constant reminder of the common
\nhumanity that joins us, and the importance of childhood, even in the face of an
\nunpredictable future.<\/p>\n

Children doodle on the blackboard, waiting for their
\nbreaktime snack.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A secondary school English class \u2013 lessons are as much about academic education as about sharing culture and creating a safe space to learn.Refugee Education Chios. All rights reserved. Amid freezing temperatures in Europe\u2019s hotspots, refugees fleeing from some of the most dangerous places on earth still encounter political stagnation and the threat of forcible…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1197\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}