My schedule today:
Meeting
Women’s Space, English class
Check out Market
Our coordinator Molly gives us an update of the political situation in Greece
(21th of August 2018)
- Because of increased crossing the Evros around 6000 had stuck in the Balkans
- Lesvos has now exceeded 10000 refugees which is a record. People are sleeping on the streets
- Push backs from the EU are also gaining momentum
- The agreement is that EU countries can send people back but must loosen restrictions on family reunification applications
- Greece has no capacity left, there is no place for returned people to go. Families and unaccompanied minors will not be returned to Greece
- Nearly 60000 refugees in Greece as of June this year
- They won’t be returned to the islands
For aktuell information read: https://greece.greekreporter.com
Today a young colleague of mine and I are invited to the container of a Syrian family of my English class. It is cosy inside. The family consisting out of six members share two about 10 qm rooms in there. In the first room there are two fridges, a small place to cook and four beds.
In the second room there are three big mats. The Muslim family celebrates Eid today, which is a day on which usually the extended families meets up, celebrates, dances and eat together. We sit down on the ground with the mother and the three daughters trying pita bread with a sauce consisting mayonnaise and garlic. Besides we also have crumbled egg and wine leaves filled with rice.
Considering that there are not much food choices at the camp the mother and the daughters have made fancy food. We would love to stay longer, but unfortunately, we only have half an hour lunchbreak today.
Quickly the youngest daughter shows us how talented she is. Besides being able to cook she is very good in drawing and besides being able to speak Arabic she also speaks Turkish, English and a few sentences French. I hope that the very best for this nice family.
It is so amazing to see the positive energy in so many of the people and children! (S.L., volunteer from Norway)