On Monday 11th February, George, Angie and I attended a conference in London focused on Refugee Week 2020. Read on to find out about Storm Ciara, strange sleeping arrangements and street protests!
Sunday
A 7am wake up. To some, this is a blessing. I am not one of those people. This early wake up time was so that we could get the 7-hour Megabus down to London (Storm Ciara meant our train had been cancelled). A broken windscreen wiper, a new coach and eight hours later, we had arrived in London Victoria. As a reward for getting in safe and sound at 5pm, we had an early Spoons dinner and pint before jetting off to my brother’s flat (who kindly let us kick him out), buying some breakfast en route. We arrived at about 7pm, set up the blow up bed that Angie would be on and then spent the rest of the night watching Forest Gump (absolute classic – you have to watch it if you haven’t already) and playing a high-octane game of Trivial Pursuit on the PS4 with Finn's friends (mine and Angie’s team won, woop woop).
And this is where the ‘strange sleeping arrangements’ part of the introduction is realised. George and I were sharing my brother’s double bed and, like I said, Angie was on the blow-up bed on her own. Until she wasn’t. As a joke, Angie jumped into the bed so that we could be that stereotypical family – gay white dads who adopt an Indonesian child. Whilst this started off as a joke, Angie soon realised that she was warmer and more comfortable in the bed. So she stayed. Whilst we were all trying to get comfortable (i.e. George and Angie had 45% of the bed each and I had the remaining 10%), George accidentally knocked my phone off the bedside table, which unplugged my phone. He then tried to plug it back in so that it would charge overnight, but seemed to take ages, so I [innocently] asked him “Have you put it in yet?” to which he retorted “It keeps coming out!” Childish giggles over and we all finally got to sleep.
Monday
After a terrible night's sleep because, well, three in a bed, we got ready at the lavish time of 7:30am. The conference was at the Amnesty International offices, which were in an area with some great graffiti. We did a few bits and bobs whilst waiting for the start of the event and met someone who works for a mental health hospital that has some services specifically for refugees and asylum seekers (RAS).
The event itself began with a speech by Maurice Wren, CEO of the British Refugee Council and Chair of Refugee Week, who has overseen its enormous expansion over the past few years (there were over 800 Refugee Week events in 2019!). The theme for Refugee Week this year (15-21 June 2020) is ‘Imagine’, which is a great theme for a community full of hope. He shared some of his hopes, one of them being a shift in the culture of the Home Office that led to the Windrush Scandal - it's a big hope considering they still haven't published the independent report relating to it and its subsequent recommendations. Anyhow, Maurice importantly highlighted that everything we do must be guided by respect and dignity, that we should celebrate our diversity as a source of strength and that the size of organisation in this field only relates to capacity to help, not importance of voice. He seems like a pretty cool guy if you ask me. And if you ask anyone he’s worked with, they clearly feel the same because one of his colleagues gave him a lovely thank you speech because he’s leaving his roles soon.
As part of this big hello, we were introduced to the RAS who were heading up the Refugee Week Leadership Project and found out their motivations, like helping to improve the narrative surrounding RAS. There was also more detail shared on Refugee Week and an example of one of last year’s events, the ‘Rubble Theatre’ in Glasgow. That particular section ended on a lovely quote:
“A different world is not only possible; she is on her way.
On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”
There were some quick presentations that I didn't make any decent notes on and then it was off to the first workshop of the day. George went off to a session about climate migrants, whilst Angie went to one about engaging various levels of the media. My session was led by FODI from Sunderland and was all about how to operate in challenging environments. Sunderland is seen as the Brexit city because it was the first to announce that it had voted to Leave and, whilst there are a lot of positive attitudes in Sunderland, that fact has brought visits from Tommy Robinson and people who share his views that oppose giving support to RAS. It was interesting hearing how FODI operate and I'd made sure to note down some ideas from them in terms of events and support to offer our learners.
Then it was time for lunch. I made sure to be smiley and complimentary to the staff for the food – it did look delicious, so it wasn’t hard – and ended up with a little extra put into my card takeaway box as a result. Fair to say I was happy. During this, Angie, George and I met Ruth from the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants Unity Project who, from what I understood from the conversation, help RAS with no recourse to public funds. She seemed proper nice, which I suppose you’d assume if they’re at an event like this, and she comes up later in this post.
Up next was a wonderful performance by several refugees all about all of the million things that you’re expected to do as a refugee, as well as the lack of autonomy that they face and the rules that they would love to see change. It was emotional and funny – I genuinely thought it was fantastic. Then Md Mominul Hamid, who goes to Northumbria University and as it turns out knows one of the learners at N.E.S.T, gave a speech talking about his experience as a victim of human trafficking and a refugee. Amazingly, he had taken the government to court for not allowing him to enrol at university as a refugee despite not using public funds AND WON. His case set a precedent and now he is trying to become a lawyer so that he can help other RAS when they need help. I love how so many refugees see it as their duty to support other forced migrants, even when they themselves don’t have much.
After that, it was time for another workshop, this time with George going to one about funding, Angie to one called "Drama Together" and myself off to one on involving young people. Now, I know what you’re thinking: “you are a young person, Fabian. Your entire organisation is run by students and former students, you don’t need to find out how to involve young people.” And you’d be right. But fortunately this session, put on by Coram, was about getting young people to use the services and feel empowered. At NEST, there a very few teenagers, we either get adults or kids, so this turned out to be pretty useful.
The penultimate part of the conference was an improvised performance, where members of the audience tried to speak to each other about food in different languages to show how difficult it can be for RAS coming to a new country. It became quite comedic and one old woman got really into it, gesticulating to explain diarrhoea, ripping out chickens’ throats and being drunk. Unexpected to say the least.
The conference then concluded with people from different organisations sharing their ideas for Refugee Week. One of these people was Ruth and she mentioned that at 6pm there would be a protest outside Downing Street to try and stop the charter flight of the #Jamaica50. The train back to Newcastle was due for 7:30pm, so after photos for the event were taken, we went to the protest. We made our way to Westminster through the guidance of another conference attendee who was a Londoner. Unfortunately, the protest turned out to be unsuccessful, despite media coverage and emotional pleas from someone whose husband had been deported last year. My explanation of the cause we protested for won’t do it justice, so if you’d like to find out more, click here and here.
And to try and encourage you to click on those links, I’ll end the post here. Thanks for reading and I hope that you guys find some way to get involved during Refugee Week – check here for some events and more info!
Happy voluntravelling,
The Voluntraveller
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