29 Jan THE REFUGEE PROJECT
PART 1
PART 2
PART 3
THE REFUGEE PROJECT
The inspiration to launch the refugee project came after a touching encounter with a little girl during my visit to Saudi Arabia in August 2018. I came across this little girl had fled from Syria, selling wooden hand made fans to support her family who had nowhere other than the open streets to live in. The innocence in her eyes when she looked up at me asking just once if I was interested in buying a fan from her was so devastating. I asked where she was from and she told me that she and her mother and younger sister had fled from Syria and that her father was killed in the war. Her mother was incredibly unwell so to make money she sells wooden fans to get by for the day. She, later on, told me she didn’t want to pester me too much and it was ok if I didn’t want to buy a fan from her.
I told her to take me to where her mother was sitting. There, I saw a woman rocking an infant in her arms. I asked her how she had gotten here, she told me “ This was not a choice. I was forced to leave my husband, He was taken from us and I have two daughters to care of.” The sadness in her voice broke me into tears. I wanted to give this lady my whole heart and tell her that it’s going to be alright. She then uttered to me in Arabic“ My love don’t feel sorry for me or cry, thank God I am amongst the many who are lucky to be breathing, there are refugees who have it worse then I do.”
After going home that night and thinking over and over again about what she had said. I decided I wanted to bring awareness to this topic that seemed to be suppressed many times because of how long the conflict in Syria had been going on for. I wanted to base my project on the Syrian refugee crisis here in the UK to see if I could find refugees or asylum seekers who would be willing to share their story with me.
It all began at the beginning of March in 2011 when many Syrians were complaining about the corruption and unemployment issues after the ruling of President Bashar Al Assad. Many Syrians were distressed about the lack of freedom and injustice that they felt, which came with the Presidency of Al- Assad and this initiated an uproar with protests around Damascus, Aleppo, and Daraa. Bashar did not like this and ordered that anyone that is to take part in these protests were to be in-prisoned or worse.
This slowly but vastly started to impact the Syrians and brought what was called the 2011 uprising in Syria. It was ordered by Bashar that anyone that is against Al Assad’s regime and was protesting or causing an obstruction were to suffer the consequences. The police were under authority to use force against protesters, use tear gas and water cannons on the opposition. Since the start of the Syrian civil war, it has been estimated 465,000 people have been killed, one million brutally injured and 12 million people forced out their homes, having to flee to neighbouring countries if they were lucky enough to make it there.
As well as Syria now being occupied and cut into territories. Which include Bashar Al Assad’s regime, the Iraqi/ Kurdish forces, the Syrian rebel forces, Islamic state group, and Isis. The Business insider produced an article that showed how much of Syria is now controlled by Isis and how they entered the state to cause a divide in the land.
For my final year project, I wanted to talk about more than local news. Something that is bigger than us all. A matter that no president, not a single country or even the United Nations till this day could find a solution to. A matter that has affected millions of innocent lives and leads families devastated. This project to me was extremely personal to me. Coming from an Arabic Middle Eastern background I sympathize deeply with the unfortunate events in Syria happening till this day.
For my year documentary, I was fortunate enough to visit a Syrian refugee camp whilst in my time in Jordan. It wasn’t initially in my mind to film a documentary while visiting this camp, I merely went for charitable purposes and to see what living conditions these refugees have to face. I took my camera and tripod with me but as I reached the entrance of the camp the authorities had confiscated it from me as I was not allowed to film due to safety reasons. They told me that you can take clips on your phone if you must but a movie documentary based on the camp was prohibited.
I didn’t argue too much as my intention was never to film a documentary at the camp, I just wanted to spend time with some of the kids there. As I got inside the camp we were given a tent to stay in for three days and had to wake up early enough to hand out food to the refugees in the campsite. I was fortunate enough to have a chance to teach a Year 2 class on the first day of my trip at the campsite a classroom of small innocent faces staring at me when I explained to them that I wanted them to draw out their happiest moment on paper with coloring pencils.
A little girl named Rawan stood up and said in Arabic “Miss I don’t recall having a happy moment in a long time, everything I loved was taken for me. My mother, My father, and my baby brother.” At this point, I was left speechless. A little girl who was just six years old was talking to me as if she was an adult. As I was going back to my tent little Rawan’s words made me tear up than whole way walking back to my tent.
I didn’t understand why news like this was never shown. and why there was no awareness of the situation and the rough conditions these refugees face. It is not called living if you can’t live but barely just surviving. From this point, I wanted to make a change and base my whole documentary series on the Refugee crisis In the UK as I was not allowed to film in Jordan and what I could film were clips that had to be approved later by the camp managers.
I set up interviews before I left for Jordan with a few charities and organisations and had two interviews who were willing to tell their stories. But due to certain circumstances, I had to leave for Jordan immediately and by the time I got back the organisations didn’t have any free time available and one of my interviewees was not comfortable to record.
My second interview that was set up was with this lady named Maryam Hijazi she was a 31-year-old Syrian Refugee. She was born and raised in Syria and had left for a brief time to pursue her career as a teacher in Saudi Arabia and came back to Syria to get married. She was only a few years into her marriage as a newlywed when she one day left her house to go to her sisters and came back to find her apartment building gone with her husband inside. She made plans to flee Syria by paying a local man £22,000 to grant her a way of means to get to Turkey.
From Turkey, she had spent some time there before coming to the UK where the government provided her with a small apartment in Hackney. Although it tends to look furnished and in a habitable condition the heating does not turn on and when it does it is not warm enough, she barely owns any valuables and has just a few clothes with her. She was not provided the right blankets or clothes for even the winter in the UK.
I wanted to somehow highlight my journey from leaving the airport to landing at the Syrian Refugee campground in Jordan. Later on, in the documentary, I show small clips of actual footage captured by The Guardian news that shows viewers what exactly the situation in Syria is till now. I wanted the viewer to experience this news on a more personal level then explaining the situation through a voice over.
My overall aim for this project was to produce a documentary in the style of a film to have the emotions of every Refugee that was involved in this project show their story without having to say much. I wanted to create content that would show the viewer what these emotions felt were like if they were at the campgrounds themselves. I wanted my documentary piece to be self-explanatory. And affect the viewer to be more aware of the situation in Syria.
By Angela Al Ansari
