A mock-up brings refugee issues to life in Orléans
If you had one hour to pack your most important belongings, what would you bring? That was a question asked of students and teachers who toured a mock refugee camp this weekend at Cairine Wilson Secondary School in Orléans.
The event, organized by the school’s Social Justice League, was set up in the cafeteria to raise awareness and to support local and international charities. Instead of lunch tables, the darkened room featured several tents set up among debris scattered on the floor.
With the sounds of children crying in the background, students acted out difficult, real-life scenarios, whether it was receiving aid in a medical tent, attempting to flee their home country in a rubber dinghy filled beyond capacity or receiving less than 500 grams of rice and pulses at a food tent to feed an entire family.
“It (the project) started as a response to students feeling like they needed to do something about the Syrian refugee crisis,” said Todd Kelly, an English and world issues teacher who organized the project, now into its third year. “And we brainstormed … and out of that, (the project) was born.”
Hundreds of parents and students toured the camp between Friday and Sunday. Many called the experience enlightening.
Retired teacher David Bourne took part in the mock exchange at the medical tent, where he was told he had been infected with cholera and was asked to wear a mask.
“I was thinking about (the students’) education and what they are starting to think about, which is important in really bringing political awareness to other parts of the world, so I think this is awesome,” Bourne said.
As visitors walked through the camp, a guide told them of experiences faced by refugees.
Unlike the sturdy tents displayed at the school, 17-year-old Shahriar Kibria said, refugee families were typically given plastic tarps for shelter, and those often could not protect them from the elements.
“It’s not safe because of storms, or it can be really cold one day and hot the next,” Kibria said. “To add to that, they are abused physically by smugglers as they are sleeping and by police … and they can also be attacked by wild animals.”
The tour ended up with a slide show offering information on the plight of refugees, including one particularly sobering statistic: 65 million refugees around the world are going without food, schooling and medical attention.
Some of the 30 students in the Social Justice League fasted and slept overnight in the tents as part of the Camp in the Caf event.
On Saturday, Kibria was on hour 29 of her fast when she spoke about her experience. She said the exercise, while contained within the school walls, would have a ripple effect because she would share her experience with friends and hoped to pursue a career as a humanitarian air worker. “I want to work for UNICEF because I’ve done this every year,” she said.
Grade 10 student Emmey Greenham, 15, participated in the event last year and called her own fasting experience “eye-opening.”
“It makes you think,” Greenham said. “I know for me I take for granted being able to eat three meals a day, whereas these people in Third World countries, the refugee camps, they don’t get enough food. So it’s eyeopening to feel the hunger that they feel.”