While some teens worry how they look in selfies, Kristina, 19, is working out how to sneak baby milk into Greek refugee camps
BY RECORD REPORTER A BIG-HEARTED teenager has won an international humanitarian award for her work with refugees.
Kristina von Kaehne, 19, has made seven trips to Greece in the past four years to work with refugees, which included giving up school holidays.
At one point, she even crept into a camp in a dangerous area in the middle of the night to take milk to a young family with a baby.
Kristina was meant to be in Greece again right now, volunteering for a charity providing support to refugees, but the trip was cancelled due to coronavirus travel restrictions.
But that hasn’t put her off helping – she’s instead spending her summer off university working as an auxiliary nurse in Cowal Community Hospital in Dunoon, Argyll.
Kristina was nominated for the Diana Award by two of her former teachers at Lomond School in Helensburgh, Dunbartonshire.
The award was set up in memory of the Princess of Wales. It celebrates young people who have demonstrated their ability to inspire and mobilise new generations to serve their communities and create long-lasting change on a global scale.
Kristina got the award for her time spent in Greece, where she has worked in refugee camps, assisted in medical centres, taught primary pupils, and hosted English and German language classes.
From her first visit to a refugee camp in Thessalonika at the age of 15, Kristina was determined to do more.
Since then, she has returned six times, has helped a widowed refugee from Kenya coordinate a charity, set up a donation scheme at Lomond School and has started her studies at Glasgow University to become a human rights and immigration and asylum lawyer.
Kristina first went to Greece with her dad, a GP who does humanitarian relief work. She said: “We were based in a camp in Thessalonika and I was shocked at the situation refugee families were facing. “Since then, whenever my dad goes, I always join him. For me it’s better than going on a summer holiday. “The third time I went out, we were based in a camp just outside of Athens. I formed a close bond with a two-year-old boy called Taregh, and at the same time my dad, who speaks the Afghan language of Dari, struck up a relationship with his family. We became really close. “When I returned for a gap year after school, Taregh’s mum had cancer and they had moved to Athens for treatment. I spent the next year working in a charity called Love and Serve Without Boundaries (LSWB) while babysitting for Taregh’s dad, Amir, so he could visit his wife.”
At just 16, Kristina was teaching primary school classes before she got involved with LSWB at the age of 17.
Set up by Kenyan refugee Maria Odhiambo in her kitchen, the charity was funded with money Maria had earned as a nanny. The community-based centre provides support to refugees and low-income and homeless Greeks.
This support includes a variety of language and skill classes, food distribution and handouts of daily essentials.
Kristina said: “I started teaching English and German classes through the charity, helping refugees of all ages learn new languages.
“I was teaching a class where the youngest was a six-year-old girl and the eldest was a 55-year-old man. It was great to spend the year there and see real progression in their language skills before I left.”
Kristina is raising money for LSWB to help refugees through the Covid-19 pandemic.
To donate, search for LSWB on gofundme.com.