Baobab refugee camp, second edition

Wednesday was fairly slow during the day, mostly at home, but with a busy and wonderful evening -- more on that below. In the early afternoon I went out to do some errands while Dee stayed home and worked on her family history lesson. I washed and vacuumed the car, which was badly needed, even though rain was threatening. Next I went to the mall to talk with Infostrada about getting a WiFi hotspot for an upcoming event. I don't know any details about it, but was asked to find out how much it would cost to buy and use a hotspot. I got the details and forwarded the information to the office. On the way home, I filled a huge cart at Lidl with food for the Institute and for home, including their wonderful buckwheat bread with walnuts. Before leaving the parking lot at the market, I packed the trunk of the car with bags of things to take into the Institute; once I arrived home, I carried four very heavy bags from the back seat into the apartment. We do our best not to open the trunk after parking, so that nobody can tell whether we have anything in there. It takes some extra time to organize, but that's life in a big city.

One funny thing happened when I finished my last Diet Dr. Pepper can. On a whim I searched for it on amazon.it and found a match which is listed as a 12-pack, but is actually a bottle brush. Very strange!

In the mail we received a copy of a Bank of America credit card for Dee. It's a joint account, with a chip-and-signature card that has zero foreign transaction fee, so it will be her backup card, after the Andrews chip-and-pin card. We had copies of the card at home but forgot to bring hers. It was easier to get BofA to mail us a new one than ship our copy from home.

In the evening we went down to the Institute, where some of the kids had gotten together to prepare pasta to take to the Baobab refugee camp, where we went in December. It was wonderful to see them there, working together crowded around the stove. We didn't plan the event -- it was them all along, which was wonderful. They cooked 6 kg (about 13 pounds) of pasta of different sorts, which they purchased themselves, packaged it up into plastic bowls, and then carried it to Sheyla's car. Five of the kids drove it all to the camp, and we accompanied three others on the subway. The camp is fed each day with donations from the community. We got there just before 7pm, which was when the website said that we needed to arrive, but they actually didn't start serving food until closer to 8pm. That gave us all a chance to visit with some of the refugees, who were mostly from Africa and the Middle East. It's heartbreaking to hear their stories of how bad it was back home, though living in a camp isn't a vacation, either. During our visit in December, there was a ton of food and many people to serve. This time, our food was about one third of everything available, and our kids were all very much needed to serve the food to the refugees, which was much more rewarding. They all had a great time, and it was fun to see them working so well together. One of the girls said that she kept almost breaking into tears seeing how these people, almost all men, are living.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ibrahim, from Egypt, teaching the Arabic alphabet to Dee

Ibrahim smiling at our GANS. What a wonderful young man

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was fairly cold outside, though a bit warmer inside the dinner tent. It's tough to think of these men sleeping in their small tents in this weather. We were talking with one young man from Iraq, who said that it was great to get three meals per day here, since in Libya (before coming to Italy) they only got one meal per day. He did say however that they were tired of "pasta, pasta, pasta", which is what Baobab asks the volunteers to bring because it's economical, easy to transport and everyone here knows how to make it. I can see how it would get boring to have the same thing all the time, especially when it's so different from their usual fare.

We met one young man from Syria, which is the birthplace of my wife's paternal grandfather. His English was not very good, but one of the other refugees translated for him. He said how dangerous things are in Syria, though he hopes to go back some day. All of these guys had been separated from their family for years, and that seemed to matter more to them than the fact that they don't really have a home. He is 22 and has been away from home for six years. His seven brothers, six sisters and parents are scattered all over, from Turkey to Libya to Italy.

Ibrahim, below, shared the Arabic alphabet with Dee and with a bunch of our kids. He is from Egypt.

 

My wife was amazing. There was a ton of walking involved: several blocks to the Metro stop, then a bunch of walking to/from the subways inside, and then about 15 minutes to the camp. We walked about half an hour in each direction. Claudia and Joyce set a really fast pace -- I could barely keep up. My wife is admittedly vertically challenged, with the shortest legs in the group, but she kept up by running quite a bit. I was surprised to see her do that. It was a good workout for both of us!

Dee writes: I was grateful for all the times I have walked up many flights of stairs, because I needed the stamina to keep up with those girls!