Pauline’s Calais diary – part one
A couple of days ago, we shared a brief story about Pauline, a retired teacher and grandmother. She’s been volunteering in France with Care4Calais for the last three weeks. Here is the first of several beautiful and heart-rending extracts from her Calais diary. April 1, 2020 — After preparing hot drinks and food packs in the morning, I left to take K* to the hospital for his appointment. The wound on his hand had festered and the clinic asked him to return after 24 hours. When I got to the camp, I couldn’t find him, but he was there, curled up …
‘This tent will save my life tonight’
I don’t speak Arabic, so I was struggling to talk to a group of Sudanese refugees about what they needed in today’s Calais distribution. Then a young man came over and kindly offered to help me translate between French and Arabic. We started chatting, and that’s when I found out he had been sleeping in Calais for days without a tent despite the freezing cold and pouring rain. His thin jacket was covered by one of the rainproof ponchos we had just handed out as the rain hammered down at a site next to an old Napoleonic fort. The …
Meet Vicky, child and wife of refugees
Meet Vicky. Her parents were Transylvanian Czech refugees who escaped multiple concentration camps to find safety in Canada, and her husband was unexpectedly relocated to Scotland after fleeing the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile. But surprisingly, it wasn’t her close proximity to refugees that motivated Vicky to start a #Coats4Calais collection. Instead, her desire to help refugees came from her neighbour when Vicky was four. Her mum had just died and her father hadn’t recovered from the years in concentration camps, so four-year-old Vicky slowly moved her belongings into her neighbour’s apartment. The neighbour lived in a tiny rented flat, but …
A reflection on Human Rights Day 2020
The people we meet in Calais have crossed the Sahara desert and survived the hell of Libya. They’ve fled persecution in Iran. They’ve escaped brutal conflict in Yemen and Sudan. At every stage their human rights are denied to them. In their home countries, on their terrible journeys, and when they arrive in France and the UK. Their freedoms of life, liberty and love are under attack. Today is #HumanRightsDay. All over the world people will reflect on the UN’s Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, forged by world leaders in the aftermath of World War II. …
London refugees enjoy day out with games and tours
When we took refugees in East London for a day out in the park this week, we discovered something shocking. Some of them said they hadn’t left their hotel in weeks. One guy told us his mental health was so poor he hadn’t gone outside in a month. An Iranian boy hadn’t left the hotel in three months because he thought he would be arrested if he walked outside without an ID card. At the park, he told us he really missed feeling the grass between his toes. The younger guys were so thrilled about having a kickabout at the …
Meet the man who motivated Tia to collect coats
Collecting warm coats for #Coats4Calais reminded me of the only time I did a distribution in the snow. It was back in February in Brussels, just before Covid-19 hit. Everyone was packed in tightly together under our haircutting gazebo, sheltering from the ice and the sleet. In the middle of the afternoon a man came up to me asking for a plaster from the first aid kit because he had a cut on his hand. He was wearing just a thin jumper and was clearly freezing cold. I gave him a plaster and asked if he had a coat. He …
Warmth, dignity and rainbows in today’s Calais distribution
We just had such a reenergising distribution. After days of heavy rain, the sun finally came out during our afternoon in Calais and we were greeted by this incredible rainbow while setting up our services. It provided the perfect backdrop to our day and lifted everyone’s mood after so much gloomy weather. One refugee and I even taught each other how to say ‘rainbow’ in English and Arabic – قوس قزح, or qus qazah. While the sun was shining we distributed base layer packs to more than 150 people. Because of how sodden the ground has been for the past …
Shop ethical this Christmas with gifts that give twice
How about an ethical gift this Christmas? Visit the Care4Calais Christmas Shop for a range of special presents for your loved ones. From beautiful vouchers that directly help refugees to Paddington merch and exclusive refugee artwork, shop with the added warmth of knowing that every gift makes this winter a little more bearable for refugees. …
Meet Gulwali, former refugee turned warmth advocate
Exactly 13 years ago, Gulwali Passarlay was a child sleeping rough in Calais in the bitter cold. He still remembers how utterly miserable it was there at this time of year. Him and his friends had to live in the same clothes for weeks until they became filthy rags, sometimes infested with fleas and lice. Getting clean, warm clothes from volunteers was their definition of a great day. That’s why he is donating this lovely winter coat to support #Coats4Calais. He understands better than anyone the huge difference it makes to people struggling to survive outside in the harsh winter. Watch …
Marking Volunteer Day with our biggest Brum distribution yet
We just had our biggest and most amazing distribution in Birmingham! More people showed up than ever before and there were also many recent arrivals who were able to get some warm clothing for the first time since coming to the UK. The general mood was incredibly positive and supportive, with several refugees happily helping us set things up and carry heavy boxes all day. Thanks to your generous donations we were able to take 14 large boxes full to the brim with warm coats, jumpers, scarves, gloves, trousers and shoes. After just a couple of hours most of it …
