Turning an ‘aha moment’ into action
I’m reading text messages from my sister.
She recently learned of an opportunity to work with an NGO in Greece assisting with the aid of refugees from the Middle East. In what seemed like the blink of an eye, she was on a plane.
Today she’s in Idomeni, the Greek border town near Macedonia where nearly 15,000 refugees are camped, waiting for their asylum claims to be heard so they can hopefully leave the tent city and find a bright future in Europe.
We hear from her often. Her team is working to provide food, housing and other resources to the refugees. When she talks about her biggest “aha moment” thus far, it is a matter of perception and reality.
The refugee crisis in Greece gets compartmentalized when you learn about it through the news. You read a story of a family crossing the Aegean Sea to escape terrorism and violence.
You see a picture, maybe a few. There are children in their parents’ arms, 50 people in one frame all standing in the dark seeming unsure of where exactly they should be going next. You finish your cup of coffee and get started with your day.
When she entered the camp at Idomeni, my sister was awestruck by the masses of people. Everywhere she turned, there were thousands of men, women and children. There are tents everywhere covering huge fields of grass.
Out of context, one of the photos she shared with us looks as if it could have been taken at a music festival. For those who don’t have a tent to sleep in, shelters have been found in the most unexpected places: abandoned houses, a cattle yard, an unattended police station, and even a freight train that was driven in and left on the tracks.
Her “aha moment” highlights how quickly and easily stories of humanitarian crises abroad pass through the American reader. There is a spot in our brains to which most of those stories get filed and I imagine they each get the same treatment. A prayer, a deep sigh or a shake of the head.
My sister shared another observation. She said that the whole situation is poorly organized.
Yes, that does mean that refugees themselves are in a state of certain confusion, but it also means that there are tons of NGOs — some big and some grassroots — that are being redundant in their efforts. Each meal of the day, refugees can choose from handfuls of food items between all the organizations at the camp. Toilets and showers are being built. Clothes are coming in such incredible number that they are no longer being used for their intended purpose, but as kindling for fires to cook over or sit around at night. Residents from cities nearby and oceans away have come in droves to serve these people, and that, she says, has been just as astounding.
I wish we felt that communal need to serve the underserved among us. I wish we were so redundant in our efforts to lift each other up that our hungry had a buffet of options to choose from. After you finish your coffee, try not to put this story in that box in your head. Try something more.
Natalia Naman Temesgen is an independent contractor. Contact her at nntemesgen@gmail.com.
This story was originally published April 8, 2016 at 6:22 PM with the headline "Turning an ‘aha moment’ into action."